Jasmine Guy returns in BET’s ‘The Quad’

By Frazier Moore

AP Television Writer

NEW YORK

Jasmine Guy is back at make-believe school. For the third time.

At 54, she has had a varied career as a dancer, writer and singer as well as actress. But she remains best-known for her stint as college student Whitley Gilbert on the “Cosby Show” spin-off “A Different World” (which aired from 1987 to 1993), and also was enrolled in Spike Lee’s college comedy “School Daze.”

Now, decades later, she’s back in academia for “The Quad,” a new BET drama set at Georgia A&M. It premieres Wednesday at 10 p.m.

“That’s the third fictitious HBCU (Historically Black Colleges and Universities) I’ve been to,” says Guy with a smile. “And I have no paper to show for it!”

“The Quad” centers on ambitious, sexy Dr. Eva Fletcher (played by Anika Noni Rose), who, having hit a career bump, takes the job of president of troubled Georgia A&M, with her daughter, a rebellious entering freshman, in tow. Guy portrays Ella Grace, dean of the history department and an Eva ally.

The college is riddled with problems, financial and otherwise. Worse, Eva – both a woman and a Northerner, not to mention her past scandalous affair with a grad student – is hardly greeted with open arms by members of the faculty.