Denzel Washington

Fun Fact: When Denzel was a child, an old woman sitting in a barbershop asked his mother to write out his full name. After his mother asked why, the lady said, “Because he's going to entertain millions one day."

Claim to Fame: After turning heads and inspiring legions of young actors black and white, in films like 1992’s Malcolm X, Washington became the first black male to win an Oscar for “Best Actor” for his role in 2001’s Training Day.

Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr. 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 three Golden Globe awards and two Academy Awards for his work. He is notable as the second African American man to win the Academy Award for Best Actor, which he received for his role in the 2001 film Training Day.


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., was an ordained Pentecostal minister and also worked for the Water Department and at a local department store, "S. Klein".

Washington attended grammar school at Pennington-Grimes Elementary School in Mount Vernon, and in 1968, at the age of 14, he was sent to a private preparatory school, Oakland Military Academy, in New Windsor in New York State, followed by Mainland High School, a public high school in Daytona Beach, Florida, from 1970-71. Nevertheless, Washington earned a B.A. in Drama and Journalism from Fordham University in 1977. At Fordham, he played collegiate basketball as a Freshman guard under coach P. J. Carlesimo. After a period of bouncing from major to major and briefly dropping out of school for a semester, Washington worked as a counselor at an overnight summer camp called Camp Sloane YMCA in Lakeville CT. After participating in a staff talent show for the campers, a colleague suggested he try acting. Returning to Fordham that fall with a renewed purpose and focus, he enrolled at the Lincoln Center campus to study acting, snagging the title character in both Eugene O'Neill's The Emperor Jones, and William Shakespeare's Othello, where he earned rave reviews. Upon graduation, he was given a scholarship to attend graduate school at the prestigious American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco, where he stayed for one year before deciding to return to New York to begin a professional acting career.

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