It is not every day you hear that an up-and-coming actor thriving in Hollywood was inspired by the Will Smith-led action film, The Wild Wild West. For Hulu’s Reasonable Doubt star, Kyle Bary, watching Smith in a bathtub scene with actress Garcelle Beauvais sealed the deal for Bary’s journey into Hollywood.
“Whatever that is, I need to do what he just did right there,” the actor said in our exclusive interview.
For seven-year-old Bary, watching the 1999 Western film helped him see the possibilities of what could exist on screen. And with a mother who worked as a commercial actor and model, the now 32-year-old knew he was destined to pursue the craft of acting.
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“I always knew I could be an [actor] in some capacity,” the budding filmmaker says, “I just did not know you could make a living out of it.”
Although the road to financial success for actors is a long one, Bary has found himself on the road that young actors dream of.
His first role on the CBS hit series Bull, playing a receptionist, marked the start of an inspiring career. Since bursting onto the scene in 2018, Bary has starred alongside Hollywood icon Morris Chestnut in Fox’s Our Kind of People, with whom he also shares the screen again in Reasonable Doubt, worked with Issa Rae on HBO’s RapSh!t, and was a breakout star in Netflix’s hit series, Ginny & Georgia.
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“I was the kid at church who would have the microphone [shouting] ‘It’s Jubilee Day… Martin Luther King Day,” Bary says, recalling how early on he learned to draw people to his showmanship and charisma.
Each role the Maryland native has taken on has led him to his latest, starring in the Kerry Washington-produced Reasonable Doubt.
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Now in its third season, the legal drama follows a successful criminal defense attorney, played by Emayatzy Corinealdi, who navigates difficult cases while being a loving mother, a supportive wife, a trusted friend, and a helpful daughter.
Bary’s character, Ozzie Edwards, was introduced this season as a complex, high-profile child star whose backstory brings fresh dynamics and drama to the series’ already compelling narrative.
“One of the beautiful things about Reasonable Doubt is these scripts and the world that Raamla Mohamed created,” Bary explains. “The [scripts] are so full and already on the page that fullness is freeing as an actor.”
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For fans, Ozzie’s arrival and legal trouble reflect Reasonable Doubt’s core themes: image, power, and vulnerability.
Ozzie’s world is turned upside down when his girlfriend and stylist, Wendy, vanishes following a heated public confrontation. When her body is later discovered, a gun registered in Ozzie’s name is implicated.
The loyal viewers who tune into the hit drama are captivated as they watch Bary’s character battle drug addiction, reveal he was sexually abused, and navigate an onslaught of secrets and lies.
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“What I love about the character Ozzie was that I almost was a child actor,” Bary says. “The plight of the child star is so relevant now… There are so many documentaries, so many artists we grew up watching and loving telling their stories and speaking out [about their experiences].”
In recent years, we’ve seen how childhood trauma, unconditional love, or even fake love can manifest in adulthood.
With Hulu’s recent documentary Childstar and Investigation Discovery’s Quiet on Set: The Dark Side of Kids TV, where viewers learned about the turmoil some of our favorite child stars endured, Bary’s character brings a fictional, yet relatable perspective, inviting fans into a world few understand, while evoking a visceral emotional reaction.
It wouldn’t be surprising if Bary had moments where he wondered what might have happened if he’d become a child star. The route the rising actor took was less conventional.
“I actually went to college,” Bary says. “I went to school for finance. I did four years of finance, sales, and trading equities.” The Cain V. Abel writer explains that it was around his junior year at Virginia Tech University when he realized he wasn’t a “finance bro.”
Although he completed his studies, graduating in 2015, Bary’s determination to pursue his dreams was never far behind.
However, it took perseverance for Bary to reach this phase of his career in an industry he once considered stepping away from. The craft he once loved began to feel one-sided, like a relationship that was no longer serving him.
“I did exclusively theater for the first two [years],” Bary shared. “And then 10 years of little wins here, little wins there, but our industry has ebbs and flows. And in this moment, right before Reasonable Doubt came, it was a very long ebb. And this thing that I had been working for and pouring myself into so much wasn’t really giving anything back.”
He admitted it felt like a toxic relationship, one that, in any other part of his life, he would have walked away from.
Still, Bary wasn’t ready to give up entirely. Instead, he decided to shift gears and nourish other passions: music and travel.
“Even though I knew it’s still what I’m here to do, I need to just shift gears,” he explained. “I did this audition in early March, and then I think it was like March 12th or 13th. Hadn’t heard anything. Auditions were slow. So, I bought a one-way ticket to Europe. And I told my manager, ‘I’m still down to audition; I’ll bring my tripod, but I need to fill myself in other ways.’”
Three hours later, his phone rang.
“My manager said, ‘I hope that one-way ticket is refundable because you’re going to Atlanta.’”
That call was for Reasonable Doubt. The role that would change everything.
Now, with a fresh outlook and new experiences living in Brooklyn, the actor has embraced each lesson to elevate himself both professionally and personally, leaving no doubt about why he became an artist.
“Being committed to a life of artistry is committing to a life as an actor. It’s a weird thing because most of it is sitting around waiting for someone to give you a job,” Bary says. “So to all those actors who are just waiting for their breakthrough or waiting for their moment, my piece of advice would be: make your own stuff, tell your own stories, write a song,” he adds, showing not only his maturity in his craft but also his willingness to inspire future generations.
“I heard something that said 90% of Black men have a hit song in their notes app… share it, we wanna hear it. You have a script you’re working on? Put it up, make it a short film. Share, expose, be out there, put yourself out there. What’s the worst that can happen?”
Bary doesn’t just talk the talk when it comes to taking chances and risks to achieve goals; the multi-talented entertainer is also a musician.
“Music has always been a huge part of my life. I started with the alto sax in fourth grade. Then we got a drum set, and then in ninth grade, I took a year of piano lessons. Similar to acting, I always knew that it would be a part of me that grew with time,” Bary says about his love for music.
“I spent a lot of my twenties, while I was auditioning, while I was doing plays, just in my room playing my piano and writing songs, and listening to songs and trying to figure it out on YouTube… just learning and building,” he explains. The actor says that his twenties were an incubator for his musicianship.
With a music video filmed for his song, Relationship, and his next song, Cosmo, on the way, the dreams of a seven-year-old, Bary are coming true.
With the Reasonable Doubt Season 3 finale on the horizon, fans are eagerly waiting for not only Ozzie’s next chapter, but also what is to come next from Bary.
Check out the full interview.
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