On this day in vegan history · July 15, 1961
Forest Whitaker Is Born
The actor who would play Idi Amin so convincingly it scared him has spent decades quietly living the opposite of that role: vegetarian, yoga, a black belt earned the slow way.
The facts
- Born
- July 15, 1961, in Longview, Texas
- Parents
- Laura Francis Whitaker, a special education teacher, and Forest E. Whitaker Jr., an insurance salesman
- Academy Award
- Best Actor, 2007, for The Last King of Scotland (2006)
- Martial arts
- Black belt in kenpo; also trains in eskrima
Forest Steven Whitaker was born on July 15, 1961, in Longview, Texas, to Laura Francis Whitaker, a special education teacher, and Forest E. Whitaker Jr., an insurance salesman. He went on to become one of the most respected character actors of his generation, winning the Academy Award for Best Actor in 2007 for playing Idi Amin in The Last King of Scotland, sweeping every major precursor award for the same role. Off screen, Whitaker built a personal discipline around yoga, martial arts, and a vegetarian diet, a practice that predates most of Hollywood's current wellness trends and has stayed a fixture of how profiles describe him.
In their words
The day in the words of the people who were there. Every quote is verbatim, and every source links out so you can check it.
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Whitaker studies yoga, has a black belt in kenpō and is a vegetarian.
Wikipedia, "Forest Whitaker"
Source: Wikipedia -
His performance earned him the Academy Award for Best Actor, making him the fourth black actor in history to do so, joining the ranks of Sidney Poitier, Denzel Washington, and Jamie Foxx.
Wikipedia, "Forest Whitaker"
Source: Wikipedia
Why it still matters
A major movie star normalizing vegetarianism without turning it into a pitch, just a fact tucked next to yoga and a black belt, does more for the diet's image than any campaign built to sell it.
Sources
This history is still being written.
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