Travis Winfrey: Accidentally Becoming An Actor, His Crush on Stacey Dash, and His Love for Entertaining

I had the pleasure of sitting down with Travis Winfrey in Harlem at Sylvia’s Soul Food Restaurant. Besides being very handsome, he was exciting and down to earth. He came with a great aura and spirit.

Travis explains how becoming an actor was a total accident.

“This lady begged me to do an acting competition and I did a scene from Next Friday. Everyone else were doing these serious monologs like Robert DeNiro and Scarface. Thousand of kids doing all of that and I did not give a damn. A lot of managers saw me and liked me. That’s how I got into acting, it was a total accident.”

We also talked about his crush on Stacey Dash. “I have a list of things I want to do in life and meeting her was very high up on that list. She is just ‘bad as hell’, an extremely attractive women.”



GLD:  How did you become an actor?
TW:  I came from a singing background. I was in a boy band called, Next Page. You know all those little corny groups that come to your school to perform and dance? That was us! I was with four other boys and they needed someone to dance [break dance] and that was me. We did about three shows a day, five days a week, we set up our own equipment, we sang. We sang cover songs and our own original songs. We performed for over 2.5M kids in four years. I learned everything, so when we became actual artists, our performance skills were off the charts. Our stage presence was just bananas, we literally did more performances than N’Sync and Backstreet Boys put together.

After our band fell apart we were all stuck in New York. This lady begged me to do an acting competition and I did a scene from Next Friday. Everyone else was doing these serious monologues like Robert DeNiro and Scarface. Thousand of kids doing all of that and I did not give a damn. A lot of managers saw me and liked me. That’s how I got into acting, it was a total accident.

GLD:  How did you like working on Dexter?
TW:  I was so in love with Dexter. It was a lot more to my episode they cut it down a lot. I was so shocked they shot it in Santa Monica and it looks just like Miami. It was really cool; he is a really awesome guy. I learned a lot from him.

GLD:  Tell us something we don’t know about Omar, something we can expect.
TW:  Hmm, what can I tell you without giving too much away? Omar gets a little drama; he is not immune to the single ladies virus that is going around in Atlanta. The drama of it raining men, so lets just stop there.

GLD:  How do you, Travis, relate to the character Omar?
TW:  The way I relate to him, is he is the mouth piece for everyone. If you really keep it real with yourself, you can admit that most of the stuff that comes out of his mouth is true. I appreciate that about it him and I feel that way about myself.

GLD:  And just to be clear, are you on the market for the ladies?
TW:  Yes, yes I am. The girl that I am dating right now will just have deal with it. I am on the market until she puts a ring on it.

GLD:  Until she puts a ring on it!? (Laugh) I like that.
TW:  Yep, damn right. I am changing the game for 2012.

GLD:  Chrissy Lampkin has really messed it up for every woman now. (Laugh) I really didn’t see anything wrong with Chrissy proposing. I’m married and my husband proposed to me.  But hey, you just have to go for what you know.
TW:  Ladies, just don’t get down on one knee. If you're reinventing the marriage proposal, then go all the way. By the way, I like the way Jim Jones dresses. I’m a firm believer that after 30, no patterns on your shirt. Jim Jones dresses like a rock star! He has style!

GLD:  How do you like working with an all female leading cast?
TW:  I only work with the females, actually. Working with the ladies is fun. LisaRaye, Stacey Dash and Charity they all have their different styles of acting. It is just phenomenal to sit back and observe and learn from them.

GLD:  You work a lot with Stacey Dash. How do you enjoy working with her?
TW:  Hard, it’s very hard! I have a list of things I want to do in life and meeting her was very high up on that list. She is just ‘bad as hell’, an extremely attractive women. She is just soft spoken and feminine but she will cut you. She told me she would cut me once and I like that.

GLD:  What do you think about people comparing ‘Single Ladies' to ‘Sex and the City’ and ‘Girlfriends’?
TW:  That’s great but they are comparing a show that just started, to shows that are already established. So you have to give the show time, neither of those shows started off great. They both started off rocky. Is it like the ‘Sex and the City’ formula? Yes, it’s about ladies and the struggle with being single. Is it like ‘Sex and the City’ the show? No, Single Ladies is something totally different, give it time and it will be bigger than ‘Sex and the City‘.

GLD:  Is music your real passion?
TW:  My passion, has always been entertaining, not just music. I love entertainment, whether it’s a joke or a song. There’s something about rocking out and having people to respond to you that I love.

GLD:  Tell us about Peachtree Industrial.
TW:  Peachtree Industrial is my band. We are a rock soul band. The band is literally, my summer thing. We love performing and doing shows; but will we ever try to get a record deal? No. The music business is not something I want to go into. I get paid to act but the music is my love.

Follow Travis on Twitter @Travis_Winfrey

'Single Ladies' season one finale airs Monday, August 8 9ET/PT.