Vital Stats: Born: December 12, 1975 Birth Place: New York, New York Nationality: American Biography This intense, charismatic young actor lived out the classic overnight success scenario by beating out approximately 1,000 other candidates to win the starring role in Spike Lee's feature "Clockers" (1995). With no previous acting experience, Phifer was so green that he had his head shots taken at a Woolworth booth, just before attending the open casting call audition. Like his character, street-level ghetto crack dealer Strike, Phifer was a 19-year-old young Black male from the inner city.    The Harlem native received mostly raves for his searing debut performance. The success of that assignment led to a supporting role in the made-for-cable TV-movie "The Tuskegee Airmen" (HBO, 1995) starring Laurence Fishburne as well as roles in "Soul Food" (1997), "I Still Know What You Did Last Summer" (1998), and in the remake of "Shaft" (2000). Sadly, one of the actor's most powerful performances, as the lead character Odin in "O," the Othello-inspired high school drama, fell victim to a bizarre socio-political phenomenon. Shot in 1999, "O" depicted a harrowing incident of violence among high school students (inspired by its Shakespearean source material) that unfortunately mirrored a series of real-life shootings in high schools across the United States, most tragically at Columbine High School in Colorado. The distributor shelved the film, and it wasn't released until 2001--and then without much fanfare although critics roundly praised the film and the performances of Pfifer, Julia Stiles and Josh Hartnett.          In 2002, Phifer was cast as Cale in the sci-fi feature "Imposter". He then went on to play a 1980s drug kingpin in the feature drama "Paid In Full" (2002), but his most visible role was as Future in "8 Mile," the film starring and loosely based on the life of hip-hop artist Eminem.