Jussie’s parents Joel Smollett and Janet HARRIS Smollett met in the Bay Area while hanging out with Black Panthers during the civil rights era. Coincidentally, Kamala HARRIS is from the Bay Area as well. Her father Donald HARRIS has been a professor at Stanford since the 70s.

Jussie has 5 siblings who all act. The Smollett family’s big break came in 1994 with a show called On Our Own, starring comedian Ralph Louis HARRIS as the older brother who took care of all the kids after the death of their parents, oh and dressed in drag