Washington, Denzel << dehn ZEHL >> (1954-… ), is an American actor and director. He has gained fame for his performances in challenging roles. Washington has appeared in dozens of motion pictures, as well as in theater and television productions. He won the 1989 Academy Award as best supporting actor for his performance as an American Civil War (1861-1865) soldier in Glory. He won the 2001 Academy Award as best actor for playing a corrupt policeman in Training Day. Washington was the second African American to win the best-actor award, after Sidney Poitier in 1963.
Denzel Hayes Washington, Jr., was born on Dec. 28, 1954, in Mount Vernon, New York. He graduated from Fordham University in New York City in 1977. He studied acting at the American Conservatory Theatre in San Francisco, California. Washington started his acting career in theater in New York City, appearing in both Shakespearean and modern plays. He won an Obie Award for his acting in the Pulitzer Prize-winning drama A Soldier’s Play (1981). Washington made his motion-picture debut in 1981 in Carbon Copy. From 1982 to 1988, he was featured in the television dramatic series “St. Elsewhere.”
Washington’s other notable films include A Soldier’s Story (1984), Cry Freedom (1987), Mo’ Better Blues (1990), Mississippi Masala (1991), Malcolm X (1992), Philadelphia (1993), Crimson Tide (1995), Courage Under Fire (1996), The Siege (1998), The Hurricane (1999), and Remember the Titans (2000). His later films include Out of Time (2003), Man on Fire (2004), Inside Man (2006), American Gangster (2007), The Taking of Pelham 1 2 3 (2009), Unstoppable (2010), Flight (2012), 2 Guns (2013), The Equalizer (2014), The Magnificent Seven (2016), and The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021). Washington directed, as well as acted in, Antwone Fisher (2002) and The Great Debaters (2007).
Washington has appeared in a number of plays on Broadway. In 2005, he played Marcus Brutus in a production of Julius Caesar (1599?), by the English dramatist William Shakespeare. In 2010, Washington won a Tony Award for his role in a Broadway revival of the play Fences (1985), by the American playwright August Wilson. He played a sanitation worker who once dreamed of a baseball career. Washington directed and starred in a motion-picture version of Fences (2016). In 2014, Washington starred in a Broadway revival of A Raisin in the Sun (1959), by the American playwright Lorraine Hansberry.
In 2022, Washington was awarded a Presidential Medal of Freedom, the highest civilian honor awarded by the president of the United States.
