Jaye Davidson

 

Oscar-nominated actor Jaye Davidson made two feature films back in the '90s and then retired from motion pictures, though he still works as a model and promoter.

Davidson's debut was as Dil, a transgender woman and agent provocateur in Neil Jordan's The Crying Game (1992). Jordan's script won the Oscar for best piece written directly for the screen. As rich as Jordan's story is -- and despite intriguing performances by Stephen Rea, Miranda Richardson and Forest Whitaker -- it was Davidson's full-frontal "reveal" that jettisoned the film into the realm of cinema legend.

Davidson, who is openly gay and married to Thomas Clarke, has said he retired from acting because the fame grew to be too much for him. Two years after The Crying Game, he appeared as the alien invader in Roland Emmerich's Stargate, a role for which he said he was paid $1 million. And that, for all intents and purposes, was it.

The son of a Black Ghanaian father and white English mother, Davidson was the first British person of color to be nominated for an Academy Award.

That's quite a footnote.