Frank Eugene "Hill" Harper (born May 17, 1966) is an American actor and author. He is known for his roles on CSI: NY, Limitless and The Good Doctor.
Early life and education
Harper was born in Iowa City, Iowa, the son of Harry D. Harper, II, a psychiatrist, and Marilyn Harper (née Hill), who was one of the first black practicing anesthesiologists in the United States and co-authored a book called Wearing Purple. Born Frank Eugene Harper, he adopted the name "Hill" as a tribute to both his maternal and paternal ancestors.
Harper has been acting since the age of 7. Harper graduated from Bella Vista High School in 1984.
Harper then graduated magna cum laude from Brown University in 1988, with a BA in economics and sociology and was valedictorian of his department. In 1992, he graduated with a JD, cum laude, from Harvard Law School. He received his Master of Public Administration degree from John F. Kennedy School at Harvard University. During his years at Harvard, he was a full-time member of Boston's Black Folks Theater Company, one of the oldest and most acclaimed black theater troupes in the country. While a student at Harvard, Harper befriended Barack Obama, with whom he played basketball. In 2012, Harper was appointed to The President's Cancer Panel, the fully vetted three-member body assigned to work with the National Institute of Health (NIH) and make recommendations to the White House around cancer policy.
He subsequently moved to Los Angeles to pursue acting. He has received eight honorary degrees, including honorary doctorates from both Westfield State College and Howard University.
Acting career
Harper's first roles in television began in 1993, in a recurring role on the Fox series Married... with Children, while also making his film debut in the short film Confessions of a Dog. He had his first acting role in a feature film with Spike Lee's Get on the Bus (1996), which cast him as a UCLA film student riding a bus to the Million Man March in Washington, D.C. He went on to further demonstrate his versatility in such films as Christopher Scott Cherot's Hav Plenty (1997) and Lee's He Got Game (1998), the former of which featured him as an egotistical pop-soul singer.
His profile subsequently rose on both the mainstream and independent film circuits, thanks to roles in films ranging from Beloved (1998) to the independent romantic comedy Loving Jezebel (1999) to The Skulls (2000). Harper did some of his most acclaimed work in Jordan Walker-Pearlman's The Visit (2000), an independent drama in which he starred as a prisoner dying of AIDS who tries to put his life back together. He also portrayed Leshem in the 2010 Syfy original movie Stonehenge Apocalypse.
Harper played coroner-turned-crime scene investigator Sheldon Hawkes on the CBS crime drama CSI: NY for nine seasons.
In February 2013, it was announced that CSI: NY would be ending and Harper would be joining the cast of Covert Affairs as a series regular.
From April 21, 2015, to May 10, 2015, Harper starred as "Hard Rock" in the Off-Broadway play ToasT. The play (produced by Lemon Andersen and co-starred Keith David) is set in the Attica Prison around the time of its 1971 prison riot and tells of the lives of its prisoners using poetic prose.
From May 1, 2018, to June 17, 2018, Harper starred as "Rooftop" in the Off-Broadway play Our Lady of 121st Street. This Dark Comedy (written by Stephen Adly Guirgis and directed by Phylicia Rashad) is about former students paying their respects to Sister Rose, only to find that Sister Rose's body has been stolen.
Since 2017, Harper has portrayed Dr. Marcus Andrews on the ABC series The Good Doctor.
Hill Harper's acting career also includes voice-over work (or voice acting) with CSI:NY the Video Game, Breathe Bible, plus, podcasts called Legal Wars and 5-Factor Authentication.
