We were lucky to catch up with Greg Martin recently and have shared our conversation below.
Hi Greg, thanks for joining us today. What did your parents do right and how has that impacted you in your life and career?
I grew up in Little Rock, Arkansas as the middle of three brothers. My dad was a great athlete when he was young, and he passed on that love for sports to all of us. Football, basketball, baseball, swimming, tennis, golf – we just went from one sport to another as the sporting seasons changed. And as a successful athlete “big fish in a small pond,” I naturally grow up with dreams of being a professional athlete. But while my dad was a good athlete, he was also a very good student, and even more important, a very wise man. I remember going with him to a Dallas Cowboys football game as a kid, and talking about how much I wanted to be a professional football player someday. My dad said (and I can’t remember the exact words, of course), “I think that’s a great goal, and you should work as hard as you can to get there. And I’ll help you every step of the way. But do you know how many young boys there are in America who want to play pro ball, and do you know how many of those actually get there? Very, very few. So, I want you to always remember, while you work as hard as you can to be the best football player you can be, you also need to work very hard and be the best student you can be, so you are prepared to have a great job and a great career in case being a pro football player doesn’t happen.” Then, and for the rest of my youth, my dad made sure that I always knew that there was a reason why the word “student” came first in the phrase “student-athlete.” Both my dad and my mom were at every single sporting event I ever did, but they were always more interested in my grades than in how many touchdowns I scored. And that guidance paid off in incalculable ways in my life. I was a good enough football player to land a football scholarship to Vanderbilt – which I chose because it was such an excellent academic institution. But I, like the vast majority of young players, was nowhere near good enough to play pro football. But my focus on my studies allowed me instead to go on to law school, and to a terrifically rewarding career in the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office. And those lessons from my parents also affected how I approached my love for acting. Just as with football, I recognized what an incredibly small percentage of those who dream of an acting profession are actually able to ever make a living at it. So, while I pursued my career as a prosecutor, I pursued acting as a sideline, as a hobby that I loved to enjoy when I could – on stage, and occasionally in TV and film. And when I retired from the D.A.’s office a couple of years ago, I took the opportunity to try and turn that previous avocation of acting into a vocation – but without the need or desperation to make a living at it! I will forever be grateful for that wise guidance from my parents.
Great, appreciate you sharing that with us. Before we ask you to share more of your insights, can you take a moment to introduce yourself and how you got to where you are today to our readers.
As a kid, I found an early love for theater, acting in a number of school and church plays, but I just didn’t have the free time for theater in high school in college, given the demands of studying and playing multiple sports. But in law school, we had a theater club on campus, and I thoroughly enjoyed performing in a couple of plays a year with other law students. And then while I was a prosecutor with the L.A. District Attorney’s Office, I was also a member of the Actors Co-op, a wonderful theater company in Hollywood, where I performed in over 25 plays during the three decades while I was a D.A. and then, when I retired from my legal career a couple of years ago, I was finally able to pursue acting on a more full-time basis. And I was blessed to soon be cast as a series regular in the. SONY/Affirm Originals series SHADRACH, which is now streaming on Great American Pure Flix. Pursuing acting now at this stage of my life is a double-edged sword. It’s great to have the time to seek acting roles, and I feel like I bring a terrific amount of real life experience to my roles, but I am also having to compete against guys my age who have been acting professionally for decades. Trying to become an overnight star in my 60’s is no easy task, ha!
What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?
The rewards for me now are varied. It is such fun in my retirement to be able to pursue a passion that brings me so much joy. But it is also so gratifying to be able to be a part of telling stories that hopefully can inspire, inform, and uplift people. I have such great respect for writers, and it is a privilege, whether on stage or on screen, to give voice and life to words and ideas that can move people, make them think, or just make them laugh.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
My goal is simply to do more of what I have just described — be a part of more projects that move and entertain audiences. I am a person of faith, I am a Christian, and it is terrific to see how many incredibly talented artists are creating more and more quality films and TV shows that speak to the values of a huge part of the viewing audience. There was a time when the term “faith-based” did not necessarily guarantee a level of quality, I think those days are largely in the past. And audiences are responding, which in turn brings more talented artists to faith-based projects, and studios are putting more money into them. So I look forward to continuing to be a part of that.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @gregallanmartin
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/greg.a.martin.7/
- Other: https://imdb.me/gregallanmartin
