My Name Is Earl

Background:

American actor Eddie Steeples first came to national prominence in 2004 thanks to his role as the “Rubberband Man” in the Emmy nominating advertising campaign for OfficeMax. He gained even more popularity and recognition with his portrayal of Darnell “Crab Man” Turner on the NBC sitcom “My Name Is Earl” (2005-2009). Steeples' film credits include “Torque” (2004), “Akeelah and the Bee” (2006), “Roman” (2006), “The Lost” (2006) and “I Know Who Killed Me” (2007). He also directed and wrote “The Best of Robbers” (2006), with Chris Sivertson, and wrote “When Is Tomorrow” (2007), with Kevin Ford.

Currently, Steeples is a resident of Los Angeles, CA.

Texan

Childhood and Family:

Eddie Steeples was born on November 25, 1973, in Texas. He was the oldest of eight children born to an evangelist mother. His stepfather was a preacher. Eddie graduated from Klein Oak High School in Spring, TX in 1992 and then moved to Santa Cruz, CA, where he took acting classes at a community college. Eddie, who had known that he wanted to become an actor since age 4, also studied the craft at the St. Louis Repertory Theater in Webster Groves, Missouri, and at Howard University in D.C.

Rubberband Man

Career:

After a few moves, Texas native Eddie Steeples eventually arrived in New York City in the mid 1990s. In NYC, he joined an avante-garde hip hop group called No Surrender and the experimental movie group Mo-Freek. In 1999, he appeared in the political documentary “Amadou,” inspired by the Amadou Diallo police protests in in 1999. In 2000, he was cast in a Mo-Freek production, “Caravan Summer,” directed by Kevin Ford. He spent the following year directing various Mo-Freek productions as well as serving as a cameraman for the Sony/Music Choice show “Street Team TV,” where he filmed artists such as Cypress Hill, Jermaine Dupri, the Ataris and Nas. Also in 2001, he played the lead role of P. in an award winning short, “Whoa,” by Maurice A. Dwyer. Steeples next was cast along side Angela Bettis and Tasha Guevara in Kevin Ford's drama film, “People Are Dead” (2002). He once again teamed with director Kevin Ford to star in the film “Lost In The Bush” (2004), a military satire co-starring Brent Roam.

Steeples' first big break came when he played the dancing office supply delivery person in the OfficeMax “Rubberband Man” commercial in 2004. The ads was nominated for an Emmy for Outstanding Commercial in 2004. Later that same year, the actor landed an important supporting role of Rasan on the action film “Torque,” about underground motorcycle gangs and racers. Directed by Joseph Kahn and starring Martin Henderson, Ice Cube, Monet Mazur, Jaime Pressly, Will Yun Lee and Jay Hernandez, the film opened No. 5 at the box office with nearly $10 million in its opening weekend, and eventually grosses a total of over $21 million in the United States and over $46 million worldwide. The budget was approximately $40 million. “Torque” received mostly negative reviews.

Steeples's career gained further boost in 2005 when he landed the main role of Darnell “'Crabman” Turner on the NBC comedy series “My Name Is Earl,” opposite Jason Lee as Earl Jehoshaphat Hickey, Ethan Suplee as Randall “Randy” Dew Hickey, Jaime Pressly as Joy Farrah Darville Hickey Turner and Nadine Velazquez as Catalina Rana Aruca. He remained with the show throughout its four season run from September 20, 2005 to May 14, 2009. Steeples shared a Screen Actors Guild nomination for Outstanding Performance by an Ensemble in a Comedy Series in 2006.

Steeples returned to the big screen in 2006 when he starred alongside Laura Maxwell in a Mo-Freek production, “ The Best of Robbers,” which he also directed with Chris Sivertson. He also played Derrick-T in “Akeelah and the Bee” (2006), a drama film written and directed by Doug Atchison and starring Laurence Fishburne and Angela Bassett, had an uncredited part in Goran Dukić's “Wristcutters: A Love Story” (2006), co-starred with Marc Senter, Shay Astar and Alex Frost in Chris Sivertson's “The Lost” (2006) and was cast as a detective in “Roman” (2006), a drama/thriller film directed by Angela Bettis. In 2007, he played the role of Ron on the comedy film “When Is Tomorrow,” which he also wrote with director Kevin Ford, and Saeed the Prosthetic Tech in the failed horror/thriller movie “I Know Who Killed Me,” directed by Chris Sivertson. He starred with Kalen Feeney in a three minute short, “Reel Life,” for director Michael X. Flores.

Recently, in 2011, Steeples portrayed Tyler the Gas Man in two episodes of the Fox sitcom “Raising Hope,” starring Lucas Neff, Martha Plimpton, Garret Dillahunt, Shannon Marie Woodward and Cloris Leachman.

Steeples is scheduled to play roles in three upcoming films: Kevin Ford's “Legs” (2011), where he will play the title role, “Zombie Apocalyps” (2011), a horror film starring Ving Rhames, Taryn Manning and Lesley-Ann Brandt, and “ Would You Rather” (2012), a drama/thriller directed by David Guy Levy and written by Steffen Schlachtenhaufen.

Awards:
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