# Denzel Washington on screen and stage

Denzel Washington is an American actor known for his performances on stage and screen as well as for his work as director and producer on the latter. Washington made his feature film debut in Carbon Copy (1981). 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. 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.
He has since gained recognition as one of the greatest actors in the 21st century. Washington went on to win two Academy Awards, his first for Best Supporting Actor as a former slave-turned-soldier in Civil War film Glory (1989) and his second for Academy Award for Best Actor for his role as a corrupt cop in the crime thriller Training Day (2001). 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. His other Oscar-nominated roles were in Cry Freedom (1987), Malcolm X (1992), The Hurricane (1999), Flight (2012), Fences (2016), Roman J. Israel, Esq. (2017), and The Tragedy of Macbeth (2021).
Washington also established himself as a leading man in Hollywood acting in films such as The Mighty Quinn (1989), Spike Lee's Mo' Better Blues (1990), the romantic drama Mississippi Masala (1991), Kenneth Branagh's Much Ado About Nothing (1993), the thriller The Pelican Brief (1993), the AIDS drama Philadelphia (1993), the action thriller Crimson Tide (1995), the war drama Courage Under Fire (1996), the sports drama Remember the Titans (2000), the action thriller Man on Fire (2004), the political thriller The Manchurian Candidate (2004), the crime thrillers Inside Man (2006), and American Gangster (2007). He has starred in the action thriller The Equalizer franchise (2014–2023) and has directed films such as Antwone Fisher (2002), The Great Debaters (2007), and Fences (2016).
He has also asserted himself onstage acting in The Public Theatre productions of William Shakespeare's tragedies Coriolanus (1979), and The Tragedy of Richard III (1990). He made his Broadway debut in Checkmates (1988). He went on to win the Tony Award for Best Actor in a Play for playing Troy Maxson in the August Wilson play Fences (2010). His other Broadway roles include Shakespeare's Julius Caesar (2005), Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun (2014), and Eugene O'Neill's The Iceman Cometh (2018), the later of which earned him another Tony Award nomination. He is set to return to Broadway in the 2025 revival of Shakepeare's Othello playing the title role.

## Film

| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
| 1981 | Carbon Copy | Roger Porter | |
| 1984 | A Soldier's Story | Private First Class Melvin Peterson | |
| 1986 | Power | Arnold Billings | |
| 1987 | Cry Freedom | Steve Biko | |
| 1988 | For Queen and Country | Reuben James | |
| 1989 | The Mighty Quinn | Xavier Quinn | |
| 1989 | Glory | Private Silas Trip | |
| 1990 | Heart Condition | Napoleon Stone | |
| 1990 | Mo' Better Blues | Bleek Gilliam | |
| 1991 | Mississippi Masala | Demetrius Williams | |
| 1991 | Ricochet | Nick Styles | |
| 1992 | Malcolm X | Malcolm X | |
| 1993 | Much Ado About Nothing | Don Pedro of Aragon | |
| 1993 | The Pelican Brief | Gray Grantham | |
| 1993 | Philadelphia | Joe Miller | |
| 1995 | Crimson Tide | Lt. Commander Ron Hunter | |
| 1995 | Virtuosity | Lt. Parker Barnes | |
| 1995 | Devil in a Blue Dress | Easy Rawlins | |
| 1996 | Courage Under Fire | Lt. Colonel Nathaniel Serling | |
| 1996 | The Preacher's Wife | Dudley | |
| 1998 | Fallen | Detective John Hobbes | |
| 1998 | He Got Game | Jake Shuttlesworth | |
| 1998 | The Siege | Anthony Hubbard | |
| 1999 | The Bone Collector | Lincoln Rhyme | |
| 1999 | The Hurricane | Rubin Carter | |
| 2000 | Remember the Titans | Herman Boone | |
| 2001 | Training Day | Alonzo Harris | |
| 2002 | John Q. | John Quincy Archibald | |
| 2002 | Antwone Fisher | Dr. Jerome Davenport | Also director and producer |
| 2003 | Out of Time | Matt Lee Whitlock | |
| 2004 | Man on Fire | John W. Creasy | |
| 2004 | The Manchurian Candidate | Maj. Ben Marco | |
| 2006 | Inside Man | Keith Frazier | |
| 2006 | Déjà Vu | Doug Carlin | |
| 2007 | American Gangster | Frank Lucas | |
| 2007 | The Great Debaters | Melvin B. Tolson | Also director |
| 2009 | The Taking of Pelham 123 | Walter Garber | |
| 2010 | The Book of Eli | Eli | Also producer |
| 2010 | Unstoppable | Frank Barnes | |
| 2012 | Safe House | Tobin Frost | |
| 2012 | Flight | William "Whip" Whitaker Sr. | |
| 2013 | 2 Guns | Robert "Bobby" Trench | |
| 2014 | The Equalizer | Robert McCall | Also producer |
| 2016 | The Magnificent Seven | Sam Chisolm | |
| 2016 | Fences | Troy Maxson | Also director and producer |
| 2017 | Roman J. Israel, Esq. | Roman J. Israel | Also producer |
| 2018 | The Equalizer 2 | Robert McCall | Also producer |
| 2020 | Ma Rainey's Black Bottom | — | Producer only |
| 2021 | The Little Things | Deputy Sheriff Joe "Deke" Deacon | |
| 2021 | The Tragedy of Macbeth | Lord Macbeth | |
| 2021 | A Journal for Jordan | — | Director and producer only |
| 2023 | The Equalizer 3 | Robert McCall | Also producer |
| 2024 | The Piano Lesson | — | Producer only |
| 2024 | Gladiator II | Macrinus | |
| TBA | Highest 2 Lowest † | TBA | Post-production |
Key :
| † | Denotes films that have not yet been released |

