We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Marcus Murphy a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Marcus , looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

As an actor choosing meaningful projects are important because of the representation being presented to viewers. In the beginning of my career I wanted to be apart of a lot of projects just to stay consistent as an actor. Therefore, I learned early in my career that the projects I attach myself to can either be beneficial or detrimental. For instance, one of my favorite projects to be involved in was Until The Flood by Dael Orlandersmith and directed by Julie Janson. The play was about the incident of Michael Brown who was murdered in Ferguson, Missouri and the events leading up to his untimely death. My character was Paul a young man who lived in the same community as Michael Brown, but had the opportunity to attend high school in a better community to receive a great education and develop his artistic skills to one day attend Berkeley, California.

Paul opportunity almost did not occur when he was almost an victim of senseless police killings due to being profiled by the police. Paul had to rethink his actions of lashing out to avoid being another murdered victim in Ferguson. As a result, Paul was able to walk away without any issues and continue to live his life and one day attend Berkeley College to pursue an art degree.

In final consideration, the project was meaningful to me because I was Paul growing up in poverty but had the opportunity to attend an boarding school to shape the direction of my life. For this reason, I have been fortunate to attend and graduate college, pursue my dreams as an actor, and give back to low income communities that I grew up in my self.

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.

The first time I knew that I wanted to pursue a creative/artistic path professionally was during my freshman year of college when I booked my first national print ad. It was the year 2012 when I was living in Hiram, Ohio attending Hiram College. I was sitting in my dorm room and researching modeling jobs that I felt I could contribute to with my look as an African American man. I stumbled upon a casting call from The Department of Health initially highlighting the HIV/AIDS epidemic, but after I was cast for the job the focus was for K2 known as synthetic marijuana. Initially, I was not hired as the lead model for the campaign, but with my professionalism and showing up early allowed me to be the face for campaign. The print ad was shown in New York City Time Square and on various metro buses throughout Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia. I knew after the print ad I wanted to pursue a entertainment career for the rest of my life.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

In the beginning of my career I did not have a lot of support from people who believed in me as an talent. The roles I knew I could connect to and portray as authentically as possible was overlooked because the way I present myself with suits. In order for me to take on challenging roles I stripped myself from what people new of me and showed a different skill. Consequently, after taking the initiative to be taken serious in my career I booked a job that stretched me and showed other directors I can get the job done.

Looking back, are there any resources you wish you knew about earlier in your creative journey?

One of the resources I wish I new earlier about in my career is knowing not to disclose my age in auditions because it is against the law. I should only disclose that if asked for a specific project I am submitting for.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: Hollywooddevon
• Facebook: MarcusDevon
• Twitter: Supermanmarc
• Other: TikTok: marcusmurphy19