Michael Jai White
American actor and fight choreographer holding black belts in, among others, Kyokushin karate, Goju-ryu and Shotokan, who himself choreographed the film Blood and Bone (2009).
Quick Facts
United StatesBiography
Michael Jai White is an American actor, fight choreographer and director, born November 10, 1967, in New York.
He began martial arts training at seven with jujutsu and has gone through nine different styles in total. He studied Goju-ryu under master Eddie Morales. He holds black belts in Kyokushin karate, Goju-ryu and Shotokan, as well as in taekwondo, Tang Soo Do, kobudo and wushu.
He had a breakthrough role as Mike Tyson in the HBO television film Tyson (1995). In 1997 he portrayed Al Simmons in Spawn, becoming the first African American to play a major comic-book superhero in a live-action film, and was nominated for a Blockbuster Entertainment Award for Favorite Male Newcomer. In Kill Bill: Volume 2 (2004) he played a fighter in a scene that was cut from the theatrical version. He also appeared in Redbelt (2008). In 2009 he himself choreographed the fight scenes in Blood and Bone, in which he played the lead character Isaiah Bone, and he wrote the screenplay and played the lead role in Black Dynamite. He made his directorial debut in 2011 with Never Back Down 2: The Beatdown; in 2016 he directed, wrote and starred in Never Back Down: No Surrender.
In 2014 he received the Fists of Legends Decade Award at the Urban Action Showcase & Expo, where in November 2019 he also received the Mantle of The Black Dragon title. In 2015 he was inducted into the International Sports Hall of Fame, and in 2017 into the Martial Arts History Museum Hall of Fame. In November 2025 he became the first non-Asian recipient of the Bruce Lee Award.
Associated Martial Arts
An Okinawan striking art reshaped in the 20th century into Japanese budo and an Olympic sport. Built on kata and hand and foot techniques.
KyokushinNotable figure→A full-contact style of karate developed by Masutatsu Oyama. Fighting is without gloves, kicks to the head are allowed, punches and elbows to the face are not.
Filmography
A screen role does not mean the person actually practises the art — that is listed above.