JURNEE SMOLLETT: From Full House to Powerhouse

THE SMOKE STAR HAS BEEN IN FRONT OF CAMERAS SINCE SHE WAS A BABY—AND SHE WOULDN’T HAVE IT ANY OTHER WAY

- LIZA ESQUIBIAS

While many childhoods are filled with soccer games and ballet lessons, Jurnee Smollett was hanging with the Olsen twins on the set of Full House. “I’ve been in front of the camera since I was 10 months old,” she says. “My older siblings were modeling and doing commercials, and I just fell into it. It wasn’t until I did Eve’s Bayou with Samuel L. Jackson when I was 10 years old that I fell in love with the craft.”

Ever since, the 38-year-old mom of one has sought projects that give her that same spark, and those have included hit shows like Friday Night Lights, Parenthood, True Blood and Lovecraft Country (which earned her an Emmy nomination in 2021). In her latest role on Apple TV+’s crime drama Smoke, she plays Michelle Calderone, a former Marine working as a detective investigating arson cases. Smollett says she was drawn to Michelle’s complexity. “It’s very instinctual if I feel that there’s certain things in the character that I need to exercise in myself,” she says.

Smoke (2025) "She's just a force of nature," Taron Egerton (left) says of scene partner Smollett.