Denzel Washington is an American actor who made his feature film debut in Carbon Copy (1981).[1] In 1982, Washington made his first appearance in the medical drama St. Elsewhere as Dr. Philip Chandler. The role proved to be the breakthrough in his career.[2][3] He starred as Private First Class Melvin Peterson in the drama A Soldier's Story (1984). The film was an adaptation of the Off-Broadway play A Soldier's Play (1981–1983) in which Washington had earlier portrayed the same character.[4] In 1987, he played Steve Biko, an anti-apartheid activist in the Richard Attenborough–directed drama Cry Freedom, for which he received his first nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.[5][6] Two years later, Washington won the award for playing Trip, a former slave-turned-soldier in Civil War film Glory (1989).[5][7] In 1990, he played the title character in the play The Tragedy of Richard III, and starred in Spike Lee's comedy-drama Mo' Better Blues. Washington received the Silver Bear for Best Actor at the Berlin International Film Festival, for playing the eponymous civil rights activist in Lee's Malcolm X (1992).[8]
In 1993, Washington starred in Kenneth Branagh's adaptation of the Shakespearean comedy Much Ado About Nothing, legal thriller The Pelican Brief with Julia Roberts, and AIDS drama Philadelphia with Tom Hanks. He appeared in Tony Scott's Crimson Tide in 1995. Washington won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama,[9] and his second Silver Bear for Best Actor for playing wrongly-convicted boxer Rubin Carter in the biographical film The Hurricane (1999).[8][10] He followed this with another biographical role as American football coach Herman Boone in the 2000 sports drama Remember the Titans.[11] For his next role as corrupt cop Alonzo Harris in the crime thriller Training Day (2001),[12] Washington received the Academy Award for Best Actor.[13] By virtue of his win, he became the first African American actor to win two competitive Academy Awards, and the first since Sidney Poitier in 1964 to win the leading actor award.[14][15]
Washington reteamed with Scott on the thriller Man on Fire, and starred with Meryl Streep in The Manchurian Candidate (both in 2004). In 2005, he returned to the stage in the Shakespearean play Julius Caesar. Washington played drug kingpin Frank Lucas in American Gangster,[16] and poet and educator Melvin B. Tolson in The Great Debaters[17] (both in 2007). In 2010, Washington received the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for playing Troy Maxson in Fences (six years later, he starred in the film adaptation of the play for which he won the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Leading Role).[18][19] For his portrayal of an alcoholic airline pilot in Flight (2012),[20] he garnered an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.[21] In 2014, Washington appeared in the action thriller The Equalizer, and the play A Raisin in the Sun. He received further nominations for the Best Actor Oscar for Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017) and The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021).[22]
Year | Title | Role | Notes | Ref(s) |
---|---|---|---|---|
1981 | Carbon Copy | Roger Porter | [23] | |
1984 | A Soldier's Story | Private First Class Melvin Peterson | [24] | |
1986 | Power | Arnold Billings | [25] | |
1987 | Cry Freedom | Steve Biko | [26] | |
1988 | For Queen and Country | Reuben James | [27] | |
1989 | The Mighty Quinn | Xavier Quinn | [28] | |
Glory | Private Silas Trip | [25] | ||
1990 | Heart Condition | Napoleon Stone | [29] | |
Mo' Better Blues | Bleek Gilliam | [30] | ||
1991 | Mississippi Masala | Demetrius Williams | [31] | |
Ricochet | Nick Styles | [32] | ||
1992 | Malcolm X | Malcolm X | [25] | |
1993 | Much Ado About Nothing | Don Pedro of Aragon | [33] | |
The Pelican Brief | Gray Grantham | [34] | ||
Philadelphia | Joe Miller | [35] | ||
1995 | Crimson Tide | Lt. Commander Ron Hunter | [36] | |
Virtuosity | Lt. Parker Barnes | [25] | ||
