Colman Domingo’s cheesesteak order: messy, gooey, ‘falling out of my mouth and out of my hands’

How do you capture the essence of your hometown in 20 minutes? That was the challenge actor-playwright-director Colman Domingo faced as he planned the Philadelphia episode of his new memoir-meets-travel docuseries You Are Here on AMC.

“I actually don’t think that I’ve seen Philadelphia from this lens, my own city,” said Domingo, from his backyard pool deck in Los Angeles. “In films and TV shows, I don’t see a Philadelphia that’s actually my Philadelphia.”

Long before his scene-stealing roles in Euphoria and Fear the Walking Dead, Domingo was “J.J.” (his middle name is Jason), a shy and skinny kid hanging on the steps of his family’s red brick rowhouse off 52nd and Chancellor Streets.

His Philadelphia gets introduced through shots of the El and sneakers hanging on a wire, as he speaks about the grit and hustle of his “tough, plainspoken city.”

Domingo sees the docuseries — with each episode set in a different city that shaped him — as a return to his interest in journalism, which was his major as an undergrad at Temple. The show “really goes with my journalistic heart of always just trying to get out in the world and see what makes us more alike than unalike,” he said.

His goal was to showcase his personal story beyond the red carpet, which feels especially timely as the longtime character actor is marking his first starring role in a film, the forthcoming biopic of West Chester-born gay civil rights activist Bayard Rustin. He’s also at the center of the buzzy musical film adaptation of The Color Purple, playing the abusive Mister. After decades on screen, on stage, and behind the scenes, Domingo is beyond ready for the spotlight — even though he’s currently on strike.

Going off script for You Are Here was both delightful and scary. When planning to visit his niece’s West Philly house for a homecoming dinner, he didn’t know who would attend — and the surprise was a sweet and tearful reunion of siblings, including his younger brother from Virginia whom he hadn’t seen in three years.

Of course, Domingo made sure to have a cheesesteak scene. He and his old friends headed to Max’s Steaks in North Philly (which famously appeared in Creed) after shopping at South Philly’s Raxx and roller skating at Rolling Thunder.

“My order is cheesesteak with Whiz, grilled onions, salt, pepper — you always gotta say salt, pepper, ketchup — pickle, and sweet peppers,” he said. “I like a lot of things on it. I like it messy and gooey and falling out of my mouth and out of my hands.”

As a kid, he would go to the neighborhood corner store to get steaks. Now, he loves Ishkabibble’s.

While steaks are obvious, Domingo also takes time to shout out Philly’s underrated theater scene. His plays are set here, and he’s even directed at People’s Light. Most recently he was a producer on the Broadway run of Fat Ham.

In one scene, Domingo gets dinner with playwright James Ijames at Booker’s in Cedar Park and talks about the Philly pride associated with the Tony-nominated play. The friends met through local theater and instantly connected. When Fat Ham headed to New York, Domingo joined to support Ijames and ease the overwhelming process.

“It’s so nice, not only as artists, but also as Black men, as Black queer men, to have that support for one another,” said Domingo. “Luckily, I know that he’s such a staunch advocate of me and anything that I do, and vice versa. We know that there’s enough food to eat at the table and we share everything.”

Domingo comes home twice a year, typically staying at AKA University City. He loves going to the Rittenhouse Square farmers market and he’ll stop at the Continental, which was one of the last places he took his mom before she died. Often, he’ll study the architecture while walking around and try new restaurants. No matter how much the city changes, though, he knows that the hustle still defines Philadelphians.

“We always consider ourselves the underdog, I know I consider myself the underdog, but we use that as a sort of armor,” said Domingo. “People thinking I’m not going to do it, I can’t get that. They don’t know I got that Rocky spirit, the spirit of a city of underdogs. We love feeling like we’re the underdogs because I think it helps us win and survive.”

“You Are Here” is streaming on AMC.com and elsewhere.