Denzel Washington

Denzel Washington
At a press conference for The Hurricane, 2000 Berlinale.
Born	Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr. December 28, 1954 (1954-12-28) (age 55) Mount Vernon, New York, United States
Occupation	Actor, screenwriter, director, producer
Years active	1977–present
Spouse	Pauletta Pearson (1983–present)

Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr. (born December 28, 1954) is an American actor, screenwriter, director and film producer. He has garnered much critical acclaim for his work in film since the 1990s, including for his portrayals of real-life figures, such as Steve Biko, Malcolm X, Rubin Carter, Melvin B. Tolson, Frank Lucas, and Herman Boone.

Washington has been awarded two Golden Globe awards, a Tony Award and two Academy Awards for his work.^[1] He is notable as the second African American man (after Sidney Poitier) to win the Academy Award for Best Actor, which he received for his role in the 2001 film Training Day.^[2]

[edit] Early life

Denzel Washington was born in Mount Vernon, near New York City, in 1954. His mother, Lennis "Lynne", was a beauty parlor-owner and operator born in Georgia and partly raised in Harlem. His father, Reverend Denzel Washington, Sr., an ordained Pentecostal minister, also worked for the Water Department and a local department store, S. Klein.^[3][4]

Washington attended grammar school at Pennington-Grimes Elementary School in Mount Vernon until 1968, when his mother sent him to a private preparatory school, Oakland Military Academy, in New Windsor, New York State, at the age of 14. "That decision changed my life," Washington later said, "because I wouldn’t have survived in the direction I was going. The guys I was hanging out with at the time, my running buddies, have now done maybe 40 years combined in the penitentiary. They were nice guys, but the streets got them."^[5] After Oakland, Washington next attended Mainland High School a public high school in Daytona Beach, Florida, from 1970–71.^[3] Washington was interested in attending Texas Tech University: "I grew up in the Boys Club in Mount Vernon, and we were the Red Raiders. So when I was in high school, I wanted to go to Texas Tech in Lubbock just because they were called the Red Raiders and their uniforms looked like ours."^[6] Washington earned a B.A. in Drama and Journalism from Fordham University in 1977.^{[citation needed]} At Fordham he played collegiate basketball as a freshman guard^[7] under coach P. J. Carlesimo.^[8] After a period of indecision on which major to study and dropping out of school for a semester Washington worked as a counselor at an overnight summer camp called Camp Sloane YMCA in Lakeville, Connecticut. He participated in a staff talent show for the campers and a colleague suggested he try acting.^[9] Returning to Fordham that fall with a renewed purpose and focus he enrolled at the Lincoln Center campus to study acting, and was given the title character in both Eugene O'Neill's The Emperor Jones and Shakespeare's Othello. Upon graduation he was given a scholarship to attend graduate school at the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco where he stayed for one year before returning to New York to begin a professional acting career.^[10]

[edit] Career

[edit] Early career

Washington's signature in front of Grauman's Chinese Theatre

Washington spent the summer of 1976 in St. Mary's City, Maryland in summer stock theater performing Wings of the Morning, the Maryland State play. Shortly after graduating from Fordham, Washington made his professional acting debut in the 1977 made-for-television movie Wilma with his first Hollywood appearance in the 1981 film Carbon Copy. Washington shared a 1982 Distinguished Ensemble Performance Obie Award for playing Private First Class Melvin Peterson in the off Broadway Negro Ensemble Company production A Soldier's Play which premiered November 20, 1981.^[11]

A major career break came when he starred as Dr. Phillip Chandler in the television hospital drama St. Elsewhere which ran from 1982 to 1988 on NBC. He was one of a few actors to appear on the series for its entire six-year run. Washington also appeared in several television, film and stage roles such as the movies A Soldier's Story (1984), Hard Lessons (1986) and Power (1986). In 1987 Washington starred as South African anti-apartheid political activist Steven Biko in Richard Attenborough's Cry Freedom for which he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. In 1989 Washington won an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for playing a defiant self-possessed ex-slave soldier in the film Glory. Also that year he gave a powerful performance in The Mighty Quinn, and as the conflicted and disillusioned Reuben James, a British soldier who, despite a distinguished military career, returns to a civilian life where racism and inner city life leads to vigilantism and violence in For Queen and Country.

[edit] 1990s

In 1990, Washington starred as Bleek Gilliam in the Spike Lee movie Mo' Better Blues. In 1992, he starred as Demetrius Williams in the romantic drama Mississippi Masala. Washington was reunited with Lee to play one of his most critically acclaimed roles as the title character of 1992's Malcolm X. His performance as the black nationalist leader earned him another nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actor. The next year he played the homophobic lawyer of a homosexual man with AIDS in the 1993 movie Philadelphia. During the early and mid 1990s, Washington starred in several successful thrillers, including The Pelican Brief and Crimson Tide, as well as in comedy Much Ado About Nothing and alongside Whitney Houston in the romantic drama The Preacher's Wife.

While filming the 1995 film Virtuosity, Washington declined to kiss his white female co-star Kelly Lynch during a romantic scene. In an interview Lynch stated "Denzel felt strongly that white males, who were the target audience of this movie, would not want him to kiss a white woman.”^[12] A similar situation occurred during the filming of The Pelican Brief when Julia Roberts expressed in an interview her desire to have her character in the film engaged in a romantic relationship with Washington's character. In a similar case, Washington turned down the role of Nick Curran in Basic Instinct due to the graphic sex scene that was required.

