Dwayne Johnson

Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson is an American actor, producer and professional wrestler who is most popularly known with his ring name The Rock. Currently signed to WWE on a part-time contract, Johnson was a college football player for the University of Miami, where he won a national championship on the 1991 Miami Hurricanes football team. He later played for the Calgary Stampeders in the Canadian Football League, and was cut two months into the 1995 season. This led him to become a professional wrestler like his grandfather, Peter Maivia, and his father, Rocky Johnson. He then gained fame in World Wrestling Entertainment and Johnson has 17 championship reigns in WWE, including 10 as a world champion, winning the WWF/WWE Championship eight times (seventh reign was as WWE Undisputed Champion) and the WCW/World Championship twice. He won the WWF Intercontinental Championship twice and the WWF Tag Team Championship five times. Johnson is the sixth Triple Crown Champion in WWE history, and won the 2000 Royal Rumble. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time. He then started to concentrate on Hollywood and made his debut as a lead in The Scorpion King and later he got featured in many movies. He is also a part of the Fast & Furious series and he also hosted and produces the reality competition series titled The Hero. He also stars in Forbes listed Johnson No. 25 in the Top 100 Most Powerful Celebrities in 2013. He is the world's highest-paid actor of 2016. . In 2015, Muscle & Fitness named Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as their "Man of the Century. Time named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2016

He was born as Dwayne Douglas Johnson on 2 May 1972 in Hayward, California, United States. His father Rocky Johnson was a professional wrestler while his mother Ata Maivia was the daughter of a wrestler. His father is of Black Nova Scotian origin, and his mother is of Samoan heritage which explains his exotic looks. He lived in New Zealand for a brief period and attended the Richmond Road Primary School, before returning to the United States where he enrolled at the Freedom High School. He was an athletic teenager and participated in several sporting activities. He played football and was also a member of the school's track and field and wrestling teams. His favorite sport was football and he received a full scholarship from the University of Miami to play defensive tackle. However, an injury dashed his dreams of a football career. He graduated in 1995, with a Bachelor of General Studies degree in criminology and physiology. He decided to train as a wrestler and received his initial training from his father. Dwayne Johnson made his WWF debut as Rocky Maivia in 1996 and won the WWF Intercontinental Championship from Hunter Hearst Helmsley on Monday Night Raw the next year. He eventually changed his ring name to ‘The Rock’ and established himself as a successful professional wrestler with several titles under his belt. His wrestling prowess combined with his rugged good-looks made him very popular among the female fans and soon he started receiving offers to appear on the small and the big screen. After appearing in a music video, he hosted ‘Saturday Night Live’ in 2000. He made his motion picture debut as The Scorpion King in the opening sequence of the film ‘The Mummy Returns’ in 2001. The success of the movie led to its spin-off ‘The Scorpion King’ in 2002 in which Johnson played the role of Mathayus. He was reportedly paid US $5.5 million for this movie which eventually became a moderate success. He played the role of Joe Kingman, a divorced father, in the family sports comedy film, ‘The Game Plan’, in 2007. The movie opened at No. 1 at the box office, grossing $22,950,971 in its first weekend in spite of getting negative reviews from critics. In 2009, he appeared in the science fiction film, ‘Race to Witch Mountain’, based on the novel ‘Escape to Witch Mountain’ by Alexander Key. This film too opened at No. 1 and became a huge box office hit. In 2011, Dwayne Johnson appeared in the fifth film of The Fast and the Furious film series, ‘Fast Five’, as Luke Hobbs, a Diplomatic Security Service agent. The film grossed over $86 million in its opening weekend and became one of Johnson’s biggest commercial hits. He reprised his role as Luke Hobbs in ‘Fast & Furious 6’, the sixth installment in The Fast and the Furious franchise, in 2013. He had Vin Diesel, Paul Walker, Gina Carano, and John Ortiz as co-stars. The film grossed over $780 million worldwide, making it No. 50 on the all-time worldwide list of highest-grossing films. In 2015 he appeared in the seventh installment in The Fast and the Furious franchise, ‘Furious 7’. This film too became a blockbuster like the earlier movies in the franchise and also received critical praise for the action sequences.

Dwayne Johnson married his longtime girlfriend Dany Garcia on 3 May 1997. The couple had a daughter, Simone Alexandra, a few years later. They separated amicably in 2007. He has received many awards and nominations for his contribution. In 2001, he won the Teen Choice Awards in the category “Film – Choice Sleazebag” for the movie ‘The Mummy Returns’. The CinemaCon Awards 2012 honored him with the Action Star of the Year Award. He won the Kids' Choice Awards for Favorite Male Butt Kicker for ‘Journey 2: The Mysterious Island’ in 2013.He also stars in Forbes listed Johnson No. 25 in the Top 100 Most Powerful Celebrities in 2013. He is the world's highest-paid actor of 2016. . In 2015, Muscle & Fitness named Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson as their "Man of the Century. Time named him one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2016.