Orlando Jones

He scored his first Hollywood job in 1987, writing for the NBC comedy A Different World, on which he had a small guest role in the season five finale.

Unlike some of his fellow original repertory performers on MADtv, Jones came to the show with limited sketch comedy experience.

Throughout the first two seasons of MADtv, Jones performed as characters like the Cabana Chat band leader Dexter St. Croix and Reverend LaMont Nixon Fatback, the vocal follower of Christopher Walken.

He was also noted for his impressions of Thomas Mikal Ford, Temuera Morrison, Warwick Davis, Danny DeVito, Michael Jai White, Eddie Griffin, and Ice Cube.

In 2006, Jones decided to return to television as one of the lead characters of ABC's crime drama The Evidence, as Cayman Bishop.

He appeared in a bit part in his first big screen film, In Harm's Way (1997), then joined Larry David in the feature Sour Grapes (1998), playing the character of an itinerant man.

Subsequently, he appeared in Woo (1998), Mike Judge's Office Space (1999), alongside fellow MADtv alumnus David Herman, and in Barry Levinson's praised drama, Liberty Heights (1999).

In addition to his appearances in the 7 Up campaigns, Jones played the role of Clifford Franklin in The Replacements (2000) and the horror film From Dusk till Dawn 3: The Hangman's Daughter (2003).

In 2002, Jones landed the lead role of Daryl Chase in the action-dramedy Double Take (2001), alongside Eddie Griffin, and worked with David Duchovny, Seann William Scott and Julianne Moore in Ivan Reitman's sci-fi comedy, Evolution (2001).

Jones was also in the 2009 film Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant and he appeared as the computer Vox 114 in The Time Machine (2002).

[6] In 2012, Jones starred in Joe Penna's original interactive thriller series Meridian created in conjunction with Fourth Wall Studios.

In October 2011, Jones provoked controversy when he joked on Twitter that someone should kill former Governor of Alaska and vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.