Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma and growing up in Denver, Colorado, Waters attended Princeton University and received his MFA in Directing from the University of Wisconsin- Madison. He worked as an actor in New York City on and off Broadway for more than a decade as well as at theaters around the country. Venues include the Mark Taper Forum, Berkeley Repertory Theatre, TheatreWorks, and the San Jose Repertory Theatre.[3]
He was a member of the Frank Silvera Writers Workshop in Harlem, which has developed the work of new, African American playwrights, directors, designers, and actors since 1973.
In 1985, he was cast as Marvin Berry (a fictional cousin of Chuck Berry) in Back to the Future, a role reprised in Back to the Future Part II in 1989.[4]
In 1991, he created the role of Belize in the first production of Angels in America.[3]
He was a cast member of the 1992 Disney show Adventures in Wonderland portraying Tweedle Dee, based on the Lewis Carroll novels Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass.[4]
He has worked in collaboration with novelist/playwright Jewelle Gomez on a play about James Baldwin, titled Waiting for Giovanni which was produced for the 2011-12 (San Francisco) New Conservatory Theater season. The project's development was sponsored by Intersection for the Arts.
Waters has taught acting, script development and has directed numerous productions around the country. He is currently a tenured professor in the Theatre Department at Macalester College.[5] As he approaches retirement, he was appointed as the Associate Dean of the Kofi Annan Institute for Global Citizenship.[6] Waters is an Honorary Member of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation's most Prestigious Academic Honor Society.[citation needed]
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