Sterling Kelby Brown (born April 5, 1976)^[1] is an American actor. He is the recipient of various accolades, including three Primetime Emmy Awards and a Golden Globe Award in addition to a nomination for an Academy Award. He was included in Time magazine's list of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2018.^[2]

Brown portrayed Christopher Darden in the FX limited series The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story (2016) and starred as Randall Pearson in the NBC drama series This Is Us (2016–2022). Both roles earned him Primetime Emmy Awards in addition to a Golden Globe for the latter. He received further Emmy nominations for his roles in the NBC sitcom Brooklyn Nine-Nine (2018) and the Amazon Prime comedy series The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel (2019).

Brown is also known for his leading roles in the drama film Hotel Artemis (2019) and the mockumentary film Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul. (2022), as well as his voice roles in the 2019 animated films The Angry Birds Movie 2 and Frozen II. He also had supporting roles in several critically acclaimed films such as Marshall (2017), Black Panther (2018), Waves (2019), and American Fiction (2023); for the lattermost, he received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.

Brown was born in St. Louis, Missouri, to Sterling Brown^[1] and Aralean (Banks) Brown. He has two sisters and two brothers.^[3] His father died when he was 10 years old.^[4]

As a child, he went by the name Kelby; when he turned 16, he adopted the name Sterling, explaining in 2016:

I went by Kelby. My mom tells me this story — she was reiterating it the other day — in kindergarten I came home one day and said, 'Mom, Sterling is eight letters and Kelby is five. I'll just do Kelby and then when I turn 16, I will go by Sterling.' And I don't remember that. The impetus for me is that he had been gone for some time, and I was like, 'Kelby was a little boy's name.' I felt like I was ready to become Sterling.^[4]

Brown grew up in Olivette, Missouri, a suburb of St. Louis. He attended the private Mary Institute and St. Louis Country Day School.^[5]

He graduated from Stanford University in 1998 with an acting degree. He had initially planned to major in economics with a focus on business, but fell in love with acting as a freshman.^[6] He did post-graduate study at New York University Tisch School of the Arts, where he graduated with a Master of Fine Arts degree.^[7]

After college, Brown performed a series of roles in regional theater.^{[8][9][10][11][12]} In the theater, Brown was cast in the 2002 production of Bertolt Brecht's The Resistible Rise of Arturo Ui starring Al Pacino, Paul Giamatti, Steve Buscemi, John Goodman and Jacqueline McKenzie.^[13]

He has also appeared on numerous television shows, including ER, NYPD Blue,^[6] JAG, Boston Legal, Alias, Without a Trace, Supernatural,^[14] and Third Watch.^[15] He was a regular in the comedy Starved,^[16] and has also appeared in numerous films, including Brown Sugar (2002) with Taye Diggs, Stay (2005) with Ewan McGregor, and Trust the Man (2005) with David Duchovny and Julianne Moore.^[17][18] He had a recurring role on the television series Supernatural, as vampire hunter Gordon Walker.^[19] He played Dr. Roland Burton on Army Wives^[20] and Detective Cal Beecher on Person of Interest,^[21] and appeared on Medium. In 2008, he played David Mosley on the "Patience" episode of Eli Stone. In 2014, he starred as Hero in Suzan-Lori Parks' Odyssey-inspired play Father Comes Home From the Wars at New York's Public Theater.^[22][23]

In 2016, he starred in the FX miniseries The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story as Christopher Darden,^[24] for which he won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or Movie at the 68th Primetime Emmy Awards.^[25] From 2016 to 2022, Brown had a starring role in the television series This Is Us.^[26][27] In 2018, it made him the first African-American actor to win a Golden Globe in the Best Actor in a Television Drama category,^[28] and the first to win a Screen Actors Guild Award in the Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Drama Series category. He also won, with the rest of the cast, the Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Drama Series.^[29]

During this time, he had high-profile supporting roles in several feature films. Brown portrayed Joseph Spell in the historical drama Marshall (2017), N'Jobu in the Marvel Cinematic Universe film Black Panther, and Ronald Williams in the A24 independent film Waves (2019).^[30] In June 2018, Brown gave the commencement address at his alma mater Stanford University.^[31] He appeared as a guest star in the NYPD sitcom Brooklyn Nine-Nine, and earned critical acclaim for his role as Philip Davidson, a dentist under investigation for murdering his business partner. He was nominated for an Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Guest Actor in a Comedy Series in 2018 for this performance.^[32] The following year he had a recurring role in the third season of The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel in 2019. He portrayed Reggie, the manager of the fictional singer Shy Baldwin (Leroy McClain). For his performance he received a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series nomination. In August 2019, he was announced at D23 Expo and on Twitter as the voice of Lieutenant Destin Mattias in Frozen II.^[33][34][35]

From 2019 to 2020, he narrated the Disney+ documentary series One Day at Disney. He portrayed Leo McGarry in the HBO special A West Wing Special to Benefit When We All Vote (2020). Brown took a recurring voice role as Michael Angelo in the Netflix animated comedy series Big Mouth (2020). He continued taking voice roles for Hulu's animated science fiction series Solar Opposites and Apple TV+'s animated children's series Interrupting Chicken. In 2022, he starred in and produced the mockumentary comedy Honk for Jesus. Save Your Soul. acting opposite Regina Hall. The film premiered at the Sundance Film Festival receiving positive reviews. The following year, he acted alongside Mark Duplass in the science fiction comedy film Biosphere (2023), which premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival. That same year, he gained critical acclaim for his supporting role in the satirical comedy American Fiction (2023).

Brown met actress Ryan Michelle Bathe as a college freshman at Stanford.^[6] They eloped in March 2006,^[36] but held a large ceremony in June 2007.^[6] They have two sons, Andrew and Amaré.^[37][38]

Brown has won 16 awards from 69 nominations.

In 2016, Brown earned his first Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Limited Series or Movie for his breakout portrayal of attorney Christopher Darden in The People v. O. J. Simpson: American Crime Story. Brown's portrayal of Darden also garnered him the Critics' Choice Television Award, along with Golden Globe Award, Screen Actors Guild Award, and NAACP Image Award nominations.

In 2023, Brown delivered the commencement speech for the graduating class at Washington University in St. Louis and received an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts degree from the university.^[43][44]