![]() ![]() He also continues to encourage rising artists at SDA and elsewhere to realize the impact they can make - beyond the stage or screen. This year, Whitaker received SDA’s Robert Redford Award for Engaged Artists for his exemplary quality, skill and innovation in his craft as a performer, as well as his public commitment to social responsibility. That includes here in Southern California, where the WPDI is working with the School of Dramatic Arts’ Institute for Theatre & Social Change to develop plays with social justice themes for WPDI partner schools in Los Angeles. The WPDI offers hope and practical new paths forward for young women and men across the world and in the United States. In 2012, he founded the Whitaker Peace & Development Initiative (WPDI), which promotes peace, reconciliation and social development within communities long marked by violence and conflict. “It was violence seeking purpose…something shifted in me after that.” “The emptiness in their eyes reminded me of my own friends who joined gangs,” Whitaker says. In researching his role as dictator Idi Amin, Whitaker had the chance to talk with child soldiers in Uganda. That same film provided a seminal life experience off-screen, too. Today, Whitaker is widely recognized as one of the greatest actors of his generation - perhaps best known for his performance in The Last King of Scotland, for which he received an Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role. “What I couldn’t have known, when I was leaving USC, was that assuming many different types of characters would let me open a door to let others take a peek at the joys, angers, and pains from both myself and throughout humanity, and use those experiences to illuminate their own lives.” “Throughout the four decades since my career began, film has been a way for me to continue my search to understand the intricacies of mankind and how I’m linked to humanity…” Whitaker says. “Our greatest artistry wasn’t going to be found in isolation.” Watch the honoree’s tribute and acceptance speech videos from the 75th anniversary benefit event, The Odyssey.Īs he gained agency in the film industry, Whitaker began choosing his films and characters based on the opportunity to highlight social justice issues or help expand consciousness - his own, as well as others.’ “The faculty here taught my classmates and me that while we existed as individuals, our greatest successes as artists would come from our capacity to channel our talents into the dynamics of an ensemble,” he says. After being accepted into both USC’s musical and acting conservatories, he chose to change routes once again, this time to drama.Īt USC, Whitaker learned a powerful lesson that changed how he approached his new craft. Indeed, as his mother taught him, he remained open to possibilities unseen. “As I walked around campus that first year, I felt a tremendous sense of opportunity and possibility,” Whitaker says. Soon, he became intrigued with opera and transferred to USC to study classical voice. After a serious back injury, he dropped football and switched his major to music. ![]() He began his college career at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, on a football scholarship. Whitaker himself took a more circuitous route to his calling. “My mother showed me that life existed outside the conflicts and problems of my neighborhood,” he says. His mother’s relentless curiosity and compassion for others opened Whitaker’s mind to new worlds. Whitaker’s mother, Laura Francis Smith, graduated from USC with degrees in special education and psychology, then became a teacher for children with disabilities. He credits his mother for each of those traits, which draw from the same well - one filled with empathy. As both an Oscar-winner and a UNESCO Special Envoy for Peace and Reconciliation, Forest Whitaker ’82 has long combined a keen eye for observation with a heart for humanity. ![]()
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