Nile Bullock is a multitalented actor, singer and dancer. He made his stage debut as Eugene Williams in The Scottsboro Boys under the direction of Susan Stroman at the Old Globe Theater and ACT in San Francisco. Bullock co-starred on the Netflix series “Seven Seconds” and guest starred on NBC’s “Chicago Med.” Most recently, Nile had a recurring role as D-Wiz in “Power Book III: Raising Kanan.”
How did you begin your acting career?
I come from a family of artists. My mom is a singer-songwriter and my dad is also a jazz bass player. My little brother is involved in the arts as well, and he picked up acting. My first love was actually dance. Ever since I came out of the womb, dance was the first thing that felt natural to me and my parents threw me in training right away. I danced for 18 years. Maybe two or three years into dance, my folks were like, “Hey, why don’t you try acting?” I don’t feel like I had any spark in me at the time that [I] really wanted to do it. My parents just threw me in at an open call for a management company and I ended up booking it and getting in. From there, I started auditioning consistently, I started taking more classes and workshops, and then acting became another passion of mine along with dance. Around the same time, I was getting into singing, and I’m picking that up from my mother. My parents really pushed me and they saw that drive and spark in me wanting to be in the spotlight and wanting to be on stage and create, and they felt that dream.
You played D-Wiz in “Power Book III: Raising Kanan.” What was that experience like?
That was a challenge. I learned over the years that I do like to play challenging characters. I like that extra push and D-Wiz was a challenge. D-Wiz was a straight gangster. He was a cold-hearted gangster, but he was also just a kid in the show. I had to sit with myself and dissect how to play him because I’m not a rough dude. I don’t stem from any of that, but I do have a lot of friends who have grown up in the projects, and I’ve seen people go through that type of lifestyle. We had a lot of kids from the projects who are a little bit on the rougher side and we had a bunch of suburban kids, so I saw different sides. I tried to channel that energy and sit and develop that character, and it really worked for me mentally and physically. After that role, I learned that I love playing characters that are completely left from who I am as a human being. It’s really therapeutic when you get to play a character that might be always angry at the world when you’re a bit more chill because it gets [that] out.
