 
Gary Dourdan
GARY DOURDAN doesn’t follow the pack—he leads it. You won’t find this actor chasing trends.
“I’ve never liked catergories; I’ve never liked boxes; I’ve always tried to be unconventional as
much as I possibly could,” he says.
Currently, Dourdan can be seen starring as Warrick Brown,a toughened, risk-taking, crime scene
investigator in the acclaimed CBS-TV series C.S.I., which was the highest-rated new drama of the
2000-2001 television season.
Dourdan can also be seen in a recurring role on the popular Showtime cable television series
Soul Food, and he is scheduled to appear on the big screen in the upcoming suspense
film, The Imposter, with Mekhi Phifer, Gary Sinise and Vincent D’Onofrio.
But Dourdan, 34, is no stranger to the many fans who have followed his arresting talent and
smoldering good looks from his days on the television show A Different World as the
con artist, Shazza. All of the characters he plays are edgy and multilayered, and it seems one
of his many talents is in portraying complex characters.
“One thing I’m trying to do with my career and with my craft is to blur the line between
what people think African-Americans should play and what I’m doing,” he says. “I’m
not much into fads and fashions and trying to follow things.”
In fact, Dourdan was one of the first Black male actors to wear ‘locks in Hollywood. “When
I was growing my ‘locks, I was the only one doing that on TV,” he says. Although the ‘locks
endeared him to the ladies, he says, he kept getting cast as a pimp or a drug dealer. “I turned
around and there were more ‘locks on TV, and I just decided to cut mine and renew myself
and go about things differently.”
Born and raised in Philadelphia, Gary Dourdan began his acting career at an early age when
he enrolled in a prestigious inner-city program called “Freedom Theater.” He expanded on his
theater roots and began to making weekly trips into New York for auditions and music lessons.
He relocated to New York City where his career escalated to numerous roles in off-Broadway
plays.
Today the 6-foot-2 actor lives in Los Angeles, in a “village of artists and sculptors” who leave
him to his acting and music. Divorced from model Roshumba since 1994 (his only comment
on his current love life is that he is “single”), he recently moved his father out to Los Angeles,
while his mom and sisters live in the Washington area. As one of five children, Dourdan says
he wasn’t raised to depend on star treatment. “My family keeps me grounded,” he says. “I wasn’t
raised that way. I’m not full of myself like other cats I know.” And although his fans now easily
recognize him, he doesn’t let it go to his head. “I have to protect myself because people think
that because you come into 25 million homes every week, they know you. I walk the line between
being gracious and being rude.”
Today he also walks effortlessly among the theatre, the small screen and the big screen by insisting
on good scripts. “As long as the material is good, then I’m with it,” he says, adding that “we’ve come
to an age where the lines are being blurred between good TV and good film.”
He is in pre-production currently with his pet project, Slipping into Darkness, he says.
The film, about a counselor who winds up slipping into the same difficulty as his young clients,
features a “tour-de-force” script, he says.
An accomplished musician, he is producing vocalist Naomi Nsombi as well as music in his own
studio. He recently released his first CD.
The talented entertainer foresees a long and varied career in Hollywood, similar to those of his
“heroes,” Sidney Poitier, Harry Belafonte and Billy Dee Williams. He says people find it
strange that he is a musician who can act and also produce. “Men like Gregory Hines dance,
act and do Broadway, so I don’t think it’s a big deal because we have come up in this
community of artists,” he says.
Control is Dourdan’s goal as he matures in his career. “I want to own my own production company,
direct my own projects,” he says, “because in Hollywood, even if you’re an ‘A-list’ actor, you’re
very powerless. You don’t have much control over your final project.”
Dourdan’s contemporaries are Jada Pinkett-Smith, Will Smith, Terrence Howard and Cuba Gooding,
Jr., all actors who have achieved big film and/or financial success. “They are all doing great work
and we’re all in different places in our careers,” he says. “I’d like to think of my career as an artist;
it’s God speaking through me and I’m trying to communicate all that I am. I’m not in a race. I’ve
always been a late bloomer.”  ~Click Pic Below To View Larger Version~    |
