Dwayne Johnson

Dwayne Douglas Johnson (born May 2, 1972), also known by his ring name "the Rock", is an American actor and professional wrestler. He is signed to WWE, where he performs on a part-time basis. Widely regarded as one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time, Johnson was integral to the development and success of the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) during the Attitude Era. He wrestled for the WWF full-time for eight years before pursuing an acting career. His films have grossed over $11.4 billion worldwide, making him one of the world's highest-grossing actors of all time. He is a co-owner of the United Football League, a member of the board of directors of TKO Group Holdings—the parent company of UFC and WWE—and co-founder of Seven Bucks Productions.

After accepting an athletic scholarship to play football at the University of Miami, Johnson was a member of the 1991 national championship team but was largely a backup player. Despite aspirations to play professional football, he went undrafted in the 1995 NFL draft, and briefly signed with the Calgary Stampeders before being cut in his first season. In 1996, his father assisted in helping him secure a contract with the WWF. Johnson quickly rose to global prominence, aided by a gimmick he employed as a charismatic trash talker. Johnson left the WWE in 2004; he returned in 2011 as a part-time performer until 2013 and made sporadic appearances until his retirement in 2019; in 2023, he returned once again on a part-time basis. A 10-time world champion—including the promotion's first of African descent—he is also a two-time Intercontinental Champion, a five-time Tag Team Champion, the 2000 Royal Rumble winner, and WWE's sixth Triple Crown champion. Johnson headlined multiple pay-per-view events, including WWE's flagship event WrestleMania six times (15, 16, 17, 28, 29, and 40 – Night 1) which includes the most-bought professional wrestling pay-per-view (WrestleMania 28) and main evented the most-watched episodes of WWE's flagship television series (Raw and SmackDown).

Johnson's first film role was in The Mummy Returns (2001). The next year, he played his first leading role in the action fantasy film The Scorpion King. He has since starred in family films The Game Plan (2007), Race to Witch Mountain (2009), Tooth Fairy (2010), Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017), Jumanji: The Next Level (2019), and Jungle Cruise (2021), and the action films Journey 2: The Mysterious Island (2012), G.I. Joe: Retaliation (2013), Hercules (2014), Skyscraper (2018), San Andreas (2015) and Rampage (2018). He also starred in the action comedy films Get Smart (2008), Central Intelligence (2016), Baywatch (2017), and Red Notice (2021). His role as Luke Hobbs in the Fast & Furious films, beginning with Fast Five (2011), helped the franchise become one of the highest-grossing in film. He joined the DC Extended Universe by playing the title role in Black Adam (2022). He has also voiced Maui in the Disney animated film Moana (2016), and its sequel Moana 2 (2024), and will reprise the role in the 2026 live-action remake. He received critical praise for his dramatic turn as MMA fighter Mark Kerr in the sports biopic The Smashing Machine (2025).

Johnson produced and starred in the HBO comedy-drama series Ballers (2015–2019) and the autobiographical sitcom Young Rock (2021–2023). His autobiography, The Rock Says, was released in 2000 and was a New York Times bestseller. In 2016 and 2019, Time named him as one of the world's most influential people.

Early life and education

Johnson was born in Hayward, California, on May 2, 1972, the son of former professional wrestler Rocky Johnson (born Wayde Douglas Bowles) and Mataniufeagaimaleata "Ata" Fitisemanu (née Maivia). Growing up, he briefly lived in Grey Lynn in Auckland, New Zealand, with his mother's family, where he played rugby and attended Richmond Road Primary School before returning to the U.S.

Johnson's father was a Black Nova Scotian with a small amount of Irish ancestry, and his mother is Samoan. His father and Tony Atlas were the first black tag team champions in WWE history, in 1983. Johnson's uncle Ricky was also a wrestler. His mother is the adopted daughter of Peter Maivia, who was also a professional wrestler. Johnson's maternal grandmother Lia was one of the first female pro wrestling promoters, taking over Polynesian Pacific Pro Wrestling after her husband's death in 1982 and managing it until 1988. Through his maternal grandfather Maivia, Johnson is a non-blood relative of the Anoaʻi wrestling family. In 2008, he inducted his father and grandfather into the WWE Hall of Fame.

Johnson attended Montclaire Elementary School in Charlotte, North Carolina, and then moved to Hamden, Connecticut, where he attended Shepherd Glen Elementary School and then Hamden Middle School. He attended President William McKinley High School in Honolulu and then Glencliff High School and McGavock High School, both in Nashville, Tennessee, and then Freedom High School in Bethlehem Township, Pennsylvania, in the Lehigh Valley region of the state, where he graduated in 1990.

At Freedom High School, Johnson initially struggled and was drawn into a culture of conflict and petty crime. By age 17, he had been arrested several times for fighting, theft, and check fraud, and was suspended two weeks for fighting. An article in the local newspaper labeled him "a troubled teenager with a history of run-ins with police". But Freedom High School football coach Jody Cwik saw athletic potential in Johnson, and recruited him to join the school's football team, where he played defensive tackle, an experience that proved to be a significant personal transformation for Johnson. "My thought process started to change. That's when I started thinking about goals and what I wanted to accomplish", he has since said about his high school football experience. In addition to playing football, Johnson also was a member of Freedom High School's track and field and wrestling teams.

By his senior year at Freedom High School, Johnson had played only two years of football, but was offered a full athletic scholarship from the University of Miami, whose football program was beginning to emerge as one of the nation's top-level NCAA Division I teams.

Football career

College career

As he did in high school, Johnson continued to play defensive tackle at the University of Miami, where he was a member of the Miami Hurricanes 1991 team, which won that year's national championship. Despite playing four years there, however, Johnson found himself behind elite players on the depth chart, including future NFL star and Pro Football Hall of Fame inductee Warren Sapp, and appeared mostly in backup roles. In his time at Miami, Johnson played in 39 games with one start. He recorded 4.5 sacks and 77 tackles.

In 1995, Johnson graduated with a Bachelor of General Studies and a dual major in criminology and physiology. He was also one of the university's most prolific student speakers in the Miami-area community, frequently delivering positive messages about his own struggles and encouraging students to remain in school and avoid the dangers of drug use.

Canadian Football League

After graduating, Johnson was signed by the Calgary Stampeders of the Canadian Football League. Calgary moved him from defensive tackle to linebacker. He was assigned to Calgary's practice roster, but was cut two months into Calgary's 1995 season.

Professional wrestling career

Early career (1996)

After being cut by Calgary, Johnson began his professional wrestling career the next year, in 1996. Veteran wrestler Pat Patterson secured several tryout matches for Johnson with the World Wrestling Federation (WWF) in 1996. Wrestling at first under his real name, Johnson defeated The Brooklyn Brawler at a house show on March 10 and lost matches to Chris Candido and Owen Hart. After wrestling at Jerry Lawler's United States Wrestling Association under the name Flex Kavana and winning the USWA tag team championship twice with his partner Bart Sawyer in the summer of 1996, Johnson was signed to a WWF contract. He received additional training from Tom Prichard, alongside Brakkus and Mark Henry.