Intentional Starpower – Jurnee Smollett On Screen and Beyond

From Child Star to Artistic Awakening

Jurnee Smollett’s first screen credits read like a snapshot of early-1990s family television. At just 10 months old, she appeared in commercials. By age six, she was Denise Frazer on Full House and later on Hangin’ with Mr. Cooper. Soon after, she starred alongside her five siblings in the ABC sitcom On Our Own. Cute, precocious, recognizable — she was a child star in every sense.

But the defining moment came in 1997, when Kasi Lemmons cast her as the 10-year-old Eve Batiste in Eve’s Bayou. It was here that Smollett found the soul of her craft. Critics hailed the film, and she won the Critics’ Choice Award for Best Young Performer. But more importantly, Smollett herself has described that role as the moment she “fell in love with the craft.” For the first time, she wasn’t just performing — she was creating, channeling, embodying.

From there, the transition to adult roles was not only smooth but purposeful. She won NAACP Image Awards for her work on Cosby. She starred in The Great Debaters (2007), directed by Denzel Washington, a role that earned her another Image Award and confirmed that she could carry weighty, historically rooted narratives. Her career trajectory revealed a young actress not content with simply staying employed, but determined to build a body of work that mattered.

Building a Catalog of Complex Characters

Smollett’s career philosophy is straightforward: work with “masterful storytellers” and choose “complex characters filled with contradictions and secrets.” The results have been remarkable.

On Friday Night Lights (2009–2011), she played Jess Merriweather, a teenager balancing ambition and family duty in small-town Texas. On True Blood (2013–2014), she was Nicole Wright, navigating survival in a supernatural world. Each role stretched her range and expanded her presence.

Her turn as Rosalee in Underground (2016–2017) was transformative. Playing an enslaved woman whose quiet determination turned into ferocious courage, Smollett channeled both personal resonance and collective history. “I know what it is to be underestimated,” she said, tying her own life to Rosalee’s arc. The role earned her critical acclaim and nominations from the NAACP and Black Reel Awards.

Then came 2020, a breakout year on two very different stages. As Dinah Lance/Black Canary in Birds of Prey, Smollett stepped into the DC Universe with grit and charisma, delivering both action and depth. Later that year, she starred as Letitia “Leti” Lewis in HBO’s Lovecraft Country. The show, a surreal mix of horror, history, and racial allegory, pushed Smollett into Emmy-nominated territory. Leti was fierce, flawed, vulnerable, and unforgettable — a character that showcased everything Smollett had been working toward: layered complexity and cultural resonance.

Her recent projects continue this intentionality. She executive-produced Lou (2022) and We Grown Now (2023), both stories with strong character focus. She starred in The Burial (2023) as attorney Mame Downes, earning another Black Reel Award nomination. In 2024’s The Order, she played Joanne Carney, and in 2025 she takes on Michell Calderone, a marine-turned-arson investigator in the psychological crime series Smoke. For the role, she trained like an athlete, bulking up and lifting heavier than ever. And waiting in the wings: a long-anticipated solo Black Canary film.

Smollett’s résumé is not just impressive; it is curated. She is not content with stardom alone — she is building a catalog.

Behind the Camera: Producing with Purpose

Smollett’s recent ventures into executive production are not vanity credits. They are extensions of her philosophy. By stepping behind the camera, she is shaping which stories get told and how. Lou (2022) and We Grown Now (2023) reflect her commitment to narratives that center marginalized voices and humanize overlooked experiences.

Hollywood is notoriously resistant to diverse storytelling unless artists claim power in the boardroom. Smollett has done just that. By producing, she is no longer simply the face of someone else’s vision — she is a custodian of her own.

Family, Motherhood, and Personal Roots

Born to Janet Harris and Joel Smollett, Jurnee is one of six siblings who grew up together in Hollywood. With Jazz, Jussie, Jake, Jojo, and Jocqui, she shared the screen in On Our Own. The family’s creative ecosystem shaped her, but she has been determined to chart her own lane.

Her personal life has been equally intentional. She married musician Josiah Bell in 2010, divorced in 2021, and together they share a son, Hunter. Smollett has been vocal about wanting Hunter to have a different childhood than hers. While he has shown interest in acting — even appearing as an extra on Smoke — she has made clear that she will not push him into auditions or the “child star hustle.” For Smollett, protecting her son’s freedom to choose his own path is non-negotiable.

This balance of family and career reflects her larger ethos: choose with care, live with integrity.

The Activist’s Heart

Smollett’s activism is not a side note — it’s a pillar. At age seven, she lost a crew member from On Our Own to AIDS. By 11, she was actively raising awareness about HIV/AIDS. Her work has spanned decades with organizations like the Black AIDS Institute, Artists for a New South Africa (ANSA), and the Red Cross.

Her advocacy has taken her to South Africa to lead empowerment workshops, and she serves on the boards of ANSA and the Children’s Defense Fund. The causes vary, but the principle is the same: use platform for justice.

Her art and activism often intersect. Underground allowed her to embody liberation struggles. Lovecraft Country placed her at the crossroads of horror and history, where Black trauma and resilience could be dramatized for mass audiences. She has often said she sees her roles as a way to fight for the voiceless — turning performance into protest.

Style as Statement

In Hollywood, fashion is often spectacle. For Smollett, it is language. Her March 2017 EBONY cover, honoring Women’s History Month, tied her activism directly to her role in Underground. The image of a woman breaking chains was both literal and symbolic.

Her 2022 The Edit feature — photographed in a velvet-brimmed hat — emphasized elegance and quiet power. Her July 2025 PhotoBook Magazine cover extended this narrative, portraying her as a woman equally at home in art-house cinema and mainstream blockbusters.

Smollett has described fashion as “a form of self-expression” and “a way of telling powerful narratives.” Each appearance, each editorial, is deliberate — another layer in her public mosaic.

Legacy in the Making

What emerges from Jurnee Smollett’s story is a profile of an artist building with intention. From a child actor finding her craft in Eve’s Bayou to an Emmy-nominated performer, from a teen activist to a board member shaping global causes, from a performer to a producer with her own slate of projects — Smollett has never ceded authorship of her life.

She is, in many ways, part of a Harlem tradition, though she was not raised here: the tradition of Black artists who make their work inseparable from their advocacy. Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Amiri Baraka, The Last Poets — each understood that art could be a weapon, balm, and mirror. Smollett stands in that lineage, proving that the microphone, the screen, and even the red carpet can all be pulpits if used with intention.

Hollywood often swallows child stars, silences women, and sidelines activists. Jurnee Smollett has defied all three traps. She is still rising, still choosing, still intentional. Her story is not finished — but already, it is a legacy in the making.