Moritz J. Williams on Showing Black Love in Another Man’s Wife and Joining the P-Valley Season 3

Some actors arrive. Moritz J. Williams has been building. For 12 years, the Dallas-born actor has been doing the unglamorous, necessary work of the industry, sharpening his craft in acting classes, grinding through web series, picking up his first real momentum through commercial bookings, and slowly, steadily accumulating the kind of experience that makes an actor ready when the right moment finally shows up.

That moment is now.

This month, Williams stars in Another Man’s Wife, premiering exclusively on Peacock on May 8. The Maverick Entertainment film, directed by Viere and co-starring Sydney Mitchell and the veteran Taye Diggs, tells the story of Shawn and Maya, a married couple whose lives are upended when Shawn loses his job, his mother is diagnosed with cancer, and a wealthy multi-millionaire named Brendan presents them with a proposition that will test everything they thought they knew about love, loyalty, and what they’re willing to do to survive.

Williams plays Shawn, and the role matters to him in a way that goes beyond just another IMDb credit. He wanted to play a husband who was smart, grounded, and fully human. He wanted to show Black love without the clichés. He wanted, in his own words, to play a Black man who had sense.

But the bigger conversation around Williams right now is one that fans of a certain drama have been waiting on for years: P-Valley is back. Season 3 of Katori Hall’s Starz series, the show that broke through as one of the most visually stunning, emotionally raw, and culturally specific dramas on television, is finally coming.

And Moritz J. Williams is part of the cast.

Getting there was a story in itself. A hurt back. An impromptu singing moment that wasn’t in the script. A callback with 15 people watching. A writer’s strike that froze everything. And then, finally, the call.

We sat down with Williams to talk about both projects, the journey that got him here, what it means to play a Black man with dignity on screen, and what he thinks Hollywood still needs to figure out.

[Interview has been edited for length and clarity]

The Quintessential Gentleman: Before acting, what were you doing?

Moritz J. Williams: I worked in insurance for a very long time. Personal injury claims. I thought that was going to be my bread and butter for a very long time. They paid me well fresh out of college. I wasn’t sure acting was going to become my full-time career. But yeah, I was doing insurance.

QG: What was the moment that changed that?

MW: I did my first musical at the Black Academy of Arts and Letters. And I remember talking myself up to go to that audition because it involved singing. I had stage fright when it came to singing. But I talked myself into going, and I walked in and I sang for the judges and acted for them. At the end of it, one of the judges, sweet lady, she’s still my friend to this day, she comes out and says, “I’m gonna tell you something.” I thought she was about to tell me I did a horrible job. She said: “You’re a great actor.” And then she told me to never go into a musical theater audition singing Ne-Yo again.

QG: What song?

MW: I sang So Sick by Ne-Yo for a musical theater audition because I had no idea. I was green. I didn’t know you needed to choose pieces from the theater. But I ended up getting the part. The play was A Christmas Carol. And when I invited my family out, they were shocked. I always kept it tucked. But that was the moment I realized: I can really do this if I research, if I practice, if I do what I’m supposed to do.

QG: Walk us through what it looked like when you first got to Los Angeles.

MW: I did it smart. I saved my money for a year before I came out. I had a nest egg. And I came out here not knowing anybody, not knowing anything. My first acting class in LA was Tasha Smith’s workshop, because when I was in Texas, everybody was like, “You gotta get into Tasha Smith’s class.” Same way people say you gotta call Tyler Perry to get a job. When I got to LA, I was like, I gotta get into Tasha’s class. And she was amazing.

From there, I got into some acting groups, developed friendships, and that led me to my first web series, Black Boots. Some of people’s favorite artists and actors today came from those web series. We all got in line behind Issa Rae and said, “Oh, we could do this too.” Then I did the series Giants. Some of the writers from that show went on to write some of your favorite shows right now. So when I put myself out there, I got swept up in that whirlwind of learning.

QG: Was there a moment where you felt like you were actually on the right path?

MW: The first time I felt like I made it came from a commercial. My first national commercial, Alive Vitamins. I remember seeing that first check, and I was like, “I can do this.” I’m about to buy my mama a house. I’m about to take care of the family for the rest of my life. That’s how good it was back then, before the contracts changed.

QG: Tell us about Another Man’s Wife.

MW: Another Man’s Wife is a great depiction of free will in relationships. It’s about a couple they fall upon hard times financially. As they’re growing, maturing, learning how to communicate, they run into an interesting offer. An offer to basically solve all of their money issues. And when you hear about it as a regular person, you’re like, yeah, no, you’re never touching my wife. But when you’re in that moment, when nobody will ever know, when it could fix all your problems, you start to go back and forth. The movie is very suspenseful. It’s a love story. It’s a roller coaster. It makes you wonder in your own relationship: would I take this offer? Or would this destroy everything?

QG: What drew you specifically to this script?

MW: Being able to play a husband. I wanted to play someone’s husband. I wanted to show Black love. I really enjoyed that. Reading these lines, I didn’t feel like my character was a weak Black man. I didn’t feel like he was an imbecile. I felt like he was smart. I felt like he made sound decisions. I felt like he needed to mature, and that’s something we see in people.

I don’t walk around in my everyday life confused about what’s going on. So when scripts write us like that and they’re not written by us, I’m not interested. When I saw this character had sense, came from a good background, his mom is in the picture, and he loves his wife, I was absolutely interested. It was a positive thing to see.

QG: You’re on screen alongside Taye Diggs. What was that dynamic like?

MW: Taye is a force in this industry. You know how people say, don’t meet your idols? Meeting Taye was really cool because you see him online, you see the jokes he makes, he’s that person in real life too. He made the environment very comfortable. He made mistakes with his lines. He still needed a second before he jumped into the next scene. He played as a team player. We were able to bounce ideas off each other. He’s been doing this for a long time and hasn’t let it corrupt who he is as a person.

QG: P-Valley. Everybody’s been waiting. How did you get there?

Moritz J. Williams: P-Valley was a long, long journey. I did a tape, sent it in, didn’t hear anything back for about a month. Then my manager, Tre, asked me about it, I sent it to him, he did his thing, and got me a callback, a producer session with about 15 people on it. And they wanted me to dance.

I am not a dancer. So I called up one of my really good friends, Kristen, she’s a dancer, and she pushes me out of my comfort zone. We come up with this whole dance. I’m working on it all week. The day before I’m supposed to film it, I hurt my back. I’m taking painkillers, trying to get through it. I know I’m looking crazy, but I push through. We piece it together and send it over.

The producer session comes up. I’m thinking, there is no way they’re going to ask me to dance again. I’m on with Katori and a few others. We get to the end, and Katori makes a joke, “That was great,” she said. She liked that I improvised singing on the tape, even though I wasn’t supposed to. And then she said: Let’s see your dance.

I moved the camera back, did the whole thing. She said thank you. And then the writer’s strike happened. Everything froze. No hard confirmation. Everybody’s on pins and needles. And finally, we get the call: you got the role. And then right after that, the SAG Strike hit. So I couldn’t talk about this news for eight, nine months. Finally, everything lifts, and I get to Atlanta and it all becomes real. From that first tape to that moment was about a year and a couple of months.

QG: Give us a little peek at what to expect this season.

MW: You can expect drama. You can expect a lot of fire, a lot of fights. I think this season is going to be so much bigger, so much better, from the writing to the stunts to the characters to the backdrops of where we film. This show is going to be the first and second seasons on steroids. The fans are going to be very pleased.

Another Man’s Wife premieres May 8, 2026, exclusively on Peacock. P-Valley Season 3 is coming to Starz.

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