Hal Williams

Halroy Candis Williams was born in Columbus, Ohio, on December 14, 1934.^[1][2][3][a]

In the early 1960s, Williams began acting in community theater in Ohio. Williams worked as a postal worker and corrections officer before moving to Hollywood to pursue an acting career in 1968.^[6]

Williams began pursuing his acting career full-time in 1970. In 1973, he appeared as a guest star on the television series Kung Fu, playing a friend of Caine named Caleb in the second-season premiere. In 1975, he reprised the role in the 24th episode of the third season. Williams had a recurring role as Officer "Smitty" Smith on Sanford and Son and the follow-up series Sanford.

Willams appeared in Paul Schrader's 1979 film Hardcore as an auditioning adult film actor. The following year, he co-starred as Drill Sergeant L.C. "Ted" Ross in Howard Zieff's Private Benjamin, a role he would reprise in the television series of the same name. After the series concluded, Williams was cast as working-class husband and father Lester Jenkins in 227, which ran for five seasons. In the early to mid-1990s, he co-starred with the comic Sinbad in The Sinbad Show and The Cherokee Kid.

He was also frequently cast as law enforcement characters, such as a police detective in Clint Eastwood's The Rookie.

Williams portrayed Howard Jones, the father to Bernie Mac's character, in the 2005 film Guess Who.

In 2024, Williams played Autry in the second episode of the TV series Matlock (drawn from the original series of the same name, and reprised the role the following year in the series' tenth episode.

Williams died at his home in Rancho Mirage, California, on July 15, 2026, at the age of 91.^[5][3][7]