We meet him midway through the third episode, monitoring a raggedy-ass drug crew.
Omar plans to rob the dealers.
“Very sloppy,” Omar says, cigarette already in his mouth.
Michael K. Williams on ‘The Wire’.Nicole Rivellli/HBO
He lights it, and takes a long drag.
Omar commanded a different kind of attention because Williams was like no other actor.
That scar across his face was a special effect he wasn’t faking.
Michael K. Williams on ‘Lovecraft Country’.Eli Joshua Ade/HBO
Omar belongs to no side in the drug war America wages against itself.
Appropriately, you could never pin down Williams' performance on the show.
Williams was Brooklyn-born, raised in the projects, and he studied at the National Black Theatre in Harlem.
But you have to credit his stunningWirerole with something heavier than authenticity and something more elemental than training.
One thinks of Omar fresh out of bed in his billowy teal pajamas, strolling through West Baltimore.
“Omar, Omar!”
There are traditions of theatricality and traditions of realism, and then there’s Michael K. Williams onThe Wire.
He turned every street into his stage.
So it’s hard to grapple withthe actor’s sudden death at the age of 54.
He had done a bit of everything.
All in the game, of course and HBO honored him as a regular player.
Fearlessness just kind of became Williams' career path.
WhenHap and Leonardcalled for a gay Black Vietnam vet in a cowboy hat: Who else could play that?
Williams could be very amusing on something likeCommunity, but then his last great role was heartbreakingly powerless.
“When the police want that they want, they will do anything,” he declares.
“You hear me?Anything.
They will lie on us.
They will lock us up.
They will kill us.”
It’s a defining screen depiction of our whole national moment.
I didn’t think about any of these amazing roles when I heard about Williams' death.
In the video below, he offers up the hood lingo to describe his scars.
He explains howThe Wirespeaks for those who have no voice.
It could feel like Williams was being squandered, frankly, in those post-Wireyears.
Good news: That’s all there onThe Wire.
It’s also fun as hell.
Omar turns a courtroom showdown into a sitcom.
He patrols back alleys the way gunfighters meander through spaghetti Westerns.
His romances can be tragic or ecstatic.
Williams was best in the quiet moments.
“You see that?”
asks Omar, his first line in the show and a statement of purpose.
You’re merely watching most actors.
Picture him in a lateBoardwalk Empirescene, in yet another back alley.
Chalky stares down the barrels of five guns, becauseBoardwalkalways added four more guns than necessary.
“All right then,” he says.
You don’t need to see the bullet, the blood, or the body.
It’s demolishing just to see Michael K. Williams close his eyes.
