Harry Lennix

Currently: Making his Broadway debut as charismatic Pittsburgh mayoral hopeful Harmond Wilks in Radio Golf, August Wilson's final play.

Hometown: Chicago

From Seminary to Stage: Raised by his mother his dad died when Harry was almost two, Lennix attended Archbishop Quigley Preparatory Seminary with plans to become a Dominican priest. "Then I fell in love with a girl," he says with a laugh, "and I fell in love with acting. I realized that I really like becoming other people." After graduating from Northwestern University, he taught elementary school for eight years while establishing himself in Chicago's theatrical community. Among his first roles: Levee in August Wilson's Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, Malcolm X in The Meeting and Jay Gatsby in The Great Gatsby, "the ultimate romantic hero and one of my favorite parts of all time." On his casting as F. Scott Fitzgerald's mysterious Long Island tycoon, a role played on film by Robert Redford, Lennix says, "What better way to point up the fact that Gatsby is an outsider?"

The Wilson Way: Lennix worked closely with August Wilson when he played the title role in a developmental production of King Hedley II at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles in 2000, a year before the play made it to Broadway. "August was always challenging me," he recalls. "No matter what I brought to the part, he wanted more. You had to raise your game to reach the capacity of his writing. In film and television, most of the time you have to try to elevate the material; with August Wilson, you have to elevate yourself." Lennix admits that he felt "huge disappointment" when Brian Stokes Mitchell was chosen to play King Hedley on Broadway, "but interestingly enough, I ended up playing the great Rev. Adam Clayton Powell Jr. in a film of his life called Keep the Faith Baby. Stokes was up for that part, so we did a little swap."

Analyze This: In Radio Golf, Lennix's smooth-talking real estate developer-turned-candidate gets mired in a political mess when his plans for building a high-rise in a crumbling black neighborhood meet unexpected opposition. "Harmond has a crisis of conscience," the actor explains. "He's got a blood tie to the community, but he's also a forward-thinking man who's become separated from his past; he's been thinking about himself and not about his obligations to his people." A lover of physics, Lennix confesses that he wrote a lengthy essay about his character and even dreamed up an equation to define Harmond's struggle: Progress Equals Ambition Over Consciousness. "You can't move forward without ambition," he notes, "but it has to work in concert with your consciousness and your soul."

Let's Talk Politics: Because he's playing a charming political newcomer and, in real life, grew up in Chicago's African-American community, it seems natural to ask Lennix about presidential hopeful Barack Obama. "I know Barack, and I think he's a very attractive political figure," he says. "He hasn't had a lot of trial by fire—we don't really know what he stands for—but he shows a lot of promise." So, is Obama Lennix's choice for 2008? "I don't know who I'm for yet," he hedges. "I'm greatly encouraged by John Edwards, and I wish Al Gore would get into the race. I think Gore is the best person possible to fix this mess we're in." A Gore-Obama ticket "would be great, but anything is better than what we've got now."

Playing Nice: Lennix laughs heartily when told how he's described on the Internet Movie Database IMDB web site: "He usually plays uppity, unlikeable characters, such as in Barbershop 2 and Ray." His response? "I would suggest respectfully that they haven't seen the wide expanse of work." In fact, his roles range from classics the title role in Macbeth in L.A., Aaron the Moor in Julie Taymor's film of Titus and Tfana in Cymbeline with the Royal Shakespeare Company to the last two Matrix films and TV's Commander in Chief as Geena Davis's chief of staff and the current season of 24 as Walid Al-Rezani, a Muslim ambassador. "I attempted to warn the government of a plot to set off nuclear bombs and I got beaten up," he says of his role in the hit drama. "I was last seen in the hospital." Sounds like he played a good guy, not a bad guy. "That's correct," he says, chuckling again, "and not the least bit uppity or unlikeable!"

Eligible Bachelor: In previous interviews, the never-married Lennix mused about his desire to settle down and have kids. "It's never too late!" he teasingly points out. "There are a lot of pretty girls in L.A. There are pretty girls here, too, of course, but L.A. is the hub for every homecoming queen from the Midwest." Given the appeal of his Radio Golf character, it's safe to assume he'll have plenty of female autograph seekers at the stage door. "Well, it hasn't happened yet," he says, adding impishly, "Sometimes I think I scare people—or maybe they read about me on IMDB and think I'm uppity and unlikeable." That particular rumor can be safely put to rest.