Bokeem Woodbine

Woodbine was born on April 13, 1973 in Harlem, New York. He attended the prestigious Dalton School on Manhattan\'s Upper East Side, before transferring to the Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School of Music & Art and Performing Arts in the city.\n', ' With the encouragement of his actress mother, Woodbine entered show biz at age 19 as a stand-in and extra in Ernest Dickerson\'s directorial debut, the hip-hop classic Juice (1992), starring Tupac Shakur and Omar Epps. In the following year, he made his TV acting debut in the CBS Schoolbreak Special entitled "Love Off Limits." His appearance was noticed by casting director Jaki Brown-Karman who later recommended him to Forest Whitaker for the latter\'s directorial effort, the HBO television movie Strapped (1993). Since then, he has worked with other major African American filmmakers such as Spike Lee, Mario Van Peebles and the Hughes Brothers in the films Crooklyn (1994), Panther (1995) and Dead Presidents (1995), respectively.\n', ' In 1996 he appeared in Tupac\'s music video for "I Ain\'t Mad at Cha" and formed a friendship with the rapper. They subsequently reunited in Vondie Curtis-Hall\'s directorial debut, Gridlock\'d, which was released four months after Tupac\'s death.\n', '