Morgan Freeman Shares Why He Loves Montecarlo, Which Fellow Actor He Enjoys Traveling With, and More

Throughout nearly six decades of his illustrious career, Morgan Freeman’s starring roles have come with the bonus of traveling the world. 

And this summer, he returned to one of the most glorious destinations on his travel resume: Monte-Carlo. In Monaco’s most iconic city, the 87-year-old actor was presented with the Crystal Nymph award at the Monte-Carlo Television Festival while also premiering the upcoming female-perspective Civil War television drama he produced with Kevin Costner, “The Gray House.” 

“Places like this are kind of magical in your imagination,” the legendary actor told Travel + Leisure of the destination at the festival in June.

This visit marked his second or third trip, including a past visit where he attended a charity dinner with Nelson Mandela in 2007.

“My friend will say, ‘What are you doing?’” he recalled. “[I’ll reply] ‘I’m going to Monte-Carlo’ and they’ll say, ‘Oh my! Monte-Carlo! It’s a magic place.”

With all of Monaco being less than one square mile (that’s less than New York City’s Central Park), the world’s second smallest country packs in a whole lot of glitz and glamor per square foot. But it’s the carefree vibe that Freeman is drawn to.

“It’s small, but there’s a quality about the life here that seems to be so easygoing,” he said. “When I was first here, there was a golf course up behind the Casino [de Monte-Carlo] up on the plateau,” he told T+L. “I went and played golf there — beautiful, beautiful, beautiful! What I do every day is I play a round of golf.”

Of course Freeman’s wide-ranging body of work also means his business travel has taken him to a diverse range of places. He filmed “Driving Miss Daisy” in and around Savannah and Evan Almighty in Virginia’s Shenandoah National Park, while he traversed oceans into the bustling center of Hong Kong for “The Dark Knight” and then spent time in South Africa for “Invictus.” One of his most notable roles, “Shawshank Redemption” made such an impression in Mansfield, Ohio, that there’s now Shawshank Trail tracing 15 of its filming locations. 

As for which actor in his iconic universe that he’s enjoyed traveling with? Jack Nicholson, he told T+L.

More recently, he was spotted in Belfast, Northern Ireland, filming part of his History Channel’s documentary series History’s Great Escapes with Morgan Freeman, which premiered in 2021, as well as in Alabama for “Gunner,” which came out August 16. He even had a chance to work right in home state of Missisissippi for “The Minute You Wake Up Dead.”

And like many travelers, there’s one item that he always packs.

“My iPad because when I’m traveling I like to play games to pass the time,” he said when asked what he can’t travel without.

When looking back at his own works, the most stand-out project has a different kind of sentimental value.

“I would say it was the movie that sprung me into movies called ‘Street Smart,’” he said at the television festival press conference of the 1987 movie filmed in Montreal and New York City.

His long list of trailblazing films has also come with with an impressive collection of awards — including a Golden Globe for “Driving Miss Daisy” in 1990, an Oscar for “Million Dollar Baby” in 2005, the Kennedy Center Honors in 2008, The Academy’s Cecile B. DeMille Award in 2012, and SAG Lifetime Achievement Award in 2018, all of which are filling up his home.

“In Mississippi, I have a room — I have two rooms!” he added. “Some of them are in a case and others are just scattered around the library and the living room. They’re not there for me to brag about. They look good where they are.”

As for his Oscar: “It’s up there in the room in a case,” he said. “Nobody sees that…I don’t bring it down and say hey hey look what I’ve got!”

But his greatest travel experience was one that took him to 13 countries in 40 days.

“Some years ago I traveled the world with a series we called The Story of God,‘” he told T+L. “ We went around the world experiencing religion in all of its forms. The lesson that I came away with is that it’s all true!”