Philip Michael Thomas

Philip Michael Thomas, born May 26, 1949, in Columbus, Ohio, is an American actor, musician, and composer who built a career spanning Broadway, film, television, and recorded music. He grew up in San Bernardino, California, and is of African American, Native American, Irish, and German descent. His father, Louis Diggs, worked as a foreman at a Westinghouse plant, and his mother was Lulu McMorris. Thomas and his seven half siblings — Marcus, Michelle, Karen, Anita, Carol, Crystal, and George — carried the surname Thomas, which belonged to his mother's first husband.

As a child, Thomas performed with his church's theater group, and at fifteen he developed an interest in ministry while singing in the choir of the Pentecostal Delman Heights Four Square Gospel Church. He graduated from San Bernardino High School in 1967 and worked briefly as a janitor to save money for college before earning a scholarship to Oakwood College, a historically Black institution in Huntsville, Alabama, where he studied religion and philosophy. After two years there, he transferred to the University of California, Riverside, and during that period auditioned for and was cast in the San Francisco production of Hair. He left college to pursue acting professionally.

Thomas's Broadway career ran from 1969 to 1980. He appeared in Hair, The Selling of the President, and No Place to Be Somebody, and starred in Reggae. His early film work included Coonskin in 1975 and the musical drama Sparkle in 1976, in which he appeared opposite Irene Cara.

Thomas became widely known in 1984 when he was cast as detective Ricardo Tubbs in the television series Miami Vice alongside Don Johnson. The character was an ex-NYPD officer from the Bronx who travels to Miami to seek revenge for his brother Rafael's death and becomes partnered with undercover cop Sonny Crockett. For the first two seasons, Thomas earned $25,000 per episode, rising to $50,000 per episode for seasons three through five. During the run of the series, Thomas coined the acronym EGOT, referring to his stated ambition to win an Emmy, Grammy, Oscar, and Tony. He received a People's Choice Award and a Golden Globe Award nomination, but as of February 2026 had not been nominated for any of the four EGOT awards. In 1991, Thomas starred alongside Bud Spencer in the six-part television miniseries Extralarge, and the two reunited for another miniseries, We Are Angels, in 1997. That same year, Thomas made two guest appearances in the police drama Nash Bridges, playing Deputy U.S. Marshal Cedrick "Rick" Hawks; his second appearance came in 2001 during the show's final season. Thomas also provided the voice of Lance Vance in the 2002 video game Grand Theft Auto: Vice City and reprised the role in the 2006 prequel Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories.

In 1985, Thomas released the album Living the Book of My Life on his own Spaceship Records label. The track "Just the Way I Planned It" reached number 75 on the Billboard R&B chart, and Thomas performed the album's title song during the Miami Vice episode "The Maze." A second song, "La Mirada," appeared in the episode "Trust Fund Pirates." His 1988 follow-up album, Somebody, produced the single "Don't Make Promises," which reached number 56 on the Billboard R&B chart. In 1987, Thomas recorded "Ever and Forever" with Argentine singer Lucía Galán of Pimpinela. In 1993, he co-wrote "My, My, My, Miam...I," which was selected as the city of Miami's theme song, and that same year he collaborated with Jamaican fitness instructor Sandi Morais to compose songs for a family-friendly musical called Sacha, which ran in south Florida and New York. The two also formed the Magic Cookie Production Company, and Thomas produced music for Morais's fitness videos in 2001 and 2006.

In 1994, Thomas became the spokesman for the Philip Michael Thomas International Psychic Network under an agreement with Psychic Reader's Network, based in Melbourne, Florida. He appeared in television advertisements alongside Eileen Brennan, Todd McKee, and his daughter Sacha Nicole, and released a cassette titled PMT Psychic Connection, Volume I. After the company, later known as Traffix, Inc., replaced him with Miss Cleo, Thomas sued for breach of contract. In 2002, a New York arbitrator awarded him $1.48 million for improper use of his name and likeness, plus an additional $780,000 in interest.