On “This Is Us,” which aired from 2016 to 2022, Mr. Jones performed William “Shakespeare” Hill, whose life is renewed by his relationship with the household of his son Randall Pearson, performed by Sterling Ok. Brown.
Mr. Jones performed a extra central position within the collection’ early seasons however appeared in some type in all six seasons of the present, which included time-jumping narratives providing recurring alternatives for its actors even after their characters’ deaths.
Mr. Jones, who gained Emmys for finest visitor actor in a drama collection in 2018 and 2020, spent most of his profession within the theater earlier than and after “This Is Us.”
On Broadway in 2021, he performed a truck-stop prepare dinner in playwright Lynn Nottage’s “Clyde’s” — a task that introduced him a Drama Desk Award and a Tony Award nomination for finest actor in a featured position in a play.
Mr. Jones was born in Paterson, N.J., on Jan. 8, 1957. He graduated in 1978 from close by Ramapo Faculty and struggled to search out work in theater.
His profession acquired a jump-start within the mid-1980s when he started hanging out and collaborating on the Nuyorican Poets Cafe, a significant inventive hub for poetry, hip-hop and the performing arts.
A breakout position got here in 1994 when he performed a drug vendor in playwright Cheryl L. West’s drama “Vacation Coronary heart.”
He would spend the following many years always within the theater, typically in off-Broadway performs in New York, together with a title flip as Shakespeare’s “Richard III” on the Public Theater and in roles with the Steppenwolf Theatre Firm in Chicago.
His movie appearances included “Half Nelson” (2006) with Ryan Gosling and “Dolemite Is My Identify” (2019) with Eddie Murphy.
Survivors embody a daughter, actress Jasmine Cephas Jones. No different data on survivors was instantly out there.