William Jackson Harper
William Jackson Harper is an actor, born 1980.
William Fitzgerald Harper, who acts as William Jackson Harper, is a playwright as well as a performer, and the writing shows in how he acts: he treats a scene as a structure rather than a chance. Before anyone knew his name he was taking the parts that go to New York stage actors on the way up, an unnamed assistant in All Good Things (2010), Zak Rausch in True Story (2015), Everett in Paterson (2016).
Chidi Anagonye made him. The Good Place, from 2016 to 2020, ran on a joke that dies fast in most hands, a man agonizing over every available choice, and Harper's solution was to play it as genuine physical distress, a stomach ache with a vocabulary. It brought him an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series.
The years since have been unusually well chosen for someone coming off a network sitcom. Josh in Midsommar (2019), James Ross in Dark Waters the same year, Royal in The Underground Railroad (2021), Noah Reed in The Resort, Mr. Campbell in Landscape with Invisible Hand, Wes Jordan in A Man in Full (2024). He is a rare American lead who can hold a scene by listening to it, and directors who understand that have used him well. Quaz in Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is the exception, and everybody involved knows what that one was for.
Movies (9)
TV (7)
Where to start with William Jackson Harper
Almost everyone arrives at Harper through The Good Place, and that is the right door: it is the only thing here built around him, and the performance holds up better than the show's later machinery.
After that, split by mood. Midsommar is the one people quote, and he is the closest thing it has to a reasonable person, a thankless job done well. The Underground Railroad is the best acting in this pool by some distance and the hardest watch. Paterson is the one where a small part does the most work. Dark Waters and A Man in Full are the grown-up procedural work, The Resort is the odd, likeable one, and Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania is for people completing a Marvel set.