Colman Domingo, the star of shows like Euphoria and films like The Color Purple and If Beale Street Could Talk, has shared that his role as Victor Strand in the spin-off in The Walking Dead universe, Fear the Walking Dead, changed his entire career.
His role in Fear the Walking Dead was not exactly his first performance on television. Domingo had been featured before in numerous Law & Order episodes, but afterward he mostly stayed on the stage playing several characters in theater adaptations of classics like A Christmas Carol, Henry V and The Taming of the Shrew. In 2015, all that would change.
Domingo was a guest on the Happy Sad Confused podcast, and he recalled being approached with the idea of starring in a TV show and his initial thoughts were, "I was a theater snob. I was like, 'Absolutely not.'" The actor claims that it took a little bit of convincing from his agent:
"Immediately, I thought, 'Obviously this person does not know me, because she’s going to send me some genre thing, some TV thing I’m not interested in.' She sends me the sides, and it was fantastic. I didn't know TV could be like this. It was rich, it was great storytelling, and a really provocative character. I had a take on the character, so I sent that tape in without even thinking about it. And then literally a couple days later, I got an offer — just from a self tape — to be a series regular on Fear the Walking Dead.
[Fear the Walking Dead] literally did change my entire career. Just before that, I thought I had achieved what I was supposed to achieve, and I was kindly ready to step away from the whole industry. Things were just not progressing the way I thought that made sense. I wasn’t booking [roles], I wasn't working, I had no access or agency, and I was entering my mid-forties. I was like, 'I can’t sustain this. I need to get a real job.' Or at least a job that makes sense.
The life of an artist was just too rocky for me at the time, and I was trying to make a decision where I wouldn't be bitter or hardened by this industry. I wanted to step away while I still loved it, but then Fear the Walking Dead gave me footing back in the industry in a new way."
Colman Domingo Is at the Prime of his Career
In the 2020s, Domingo's career saw a huge rise when he was featured in films like Ma Rainey's Black Bottom and the Candyman reboot. Since 2023, the year that Fear the Walking Dead ended, Domingo has appeared in widely acclaimed roles that have earned him a couple of Academy Award nominations. His performance as civil rights activist Bayard Rustin in Rustin was outstanding, but 2024 was the year of Cillian Murphy and his sweep on the awards circuit. Most recently, Domingo played Divine G in the prison drama Sing Sing, a role that earned him his second Oscar nomination. We'll have to wait and see what happens at the ceremony taking place next March 2, 2025.
Domingo's career has also grown in the TV medium. Netflix's The Madness was divisive but the actor's performance shone above everything. The Disney+ animated show Your Friendly Neighborhood Spider-Man, in which Domingo provides the voice of Norman Osborn, has been met with good reviews.
However, Domingo's involvement in the next Spielberg movie is the one we're most excited about. The mysterious UFO-related project will also star Wyatt Russell, Emily Blunt and Josh O'Connor, among others. The actor actually shared a few details in the Josh Horowitz podcast about the project when the host asked him whether the film was closer to War of the Worlds or Close Encounters of the Third Kind: "I think it's something new and different. But I'll tell you one thing. It has so much heart. I feel like it's a love letter to our humanity. This is very 'Stephen Spielberg.'"
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