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    *The name Wesley Jonathan may not ring a bell, but his repertoire does. The actor made his debut on the 80s young cop drama “21 Jump Street.”

      His signature dimples took him to the Saturday morning teen sitcom “City Guys” and then on to the WB’s “What I Like About You.” This versatile actor is one of those TV actors that you know and love. With decades of acting under his belt, the actor is now making his move to the big screen in the sports film “Crossover.”

     The film, opening this weekend, stars Jonathan as a young athlete who’s heading to UCLA to play college basketball. In a fateful trip to Los Angeles with his best friends, he gets a taste of the struggle he faces in trying to pursue his dream of using his basketball scholarship to become a doctor and the dream his friends have for him to become an NBA star.

      “I play a cat by the name of Noah Cruise who is a young, pretty intelligent kid who is extremely talented in the fundamentals of basketball. He’s talented in basketball, but his mother, his grandmother – who raised him, and he himself, want him to be a doctor. So he uses the basketball scholarship to get his degree in medicine. All the while, everyone is on his back and those in the ‘hood to be an NBA player,” Jonathan described.

     While the story has it’s attraction as a coming-of-age-slam-dunkin’ sports drama, Jonathan was attracted to the script on a more societal level. The actor was drawn to the focus of the dilemma that many young African-American males face today.

     “What attracted me to the script is that in a lot of cases, this is really true of young brothers – that an African-American man may not feel noble enough to want to be a doctor and save lives,” he said.

Wesley Jonathan & Anthony Mackie in 'Crossover.'

     The film also stars Anthony Mackie as his b-ball buddy, “America’s Next Top Model” star Eva Pigford as his love interest, and Wayne Brady as an unscrupulous bookmaker.

     “Wayne Brady is the bookie and the illegal underground snake. It’s a stretch, but I think he did a great job. I think he did a wonderful job,” Jonathan said of the actor who's most known for he’s comedic persona displayed on the improv TV show “Whose Line Is It Anyway.”

     The very modest and humble Jonathan explained that the film has three main plots, his being just one, but he realizes that being a lead in a feature film is a pretty significant step in his career.

     “It’s an accomplishment in itself,” 28-year-old Jonathan said of his movie headlining status. “I’ve been acting for 20 years. My first job was when I was 8 years old.”

     Fortunately for the film’s producers, he has also been playing basketball since he was a kid.

     “I can play ball pretty doggone well. It’s not just for movies, it’s for real,” he said. “That was part of the casting; they wanted somebody who could play basketball and act. I’ve been playing since I was a kid; I just went into a different type of training for the film to make things a little more defined. I can better ball than [co-star] Anthony Mackie, but he can play.”

     Jonathan didn’t get to test that theory, though. The two were too tired and too busy training for the film than to do a pick up game of one on one.

     “We were hanging on each other’s shoulders saying, ‘Oh, please let this end,’” he recalled.

     “Crossover” represents a new phase for Jonathan. The actor is hanging tough with his sitcom “What I Like About You” and he’s also completed three other films waiting to be either released as features or straight to video.

      For MORE info on "Crossover" go HERE.