Samuel L. Jackson

Samuel Leroy Jackson (born December 21, 1948) is an American actor.

One of the most widely recognized actors of his generation, the films in which he has appeared have collectively grossed over $27 billion worldwide, making him the highest-grossing actor of all time.

In 2022, he received the Academy Honorary Award as "a cultural icon whose dynamic work has resonated across genres and generations and audiences worldwide".

Samuel Leroy Jackson was born in Washington, D.C., on December 21, 1948, the only child of Elizabeth Harriett (née Montgomery) and Roy Henry Jackson.

He grew up in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

His father lived away from the family in Kansas City, Missouri, and later died of alcoholism.

Jackson met him only twice during his life.

He was raised by his mother, a factory worker and later a supplies buyer for a mental institution; he was also raised by his maternal grandparents, Edgar and Pearl Montgomery, as well as extended family.

After Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination in 1968, Jackson attended King's funeral in Atlanta as one of the ushers.

He then travelled to Memphis, Tennessee, to join an equal rights protest march.

In 1969, Jackson and several other students held members of the Morehouse College board of trustees (including Martin Luther King Sr.) hostage on the campus, demanding reform in the school's curriculum and governance.

The college eventually agreed to change its policy, but Jackson was charged with and eventually convicted of unlawful confinement, a second-degree felony.

He was suspended for two years for his criminal record and his actions.

Before graduating in 1972, he co-founded the Just Us Theatre.

He would later return to the college to earn a BA in drama in 1972.

While he was suspended, he took a job as a social worker in Los Angeles.

He decided to return to Atlanta, where he met with Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, and others active in the Black Power movement.

He began to feel empowered with his involvement in the movement, especially when the group began buying guns.

However, before he could become involved with any significant armed confrontations, his mother sent him to Los Angeles after the FBI warned her that he would die within a year if he remained with the group.

Jackson made his professional theatre debut in Mother Courage and Her Children in 1980 at The Public Theatre.

From 1981 to 1983 he originated the role of Private Louis Henderson in A Soldier's Play off-Broadway.

He also originated the role of Boy Willie in August Wilson's The Piano Lesson in 1987 at the Yale Repertory Theatre.

Jackson's early film roles include Coming to America (1988), Juice (1992), True Romance (1993), Menace II Society (1993), and Fresh (1994).

His collaborations with Spike Lee led to greater prominence with films such as School Daze (1988), Do the Right Thing (1989), Mo' Better Blues (1990), Jungle Fever (1991), Oldboy (2013), and Chi-Raq (2015).

Jackson's breakout performance was as Jules Winnfield in Quentin Tarantino's crime drama Pulp Fiction (1994) which earned him a BAFTA Award win and a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

He has also acted in a number of big-budget films, including Die Hard with a Vengeance (1995), A Time to Kill (1996), Unbreakable (2000), Shaft (2000) and its reboot (2019), XXX (2002), Coach Carter (2005), Snakes on a Plane (2006), Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014), Kong: Skull Island (2017), and Glass (2019).

He further collaborated with Tarantino, acting in Jackie Brown (1997), Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004), Django Unchained (2012), and The Hateful Eight (2015).

He also gained widespread recognition as the Jedi Mace Windu in the Star Wars prequel trilogy (1999–2005), and Nick Fury in 11 Marvel Cinematic Universe films, beginning with Iron Man (2008), as well as guest-starring in the ABC series Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D..

Jackson has provided his voice for Lucius Best / Frozone in the Pixar films The Incredibles (2004) and Incredibles 2 (2018).

In a 2005 Parade interview, he said, "I was angry about the assassination, but I wasn't shocked by it. I knew that change was going to take something different—not sit-ins, not peaceful coexistence."

He portrayed Martin Luther King Jr. in the Broadway play The Mountaintop (2011).

He returned to Broadway in the 2022 revival of The Piano Lesson playing Doaker Charles, for which he received a Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Play nomination.

According to DNA tests, Jackson partially descends from the Benga people of Gabon, and he became a naturalized citizen of Gabon in 2019.

He attended several segregated schools and graduated from Riverside High School in Chattanooga.

He played the French horn, piccolo, trumpet, and flute in the school orchestra.

He developed a stutter during childhood and learned to "pretend to be other people who didn't stutter".

He still uses the word "motherfucker" to get through a speech block.

He still has days where he stutters.

Initially intent on pursuing a degree in marine biology, he attended Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia.

After joining a local acting group to earn extra points in a class, he found an interest in acting and switched his major.