My parents moved to Los Angeles when I was really young, but I spent every summer with my grandparents, and I'd stay with my grandfather on the farm in Longview. He was retired from the railroad, and he had a small farm with some cows and some pigs. I remember part of my youth was feeding hogs and plowing fields and stuff, so that's a part of me.

His performance earned him the 2007 Academy Award for Best Actor in a Leading Role making him the fourth African-American actor in history to do so joining the ranks of Sidney Poitier Denzel Washington and Jamie Foxx. On Inside the Actors Studio Whitaker said that a genetic test indicated he was of Igbo descent on his father's side and Akan descent on his mother's side. Ron Hubbard.

Forest Steven Whitaker (born July 15 1961) is an American actor producer and director. Whitaker has also won a Golden Globe and a BAFTA.