Marcus Scribner is enjoying a new kind of freedom. The actor has spent the last decade working in the sitcom world: he first originated the role of Andre Anderson Jr.—best known as Junior—on the hit series Black’ish back in 2014. When the show ended in 2022, Scribner followed his elder on-screen sister to college, joining the cast of Grown’ish. Now, as the series celebrates its finale episode this week, Scribner has made a real-life changing move: he’s now a New York City resident.
"I grew up in Los Angeles. And I wanted a change of scenery,” the actor shared with EBONY while enjoying finger sandwiches and his first macaron ever inside the Cacao Bar at MarieBelle, the trendy chocolatier shop in the city’s SoHo district. "I'd come to New York a couple of times for business and fun, and I just had a great time."
Being in a city where people walk everywhere, Scribner finds himself getting out and about more than ever. “I like to stay in the house a lot so New York brings me out of that shell and forces me into a new environment, along with just being able to see all different types of people in one congregated area,” he shared.
Like most New York transplants, he’s still figuring his way around the Big Apple. “I'm very bad with directions,” Scribner declared. “I've been watching Amazing Race recently, and I'm like, okay, navigation would not be my strong suit.”
But, he is adapting. “I finally understand the [subway] system; this is a Brooklyn- or Manhattan-bound train. And it's weird because I grew up in L.A., but I feel like navigating New York for me is easier. It's just more grid-like and things aren’t randomly placed.”
Back in Los Angeles, at the fictional California University of Liberal Arts, Scribner promises that the Grown'ish finale is one to watch. “I'm really excited about it. I didn't know how they're going to wrap up the show because Junior has storylines going in every different direction,” he said. “We have some amazing guest stars in our final episodes. I think it goes out with a bang, and it closes Junior's storyline off wonderfully.”
One of the great things about Junior’s time on Grown’ish is that this is one young Black man whose life hasn’t been steeped in trauma.
"It's very refreshing to see a character where they tell a storyline about us, and they're just having fun,” he exclaimed, referring to the recent episode where Junior and his pals searched for the anonymous artist The Squid.
"That's what I loved so much about Black’ish and Grown’ish—we obviously talk about the issues that we face in our community, but we can also just have a good time.”
Scribner’s had the opportunity to learn from his alter-ego as well. “Junior has a lot of the same interests as me, whether it’s fantasy or sci-fi and the nerdy things that he’s been known for for years. But he is so soundly confident in who he is, and he treats everybody around him with utmost respect and love. He tries to lead with kindness, which I think is very important and very uncommon in a world like our own. And so I tried to pick that up from him and bring it into my everyday life.”
While his coast has changed, Scribner wants to continue his acting career on this side of the Atlantic. “I'm hoping to move a little bit more into theater, which I'm excited about. I'm trying to learn and absorb as much as I can while I'm young.” He just starred in a play based on Langston Hughes and other artists’ trip to Moscow in 1932, where they appeared in a Soviet film about race relations and labor disputes in the American South. “I’m not going to stop with the TV and movie stuff, but I definitely want to learn from the theater grandmasters.”
Scribner has also started a production company. “We have a film called How I Learned to Fly,” he revealed. “We produced it on a shoestring budget, but it came out phenomenally … We have Cliff "Method Man" Davis, Cedric the Entertainer; we've got a stacked cast. And it's more of a trauma story, so we took a step back from having fun. But it was a really interesting role for me to get into as an actor.”
With the added grit on his resume and his new New York City address, we wholeheartedly expect to see Scribner in an upcoming arc on Law & Order: SVU, a New York actor’s rites of passage.
Grown’ish, the series finale, airs Wednesday, May 21, 2024, on Freeform and the next day on Hulu.
