Netta Walker settles into ‘All American: Homecoming’ after a streak of success in Chicago theater

Chicago actor Netta Walker found her groove in Chicago theater in 2018-19 with a run of performances which received fine notices all around.

Walker portrayed a conflicted Ophelia in Monty Cole’s ambitious “Hamlet” at Gift Theatre, a lovely Mrs. Darcy in Lauren Gunderson and Margot Melcon’s “The Wickhams: Christmas at Pemberley” and a troubled young woman named Jennifer in Anna Jordan’s tough drama “Yen” at Raven Theatre, a role for which she won a Jeff Award.

When the pandemic brought everything to a halt, including every theater in town, Walker’s talent continued to take her to new places. Hunkered down in her Logan Square apartment, Walker submitted an audition video for “All American: Homecoming,” a college-age spinoff of the popular CW high school drama “All American.”

“I thought it would be another one of the auditions I sent off and never heard back about,” Walker recalls, in a phone conversation from Los Angeles.

But she did hear back and was cast as Keisha McCalla, a dance student and dorm RA at fictional Bringston University, an HBCU in Atlanta. Always trying to help fix her friends’ problems, she is known as the “mayor of Bringston.”

“Keisha just makes sense to me,” says Walker, 26. “She’s confident in who she is and not afraid to express herself. She’s very driven and like everyone else she makes mistakes, but she also wants to resolve those mistakes.”

And while Keisha is the glue that holds her friends together as they face the ups and downs of college life, the character will face some challenges of her own in a larger story arc when the show resumes its second season at 8 p.m. Monday on WCIU-Channel 26.

Walker won’t give anything away but does say Keisha comes face-to-face with the “hard work and stress level of being a dancer in a conservatory program. You see what that does to her.”

Walker grew up in Jacksonville, Florida, the youngest of four (she has three older brothers). They were military kids; her African-American father met her mother while stationed in the Philippines.

Filipino culture remains an important element in Walker’s life — and in Keisha’s life as well, as the show at times puts her Filipino heritage to the forefront of storylines.

“The willingness to honor and explore Filipino culture was something I’d never seen before,” Walker says, adding, “I was able to collaborate with the writers on what Filipino culture really looks like.”

Walker took dance and voice lessons growing up. But it wasn’t until high school, when she admits to “doing things I shouldn’t have been doing and getting in trouble,” that a drama teacher, Shirley Sacks, helped guide her toward the path that would eventually land her in Roosevelt University’s Performing Arts program.

“She saw me really floundering, trying to figure out my life, and she saved me,” Walker says. “Her classes were incredibly detailed and academic. I felt very attached to theater.”

Walker acknowledges that every play she did was special in its own way, but that “Yen” was “a really special experience and the most emotionally draining show I’ve done.”

In the visceral drama, Walker’s Jennifer is the light that brings out the humanity in a pair of toxic teenage brothers living alone in a West London flat.

“Netta blew me away with her commitment,” recalls “Yen” director Elly Green. “She brought so much of herself to that role: unafraid to be goofy, raw and tender all at once. The play tackled difficult subjects, and Netta brought curiosity and sensitivity to the process.”

It was after winning the Jeff in 2019 that Walker voiced via Facebook her complaints about discrimination and abuse that she said she and other students experienced in Roosevelt’s performing arts program. The post and the hundreds of comments that followed resulted in changes at the university, including the ouster of a faculty member who was the focus of the complaints. 

Walker says she carries that learning experience with her as she transitions to work in a new industry and a new environment that she acknowledges has “a big learning curve.”

“Thankfully I got my start in Chicago with all the artists who supported me and made me feel that my voice and my opinions and my experiences were valid to talk about. I feel confident in saying what I need to say.

“But I still think I’m learning; I’m still tripping over myself; I’m still pretty young in my communication skills. But my knowledge in knowing what is morally right or wrong and being able to stand up and speak up when I have to is strong. I think I would feel more afraid if I hadn’t had that experience in Chicago.”