Isiah Whitlock Jr., ‘The Wire’ Actor and Longtime Spike Lee Collaborator, Dies at 71

Isiah Whitlock Jr., the veteran character actor who appeared in “The Wire,” “Veep” and multiple Spike Lee films, died Tuesday in New York, according to his manager Brian Liebman. He was 71.

Whitlock worked with Lee on six joints: “BlacKkKlansman,” “Da 5 Bloods,” “She Hate Me,” “25th Hour,” “Red Hook Summer” and “Chi-Raq.”

On HBO and David Simon’s “The Wire,” he starred across 25 episodes as State Senator R. Clayton ‘Clay’ Davis.

“It is with tremendous sadness that...