Reginald VelJohnson
Born	August 16 1952 (1952--) (age 55) Queens, New York, U.S.

Reginald VelJohnson (born August 16, 1952) is an American film, stage and television actor, who is perhaps best known for his role as Carl Winslow on the sitcom Family Matters and as LAPD Sgt. Al Powell in the hit film Die Hard (1988) and the sequel Die Hard 2 (1990).

Biography

Personal life

VelJohnson was born in Queens, New York^[1] to Eve, a nurse, and Dan Johnson, a hospital attendant.^[2] His father left the family when VelJohnson was thirteen years old, and his mother subsequently remarried to John Reilly.^[1] VelJohnson attended New York University.^[1] He has homes in Los Angeles, California and Raleigh, North Carolina.

VelJohnson is often mistaken for actor James Avery and vice-versa, a joke that was played out on an episode of Family Matters.

Career

VelJohnson is known for playing police officers in movies and on television. However, he has made other appearances as similarly uniformed characters. In Ghostbusters, he had a brief appearance as a jail guard, and in Crocodile Dundee, he plays a limo driver. VelJohnson played Sgt. Al Powell in the 1988 hit Die Hard and its sequel, Die Hard 2 in 1990. VelJohnson also played a police officer alongside Tom Hanks in Turner and Hooch (1989) and a minor role in the 2002 film Like Mike. VelJohnson replayed his role of Sgt. Al Powell in the Gamecube video game title, Die Hard: Vendetta; also in 2002.

Since the end of Family Matters, besides making a few guest appearances on TV shows, VelJohnson has done mostly theater work. He has also written a critically acclaimed series of short stories called Division Street. One of them, called Sunday Evening Haircut, was made into a short film in 2005, which starred Reginald himself, alongside Kiki Shepard. VelJohnson has made notable guest appearances in several TV shows, including The Equalizer, Diagnosis Murder, Twice in a Lifetime, Will & Grace, Monk, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Eve, Crossing Jordan, The Parkers and That's So Raven.

In 2007, he appeared in the short films Reverse, Nerve Endings, and Time Upon A Once which were made during the reality show On the Lot.^[3] He will play Scott's dad in 41 Dollars (The Scott Hicks Story).

In the comic book Invincible, the title character attends Reginald VelJohnson High School. The school's principal is also modelled after VelJohnson.

Filmography

Television

References

External links

• Reginald VelJohnson at the Internet Movie Database
• Reginald VelJohnson at Yahoo TV

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