Today we’d like to introduce you to Antonio Baldwin.
Antonio, let’s start with your story. We’d love to hear how you got started and how the journey has been so far.
I currently live in Lithia Springs, GA. Long story short God has placed me on this earth to motivate and change the world through film. My story has several chapters but first, let me give you a visual of my personality. I have goals of motivating and changing lives through any means necessary. For example; at 18, I attempted to speak with “Phillip Calvin Mcgraw”,(formerly known as “Dr.phil”) to seek out help for a former co-worker who was getting abused by her husband. At that same job, I also convinced two of my other co-workers to further their education at community college. The world is a Big place with infinite possibilities and inspirations, And I just happen to know; If I can’t change the world right this second, Changing someone’s life, is just the same. Now lets talk school, something I was never good at.
While in high school, I took graphic design/tv production classes at the College and Career Academy for two years, as well as participated in the “SkillsUSA” contest, where two others and I represented the entire Academy. Now as I stated earlier, School was something I wasn’t the best at, But it’s something about those graphic design/tv production classes; It brought out the creative side, the adventurous side, the side of me that sees the colors of the world. Now on to the next chapter, towards the end of highschool I felt as though I had a cluster of ideas trapped inside my head, from skits to shorts, to feature films. Around this time, vine was popular, and I joined the trend! Vine was the first place I was allowed to showcase my ideas and the response was amazing! In this chapter of my life I learned the endless possibilities of just putting yourself out there! I would get responses of people telling me they watch my videos everyday, some watched them to feel better, and a lot watched to simply get a good laugh! Now to a young man in highschool, who’s goal was to influence, inspire and make a mark in his world, these responses were more than enough for me to continue and move forward!
Shortly after high school, I discovered my passion for acting! Fast forward, I enrolled in an acting class at words in motion studios, got signed by two agencies, and stared in 2 short films, a feature film, a tv pilot and a television show, and one commercial! During this chapter of life, I’ve learned a lot about the “industry”, the ups and down, and I was motivated to create my own environment where I could give young actors the opportunities to perform at their best and have fun as well. In this chapter of my life I realized to make an impact I needed to create a brand!
I now introduce you to IAMTONYTALKS! IAMTONYTALKS is my brand, It is my definition of what being you looks like and what it can do for you! Confused yet? Let me explain, being the only boy in a family of four, I felt the necessity to stand out, to create a mark, as stated earlier, my purpose in life is to motivate and change lives through film, with a background in a highly interactive social media account on vine and YouTube, I knew I had the skill to create an Audience! With that knowledge, I took on Instagram and created @IAMTONYTALKS! With consistent messages of my impact on certain users, post by post I am getting closer to building a happy group of individuals who come to my page to feel good! As I stated before, my story has several chapters but as you can see the rest is still unwritten, As for I plan on furthering my brand to television, creating a sit-com full of skits to make the world smile again, One face at a time!
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
It hasn’t been the smoothest road due to my sexuality, I have been fortunate to be accepted by my immediate family, however when I began expressing myself over Instagram and YouTube, I encounter positive and negative feedback. For example, I created a video on YouTube of me texturizing my hair. Soon the video gained 70k views; however, the comments were filled with homophobic insults. With the majoring of my skits requiring various wigs, I ran into a lot of homophobia.
As for acting, the main reason IAMTONYTALKS was created was to create my own opportunities. While auditioning, I noticed I was getting type casted into thugs, criminals or overly stereotyped lgbtq roles. While auditioning I also noticed the disappointment in a callback waiting room, where everyone was so nervous to speak to eachother, creating more nerves, I would be looked at as weird because I tried to become friends with the individuals I was auditioning “against”, I even offer to take one of my “competitors” home so he wouldn’t have to walk! From these situations came the desire to create an environment where it’s safe to be yourself and have fun doing it!
We’d love to hear more about your work and what you are currently focused on. What else should we know?
IAMTONYTALKS Is the title of my Instagram and YouTube! My page is place to come and smile! I am an entertainer! I act, write and dance! I am most proud of the impact I can make on an individual! I believe what sets me apart from a lot of entertainers, is I simply do it, I never worried about what equipment I have or who’s gonna see it, if I have an idea, I do it! And the fun is never taken out, I have a very visual imagination and what I see I build to life.
What were you like growing up?
Growing up honestly, I was all over the place! I knew what I wanted to do but not to sure how to. I was extremely shy in my middle school years, so shy and reserved, I use to chew on my sleeves of my long sleeve shirts to ease my anxiety! Crazy right? I remember a growing moment for me was when I had a school project to create a PowerPoint teaching the class about a certain topic, I was so nervous until I presented mine and the class cheered because of how visual and cool the presentation was (I was the only one who makes a video and not a PowerPoint), crazy enough the video is still available on YouTube! After that presentation I made some friends and it all went up from there
Contact Info:
- Email: baldwinantonio62@gmail.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamtonytalks/
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