Vin Diesel: Difference between revisions

Vin Diesel (born Mark Sinclair Vincent on July 18, 1967 in New York City) is a biracial/multi-ethnic (is at least of Italian, Mexican, Irish, German, Dominican ancestry) American actor, writer, director, and producer. Diesel is also the founder of the production companies OneRace Films and Tigon Studios. Diesel is distinguished by a bald head, muscular physique, and deep, textured baritone voice.

Born in New York City on July 18, 1967, Diesel made his stage debut at the age of seven in Theatre for the New City, which was produced in Greenwich Village. He continued to be involved with the theatre throughout his adolescence, and he went on to attend the city's Hunter College, where his studies in creative writing led him to begin writing screenplays. Diesel became active in filmmaking in the early 1990s, first earning notice for the short Multi-Facial, which was selected for screening at the 1995 Cannes Festival. He followed up Multi-Facial with his first feature-length film, 1997's Strays, an urban drama in which he cast himself as a gang boss whose love for a woman inspires him to try to change his ways. Written, directed, and produced by Diesel, the film was selected for competition at the 1997 Sundance Festival, which led to a deal with MTV to turn it into a series.

In an interview on Late Night with Conan O’Brien, he stated that he changed his name to Vin Diesel while he was working as a bouncer because in that business, one's real name is not generally given out. The name "Vin" is a shortened version of Vincent.

Diesel produced, directed, and starred in the 1994 short film Multi-Facial, a short semi-autobiographical film which follows the auditions of a struggling actor stuck in the audition process. With each film that he auditions for he is found to either be "too black" or "too white", or not black or white enough.

Diesel was cast in 1998's Saving Private Ryan on the poignancy of his performance in Multi-Facial, and followed it up with major roles in Pitch Black and Boiler Room (2000). He also received critical acclaim for his voice work as the title character in The Iron Giant (1999). He broke through to mainstream audiences with the 2001 film The Fast and the Furious and the 2002 film xXx. In 2004, he reprised his role as Pitch Black's Riddick in The Chronicles of Riddick. He has announced his intention to direct Hannibal, and star as the legendary Carthaginian general who crossed the Alps by elephant to attack Rome.

Diesel was originally offered the lead role in Doom, but turned it down. The role eventually went to The Rock.

He also will star as the popular video game assasin Codename 47 in the adaption of the Hitman video game series.

As a teenager, Diesel was a skilled breakdancer and appeared in an instructional video on breakdancing.^[1] He appeared as a dancer in music videos for the rapper Kwamé, who is his cousin.^[2] Diesel is a long time fan and player of Dungeons & Dragons and other role playing games, a fact that he proudly states in various interviews.^[3] He occasionally makes reference to D&D in his films, such as in xXx where one of the tattoos on Xander Cage (Diesel's character) reads "Melkor," the name of one of Diesel's old player characters. (Melkor is also the original name of the Satan-like character in The Silmarillion and other Tolkien stories.) It has been said that his portrayal of Richard Riddick in the Pitch Black series of movies and games is based somewhat on this favorite character, a Drow "witch-hunter" who was a loner, and that Diesel has the character's image tattooed on his leg. He has also written the foreword to the commemorative book 30 Years of Adventure: A Celebration of D&D, a collection of stories and essays which chronicles the history of D&D.

Diesel is also an avid fan of video games. He currently owns his own game studio, Tigon Studios, which produced The Chronicles of Riddick: Escape from Butcher Bay, a successful Xbox and PC game. His likeness and voice are featured in the game. At the 2006 Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los Angeles, a trailer for another game with his likeness, entitled The Wheelman, was shown.

In a 2004 interview in USA Today,^[4] Diesel denied rumors that he is gay. In fact, actress Karrine Steffans chronicled a sexual encounter she shared with him in her controversial book, "Confessions of a Video Vixen."

1. Hitman (200X) (executive producer)
2. Rockfish (200X) (producer)
3. Find Me Guilty (2006) (producer)
4. Life is a Dream (2004) documentary (executive producer)
5. Chronicles of Riddick (2004) (executive producer)
6. A Man Apart (2003) (executive producer)
7. xXx (2002) (executive producer)
8. Strays (1997) (executive producer) (producer)
9. Multi-Facial (1994) (producer)

1. Hannibal (200X) .... Hannibal Barca - annouanced - soft-pre-production
2. Strays (1997)
3. Multi-Facial (1994)

1. Strays (1997)
2. Multi-Facial (1994)

• The Chronicles of Riddick (2004) $11,500,000
• A Man Apart (2003) $2,500,000
• xXx (2002) $10,000,000
• The Fast and the Furious (2001) $2,000,000
• Saving Private Ryan (1998) $100,000

There is an Internet meme growing around Vin Diesel, where the joke is to suggest superhuman feats supposedly accomplished by him. They are always focused into his (alleged) greatness, prowess and "awesomeness," in a humorous way. 800 or so of the original alleged facts come from a thread in the SomethingAwful forums [2] by forum member ScootsMagoo. They have been cited in forum signatures and small compilations. Examples include "In an average living room there are 1,242 objects Vin Diesel could use to kill you, including the room itself." and "The letters in Vin Diesel's name can be rearanged to I end lives". This, however, is not an entirely original fact as it has been done with other people in the past and all of these are predated by a Saturday Night Live sketch about Bill Brasky. These all owe lineage to tall tales such as those of Paul Bunyan. A set of Chuck Norris Facts was started, based on the popularity of the Vin Diesel facts, as well as facts for Mr. T and Jack Bauer.

• Vin Diesel has mentioned on several occasions that his favourite actress is Dame Judi Dench. This may go some way to explaining her appearence in The Chronicles of Riddick.
• Due to keeping his head so closely shaven, many speculate on how much hair Vin Diesel actually has. It was once said that even his publicist was not sure if Diesel was capable of growing a full head of hair. After filming Find Me Guilty, Vin would not discuss whether the hair on his characters head was real or prosthetic.
• Vin Diesel is a first cousin of former rapper Kwamé.^{[citation needed]}

• Vin Diesel at IMDb