Jamie Foxx

Jamie Foxx

Eric Marlon Bishop, better known as Jamie Foxx is one of the many talented individuals the world has seen. He is an actor, singer-songwriter, musician and stand-up comedian. Foxx is a December baby and was born in Terrell, Texas. Within a short period of time, his parents’ marriage fell apart and his mother Louise Annette Talley Dixon’s adoptive parents Esther Marie and Mark Talley took him under their wing and brought him up as their own. He had little contact with his birth parents throughout his childhood and was raised in a racially segregated community. He was brought up in a strict and rigid environment but music and the performing arts has always been a part of his life. He started playing the piano at the age of five and was also part of the church choir. By the time he reached second grade, his teachers would let him tell the class jokes if they behaved themselves. He attended Terrell High School and there he was quarterback for his team. Sports were not the only area in life he succeeded. He was a top grade student and played basketball as well. He was also a member of a school band which called itself “Leather and Lace”. After high school, Foxx accepted a scholarship to the United States International University. He studied classical music and learned how to compose music there.

His career started by accident; his girlfriend dared him to perform at a comedy club and he did. In 1991 he joined the cast of In Living Color and also starred in the sitcom Roc. In 2001, he also started his own show called The Jamie Foxx Show. His debut as an actor was in 1992 with a film Toys. From then on he moved to playing an American football player – because of his history as a quarter-back, in the movie Any Given Sunday (1999). He got his big break when he played a taxi driver opposite Tom Cruise in Collateral in 2004. He received exceptional reviews and bagged a few nominations as well. In the same year, he released a song “Slow Jamz” with Kanye West. This song was a phenomenal hit on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100 singles and on the UK Singles Chart. He collaborated with West yet again on “I Got a Woman” which was a huge hit as well.

In 2004, Foxx also starred in Ray, for which he received an Academy Award for Best Actor and the BAFTA Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role. He also made history when he received two Oscar Nominations for Collateral and Ray in the same year. He was also invited to join the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences in 2005.  Meanwhile, Foxx also worked on his second studio album and sold over 1.9 million copies in the U.S. Following these major successes, Foxx appeared in Jarhead, Miami Vice as well as box office hit Dreamgirls, co-starring with Jennifer Hudson. Other successive films were The Kingdom (2007), The Soloist (2009), Law Abiding Citizen (2009), Valentine’s Day (2010), Rio (2011), Horrible Bosses (2011), Django Unchained (2012), The Amazing Spiderman 2 (2014) and A Million Ways to Die in the West (2014).  In addition to his movies, Jamie Foxx continues to collaborate to progress his musical career such as with Rascal Flatts “She Goes All The Way” and Plies’ “Please Excuse My Hands” as well as the remix for Ne-Yo’s “Miss Independent” making him a bankable actor as well as a music icon.


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