Samuel L. Jackson

Samuel Leroy Jackson, born December 21, 1948  is an American film and television actor and film producer. After Jackson became involved with the Civil Rights Movement, he moved on to acting in theater at Morehouse College, and then films. He had several small roles such as in the film Goodfellas, Def by Temptation, before meeting his mentor, Morgan Freeman, and the director Spike Lee. After gaining critical acclaim for his role in Jungle Fever in 1991, he appeared in films such as Patriot Games, Amos & Andrew, True Romance and Jurassic Park. In 1994 he was cast as Jules Winnfield in Pulp Fiction, and his performance received several award nominations and critical acclaim.

Jackson has since appeared in over 100 films including Die Hard with a Vengeance, The 51st State, Jackie Brown, Unbreakable, The Incredibles, Black Snake Moan, Shaft, Snakes on a Plane, as well as the Star Wars prequel trilogy and small roles in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill Vol. 2 and Inglourious Basterds. He played Nick Fury in Iron Man and Iron Man 2, Thor, the first two of a nine-film commitment as the character for the Marvel Cinematic Universe franchise. Jackson's many roles have made him one of the highest grossing actors at the box office. Jackson has won multiple awards throughout his career and has been portrayed in various forms of media including films, television series, and songs. In 1980, Jackson married LaTanya Richardson, with whom he has one daughter, Zoe.

Early life

Jackson was born in Washington, D.C. He grew up as an only child in Chattanooga, Tennessee with his mother, Elizabeth Jackson (née Montgomery), who was a factory worker and later a supplies buyer for a mental institution, and his maternal grandparents and extended family. His father lived away from the family, in Kansas City, Missouri, and later died from alcoholism; Jackson had only met his father twice during his life. Jackson attended several segregated schools and graduated from Riverside High School in Chattanooga. Between the third and twelfth grades, he played the French horn and trumpet in the school orchestra. 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, Jackson found an interest in acting and switched his major. Before graduating in 1972, he co-founded the "Just Us Theatre".

Civil Rights Movement involvement

After the 1968 assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr., Jackson attended the funeral in Atlanta as one of the ushers. Jackson then flew to Memphis to join an equal rights protest march. In a Parade interview Jackson revealed: "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. In 1969, Jackson and several other students held members of the Morehouse College board of trustees (including a nearby 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. Jackson was then suspended for two years for his criminal record and his actions (although he would later return to the college to earn his Bachelor of Arts in Drama in 1972).

"I would like to think because of the things I did, my daughter can do the things that she does. She barely has a recognition that she's black."

—Jackson reflecting on his actions during the Civil Rights Movement.

While he was expelled, Jackson was employed as a social worker in Los Angeles. Jackson decided to return to Atlanta, where he met with Stokely Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, and others active in the Black Power movement. Jackson revealed in the same Parade interview that he began to feel empowered with his involvement in the movement, especially when the group began buying guns. However, before Jackson could become involved with any significant armed confrontation, his mother sent him to Los Angeles after the FBI told her that he would die within a year if he remained with the Black Power movement.

Personal life

Jackson married actress LaTanya Richardson in 1980, whom he met while attending Morehouse College. In 2009, the couple started their own charitable organization to help support education. The couple, who live in Los Angeles, California, have a daughter, Zoe, born in 1982. She works as a sports channel producer.

Jackson has revealed in an interview that he sees every one of his movies in theaters with paying customers claiming that "Even during my theater years, I wished I could watch the plays I was in — while I was in them! I dig watching myself work. He also enjoys collecting the action figures of the characters he portrays in his films, including Jules Winnfield, Shaft, Mace Windu, and Frozone. He is a comic book and anime fan.

Jackson is bald, but enjoys wearing unusual wigs in his films. Jackson has reflected on his decision to go bald: "I keep ending up on those bald is beautiful lists. It's cool. You know, when I started losing my hair it was during the era when everybody had lots of hair. ... All of a sudden I felt this big hole in the middle of my afro, I couldn't face having a comb over so I had to quickly figure what the haircut for me was. His first bald role was in The Great White Hype. Jackson usually gets to pick his own hairstyles for each character he portrays. Although he did poke fun at his baldness the first time he appeared bald on The Tonight Show, explaining that he had to shave his head for one role, but then he kept receiving more and more roles afterward, and had to keep shaving his head so wigs could be made for him. Laughingly, he ended the tale by lamenting to Jay Leno, "The only way I'm gonna have time to grow my hair back, is if I'm not workin'!".

Television and other roles

In addition to films, Jackson also appeared in several television shows, a video game, music videos, as well as an audiobook. Jackson had a small part in the Public Enemy music video for "911 Is a Joke". Jackson voiced several television show characters including the lead role in the anime series, Afro Samurai, in addition to a recurring part as the voice of Gin Rummy in several episodes of the animated series The Boondocks. He guest-starred as himself in an episode of the BBC/HBO sitcom Extras. He voiced the main antagonist, Officer Frank Tenpenny, in the video game Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas. Jackson also hosted a variety of awards shows. Thus far, he has hosted the MTV Movie Awards (1998), the ESPYs (1999, 2001, 2002, and 2009), and the Spike TV Video Game Awards (2005, 2006, and 2007). In November 2006, he provided the voice of God for The Bible Experience, the New Testament audiobook version of the Bible. He was given the lead role because producers believed his deep, authoritative voice would best fit the role. For the Atlanta Falcons 2010 season, Samuel L. Jackson portrayed Rev. Sultan in the Falcons "Rise Up" commercial to help improve tickets sales.

Upcoming films

Jackson has several upcoming film projects between 2010 and 2012. In 2001, Jackson gave his consent for Marvel Comics to design their "Ultimate" version of the character Nick Fury after his likeness. In the 2008 film Iron Man, he made a cameo as the character in a post-credit scene. In February 2009, Jackson signed on to a nine-picture deal with Marvel which would see him appear as the character in Iron Man 2, Thor, Captain America: The First Avenger, and The Avengers as well as any other sequels they would produce. He will also appear in xXx: The Return of Xander Cage and was made a part in Tarantino's upcoming film, Django Unchained.

Jackson is involved in another project, titled The Samaritan.

Box office performance

Jackson has said that he chooses roles that are "exciting to watch" and have an "interesting character inside of a story", and that in his roles he wanted to "do things he hasn't done, things he saw as a kid and wanted to do and now has an opportunity to do". Throughout the 1990s, A.C. Neilson E.C.I., a box office tracking company, determined that Jackson appeared in more films than any other actor which grossing $1.7 billion domestically.For all the films in his career, where he is featured as a leading actor or supporting co-star, his films have grossed a total of $2.81 to $4.91 billion at the North American box office, placing him as the seventh (as strictly lead) or the second highest-grossing movie star (counting supporting roles) of all time; behind only that of voice actor Frank Welker. In August 2007, Jackson stated in an interview that he wanted to play a small role in George Lucas's Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull so that he could keep his box office position over Harrison Ford. The 2009 edition of The Guinness World Records, which uses a different calculation to determine film grosses, stated that Jackson is the world's highest grossing actor, having earned $7.42 billion in 68 films.