When he turned 33, St. Louis native William Stanford Davis decided to make the ultimate leap of faith and move to Los Angeles in search of fame and fortune. Two days in, his car caught fire and he lost everything.
Most people would be deterred by the harrowing experience and go back home. However, Davis saw this as an omen and stuck it out.
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The actor, now 73, hails from The Ville and credits his St. Louis upbringing for this determination and never-say-die attitude—a trait that came in handy during the actor’s early years in Hollywood.
“Being raised in St. Louis has [taught me] to never give up and don’t quit, to see it through. St. Louis has fed my soul from the time that I left there when I was 20 years old,” says Davis. “That’s what being from St. Louis is about, it’s an industrial town with a lot of hard work, and you are always reaching towards success. Trying to make tomorrow better than today, that’s what St. Louis has always been for me.”
The patience and resolve paid off. After 40 years in the industry, Davis received his breakthrough moment in hit ABC sitcom Abbott Elementary as the fan-favorite school custodian, Mr. Johnson.
Created by Quinta Brunson, Abbott Elementary is a mockumentary-style show that follows the lives of teachers in an underfunded and mismanaged Philadelphia public school.
The series premiered in December 2021 and was welcomed with huge acclaim from audiences and critics alike. It has received 24 Emmy nominations and won four, including one for Brunson for Outstanding Lead Actress In a Comedy Series. Fans can see how the cast and creative team does at this year’s awards on Sunday, September 15, during the live telecast on ABC.
After three seasons—the fourth premieres October 9—Abbott Elementary has an incredible 99 percent on Rotten Tomatoes and resonates with millions of viewers around the world.
Davis says that the show’s popularity stems from its reliability and ability to connect with a wider audience. “Everyone’s life has been touched by a teacher,” he says. And Davis believes the show “tells the truth” about that experience.
For Davis, one of his most influential experiences with a schoolteacher was being taught by his aunt, Helen Flagg, who was his third-grade teacher at an all-Black elementary school in St. Louis.
“On my first day in her class, she pulled me by my collar and said, ‘There won’t be any free rides or special favors.’ She demanded excellence from me,” Davis says.
Following his move to Los Angeles, Davis landed a role in the soap opera The Bold and the Beautiful. But it wasn’t the big breakthrough he was expecting, and Davis struggled to find jobs in television and film. Nevertheless, the actor remained defiant about making it work and dedicated himself to the craft of theater. He believes they are crucial building blocks for any actor to truly develop.
“A lot of actors don’t want to audition for plays, but you can’t become an actor if you don’t want to do theater,” he says. “It is the foundation of what we do as actors. Film makes you famous; TV makes you rich. But theater makes you good. If you don’t want to do theater, then you just want to be famous. You don’t want to be an actor, you want to be a celebrity.”
Earlier in his career, the actor auditioned for the iconic sitcom Friends. His agent not only told him that he didn’t get the part but that the casting department thought his audition was so terrible that he should go back to being a telemarketer. Needless to say, he didn’t heed the advice.
Over the years, Davis has trained himself to not have expectations for the phone to ring after an audition and to keep working hard. Eventually, he believes, something will stick. That belief rang true as he booked the role of Mr. Johnson. Davis auditioned for Abbott Elementary via Zoom during the height of COVID-19. His wife, who is also his manager, told him the good news that he had booked the job—but he didn’t know what she was talking about.
“About three weeks later, she told me that I booked the job. I said, ‘What job?’ The job about the school. I said, ‘What job about the school?’ I had forgotten all about it, and that’s a muscle that you have to develop so you don’t sit around and agonize over it,” Davis says.
When he was booked for the ABC hit comedy, Davis thought it would just be a couple of days work as a guest star, but it didn’t take long for the actor to receive a call from his agent to say that he had been made a season regular. Davis burst into tears because he knew that this role was going to change not only his life, but his family’s lives, too. After finding out that he had been made a series regular, Davis pulled Quinta Brunson to one side and thanked her for changing his life. For Brunson, it was a no-brainer. Mr. Johnson adds an integral layer to Abbott Elementary that would be impossible to replace.
“Stan is simply the man. I am so glad that he found his way to my project, because it wouldn’t have been the same without him. He’s always happy, always kind, always fly, and consistently funny in ways I’m always surprised by. In short, he’s a gem,” Brunson says.
Nothing encapsulates Davis’ recent career success more than his mantra, “Success is when preparedness and opportunity collide.” He waited all of his professional life for have have his star-making moment, but it only came after years of hard work.
“From the beginning, I’ve always just tried to do the work and stay out of the results. We all want to book the job, of course, but you just have to do the work,” he says. “It’s like the saying, ‘If you build it, they will come.’ If you do the work, the jobs will come. Quit worrying about whether you got the job and live your life.”
Since joining the cast of Abbott Elementary, Davis received global recognition and an array of exciting opportunities, but it’s the impact and popularity of Mr. Johnson that has been the icing on the cake for Davis. People have resonated with the fan-favorite character and taken him into their hearts.
“The show has changed my life in ways that I could never have possibly imagined,” Davis says. “I’m still pinching myself every day—is this really happening at this time in my life?”