In 1999, Washington starred in The Hurricane a movie about boxer Rubin 'Hurricane' Carter whose conviction for triple murder was overturned after he had spent almost 20 years in prison. A former reporter who was angry at seeing the film portray Carter as innocent despite the overturned conviction began a campaign to pressure Academy Award voters not to award the film Oscars.^[13] Washington did receive a Golden Globe Award in 2000 and a Silver Bear Award at the Berlin International Film Festival for the role.

He also presented the Arthur Ashe ESPY Award to Loretta Claiborne for her courage and appeared as himself in the end of The Loretta Claiborne Story movie.

[edit] 2000s

In 2000, Washington appeared in the Disney film Remember the Titans which grossed over $100 million at the United States box office.^{[citation needed]} He won an Academy Award for Best Actor in his next film, the 2001 cop thriller Training Day as Det. Alonzo Harris, a rogue LAPD cop with questionable law-enforcement tactics. Washington was the second African-American performer to win an Academy Award for Best Actor, the first being Sidney Poitier who happened to receive an Honorary Academy Award the same night that Washington won. Washington holds the record (five so far) for most Oscar nominations by an actor of African descent, along with Morgan Freeman since 2009.

After appearing in 2002's box office success, the health care-themed John Q., Washington directed his first film, a well-reviewed drama called Antwone Fisher, in which he also co-starred.

Between 2003 and 2004, Washington appeared in a series of thrillers that performed generally well at the box office, including Out of Time, Man on Fire, and The Manchurian Candidate.^[14] In 2006, he starred in Inside Man, a Spike Lee-directed bank heist thriller co-starring Jodie Foster and Clive Owen, and Déjà Vu released in November 2006.

In 2007, he co-starred with Russell Crowe in American Gangster. Washington directed and starred in the drama The Great Debaters with Forest Whitaker. Washington next appeared in the 2009 film The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3, a remake of the '70s thriller The Taking of Pelham One, Two Three, directed by Tony Scott as New York City subway security chief Walter Garber opposite John Travolta.

[edit] Return to theater

Washington after a performance of Julius Caesar in May 2005

Washington was last seen onstage in the summer of 1990 in the title role of the Public Theater's production of Shakespeare's Richard III and in 2005 after a 15-year hiatus he appeared onstage again in another Shakespeare play as Marcus Brutus in Julius Caesar on Broadway. The production's limited run was a consistent sell-out averaging over 100% attendance capacity nightly despite receiving mixed reviews.^[15]

[edit] 2010s

In February 2009, Washington began filming The Book of Eli a post-Apocalyptic drama set in the near future which was released in January 2010. He is also set to star as a veteran railroad engineer in the action film Unstoppable which is about an unmanned, half-mile-long runaway freight train carrying a dangerous cargo. The film is to be directed by Tony Scott and it will be the fifth collaboration between the two with previous films Crimson Tide (1995), Man on Fire (2004), Déjà Vu (2006) and The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009).

On Sunday, June 13, 2010, Washington won the Tony Award for Best Performance by a Leading Actor in a Play for his role in the play Fences.^[16][17]

[edit] Personal life

In 1983, Washington married actress Pauletta Pearson, whom he met on the set of his first screen work, the TV-movie Wilma. The couple have four children: John David (b. July 28, 1984) who signed a football contract with the St. Louis Rams in May 2006 after playing college football at Morehouse,^[18] Katia (b. November 1987) who is attending Yale University, and twins Olivia and Malcolm (named in honor of Malcolm X)^[19] (b. April 10, 1991). Malcolm is attending University of Pennsylvania where he plays for the basketball team.^[20] In 1995 the couple renewed their wedding vows in South Africa with Archbishop Desmond Tutu officiating.^[21]

Washington is a devout Christian,^[22] and has even considered becoming a preacher. "A part of me still says, ‘Maybe, Denzel, you’re supposed to preach. Maybe you’re still compromising.’ I’ve had an opportunity to play great men and, through their words, to preach. I take what talent I’ve been given seriously, and I want to use it for good.”^[23] In 1995 he donated 2.5 million dollars to help build the new West Angeles COGIC facility in Los Angeles at the city's West Angeles Church of God in Christ.^[24]

The Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia named Washington as one of three people (the others being directors Oliver Stone and Michael Moore) with whom they were willing to negotiate for the release of three defense contractors that the group had held captive from 2003 to 2008.^[25]

On May 18, 1991, Washington was awarded an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, Fordham University, for having "impressively succeeded in exploring the edge of his multifaceted talent".^[26] He also was awarded an honorary doctorate of humanities from Morehouse College on May 20, 2007.^[27]

In 2008, Washington visited Israel with a delegation of African American artists in honor of the Jewish State's 60th birthday.^[28]

He is good friends with film producer and director Tony Scott.

[edit] Filmography

[edit] References

[edit] External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Denzel Washington

• Denzel Washington at the Internet Movie Database
• Denzel Washington at the TCM Movie Database
• Denzel Washington at the Internet Broadway Database
• Denzel Washington at the Internet Off-Broadway Database
• Denzel Washington at People.com
• Denzel Washington at Moviefone.com