Devil in a Blue Dress | Easy Rawlins | [25] | ||
1996 | Courage Under Fire | Lt. Colonel Nathaniel Serling | [25] | |
The Preacher's Wife | Dudley | [37] | ||
1998 | Fallen | Detective John Hobbes | [38] | |
He Got Game | Jake Shuttlesworth | [25] | ||
The Siege | Anthony Hubbard | [25] | ||
1999 | The Bone Collector | Lincoln Rhyme | [25] | |
The Hurricane | Rubin Carter | [10] | ||
2000 | Remember the Titans | Herman Boone | [11] | |
2001 | Training Day | Alonzo Harris | [25] | |
2002 | John Q. | John Quincy Archibald | [39] | |
Antwone Fisher | Dr. Jerome Davenport | Also director and producer | [40] | |
2003 | Out of Time | Matt Lee Whitlock | [41] | |
2004 | Man on Fire | John W. Creasy | [42] | |
The Manchurian Candidate | Maj. Ben Marco | [43] | ||
2006 | Inside Man | Keith Frazier | [44] | |
Déjà Vu | Doug Carlin | [45] | ||
2007 | American Gangster | Frank Lucas | [25] | |
The Great Debaters | Melvin B. Tolson | Also director | [25] | |
2009 | The Taking of Pelham 123 | Walter Garber | [25] | |
2010 | The Book of Eli | Eli | Also producer | [46] |
Unstoppable | Frank Barnes | [47] | ||
2012 | Safe House | Tobin Frost | [48] | |
Flight | William "Whip" Whitaker Sr. | [49] | ||
2013 | 2 Guns | Robert "Bobby" Trench | [25] | |
2014 | The Equalizer | Robert McCall | Also producer | [50] |
2016 | The Magnificent Seven | Sam Chisolm | [51] | |
Fences | Troy Maxson | Also director and producer | [52] | |
2017 | Roman J. Israel, Esq. | Roman J. Israel | Also producer | [53][54] |
2018 | The Equalizer 2 | Robert McCall | Also producer | [55] |
2020 | Ma Rainey's Black Bottom | — | Producer only | [56] |
2021 | The Little Things | Deputy Sheriff Joe "Deke" Deacon | [57] | |
The Tragedy of Macbeth | Lord Macbeth | [58] | ||
A Journal for Jordan | — | Director and producer only | [59] | |
2023 | The Equalizer 3 | Robert McCall | Also producer | [60] |
2024 | Gladiator 2 † | Filming | [61] | |
TBA | The Piano Lesson † | — | Producer only | [62] |
† | Denotes films that have not yet been released |
Year(s) | Title | Role(s) | Notes | Ref(s) |
---|---|---|---|---|
1977 | The Wilma Rudolph Story | Robert Eldridge – age 18 | Television film | [63] [64] |
1979 | Flesh & Blood | Kirk | Television film | [65] [66] |
1982–1988 | St. Elsewhere | Dr. Philip Chandler | 118 episodes | [67] |
1984 | License to Kill | Martin Sawyer | Television film | [68] |
1986 | The George McKenna Story | George McKenna | Also known as Hard Lessons; Television film | [69] |
1992 | Great Performances | Narrator | Episode: "Jammin': Jelly Roll Morton on Broadway" | [70] |
1992 | Liberators: Fighting on Two Fronts in World War II | Narrator | Documentary film | [71] |
1995 1997 |
Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales for Every Child | King Omar / Humpty Dumpty / Crooked Man | Voice, 2 episodes | [72] [73] |
2013 | The March | Narrator | Documentary film | [74] |
2016 | Grey's Anatomy | — | Director of episode: "The Sound of Silence" | [75] |
Year(s) | Production | Role(s) | Theater | Notes | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
1979 | Coriolanus | Aediles / Roman Citizen / Voscian Citizen Roman Soldier / Voscian Soldier |
Joseph Papp Public Theater | June 22 − July 22 | [76] |
1981 | When the Chickens Came Home to Roost | Malcolm X | New Federal Theatre | [77] | |
1981–1983 | A Soldier's Play | Private First Class Melvin Peterson | Theatre Four | Nov. 20, 1981 − Jan. 2, 1983 | [78] |
1988 | Checkmates | Sylvester Williams | 46th Street Theatre | August 4 − December 31 | [79] |
1990 | The Tragedy of Richard III | Richard III of England | Joseph Papp Public Theater | August 3 − September 2 | [80] |
2005 | Julius Caesar | Marcus Brutus | Belasco Theatre | April 3 − June 12 | [81] |
2010 | Fences | Troy Maxson | Cort Theatre | April 26 − July 11 | [82] |
2014 | A Raisin in the Sun | Walter Lee Younger | Ethel Barrymore Theatre | April 3 − June 15 | [83] |
2018 | The Iceman Cometh | Theodore "Hickey" Hickman | Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre | April 26 − July 1 | [84] |