Devon iott biography of barack

This article originally appeared in the January 2016 issue of ELLE.

With Barack Obama's eight-year presidency almost in rearview, the culture at large is due for a wave of biographies and biopics set to reveal what, exactly, his legacy will look like.

I always think of him as this superhero figure; [in actuality] he was the quiet guy in the corner, still trying to discover himself. I've always idolized him as a young man."

For that reason, Devon "just wanted to portray him as a person and understand his mindset and get into that physicality." But while it's always a little daunting to play a real person, it's a slightly different task to portray a young man who could be any 20-year-old college student, while knowing full well that he will eventually become the first black president of the United States.

Research for the film included reading Obama's books The Audacity of Hope and Dreams From My Father, the latter of which heavily influenced the movie.

"I had an emotional connection and absolutely loved it," he tells Teen Vogue.

The actor, who hails from the city of Perth in Australia, has said in the past that playing Obama was his dream role. But for everything we know about the president in the information age, Devon says he was most surprised to learn that Barack — or Barry, as he was called during his college years — "was a normal guy who just wanted to create change, but [maybe not] to the degree that I think he ended up doing.

First among them is Netflix's new quiet, contemplative feature film Barry—partially based on Obama's 1995 memoir, Dreams From My Father—which details his junior year at New York's Columbia University. He is of mixed ethnicity of Afro-American and anglo-Indian ethnicity/heritage//ancestry.

Devon Terrell Height and Measurements

How tall is Terrell? Devon stands at an average height of 5 feet 11 inches (1.8 m).

"My agent said, 'Look, there's a film that's coming out. He then attended the auditions of ‘Barry’ a biopic about Barack Obama’s college years.

For him to secure a role in the film he had to work with a dialect coach and also watched Obama’s speeches to master his accent.

"I've always idolized Barack," says the half-African American, half-Anglo Indian Terrell, a Long Beach, California, native who moved to Perth at age five and studied drama at Sydney's National Institute of Dramatic Art. "The world knows and respects him, but as a young man grappling with a lot of the things Barry had to—constantly asking that question of 'Where do I fit in?'—I wanted to tell the story underneath."

Terrell's portrayal shows off many identifiable Barackisms: the smile, the considered poise, and, yes, the sometimes halting, always mesmerizing baritone voice (nuanced, not caricatured).

He was offered the part after one audition. 

He also trained himself to portray the left-handed Obama, including learning how to write and play basketball with his left hand. There is a lot Barry must navigate to become his own man; the audience knows who that man will be, but it seems, in the movie, that he does not.

Devon Terrell Biography | Wiki

Devon Terrell is an American-Australian actor globally recognized for portraying his role in the 2016 biographical film ‘Barry’ as a young Barack Obama and in the Netflix series Cursed as Arthur.