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Monday, Jan. 05, 2009

Featured roles boosting Dublin actor’s career in entertainment

If Jackson Walker had mapped out his career plan to be an actor, you’d think he got everything backward.

The Dublin native spent about a decade in Los Angeles doing bit parts on TV series and working in commercials.

When Walker and his wife, Buffy, decided they wanted to start a family and didn’t want to rear their children there, Walker — who has always been more interested in the production side of the film industry — was ready to put acting behind him.

But these days, Walker has several roles under his belt — and plenty more on the way.

Walker was cast in a memorable role in Denzel Washington’s “The Great Debaters” in 2007, and he has been working steadily ever since. He has been so busy, in fact, that he said he had to turn down a role in Tyler Perry’s TV series “House of Payne” because he was working on another production and wasn’t able to leave.

“I knew there were fantastic new tax incentives in Georgia (for film and TV production), and I was working on a small, low-budget film. I ended up working on “The Great Debaters,” which Denzel Washington directed, and had an important role in that film. I’ve been working constantly since then.

“All my friends in L.A. want to move to Dublin,” he said with a laugh.

Walker opened Blackbird Coffee in Dublin, which he still considers his day job, but between the coffee shop and his acting schedule, he has had little time to work on his own projects as a writer, director and producer.

“I never thought I’d be this busy — never,” Walker said. “When my wife and I discussed leaving L.A., acting was not my first love. It was filmmaking, which you can do anywhere. In my mind, that was it. I’m also 40, so I wasn’t trying to be a movie star. ... I don’t have time to write or produce.”

That doesn’t mean he hasn’t gotten some films made while being on the other side of the camera. He made the short movie “Tin Man,” which played at the Macon Film and Video Festival a couple of years ago.

Tragically, the subject matter of the film — in which a farmer has to cope with the death of a child — played out in real life when Walker’s son Nash died of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome in 2005.

About the same time, Walker lost his Screen Actors Guild health insurance, because he hadn’t worked enough to keep it. So he got back into acting to restore his insurance benefits.

He met director Dalton Harpe at the Macon film festival, and the two of them made “12 FL OZ,” which they are sending out to all of the major film festivals this year.

Vincent Duvall, an actor who worked on “12 FL OZ” and has known Walker since his L.A. days, said it was a great experience to work with Walker when they shot the movie in Dexter.

“Jackson is a great guy,” Duvall said. “I’ve known him for a long time. (The shoot) was a great experience. It was a great crew and a great story. It was a knock-down, drag-out kind of script.”

Duvall said that with so many productions moving out of L.A. to take advantage of tax breaks and incentives that state and local governments offer, he isn’t surprised that Walker has carved out a nice career while living in Dublin.

“It doesn’t seem strange that he would go some place and be a bigger fish in a smaller pond. I knew Jackson was talented, so he could do it wherever he wanted to. ... Of all my friends, he’s the most down to earth, solid friend. I think that, if anything, is what makes him so attractive to people in the film business, in addition to being a great actor.”

Day Permuay, who has worked as a producer on a movie and a TV pilot with Walker, agreed. She recently cast him to be the host of a reality-TV pilot called “Family Traditions,” which examines families from all walks of life and what they do when they get together.

“He has something special,” she said. “He’s an everybody kind of guy. He’s a man’s man, but he also has a sensitive side that goes well with the families.”

Movie and TV fans will get an opportunity to see Walker’s latest work soon enough. He filmed the TV movie “The People vs. Leo Frank,” in which he plays a detective, based on the real-life lynching of a Jewish factory manager in Atlanta who was falsely accused of a girl’s slaying in 1913. Walker said it’s scheduled to debut on PBS in March or April.

Also on PBS is a segment of “American Experience” called “We Shall Remain,” which details the Cherokee Trail of Tears. For that role, he was required to speak Cherokee with a Scottish accent.

“My saving grace is that no one knows what that would sound like,” Walker said, chuckling. Also on the slate is a role in the movie “Our Child Is Missing,” a featured part in Perry’s “Madea Goes To Jail,” and a role in the horror franchise “Final Destination 4: Death Trip 3D.”

When Walker does get back into writing and producing, he wants to work on a project about the Big Brothers-Big Sisters program, which he is actively involved with.

“Life is so full of opportunities to tell these stories,” he said. “It’s a good resource for the community, ... and I can provide some free publicity for them.”