You can call Courtney B. Vance an `overnight sensation,' But you would be wrong
Since his debut in the original Broadway productions of August Wilson's “Fences” and John Guare's “Six Degrees of Separation,” Courtney B. Vance has jumped between stage and screen, playing an extensive gallery of strong, vibrant characters in a career that has spanned almost four decades.
But while his Tony Award-winning role in 2013's “Lucky Guy” and appearances in “The Hunt For Red October,” “Picket Fences,” “Law & Order: Criminal Intent,” “The Closer,” “The Preacher's Wife,” “Isle of Dogs” and scores of other projects established Vance as a familiar presence to audiences, the breakout role that would display the full range of his craft remained elusive.
His defense of O.J. Simpson proved to be a game-changer.
Vance's sly portrayal of Simpson's cunning defense attorney Johnnie Cochran was a standout of FX's “The People v. O.J. Simpson: American Crime Story,” scoring the actor an Emmy and opening the door to more prominent roles.
“Folks saw `O.J.' and said, `Wow, this guy is an overnight sensation,'” Vance said with a slight chuckle during a recent Zoom interview. “So I said, `OK, I'll take that.'”
His subsequent projects — including HBO's “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks” and NatGeo's “Genius: Aretha” — won him more praise, and his guest role as a traveling guidebook author in HBO's “Lovecraft Country” brought another Emmy.
The actor is now the lead in AMC's “61st
Street,” playing a veteran
Courtney B. Vance arrives at the 26th Screen Actors Guild Awards at the Los Angeles Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall on.
public defender just days from retirement who gets wrapped up in the charged case of a Black collegebound athlete accused of killing a white Chicago police detective. Already burdened with serious health and family issues, Vance's character, Franklin Roberts, steps up to defend the young man — a decision that does not sit well with his activist wife, Martha (Aunjanue Ellis), and other members of the community.
Premiering Sunday, the drama, which lists Michael B. Jordan as an executive producer, is already generating buzz, winning an Audience Award at last
month's SXSW Film Festival. And it continues Vance's streak of projects that grapple with the often-explosive subject matter of race and racism.
Said Vance: “I'm still trying to find projects that ask questions, are about provocative issues, that are fun to do and make a little money. My wife and I, we will literally sit there and say, `Is this worth doing?' We will literally ask ourselves that question because sometimes it's not clear.”
During the interview, Vance, who is married to actor Angela Bassett (“Black Panther,” “9-11”) spoke of the impact of “The People v. O.J. Simpson,” race in Hollywood and his memories of working with Whitney Houston, his “Preacher's Wife” co-star.
Q: You've always had a busy and steady career. But it seems like you've become even busier since your Emmy win for `The People v. O.J. Simpson.'
A: Things shifted after “O.J.” Prior to that, I still had to audition for everything. But after “O.J.” and coming up on being 60 years old, I said, “OK, I think I've earned a little right to at least have something presented to me.” The Emmy gave me that.
Q: Were you surprised that series made such an impact?
A: There were people who thought “O.J.” would not do well because everyone knows what happened. We all saw the news coverage. But we hadn't seen what happened in the bedroom between Johnnie and his wife as he was picking out his tie and she told him not to wear a purple tie because it made him look like a grape. That's the kind of stuff people wanted to know.
We see at every turn that Johnnie is out-dueling Marcia Clark. She had no idea what she was entering into, and thought it was business as usual until it was too late. Those are the kinds of things that made the show bigger, bigger than the actual case. It took on a life of its own. We knew we had a great project, but did we know people would get behind it and make it the thing to see? Nobody knows that. The reception is not up to us.