Y'lan Noel

Y'lan Noel was born on August 19, 1988 in Brooklyn, New York, before his family moved to Queens and later settled in Decatur, Georgia. He is of Afro‑Panamanian descent and grew up surrounded by a blend of Caribbean and American cultural influences that have informed his artistic sensibility. Noel began his higher‑education journey at Morehouse College, a historically Black institution, before transferring to New York University where he pursued a Bachelor of Fine Arts at the Tisch School of the Arts. While at NYU he became a member of the Kappa Alpha Psi fraternity, an affiliation that reflects his commitment to community and leadership. His formative years were marked by a deep love for storytelling, a passion that was nurtured through school productions and local theater workshops. This early immersion in performance laid the groundwork for a career that would soon span television, film, and interactive media. Bold moments in his life include the decision to leave academia for Los Angeles to chase acting opportunities, a risk that paid off when he secured his first professional credit in 2012. Throughout his upbringing, Noel’s experiences with diversity, migration, and family dynamics have helped shape the nuanced characters he later portrayed on screen.