Commanding actor Richard Brooks was born in Cleveland, Ohio. He is an actor, director and singer. Raised in Cleveland, Ohio, Brooks studied acting, dance, and voice work at Interlochen Academy of Arts in Michigan. Later, he moved to New York City and was a student of the Circle in the Square Professional Theater School and performed in the Eugene O'Neill Theater Conference production of August Wilson's Fences.

He moved to Los Angeles, where he started his movie career. Some of his appearances were in Teen Wolf (1985), Off Limits (1988), Shakedown (1988), Shocker (1989) and To Sleep with Anger (1990). He became noticed in The Substitute (1996) with Tom Berenger and as voodoo drug lord Judah Earl in The Crow: City of Angels (1996) with Vincent Perez, Thomas Jane, Mia Kirshner and Iggy Pop. While on TV, he is best known as Paul Robinette on Law & Order (1990) and Jubal Early on Firefly (2002). He portrayed Frederick Douglass in the PBS American Experience docudrama mini-series The Abolitionists (1988) and plays Gabrielle Union's big brother Patrick in the hit BET drama Being Mary Jane (2013).