Danny Lebern Glover (born July 22, 1946) is an American actor, film director, and political activist.
Biography
Early life
Glover was born in San Francisco, California, the son of Carrie (née Hunley) and James Glover, both of whom were postal workers and were active in the NAACP. Glover grew up with a love for sports just like his father. Glover's mother, daughter of a midwife, was born in Louisville, Georgia and graduated from Paine College. Glover graduated from George Washington High School (San Francisco) before attending American University and matriculating at San Francisco State University. At university, he also met his future wife Asake Bomani, whom he married in 1975. They have been divorced for some time now.In his late twenties, Glover enrolled in the Black Actors Workshop at the American Conservatory Theater, a regional training program in San Francisco. Glover also trained with Jean Shelton at the Shelton Actors Lab in San Francisco. In an interview on Inside the Actor's Studio, Glover credited Shelton for much of his development as an actor. Deciding that he wanted to be an actor, Glover resigned from his city administration job and soon began his career as a stage actor, which eventually brought him to Los Angeles.
Glover suffered from epilepsy as a teenager and young adult; according to his own account, he "developed a way of concentrating so that seizures wouldn't happen." Using this technique, which he describes as a type of self-hypnosis, Glover says he hasn't suffered a seizure since the age of 35.
Career
He has had a variety of film, stage, and television roles, and is best known for playing Los Angeles police Sgt. Roger Murtaugh in the Lethal Weapon series of action films, and the abusive husband to Whoopi Goldberg's character Celie in The Color Purple. He was given top billing for the first time in Predator 2, the sequel to the sci-fi actioner Predator. In addition, Glover has been a voice actor in many children's movies. Among many awards, he has won five NAACP Image Awards, for his achievements as an actor of color . Danny Glover also worked in 2001 blockbuster Royal Tenenbaums also starring Gywneth Paltrow, Anjelica Huston, Ben Stiller and Owen Wilson.He joined the ranks of actors, such as Humphrey Bogart, Elliott Gould, and Robert Mitchum, who have portrayed Raymond Chandler's private eye detective Philip Marlowe in the episode 'Red Wind' of the Showtime network's 1995 series Fallen Angels. Glover made his directorial debut with the Showtime channel short film Override in 1994. Also in 1994, Glover and actor Ben Guillory formed the Robey Theatre Company in Los Angeles, focusing on theatre by and about the Black experience.
In 2005, Glover and Joslyn Barnes announced plans to make "No FEAR," a movie about Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo's experience. Coleman-Adebayo won a 2000 jury trial against the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The jury found the EPA guilty of violating the civil rights of Coleman-Adebayo on the basis of race, sex, color and a hostile work environment, under the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Coleman-Adebayo was terminated shortly after she revealed the environmental and human disaster taking place in the Brits, South Africa, vanadium mines. Her experience inspired passage of the No FEAR Act.
In May 2007, it was announced that the Venezuelan Government would give Glover $18 million to make a film version of the 18th-century Haiti slave uprising that was led by Toussaint Louverture. The Asociación Nacional de Autores Cinematográficos (ANAC) and several prominent Venezuelan filmmakers such as Solveig Hoogesteijn, Jonathan Jakubowicz, Franco de Peña and José Ramón Novoa criticized such large investment in Glover's movie since the same amount of money is equivalent to the budget for 4 years given by the Venezuelan government to the National Film Board of Venezuela (CNAC) and could could support the production of over 34 Venezuelan films. An additional $9.840.505 was approved by the Venezuelan National Assembly in April of 2008.
Glover is known for saying "I'm too old for this shit!" in multiple films.
Activism
While attending San Francisco State University, Glover was a member of the Black Students Union who along with the Third World Liberation Front led the five month strike for Ethnic Studies. Not only did this help to create the first school of Ethnic Studies in the U.S., but it was also the longest student strike in the history of the United States. During the strike, he protested alongside Hari Dillon who is now the president of the Vanguard Public Foundation, of which Glover sits on the advisory board.
Glover serves as a board member to numerous national and international organizations. He is presently chair of the TransAfrica Forum, "a non-profit organization dedicated to educating the general public — particularly African-Americans — on the economic, political and moral ramifications of U.S. foreign policy as it affects Africa and the Diaspora in the Caribbean and Latin America" and a board member of Cheryl Byron's Something Positive Dance Group. In March 1998, he was appointed ambassador to the United Nations Development Programme.
Glover is among a number of high-profile U.S. supporters of Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez. The group also includes singer Harry Belafonte and Princeton University scholar Cornel West, who have sided with the Venezuelan president against accusations of democratic abuses.
Between 2007 and 2008, Glover has received loans close to U.S. $28 million from the Venezuelan government to make a film based on the life of François Dominique Toussaint-Louverture, an Haitian freedom fighter.
He also serves on the Advisory Council for TeleSUR, "Television of the South", a pan-Latin American television network based in Caracas, financed by the Venezuelan government. It began broadcasting on July 24, 2005. His role in this capacity and his resulting interaction with Chávez have drawn criticism for Glover from some Western media. On Friday May 4, 2007 Glover endorsed former Senator John Edwards for the Democratic nomination for President in the 2008 Presidential Race. After Edwards withdrew from the race, Glover endorsed Barack Obama.
