William Jackson Harper Finds a New Confidence as Royal on 'The Underground Railroad' (Exclusive)
Barry Jenkins’ acclaimed TV adaptation of Colson Whitehead’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel,, William Jackson Harper plays Royal, a freeborn man who helps a runaway slave named Cora Randall (Thuso Mbedu) as she goes on a harrowing journey through the antebellum South to find freedom by way of an underground network of trains, tracks and tunnels. “I just figured this is the kind of job that goes to other people,” Harper tells ET about coming off four years of, where he earned an Emmy nomination for playing Chidi, and interested in doing something completely different as a performer.