Vin Diesel

In 1995 Vin Diesel wrote, directed and starred in a short film called Multi-Facial, about an actor of ambiguous racial background who keeps being turned away from auditions for not being the right ethnicity. The film was shown at the Cannes Film Festival, and Steven Spielberg saw it. Spielberg was so impressed that he wrote a part for Diesel in Saving Private Ryan, and the career of one of Hollywood's biggest action stars began with a story about rejection.

He was born Mark Sinclair on July 18, 1967, in Alameda County, California, at 3:35 in the afternoon, the time on his birth record, along with his twin brother, Paul. His mother, Delora, is an astrologer and psychologist, and his stepfather, Irving Vincent, was an acting teacher and theater manager. Diesel has said he never knew his biological father.

His Sun is in Cancer in the ninth house of faraway places and big ideas. Cancer puts kin above everything, and it is hard to find a more on-the-nose placement for the man whose Fast & Furious franchise turned the word "family" into its catchphrase. As Dominic Toretto, Diesel has spent more than two decades playing a man whose loyalty to his chosen family is absolute, and he has become the producer and guiding force of the series.

Scorpio is his rising sign, with Neptune in Scorpio in the first house. Scorpio gives an intense, powerful and secretive presence, and Neptune adds mystery and an image that is hard to pin down. Diesel's deep voice and impassive face became his trademark, and he has kept much of his private life and his background deliberately vague.

Mercury, retrograde in Cancer, sits in his eighth house of transformation, and Mars falls in the last degree of Libra in the twelfth house. Diesel grew up in a New York artists' housing complex in Greenwich Village, broke into a theater as a boy and was offered a part instead of punishment. Later he worked as a bouncer in Manhattan nightclubs, which is where the name Diesel came from.

His Moon is in Sagittarius in the second house of resources. A Sagittarius Moon is expansive and adventurous, and in the second house it suggests a broad, enthusiastic approach to building wealth. Diesel built a business empire around his franchises, including the Riddick films, which began with Pitch Black in 2000.

Venus, Uranus and Pluto, all in Virgo, fall in his tenth house of career and reputation, describing a career with sudden twists and reinventions. He also became the voice of Groot in the Guardians of the Galaxy films, a character who speaks only three words, "I am Groot."

Jupiter in Leo, also in his ninth house, suggests generosity and a big, warm public persona. When his friend and co-star Paul Walker died in a car crash in 2013, Diesel later named his daughter Pauline in his memory. The Cancer Sun built a career on family; the Scorpio Ascendant kept everything else private.