On January 24, 2008, he was convicted of trespassing during a union rally at a Sheraton Hotel in Niagara Falls, Ontario. He was convicted along with union representative Alex Dagg and Ontario Federation of Labour president Wayne Samuelson.Although Canadian Niagara Hotels were seeking $22,000 in a private prosecution, Glover, Dagg and Samuelson were sentenced with a $100 fine on February 8, 2008. The justice of the peace suggested that "the prosecution was unnecessary to protect the interests of the hotel's owner, and that the company should have put more effort toward good faith negotiations with the union".
Filmography
| Year | Film | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1979 | Escape from Alcatraz | Inmate | |
| 1982 | Deadly Drifter | Jojo/Roland | |
| 1983 | Chiefs | Marshall Peters | TV Mini-series |
| 1984 | Places in the Heart | Moze | |
| 1985 | Silverado | Malachi 'Mal' Johnson | |
| Witness | Det. Lt. James McFee | ||
| The Color Purple | Albert | ||
| 1987 | Lethal Weapon | Sergeant Roger Murtaugh | |
| Mandela | Nelson Mandela | ||
| 1988 | Bat*21 | Capt. Bartholomew Clark | |
| 1989 | Lonesome Dove | Joshua Deets | TV miniseries |
| Lethal Weapon 2 | Sergeant Roger Murtaugh | ||
| A Raisin in the Sun | Walter Lee Younger | ||
| 1990 | To Sleep With Anger | Harry | |
| Predator 2 | Lt. Mike Harrigan | ||
| 1991 | Flight of the Intruder | Cmdr. Frank 'Dooke' Camparelli | |
| Grand Canyon | Simon | ||
| Pure Luck | Raymond Campanella | ||
| 1992 | Lethal Weapon 3 | Roger Murtaugh | |
| 1993 | Queen | Alec Haley | TV miniseries |
| The Saint of Fort Washington | Jerry/Narrator | ||
| Bopha! | Micah Mangena | ||
| 1994 | Maverick | Bank Robber | |
| Angels in the Outfield | George Knox | ||
| 1995 | Operation Dumbo Drop | Capt. Sam Cahill | |
| Fallen Angels: Red Wind | Phillip Marlowe | ||
| 1997 | The Rainmaker | Judge Tyrone Kipler | |
| Gone Fishin' | Gus Green | ||
| Switchback | Bob Goodall | ||
| 1998 | Lethal Weapon 4 | Roger Murtaugh | |
| The Prince of Egypt | Jethro (voice) | ||
| Beloved | Paul D. Garner | ||
| Antz | Barbatus (voice) | ||
| 2000 | Boesman and Lena | Boesman | |
| 2001 | The Royal Tenenbaums | Henry Sherman | |
| 2004 | The Cookout | Judge Crowley | |
| Saw | Detective David Tapp | ||
| Legend of Earthsea | Ogion | TV miniseries | |
| 2005 | Manderlay | Wilhelm | |
| Missing in America | Jake Neeley | ||
| 2006 | Bamako | Cow-boy | |
| Barnyard | Miles the Mule (voice) | ||
| The Shaggy Dog | Ken Hollister | ||
| Dreamgirls | Marty Madison | ||
| 2007 | Shooter | Colonel Isaac Johnson | |
| Poor Boy's Game | George | ||
| Terra | President Chen (voice) | ||
| Honeydripper | Tyrone Purvis | ||
| 2008 | Be Kind Rewind | Mr. Fletcher | |
| Gospel Hill | John Malcolm | ||
| Blindness | Old man with the black eye patch/Narrator | awaiting release | |
| Por Vida | Mr. Shannon | post-production | |
| Unstable Fables: Tortoise vs. Hare | Walter Tortoise (voice) | post-production | |
| 2009 | Night Train | Miles | post-production |
| Stride | James 'Honeybear' Powell | post-production | |
| The Harimaya Bridge | Joseph Holder | filming | |
| 2012 | TBA | pre-production |
References
External links
- Danny Glover at the Internet Movie Database
- Al Jazeera English's Riz Khan interview with Danny Glover
- A free video excerpt of a lecture by Glover
- InnerVIEWS with Ernie Manouse: Danny Glover (TV Interview)
- The TransAfrica Forum
- Interview on Democracy Now! (audio)
- Interview in AARP Magazine
- Interview in The Progressive
- Interview (4/5/2007) from Africa On Fire! on KBOO
- Danny Glover in the news supporting Mumia Abu-Jamal
- Danny Glover on Democracy Now! February 26 2007 discussing the Oscars and the Panafrican Film and Television Festival in Burkina Faso
- Danny Glover talks about Bamako
- The ongoing effort to draft Danny Glover into the San Francisco Mayoral race
- Cheryl Byron and Something Positive
- Danny Glover Interview on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos
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Last updated on Thursday July 24, 2008 at 04:04:48 PDT (GMT -0700)
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