01/29/2016
HISTORY MADE - Nate Parker (born November 18, 1979) is an American actor, director, producer, writer and musical performer who has appeared in Beyond the Lights, Red Tails, The Secret Life of Bees, The Great Debaters, Arbitrage, Non-Stop, Felon, Pride and and the soon-to-be released Nat Turner Bio Pic, Birth Of A Nation. He was an All-American wrestler at both Great Bridge High School and the University of Oklahoma. Parker has been active in charitable work, donating his time both as a volunteer wrestling coach and a political activist.
Parker was born in Norfolk, Virginia, to Carolyn, a 17-year-old mother at the time. His mother never married his biological father, but did wed the man who gave Parker his last name. Parker has four younger sisters. Parker moved to Virginia Beach, Virginia to stay with his maternal uncle, Jay Combs, a former wrestler, at age 14. Because Parker looked up to his uncle Combs and got Parker started in Wrestling at Princess Anne High School. Parker placed third in the Virginia High School League state wrestling championships as a junior while attending Churchland after reuniting with his mother.
As a sophomore at Pennsylvania State University in 1999, he and a teammate were accused of having had non-consensual s*x with a woman who had passed out, but when she admitted during the trial to having had consensual s*x with Parker the day before the alleged r**e, Parker was acquitted in 2001. Parker married Erie, Pennsylvania-native Sarah DiSanto, whom he met while they were attending Penn State in 2007. Parker earned a full scholarship to wrestle at Penn State University. In 2002, he placed fifth at the National Collegiate Athletic Association wrestling championships and became an All-American at Oklahoma. Following his fifth-place finish, he was ranked second nationally as a redshirt senior. In 2003, he earned an undergraduate degree in computer programming from Oklahoma.
After graduating from Oklahoma, he worked as a computer programmer until he was noticed at a modeling convention in Dallas, Texas, while accompanying a model friend. A Los Angeles talent manager Jon Simmons noticed Parker at the convention and talent search while Parker was waiting for his friend to finish her audition. Simmons felt Parker had "the look" Simmons told him to move to Los Angeles, California right away. Parker packed his clothes and computer and moved to sleep on another aspiring actor's couch. He quickly landed a part in a television commercial. Bit parts and guest appearances followed. In California parker lived with his wife, mother and three of his sisters in a 650-square-foot (60 m2) one-bedroom apartment.
Parker won the lead role in Rome and Jewel, a hip-hop take on Romeo and Juliet in 2006 and had a smaller role in Pride, a film about an African American swim team, but it was Denzel Washington's, The Great Debaters that solidified Parker as a working actor.
In The Secret Life of Bees he played the love interest of Alicia Keys' character. The movie co-starred Queen Latifah, Dakota Fanning, Jennifer Hudson, Alicia Keys, and Sophie Okonedo and was written and directed by Gina Prince-Bythewood based on the book of the same name by Sue Monk Kidd.
In 2014 he reunited with his The Secret Life of Bees director Gina Prince-Bythewood playing the male lead in her film Beyond the Lights. His performance was nominated for a Black Reel Award for Best Actor and a Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture.
For years Parker was interested in making a film based on the life of Nat Turner. In 2014 he announced that he had funding and was working on assembling his team, and that the film would be called The Birth of a Nation in an ironic tribute to the famously racist 1915 film of the same name. In addition to writing and directing Parker cast himself as Turner. Aja Naomi King, Armie Hammer and Gabrielle Union were also cast in key roles. After 7 years, and $100,000 of his money, Nate had finished a masterpiece and The Birth of a Nation was excepted into this year's Sundance festival. Parker, who wrote, directed and starred in the slave-rebellion drama, sold his film for distribution with Fox Searchlight's for $17.5 million. Streaming giant like Netflix was offering $20 million, according to multiple sources.
Parker aspires to provide scholarships to youth between the ages of 17 and 25 at Wiley College through the 100 Men of Excellence Initiative. He has been a supporter of Boys & Girls Clubs of America as well as a program called Peace4Kids, which is a program for foster youths and underprivileged youth in South Los Angeles, California where kids are involved in daily activities that stimulate and nurture creativity and intellect. Parker also coaches a wrestling team of 10, 11 and 12-year-olds at Rosemead High School and he assists in coaching wrestling at Rio Hondo College. Parker was an active supporter of and volunteer for the 2008 Barack Obama presidential campaign
Black History Mini Docs - History Made
