Early life

Sunjata was born and grew up in Chicago, the adopted son of Bill and Catherine Condon, a police dispatcher and a civil rights worker. His parents are of mixed African American, Irish, and German ancestry.

Sunjata graduated from Mount Carmel High School in Chicago, where he played linebacker for two state championship football teams. He completed his undergraduate studies at Florida A&M University and the University of Louisiana at Lafayette. He received a master's degree in fine arts from the Graduate Acting Program at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts.

Career

Sunjata played the role of a sailor on shore leave on the first post-9/11 themed episode of Sex and The City. He has portrayed Langston Hughes in the film Brother to Brother and James Holt, a fashion designer in The Devil Wears Prada.

He starred as firefighter Franco Rivera on the television program Rescue Me. During the summer of 2007, he also starred in the ESPN miniseries The Bronx is Burning as Reggie Jackson. He appeared as a Special Forces Operative in Christopher Nolan's The Dark Knight Rises (2012).

In 2003, he won a Theatre World Award for his breakout Broadway performance as a gay Major League Baseball player who comes out to the public in Take Me Out, the Tony award-winning play, which also earned him nominations for a Tony Award and Drama Desk Award.

Views on the September 11 attacks

On April 30, 2009, Sunjata announced his participation as narrator in Loose Change 9/11: An American Coup, which was the last in a series of documentaries, collectively known as Loose Change, that argue that the September 11 attacks were planned by the United States government.

Sunjata has stated that he believes "absolutely, 100 percent" in this theory. Producers of Rescue Me, inspired by Sunjata's views, created a subplot of the show that year (the show's fifth season) in which Sunjata's character, Franco Rivera, stirs up controversy in the firehouse when he announces these same views to a journalist.

Filmography

Film

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1998	Twelfth Night, or What You Will	Valentine	Television movie
2001	The Feast of All Saints	Christophe Mercier	Television movie
2002	Bad Company	Officer Carew
2004	Melinda and Melinda	Billy Wheeler
2004	Noel	Marco
2004	Brother to Brother	Langston Hughes
2006	The Devil Wears Prada	James Holt
2009	Ghosts of Girlfriends Past	Brad
2009	Loose Change 9/11: An American Coup	Narrator
2010	At Risk	Detective Win Garano	Television movie
2010	The Front	Detective Win Garano	Television movie
2010	Weakness	Alejandro
2012	One for the Money	Ranger
2012	Gone	Powers
2012	The Dark Knight Rises	Captain Jones
2014	Lullaby	Officer Ramirez

Television

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2000	D.C.	Lewis Freeman	7 episodes
2000	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	Bomb Squad Officer	Episode: "Remorse"
2001	All My Children	Zachary Pell	Unknown episodes
2002	Sex and the City	Louis Leroy, USN	Episode: "Anchors Away"
2002-04	Law & Order: Special Victims Unit	CSU Technician Burt Trevor	15 episodes
2003	Ed	Danny Martin	Episode: "The Case"
2004-11	Rescue Me	Franco Rivera	93 episodes Satellite Award for Best Cast - Television Series
2005	Law & Order	Kenny Tremont	Episode: "Mammon"
2006	Love Monkey	Diego	4 episodes
2007	The Bronx is Burning	Reggie Jackson	8 episodes Nominated—NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor in a Television Movie, Mini-Series or Dramatic Special
2008	Great Performances	Christian de Neuvillette	Episode: "Cyrano de Bergerac"
2009	Lie to Me	Andrew Jenkins	Episode: "Blinded"
2010	30 Rock	Chris	Episode: "College"
2010-11	Grey's Anatomy	Nurse Eli	8 episodes
2012-13	Smash	Peter Gillman	4 episodes
2013-15	Graceland	Paul Briggs	38 episodes

Video games

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2002	TOCA Race Driver	Nick Landers/James Randall	Voice

Theater

Year	Title	Role	Notes
1998	Twelfth Night	Valentine
2003	Take Me Out	Darren Lemming	Theatre World Award Nominated - Tony Award for Best Performance by a Featured Actor in a Play Nominated - Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actor in a Play
2007	Cyrano de Bergerac	Christian De Neuvillette
2013	Macbeth	Macduff
2014	The Country House	Michael Astor

[ Source: Wikipedia ]