Esai Morales

Actor

Birthday October 1, 1962

Birth Sign Libra

Birthplace Brooklyn, New York, U.S.

Age 61 years old

Nationality United States

#5860 Most Popular

1950

He played Bob Morales, the real-life ex-convict and biker half-brother of 1950s rock and roll singer Ritchie Valens, in La Bamba (1987).

1962

Esai Manuel Morales Jr. (born October 1, 1962) is an American actor.

He has had notable roles in the films Bad Boys with Sean Penn and La Bamba with Lou Diamond Phillips.

1983

His first major film was Bad Boys (1983), about rival teenagers sentenced to a juvenile correction facility.

1985

Morales appeared in a 1985 episode of the TV series Fame.

1986

He co-starred with Burt Lancaster in the 1986 NBC miniseries On Wings of Eagles, playing the Iranian Rashid, the hero of a true story about Ross Perot.

Morales also appeared in Miami Vice, The Equalizer, and 24.

1989

In the latter three films, as well as in others such as Bloodhounds of Broadway (1989) and Rapa-Nui (1994), Morales saw increased amounts of screen time, starting with a role in the Pauly Shore film In The Army Now (1994).

1990

In the 1990s, he guest-starred on episodes of The Outer Limits, Tales from the Crypt, and two shorter-lived series, L.A. Doctors and The Hunger.

1992

He also played Nicholas Walker in Ultraviolet (1992).

1994

Some of his other roles have reflected his socio-political interests, such as The Burning Season in 1994, My Family/Mi Familia in 1995, The Disappearance of Garcia Lorca (1997) and Southern Cross (1999).

1996

He portrayed a police officer in the film Dogwatch (1996) and Father Herrera in The Virgin of Juarez (2006).

2000

He appeared in a two-part episode of Family Law in 2000.

2001

He was part of the main cast of the long-running series NYPD Blue for three and a half seasons, from 2001 to 2004, as the head of the 15th precinct detective squad.

2002

His television roles include the PBS 2002 drama series American Family, the Showtime series Resurrection Blvd. (2000–2002), portraying Lt. Tony Rodriguez on NYPD Blue (2001–2004), Joseph Adama in the science fiction series Caprica (2009–2010), Camino del Rio in the Netflix original series Ozark (2017), and the DC Comics supervillain Slade Wilson / Deathstroke in the superhero series Titans (2018).

Morales appeared as Gabriel, the main antagonist character in the 2023 spy action film Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One opposite Tom Cruise, a role which he will reprise in the untitled eighth Mission: Impossible film in 2025.

Of Puerto Rican descent, Morales was born in Brooklyn, New York, to Esai Morales Sr., a welder, and Iris Margarita (née Declet), a union activist involved with the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union.

Morales began his pursuit of an acting career by attending the School of Performing Arts in Manhattan.

His first professional performances were in theater and television in New York.

He played a drug dealer named Lulu in the 2002 film Paid in Full.

2005

In 2005, he was a voice actor in the video game True Crime: New York City.

In 2005, Morales (along with Mercedes Ruehl) received the Rita Moreno HOLA Award for Excellence from the Hispanic Organization of Latin Actors (HOLA).

He received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Arpa Foundation for Film, Music and Art, for his impact as an actor and role model.

Morales has described himself as an "actorvist", primarily as one of the founders of the National Hispanic Foundation for the Arts, taking inspiration from his mother, who was an organizer for the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union.

He is also interested in environmental issues and was a founding board member of E.C.O. (Earth Communications Office).

2006

Morales was cast in the film American Fusion (2005), and on June 19, 2006, he joined the cast of the Fox series Vanished, as FBI agent Michael Tyner; the series ran for one season.

2007

In 2007, Morales appeared in an episode of the USA Network drama series Burn Notice, as a Cuban shopkeeper being shaken down for "protection" money by local criminals.

In a February 28, 2007, all-star benefit reading of The Gift of Peace at UCLA's Freud Playhouse, he portrayed a hopeful member of a struggling immigrant family.

The play was an open appeal and fundraiser for passage of U.S. House Resolution 808, which sought to establish a Cabinet-level "Department of Peace" in the U.S. government, to be funded by a two percent diversion of the Pentagon's annual budget.

Morales is a vegetarian.

2008

In early 2008, Morales had a role in the CBS drama Jericho, as Major Edward Beck.

He appeared in all seven episodes of the shortened second season That same year, he appeared in Kill Kill Faster Faster, a film noir based on the novel of the same name by Joel Rose.

In May 2008, it was announced that Morales would play the role of Joseph Adama in the science fiction television series Caprica – Syfy's prequel to the series Battlestar Galactica.

2009

In 2009, he served as an official festival judge for the Noor Iranian Film Festival in Los Angeles.

2010

The series, though highly anticipated, only ran for one season in 2010.

He has a daughter, born in 2010.

2011

In 2011, Morales starred in the drama film Gun Hill Road as Enrique, and in the web drama Los Americans airing on PIC.tv.

and Morales worked with Tony Plana, Yvonne DeLaRosa, Lupe Ontiveros, and JC Gonzalez in Los Americans, an Internet program launched in May 2011.

2015

In March 2015, Robert Rodriguez cast him as Lord Amancio Malvado for the second season of horror series From Dusk till Dawn: The Series, which was followed in 2017 by a main role in the first season of the Netflix original series Ozark, and then in 2019 in an antagonist role for the second season of the DC Universe superhero series Titans as Slade Wilson / Deathstroke.

2020

On May 21, 2020, Morales was officially confirmed to be starring in Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning Part One as Gabriel, the film's main villain, a role which he is reprising in the second part.