## Television

| Year(s) | Title | Role(s) | Notes |
| 1977 | Wilma: The Wilma Rudolph Story | Robert Eldridge – age 18 | Television film |
| 1979 | Flesh & Blood | Kirk | Television film |
| 1982–1988 | St. Elsewhere | Dr. Philip Chandler | 118 episodes |
| 1984 | License to Kill | Martin Sawyer | Television film |
| 1986 | The George McKenna Story | George McKenna | Also known as Hard Lessons; Television film |
| 1992 | Great Performances | Narrator | Episode: "Jammin': Jelly Roll Morton on Broadway" |
| 1992 | Liberators: Fighting on Two Fronts in World War II | Narrator | Documentary |
| 1995, 1997 | Happily Ever After: Fairy Tales for Every Child | King Omar / Humpty Dumpty / Crooked Man | Voice, 2 episodes |
| 2013 | The March | Narrator | Documentary |
| 2016 | Grey's Anatomy | — | Director of episode: "The Sound of Silence" |

## Theatre

| Year(s) | Production | Role(s) | Theater | Notes |
| 1979 | Coriolanus | Aediles / Roman Citizen / Voscian Citizen Roman Soldier / Voscian Soldier | Joseph Papp Public Theater | June 22 − July 22 |
| 1981 | When the Chickens Came Home to Roost | Malcolm X | New Federal Theatre | |
| 1981–1983 | A Soldier's Play | Private First Class Melvin Peterson | Theatre Four | Nov. 20, 1981 − Jan. 2, 1983 |
| 1988 | Checkmates | Sylvester Williams | 46th Street Theatre | August 4 − December 31 |
| 1990 | The Tragedy of Richard III | Richard III of England | Joseph Papp Public Theater | August 3 − September 2 |
| 2005 | Julius Caesar | Marcus Brutus | Belasco Theatre | April 3 − June 12 |
| 2010 | Fences | Troy Maxson | Cort Theatre | April 26 − July 11 |
| 2014 | A Raisin in the Sun | Walter Lee Younger | Ethel Barrymore Theatre | April 3 − June 15 |
| 2018 | The Iceman Cometh | Theodore "Hickey" Hickman | Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre | April 26 − July 1 |
| 2025 | Othello † | Othello | Ethel Barrymore Theatre | February 24 − June 6 |