Doug E. Doug

Lively and charismatic, this young African-American performer segued from standup comedy to films and TV while barely out of his teens. Doug became a fixture on the New York comedy club circuit while attending college and working as an NBC security guard. Writer-director Spike Lee spotted the comic performing at the famed Apollo Theater in Harlem and invited him to do a walk on for his feature "Mo' Better Blues" (1990). This led to a co-starring role in "Hangin' With the Homeboys" (1991) as Willie, an embittered teen from Brooklyn. The performance earned the neophyte actor a best actor nomination for the Independent Spirit Award.

Doug followed up with a small role in Lee's "Jungle Fever" (1991) and more substantial parts in the cartoony Kid'N'Play vehicle, "Class Act" and the horror comedy "Dr. Giggles" (both 1992). He became the host and co-writer of "New Music Report", a local NYC music and talk show on WNBC. Doug joined ABC's primetime line up as the star and co-producer of "Where I Live" (1993), an amiable Disney-produced sitcom about a young Harlem resident navigating life's choices while weighing the values andy demands of his friends and his middle-class family. He returned to features as one of the stars of Disney's "Cool Runnings" (1993), a comedy inspired by the true story of the first Jamaican Olympic bobsled team. After teaming with Christina Ricci for a remake of Disney's "That Darn Cat!" (1996), he was back on the small screen in the CBS sitcom "Cosby" (1996-200), as the boyfriend of Bill Cosby's daughter.

• Born:
  January 7, 1970 in Brooklyn, New York, USA
• Job Titles:
  Actor, Comedian, TV host, Co-producer, Writer, Security guard at NBC

Education

• St John s University, journalism and communication

Milestones

• 1989 Discovered while performing at the Apollo Theater in Harlem by writer-director Spike Lee
• 1990 Feature debut, a walk-on in Lee s Mo Better Blues
• 1991 First leading role in a feature, Hangin With the Homeboys
• 1993 Network TV debut as star and co-producer of Where I Live , a short-lived ABC family sitcom
• 1996 Cast as the boyfriend of Bill Cosby s daughter on the CBS sitcom Cosby
• 2002 Appeared in the comedy Eight Legged Freaks starring David Arquette
• 2002 Voiced Bernie, a Rastafarian Jellyfish in the animated feature Shark Tale
• Began performing the NYC comedy club circuit while attending St. John s University and working as an NBC security guard
• Improvised on Charles Dickens s words in a school production of A Christmas Carol
• Studied music and played the trumpet
• TV debut as host and co-writer of The New Music Report , a local music and talk show on WNBC in NYC
• Taken to the NYC comedy club, the Comic Strip, by his dean
• Was the class comedian at his Catholic high school