Omar represented the duality of a black experience never before given such honest screen time, represented in his exchanges with Wendell Pierce's detective Bunk, a black schoolfriend who reminded him of the different paths life afforded them.
Interviewed together years before Williams' death, Pierce said his co-star's performance gave voice and flesh to characters "that most people would have never given the same humanity to… opening a window to a world of men that we pass by or don't know about".