Samuel Whitehill's acting career began in his 20s while he was living in Austin, Texas, where he started with student film productions. He took a hiatus from acting for several decades before returning to the craft in 2015. Since then, he has appeared in over 200 feature films, shorts, TV shows, music videos, and commercials, playing principal roles in many of them.
Whitehill's notable performances include his role in Michael Boston's 2024 dystopian long short/short feature "Political Prisoner," for which he was named Best Supporting Actor at three international film festivals. He also played a major supporting role in the 2023 feature "Mickey Hardaway," which was nominated for Best Diaspora Feature at the 2024 African Movie Academy Awards.
In addition to his film work, Whitehill has received numerous awards for his performances, including being named Best Supporting Actor for his role in Boston's "Jesus Rides a Harley" and being nominated for Best Actor for his role as a racist cafe owner in Marcellus Cox's monumental short film "Rolling in the Deep." He has also been recognized for his work in the sci-fi feature "Hallucinations," an award-winning film by M. Wild, in which he played a major supporting role as an eccentric British anthropologist.
Whitehill's extensive education and life experiences have greatly influenced his acting career. He holds a law degree, as well as a master's degree in English and a graduate minor in Hebrew literature, from the University of Texas at Austin. He also earned an undergraduate degree in English, with minors in Geology and French, from Texas Tech University.
In addition to his degrees, Whitehill is a polyglot who speaks English, Spanish, and Hebrew, has a working command of French, and speaks some Mandarin Chinese. He has published four books of original Hebrew poetry in Israel, where he is known as Robert Whitehill-Bashan. He has also translated the works of Israeli authors into English and poetry by Walt Whitman into Hebrew.
Whitehill has been married for 46 years and has four adult children, eight grandchildren, and a rescue dog named Button. He currently resides in Burbank, California.
