Edi Gathegi

Edi Mūe Gathegi (/ˈɛdi ˈmweɪ ɡəˈθɛɡi/;^{[citation needed]} born March 10, 1979) is a Kenyan-American actor. He had his breakthrough playing Dr. Jeffrey "Big Love" Cole on the fourth season of the television series House (2007), followed by his roles as Cheese in the 2007 film Gone Baby Gone, vampire Laurent in the films Twilight and its sequel The Twilight Saga: New Moon, and as Darwin in X-Men: First Class. He played cover operative Matias Solomon on The Blacklist, which he reprised for the spinoff series The Blacklist: Redemption.^[2]

Edi Gathegi
Gathegi in 2009
Born	Edi Mūe Gathegi[1] (1979-03-10) March 10, 1979 (age 46) Nairobi, Nairobi City County, Kenya
Education	University of California, Santa Barbara (BA) New York University (MFA)
Occupation	Actor
Years active	2006–present
Spouse	Adriana Marinescu (m. 2018)

Gathegi is also featured in the AMC series Into the Badlands as Baron Jacobee. He has also played a leading role in Startup, a television drama series on Crackle. Since 2022, Gathegi has played engineer and entrepreneur Dev Ayesa in the Apple TV+ original science fiction space drama series For All Mankind, and played Mister Terrific in the DC Universe film Superman (2025).

Early life

Born on March 10, 1979,^[3] in Nairobi, Kenya, Gathegi grew up in Albany, California, U.S.^[4] Gathegi attended the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he played basketball until a knee injury ended his career. Gathegi then began taking acting classes.^[4] He studied at New York University's Graduate Acting Program at the Tisch School of the Arts, graduating in 2005.^[5] Gathegi's career began in theatre,^[6] and his stage credits include Two Trains Running at the Old Globe Theatre, As You Like It, Twelfth Night, Othello, A Midsummer Night's Dream, and Cyrano de Bergerac, among others.^[1]

Career

Gathegi's first professional role was the Haitian Cabbie in the 2006 film, Crank. Though he had originally auditioned for the role of Kaylo, the producers gave the role to Efren Ramirez and instead offered Gathegi an appearance as the Haitian Cabbie.^[6] He was skeptical at first about performing a Haitian accent but was coached by a Haitian friend.^[6] In 2007, after guest-starring on Lincoln Heights and Veronica Mars, Gathegi went on to star as Bodie in Death Sentence, Darudi in The Fifth Patient, and Cheese in Gone Baby Gone. He later had a recurring role as Mormon intern Dr. Jeffrey Cole in the television medical drama House. His character was often mocked for his religious beliefs by Dr. House, who himself is an atheist. He also guest-starred in CSI: Miami, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and Life on Mars in 2008 before being cast as Laurent in Twilight. When Gathegi first auditioned for the 2008 film, adapted from the same-titled first book in Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series, he had not heard of the series and was not aware that his character was a vampire.^[7] Gathegi later read the whole series and now considers himself a hardcore fan.^[7][8]

He portrayed Eddie Willers in Atlas Shrugged (2011), based on Ayn Rand's novel of the same name. He later portrayed another Haitian character, Jean Baptiste, in the fifth season of Justified, but was unhappy with the role and asked to be written off the show.^[9][10] He has also been a recurring character in NBC's television series The Blacklist as Matias Solomon, an operative for a covert organization. Gathegi reprised the role in the 2016–2017 season crime thriller The Blacklist: Redemption.^[2] He also portrays the character Ronald Dacey on StartUp. In July 2025, Gathegi appeared as Mister Terrific in the DC Universe (DCU) film Superman (2025).^[11]

Personal life

Gathegi married Romanian Adriana Marinescu, a dancer, in 2018.^[12]

Filmography

Film roles

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2006	Crank	Haitian Cabbie
2007	Gone Baby Gone	Cheese
	The Fifth Patient	Darudi
	Death Sentence	Bodie
2008	Twilight	Laurent
2009	My Bloody Valentine 3D	Deputy Martin
	The Twilight Saga: New Moon	Laurent
2010	This Is Not a Movie	Ghost of Jimmy
2011	X-Men: First Class	Armando Muñoz / Darwin
	Atlas Shrugged	Eddie Willers
	The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn - Part I	Laurent	Flashback only
2014	Bleeding Heart	Dex
2015	This Isn't Funny	Ryan
	Aloha	Lt. Col. Curtis
	Criminal Activities	Marques
2016	The Watcher	Noah
2018	Pimp	Kenny Wayne
	Better Start Running	Fitz Paradise
2019	Princess of the Row	Beaumont "Bo" Willis
2020	The Last Thing He Wanted	Jones
2021	Caged	Harlow Reid
	The Harder They Fall	Bill Pickett
2023	Aporia	Mal
2025	Superman	Michael Holt / Mister Terrific

Television roles

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2007	House	Dr. Jeffrey Cole	Recurring role; 7 episodes
	Lincoln Heights	Boa	3 episodes
	Veronica Mars	Zeke Molinda	Episode: "I Know What You'll Do Next Summer"
2008	CSI: Miami	Freddie Mays	Episode: "Tunnel Vision"
	Life on Mars	Fletcher Bellow	Episode: "Things to Do in New York When You Think You're Dead"
	CSI: Crime Scene Investigation	Skinny Dude	Episode: "Leave Out All the Rest"
2011	Nikita	Kalume Ungara	Episode: "Girl's Best Friend"
2012	Phineas and Ferb	Iggy/Various characters	2 episodes
2013	The Family Tools	Darren Poynton	Main role; 10 episodes
	Beauty & the Beast	Kyle	3 episodes
	Red Widow	Leon
2014	Justified	Jean Baptiste	4 episodes
	Wild Card	Tres	Unsold television pilot[13]
2015	Proof	Zed	Main role; 10 episodes
2015–2016	The Blacklist	Matias Solomon	Recurring role; 13 episodes
2015	Into the Badlands	Jacobee	2 episodes
2016–18	StartUp	Ronald Dacey	Main role; 30 episodes
2017	The Blacklist: Redemption	Matias Solomon	Main role; 8 episodes[2]
2020	Briarpatch	A.D. Singe	Main role
2022	The Guardians of Justice	Mr. Smiles	7 episodes
2022–present	For All Mankind	Dev Ayesa	Main role; season 3–present[14]

Audio

Year	Title	Role	Notes
2023	The Mantawauk Caves	James Fincher	Main role; podcast[15]

Awards and nominations

Drama Desk Awards

• 2018: Won along with Sean Carvajal for last-minute entrances into the Signature Theatre Company production of Jesus Hopped the 'A' Train, ensuring it had a happy real-life ending after replacing Reg E. Cathey in late September for an October 5th first preview^[16][17]

Obie Awards

• 2018: Won OBIE Award for his performance as Lucius Jenkins in Signature Theater Company revival of Jesus Hopped the 'A' Train ^[18]

Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards

• 2011: Won LADCC Award for best Lead Actor in a Play for the role of Franco Wicks in the Geffen Playhouse production of Superior Donuts^[19]

Method Fest Independent Film Festival

• 2019: Won Breakout Acting Award for his method performance as Beau Willis in Princess of the Row^[20]

Ovation Awards

• 2011: Nominated for Featured Actor in a Play for the role of Franco Wicks in the Geffen Playhouse production of Superior Donuts^[21]

Lucille Lortel Awards

• 2018: Nominated for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play for his role in Jesus Hopped the 'A' Train at Signature Theatre Company^[22]