While the rest of the country was following the adventures of neurotic castaways, angst-ridden brats in the Bayou, and a group of the most boring housemates ever assembled in captivity, the Los Angeles Times was following the real life of J. August Richards, the actor who plays Charles Gunn on Angel, in his own version of The Truman Show.

The newspaper's view of reality television, however, was a little bit different. In fact, it was exploring how realistic it was for minorities to land choice roles on television at a time when it seemed like the networks existed on a decidedly vanilla landscape.

"The writer followed me around for a year to see if I'd get a show or not," Richards explains. "Fortunately, it all ended positively with me getting a role on Angel. What's ironic is that I don't think [race] ultimately had anything to do with me getting the part. When I auditioned, I heard that they were also looking at white guys, Latino guys, so they didn't know where they were going to go with it."

They wound up going with Richards, who brings a brand of urban toughness to Angel Investigations that he experienced while visiting family members in inner-city Washington DC as a kid.

"That's not really where I grew up and it's not who I am," the Bladensburg, Maryland native explains. "But it's something that I've always observed and has always been in my back pocket per se. I think East Coast guys are tougher than West Coast guys ever were, so I'm trying to use that energy."

As the only African American character sharing office space with a former Sunnydale Harvest Queen, an intellectual Brit, and an Irish vampire who's run amok over the past couple of centuries, Richards credits the predominately white Angel writing staff with developing Gunn's streetwise attitude and authentic dialogue…with a little help.

"When I change my lines, I just deliver them and wait for their reaction," Richards says with a sly grin. "I just kind of riff sometimes and they'll pull me back or they'll just let it go. When they have a problem with it, they tell me. It's not that I have to change much, because they usually get it right. The writers are really good. Some of the things you hear me saying that you might think I made up, they wrote. I'm glad they don't dumb him down and make him say stupid things. He still speaks English and understands English."

It was Gunn's actions that spoke much louder than his words, however, when he arrived on Angel's vampire-dusting scene in last season's "War Zone." When he staked his beloved sister, Alonna; the final act of protection was to protect her from herself by killing her. As hard as that was, he had to stay true to himself and protect her. That's what I love about that moment and that episode."

Dusting one's own undead sibling tends to leave the type of emotional scar that makes one a natural fit for Joss Whedon's Angelverse. Gunn's act also shows the exact type of tragic heroism that led Richards from an occasional guest star credit to the more secure title of series regular--though no one is ever truly safe with demons hiding in every alley.

It's also a part that almost didn't materialize for Richards, who was supposed to audition for another series while he was waiting to hear about Angel.

"That morning I woke up and went to go test for Angel. Then I was sitting in my apartment waiting to see if I got the part--if I did, I wouldn't go to the next audition. But if I didn't, I'd have to," he recalls. "I couldn't even look at the script for the next job, because I was so needing to know if I got the part on Angel. It was five minutes before the second audition, I was siting outside feeling kind of depressed like I hadn't gotten it, and then right as I was getting out of the car, my manager called me and told me I had gotten the part. I didn't want to go to the other audition--I wasn't mentally up to it, because I was so attached to this character. I felt like auditioning for the second role would be to let Gunn go."

While Richards had never seen an episode of Buffy or Angel prior to his audition due to Tuesday night acting classes, he was suddenly a part of one of the hottest ensembles on television. Since the part in the series he walked away from never aired, Richards' gamble paid off. He's never been one to shy away from the path less taken, however, or to simply blaze his own trail.

The son of native Panamanians, his father a mechanic and his mother an educator, Richards' choice to study acting made his family a little uneasy at first.

"They thought I was throwing it all away, because I was so good at math--I really love Calculus to this day--but this is what I wanted to do," he says. "My mom only wanted me to be a priest or a lawyer. Those were her two wishes for me."

Richards was influenced more by Sean Penn and Denzel Washington than Isaac Newton or Gottfried Leibniz, however, so his vanguard spirit led him to the University of Southern California where he studied acting with some equally distinguished classmates.

"There were three black men in the class: me, James Lesure from For Your Love and Kevin Mambo, who won two Emmys back-to-back for Guiding Light," he says. "There are other people in the class who are also succeeding, but I think it's really cool that the three of us who are still friends are all doing well."

Richards also received some invaluable on-the-job training while shooting a guest spot on the long-running Steve Urkel comedy showcase, Family Matters.

"I learned what a stand-in was," he says sheepishly. "I thought this guy was trying to take my job--I was so pissed. On a sitcom, you do the rehearsal, then they say 'cut--second team' to set the lighting. I didn't known what second team was, so I'm standing in my place getting ready to go, and this guy comes up to me and says, 'I'm gonna do it this time.' I was like, 'No, this is my part.' I really thought he was trying to steal my part."

And now that Richards brings the same tenacity with which he defended his role to protecting the innocents on the mean streets of Angel, he says working in the cut-throat entertainment industry helped him grasp the concept of the show quickly.

"The show is taking the veil off of the real LA, because there are some real vampires and demons walking around here," Richards says. "They just don't have masks and they can walk around in the sunlight. I think this show is a perfect analogy for what LA really is. I do love living in LA and enjoy the city, but vampires are all about. They're people that drain the blood right out of you. They're all around the planet, so it's not hard for me to connect to what a vampire is."

Real-life vampires aside, Richards couldn't be happier with the current success he is enjoying or the cast of characters he is sharing it with.

"Everybody on the set is so fantastic and there are so many interesting people," he says. "I absolutely love working with David Boreanaz. He's so tight with his dramatic skills and his comedic skills--he juggles that line so well. Charisma Carpenter, I completely adore. She teaches me dances, choreographs dances, and we do them together between takes. She's definitely one of my favorite people on the set. And Alexis Denisof is a dynamic actor. He's phenomenal. There's a Tony or an Oscar in his future--you heard it here first."

At the end of the day, however, it's the work that the actor seems to love the most, and it shows in his approach to Gunn.

"I really love his spirit. He's so pure and clean and unaffected," Richards enthuses. "It's just about protecting what you love, and I think anybody can connect to that. I love the extent to which he goes to protect the people he loves. I find that fascinating and admirable."