William Catlett is an American actor and producer. He is best known for portraying 1997 Yasir Omar in Love Is, Latavius "Lala" Johnson in Black Lightning, Herschel in True Story, Paul Lancaster in Constellation and Rickles in Abigail.
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Early life
Catlett was born in Alexandria, Virginia. His father had ambitions to be an actor before he joined the military and worked in government.
Career
Catlett's early television credits include The Mentalist on CBS as well as Insecure and Brothers in Atlanta on HBO. He appeared in the 2018 Salim Akil and Mara Brock Akil television series Love Is, for which he was also in the writers room. He played the lead roles in Issa Rae’s YouTube series First and Black & Sexy TV’s That Guy. Catlett produced Giants for Issa Rae Presents, the short film Stages, in which he also stars and the television series Garden Hills.
Catlett later worked again with Salim Akil and Mara Brock Akil on Black Lightning portraying Latavius "Lala" Jackson of the 100. He appeared in the 2020 film Charm City Kings. In 2021, he could be seen with Kevin Hart, Wesley Snipes and Billy Zane in Netflix comedy thriller True Story. For that role, was nominated for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Television Movie, Limited-Series or Dramatic Special at the 53rd NAACP Image Awards. He also appeared in the television series Lovecraft Country. In 2023, he appeared in A.V. Rockwell's film A Thousand and One as Lucky. He appeared in the 2024 comedy horror film Abigail portraying Rickles, a sniper who is part of a group that kidnap the titular character (Alisha Weir). He is a series regular in the Apple TV+ series Constellation, playing Paul Lancaster.
Personal life
He is the founder of Catlett Academy.
