Jamie Foxx was only seven months old when his parents split up so his grandparents stepped in and adopted him. As a boy, he was a member of the Boy Scouts of America and sang with the church choir. During high school, his interests turned towards athletics and he became quarterback for his high school team.

Though he studied music in college, his life changed in 1989 when a girlfriend challenged him to get up onstage at the Comedy Club. Foxx's career was launched into overdrive when he was cast on the groundbreaking Fox sketch series In Living Color. Foxx spent three seasons on the show developing a wide array of characters. Foxx also had a recurring role on the critically acclaimed show Roc, in which he played Crazy George.

After In Living Color, he decided to go solo and create his own T.V. series. In 1996, he became the star, co-creator and producer of The Jamie Foxx Show, one of the WB network's most highly-rated shows. The sitcom followed the silly problems of a young man, Jamie King (played by Foxx), who worked in a hotel with Braxton, Fancy, and his uncle.

Jamie took his feature film career to the next level in 2001 with his riveting performance in Ali starring Will Smith, for which he won a 2002 Black Reel Award as Best Supporting Actor and a 2002 Image Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor.

While 2002 was a great year for Jamie 2004 would prove to be the year of the Foxx. It suddenly seemed he was everywhere, receiving applause from critics and audiences alike for his work in Collateral (2004) opposite Tom Cruise, in the TV movie Redemption: The Stan Tookie Williams Story (2004) and in the critically-acclaimed motion picture Ray (2004). Foxx made history when he received nominations for three Golden Globes for Best Musical Or Comedy Actor for Ray,  Best Actor In A TV Movie Or Miniseries for Redemption and Best Supporting Actor for Collateral. He won the Golden Globe award for his exceptional portrayal of Ray Charles in Ray. 

The Golden Globe's win was followed up by two 2004 Academy Award nominations: a Supporting Actor nomination for Collateral and a Leading Actor nomination for Ray. Foxx led a record five nominations for four black actors, the most in any year in Academy history. He also became only the third actor (after Barry Fitzgerald and Al Pacino) to win best and supporting nominations the same year. His eerie channeling of blind music star Ray Charles in Ray makes him the odds-on favorite to win the Oscar. His supporting nod honors his turn in Collateral as an L.A. cabbie forced to squire hit man Tom Cruise around town.

Jamie Foxx IS Ray Charles in the high-energy portrait of an exceptional man who became an American icon. Born in a poor African American town in central Florida, Ray Charles went blind at the age of 7. With the staunch support of his determined single mother, he developed the fierce resolve, wit and incredible talent that would eventually enable him to overcome not only Jim Crow Racism and the cruel prejudices against the blind, but also discover his own sound which revolutionized American popular music. Nonetheless, as Ray's unprecedented fame grew, so did his weakness for drugs and women, until they threatened to strip away the very things he held most dear. This little known story of Ray Charles' meteoric rise from humble beginnings, his successful struggle to excel in a sighted world and his eventual defeat of his own personal demons make for an inspiring and unforgettable true story of human triumph.

Foxx insists that Wesley Snipes' performance in New Jack City triggered his quest for big screen stardom. The 1991 movie made him realize black actors could succeed in white-dominated Hollywood and proved that lack actors are not limited to stereotypical roles. The 37-year-old says, "My favorite film is New Jack City with Wesley Snipes. This was basically a black version of The Godfather and even though it was a hit it was more like an underground film. A lot of people don't know that Wesley Snipes played opposite Michael Jackson in the BAD video. He's the one who says, 'You ain't bad, you ain't nothing!' He went from that to New Jack City and it was the first time you saw a black kid play a role like Al Pacino in Scarface or The Godfather."

Foxx is very proud of his accomplishments and hopes that he can inspire someone else. "We have been so flooded with so many negative things in our community so for something positive like this to happen it makes those kids and everybody just say, 'Man, maybe I can do it like Jamie Foxx did.'" He says.