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Biography
Life
Story ,
Career
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Trivia
With sleek, well-muscled good looks that
easily lend themselves to romantic leading roles or parts that call for
running, jumping, and handling firearms, Wesley Snipes became one of the
most popular Hollywood stars of the 1990s. First coming to prominence
with roles in Spike Lee's Mo' Better Blues and Jungle Fever, Snipes went
on to prove himself as an actor who could appeal to audiences as a man
that women want and men want to be.
Wesley Trent Snipes (born July 31, 1962) is an American actor, film producer, martial artist and tax protester.
Snipes has starred in action-adventures, thrillers and dramatic feature films opposite such actors as Robert De Niro and Sean Connery. In recent years, Snipes has moved behind the scenes in order to make his own films. To this end, he formed his own independent production company, Amen Ra Films, and its subsidiary Black Dot Media in 1991, to develop projects for film and television.
Wesley Snipes has been training in martial arts since he was twelve. He is a fourth-degree Black Belt in Shotokan Karate and a student of Capoeira under Mestre Jelon Vieira, an African/Brazilian Martial Art. Snipes has also pursued training in a number of other disciplines including Kung Fu. Snipes will return to the big screen in the U.S. with 2009's Gallowwalker.
Born in Orlando, Florida, Snipes grew up in the Bronx where he attended Manhattan's famed High School for the Performing Arts but he moved back to Florida before he could graduate. After finishing high school in Florida, Snipes attended the State University of New York at Purchase and began pursuing an acting career. A 24-year-old Snipes was discovered by an agent while performing in a competition. A short time later he made his film debut in the Goldie Hawn vehicle Wildcats. In 1987, Snipes appeared as Michael Jackson's rival gang leader in the Martin Scorsese-directed music video "Bad" (he is only seen in the long version of the video) and the feature film Streets of Gold.
Snipe's performance in the music video "Bad" caught the eye of director Spike Lee. Snipes turned down a small role in Lee's Do the Right Thing for the larger part of Willie Mays Hays in Major League, beginning a succession of box-office hits for Snipes. Lee would later cast Snipes as the jazz saxophonist Shadow Henderson in Mo' Better Blues and as the lead in the interracial romance drama Jungle Fever. Another important role for Snipes was the powerful drug lord Nino Brown in New Jack City, which was written specifically for him by Barry Michael Cooper. Another film in which his character was involved in drugs was the somber movie Sugar Hill.
Although Snipes is more remembered for his roles in action films like Passenger 57, Demolition Man (with Sylvester Stallone), and Rising Sun (with Connery), he has also had success in comedies like White Men Can't Jump, and To Wong Foo, Thanks for Everything! Julie Newmar where he played a drag queen together with Patrick Swayze and John Leguizamo. Snipes has also been critically acclaimed for his roles in dramas like The Waterdance and Disappearing Acts.
In 1997 he won the Best Actor Volpi Cup at the Venice Film Festival for his performance in New Line Cinema's One Night Stand. Snipes was also lauded by critics worldwide for his performance in U.S. Marshals, a sequel of sorts to the box-office hit, The Fugitive.
1998 was especially rewarding for Snipes with the opening of the year's hit Blade, for New Line Cinema, which has grossed over $150 million worldwide. The film turned into a successful series (see Blade) with the last installment coming out in 2004. He was also honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame and received an honorary doctorate from his alma mater, SUNY/Purchase, for his outstanding achievements in film.
Despite all the success, due to Snipes recent legal troubles, his career has suffered lately with most of his latest films being released straight-to-DVD. His latest films are The Shooter (also know as The Contractor), filmed in Bulgaria and the UK, with Charles Dance, Lena Heady and Eliza Bennett, and the upcoming Gallowwalker, set to be released in 2009. Wesley also signed to star in director Cirio Santiago's sci-fi "Man with Gun", to be shot in Romenia. Wesley will play Cassius Muhammad, a deaf-and-mute ex-CIA agent vacationing with his family through the Great Wall of China, when a group of Chechen rebels take over the place with intents to blow it up, and it's up to Muhammad to save the day.
In 1991, Snipes formed the independent production company Amen Ra Films. It co-produced the first two Blade films and other titles that Snipes has starred in.
Snipes produced The Big Hit, starring Mark Wahlberg and executive produced by John Woo and Terrence Chang, and the critically acclaimed feature Down in the Delta, which marked Maya Angelou's directorial debut and garnered several awards including a Christopher Prism and nominations in multiple categories for the Acapulco Black Film Festival, as well as an NAACP Image Award for Best Motion Picture.
Additionally, television projects distinguished Snipes as a creative force with ABC's Futuresport, in which he starred with Dean Cain and Vanessa L. Williams. Snipes also produced the highest rated cable special of all time, TNT's "The First Tribute to the Martial Arts Masters of the 20th Century," which showcased some of the greatest innovators of the martial arts.
Snipes also served as executive producer of a series of documentaries that he personally financed through now defunct Black Dot Media. The company showcased prominent thinkers from the African and Afro-Caribbean culture. The first in the series, John Henrik Clarke: A Great and Mighty Walk, chronicled the life of John Henrik Clarke, an authority on African and Afro-Caribbean studies. The film won critical acclaim at the Sundance Film Festival in 1997 and won the Grand Jury Prize for Best Documentary at the Urbanworld Film Festival in New York.
In the late 90s, Snipes and his brother started a security firm called the Royal Guard of Amen-Ra dedicated to providing VIPs with bodyguards trained in law enforcement, military, and martial arts.
In 2000, the business was investigated for alleged ties to an extremist religious cult called the United Nuwaubian Nation of Moors. Turns out that Snipes had spotted 200 acres of land with the intention to buy and use for his business academy, which were close to the aforementioned religious cult compound in Putnam County, Georgia. As far as coincidences go, both Snipes business and the religious cult had Egyptian motifs as their symbols which prompted people to make up alleged ties between both.
Snipes and his brother ended up not buying the land and established their company in Florida and Antigua, while the religious cult compound was raided in 2002 and their leader convicted. In 2005 Snipes was in negotiations to fight Fear Factor star and UFC commentator Joe Rogan in an upcomming UFC event.
Snipes has been linked to a number of women including Jada Pinkett Smith, Sanaa Lathan, Halle Berry, and Jennifer Lopez.
Snipes has also been married twice. First, to April Snipes from 1985-1990 with whom he has a son, Jelani Asar Snipes, born in 1988. Jelani had a cameo role in Snipes 1990 film Mo' Better Blues.
In 2003, Snipes wed painter Nakyung "Nikki" Park, who is the mother of his four youngest children: son Akhenaten Kihwa-T Snipes; daughter Iset Jua-T Snipes (born July 31, 2001); son Alaafia Jehu-T Snipes; and son Alimayu Moa-T Snipes (born March 26, 2007). Snipes spends a lot of time in Park's home country of South Korea which he call his "second home". |
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