William Jackson Harper challenges the white default in the performing arts community
Written by Ashley Wehrs, featured image courtesy of SCAD, photography by Ashley Wehrs
Emmy award winning actor and playwright William Jackson Harper visited SCAD via Zoom for a new episode of “Guests and Gusto” on Sept. 29. Harper is well known for his role of Chidi Anagonye on “The Good Place” along with his roles in “Midsommar” and the anticipated new series “The Underground Railroad”. His “Guests and Gusto” appearance was moderated by SCAD Professor of performing arts Alpha Tyler.
Leading up to Harper’s role of the beloved Chidi Anagonye on “The Good Place”, he was actually ready to quit acting. “I had been doing a lot of theatre,” Harper said, “I was broke and I was in my mid-thirties living with several roommates. […] I missed a lot of important moments in friends’ lives. I couldn’t afford to go and get a ticket to a friend’s wedding.”
Harper’s audition process for “The Good Place” began in New York. Despite having gotten the role, he admitted to attendees that he felt his audition hadn’t gone well. When he was called back for a reading in Los Angeles, his attitude shifted. “You have to act like nothings at stake,” Harper said, “Looking to give a performance [rather] than get a job really helped.”
Harper was lead to consider leaving acting largely because of his inability to make a fair wage and find consistent work. “I really do feel artists, for what is required of them, should earn living wage. This isn’t a hobby [or] something we do for fun when it fits into [our] schedule,” Harper said, “I think we lose a lot of people in the industry because of the realities of it.”
Although many of us associate Harper with “The Good Place”, he has made a few stage appearances and holds a special place in his heart for theatre. “There is a lot of rehearsal, discovery, trying to find the inevitable yet surprising way to get to where the play is going,” Harper said. The actor also described theatre to be more interactive, where television can be solitary. “You rehearse the play long enough that it’s in your bones,” Harper stated.
In 2018, Harper had his debut script “Travisville” brought to stage. The play follows the lack of Civil Rights movement exposure in a city in Texas and the variety of African American perspectives on how to move forward. “They want a similar thing, but the ways they want to go around it are different,” Harper said.
Continuing to represent the authentic experiences of African Americans in history, Harper is acting in Berry Jenkin’s television adaption of “The Underground Railroad” by Colson Whitehead. Although the story explores the fictional concept of the underground railroad being an actual train, the story deconstructs the devastating effects of slavery. “It really unpacks how monstrous slavery was, not only physically but also psychologically and what it does to people,” Harper said, “This is a story about slavery that doesn’t let white people off the hook.”
As society, and more specifically the art community, continues working towards sharing diverse experiences, Harper hopes we can begin to shift the default and assumption that characters are white unless a script states otherwise. “If it’s not germane to the script, let’s just throw it all up,” Harper said.
