DPS NOTABLE
CHASING SUCCESS: A BEAUTIFUL JOURNEY Oscar-nominated DPS grad Kevin Wilson Jr.
o many, 2007 Hillside High School graduate Kevin Wilson Jr. has seemingly reached a pinnacle–or at least checked off a professional and personal best. A short film that he wrote, produced, and directed was nominated for an Oscar at the 90th Academy Awards. “My Nephew Emmett” was written from the point of view of Emmett Till’s uncle, at whose home the 14-year-old was staying for the summer and from which he was abducted. The 19-minute film has been lauded and screened at national film festivals. Despite having been recognized globally for his cinematic talent, Wilson says he is still chasing the success that he says his theater mentor, retired Hillside High School drama director Wendell Tabb, personified. When he was in fifth grade at Burton Geo-World (now Burton Magnet Elementary), Wilson saw his cousin perform in one of Tabb’s productions. Later, he landed the role of the protagonist in “The Butterfly Child,” a play about suicide. “That—fifth grade—was when I fell in love with the arts,” Wilson says. Wilson moved on to Shepard for middle school, then Hillside High School, where he impressed Tabb with a performance. Now immersed in the film industry and a celebrity in his own right, Wilson remains proud of his roots, still catches Hillside shows when he comes home, and regularly speaks with his former drama teacher. “He’s a great mentor, great director, all those things. But beyond all that, he’s just a good man. Good father figure. He’s a good man of faith,” says Wilson, who says he grew up in a single-parent household until he was 15. His mother had become an emancipated minor at 15, living on her own in New York. Wilson says his mom’s circumstances made her tough and beautiful simultaneously. Now a professional and an adjunct professor at N.C. Central University, his mom was
20 SPARK INSIDER
intentional in how she raised her son, introducing him to men who would help him become a humble man of faith himself. Wilson gravitated toward the piano when his dad – himself a musician – insisted that he learn to play an instrument, and played the trumpet at Shepard and in the marching band at Hillside. Tabb was known to give his students an ultimatum and did just that with Wilson: choose either band or theater, which changed his entire life’s trajectory. Not only did he begin carving out a career, but it also taught him how to be fully immersed in the craft of his choosing. “That’s what I’m confronted with as a creative right now. I can’t do everything. If I have all my tentacles out, I’m not going to be able to concentrate fully on one specific thing. Mr. Tabb was trying to help us understand that theater and arts is a full-time job. It’s not just something that you can just devote half of yourself to. Either you’re going to be all in or you’re not going to be in at all,” says Wilson. He remembers rehearsals that lasted until the wee hours of the morning. “It was just a part of the process. An enjoyable part of the process,” he says. “We had to be pushed beyond our limits to really understand how great we could be. By coddling the students, they’re not going to understand how far they can really go. If you’re in the gym and you’re working out, when you’re pushing past that set that you felt like was your last, you throw one more up because you realize that that’s how your muscles get built,” he says. Teachers demanded excellence, and Wilson, to this day, pushes himself as a result. He tells of being a student at Burton where there was a television station in the basement of the school. There, students could produce, anchor, report the weather, or direct, among other jobs. All the classrooms had televisions. “Doing that was fascinating to me. I think that was when
