We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Trent Walker a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Trent, thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.
First of all, I love this question. I moved to L.A. in 1991. I had been in New York studying acting at HB Studios with amazing teachers like Uta Hagen and Sandy Dennis. I ended up getting a recurring role on a soap opera and people started telling me I’d probably be successful in film and television and that I should move to Los Angeles. I loved New York so much, but I was very much a struggling artist. My money went for food, rent and acting classes. When a casting director, friend, Joy Todd, moved to L.A. I followed her lead. She would end up casting me in three studio films. I was very grateful and felt right at home on the set. I had learned my craft and continued to study and add improv to my skills.
When covid hit I had plenty of time to work on something for myself. I was determined to not waste all of this free time I had. I started writing comedy scenes and wrote a scene called “Nosey Neighbors”. It was about a gay couple who try to befriend their new neighbor. Really they are being nosey. I decided one day to film the scene on my iPhone. I got some costumes together and started shooting. I made of one half of the gay couple an over the top drama queen and the other a cowboy. The neighbor was going to be a kind of trashy Southern lady, but she seemed too much like the cowboy, so I made her British.
I showed the filmed scene to some friends and they like to characters and suggested I build on this idea and shoot some more scenes, which I did. After some time I had about sixteen short scenes filmed and I titled the show “Gaybors”, since that is what the gay couple was…gay neighbors. Then, a friend suggested I try to sell the show. I thought, yeah right, I shot this in my apartment on my iPhone. I looked into it and discovered a company called Filmhub. I could submit my show and see if streaming sites would pick it up. I edited the scenes into two full episodes and would later shoot two more, loaded them onto the Filmhub site. Much to my surprise I have ended up with nine streaming deals. for “Gaybors”. With this most lucrative being Tubi. It is a show I created out of a small idea and built on. Never, and I mean never, did I think I’d make any money on this show. It’s done so well that I have recently created a new show called “316 Greenbrier” and I”m in production done on my first full length documentary. “Gaybors” is my baby and means more to me than anything I’ve done in this business so far. I am forever grateful to those who saw the shows potential before I ever did.
As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?
I was born and raised in Tennessee. I was a creative kid, always making up shows, singing, playing instruments, doing art. If anyone was born to be an actor, it was me. Although I had no idea how to go about becoming one. I wrote songs at an early age. My father was a musician, but I didn’t live with him or see him often. My mother raised me and my two sisters the best she could. She was not going to win a “mother of the year” award, but she was a heck of a lot of fun, was big into civil rights and marched to the beat of her own drum. She didn’t cook or do the normal things mothers at the time did, and that would actually cause me to become very independent. I never wanted to do things in a normal way. I always felt like a misfit. Little boys in those days played sports and were rough and tough. I was popular, but inside I was a geeky theatre kid.
I would end up getting a vocal scholarship at the University of Tennessee and even plead a fraternity. I hated everything about college. I was miserable. I wanted to be acting, I wanted to be singing, I wanted to be on a stage doing it, not taking classes about it. And certainly not taking classes that didn’t have anything to do with show business.
I was in a pops group at UT and a girl in the group was a model. She got booked to do a photo shoot for the newspaper about picnics. They asked if she knew of a male model to be in the shoot with her. I was tall and thin and she asked me to do it. Me? Model? Okay, I guess. That one shoot would lead me to getting a modeling contract with Elite Models in Texas. I got a job as a singing cowboy at Six Flags Over Texas so I would have money to build up my modeling portfolio. Two days after I moved to Texas I got my first modeling campaign for Dr. Pepper. I was blown away that I booked a job. That lead me to model for many years. I would end up moving Nashville Tennessee to pursue music, but ended up as a talent agent. That lead me to New York where I studied acting, starting working as an actor and then moved to Los Angeles and acted in dozens of stage, film and tv roles.
In time I started creating my own shows and currently I have created several shows with my most successful one being a show called “Gaybors” that is on Tubi. My new show “316 Greenbrier” will hit the streaming channels soon.
We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.
So many people that started in the business when I did, don’t do it any longer. It takes a lot out of you to keep going in show business. You have to find your way and where you fit in. No one is going to really know your place and you have to discover yourself along the way. It really is the journey. The satisfaction is in the doing, the trying, the getting knocked down and pulling yourself back up. I am now an older character actor. I’ve been through a lot in this business. I’ve dealt with insecurities, dishonest people, and people that offered to help me out and then went missing in action. And you know what? It’s okay. I’m okay. As long as a have a passion for story telling and can create characters and shows, then I’m good. I love what I do. It fills me up and feeds my soul. Give me a costume and an interesting character and I’m in heaven.
I do have an amazing and supportive partner. I have a handful of very close friends who love me and who I know have my back. I’ve beat cancer twice! So everything else is a gift. It really is.
Is there mission driving your creative journey?
My goal is to tell interesting stories about the underdog. The person who feels out of place. Who feels misunderstood. The person who feels like a misfit, but kind of likes that about themselves. I relate to that. Wanting to be seen and knowing that there are others like you that feel the same. And my goal is to help people feel that different is a good thing. That’s what makes us special and unique.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.trentwalker.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/trentwalker_actor/
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/trent.walker.hollywoodactor
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/trentwalker33/
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/TrentWalker
- Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/trent-walker-music
- Other: https://tubitv.com/tv-shows/200019132/s01-e01-meet-your-new-gaybors
Image Credits
Gaybors Poster: (c) Trent Walker Entertainment
All other photos: photographer: Bernadette Bentley, (c) Trent Walker Entertainment