Source of inspiration

By Mike Crowley

MEADVILLE TRIBUNE

Just over 20 years ago, Daniel Johnson was a Meadville Area Senior High School senior receiving one of the longest running college scholarships in the area.

On Sunday, he will address this year’s recipients, offering tips for success and tales of his experiences as an actor, producer and writer.

“We try to always bring back a past recipient,” Melissa Burnett said of the upcoming scholarship reception. “We try to bring back See SCHOLARSHIP, Page A8

Actor and Meadville graduate Daniel Johnson will be the keynote speaker at the reception for the 2023 beneficiaries of the Meadville Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship Fund.

SHANNON ROAE/Meadville Tribune

Continued from Page A1 people that are accomplished in their areas, doing great things and let the community know they can do the same thing. They come back and inspire our students and encourage them to be the best.”

Johnson shared his story with an assembly for Meadville Area Middle School students near the end of the school day Thursday, and Sunday he will be the keynote speaker at the reception for the 2023 beneficiaries of the Meadville Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Scholarship Fund.

Johnson is certainly no stranger to the award that helps students and honors King, whose life inspired the fund: Not only did Johnson receive a scholarship, Tyerra Johnson, the oldest of his three children, received one as well in 2020.

This year, three MASH seniors will be honored: Kayla Baker, Mkenna Gerard and Katie Say.

A MAMS classroom played the role of green room prior to the assembly in which Johnson starred Thursday. Gathered there with him were Burnett, who chairs the scholarship reception committee; his twin brother and production partner, Nate Johnson; Armendia Dixon, president of the scholarship fund, and MAMS Principal Jon Frye.

Before Johnson graduated from MASH in 2001 — and before Frye moved into administration — Frye was his gym teacher.

“If there was a basketball out, his hands were on it,” Frye recalled Thursday. “His basketball-handling skills were the best I’ve ever seen from a kid.”

Johnson spent much of his time outside of school at Meadville Family YMCA, Frye added, and while he had not yet caught the acting bug, Frye could see hints that performing could be in his future.

“I probably would have assumed that he would have gone on to the Harlem Globetrotters,” Frye said.

Johnson did continue to pursue basketball, playing at the University of Pittsburgh at Titusville, where he was named captain and earned All-Academic honors before finishing his college career at the school’s main campus in Pittsburgh. But rather than the Globetrotters, Johnson eventually found himself drawn to the world of acting and film production.

The career that now keeps him busy and sends him around the country started off modestly: The first credit listed on his IMDB page is the Ben Stiller-directed miniseries “Escate at Dennamora,” but you won’t see Johnson’s name even if you slow down the credits crawl at the end.

That’s because he was background talent for the production — an extra who didn’t have lines. But since that 2018 series, Johnson has steadily added credits to his resume, at first as an extra, then supporting roles and, more recently, leads. By 2021, he was the third-credited actor in a horror film, “The Boonies,” filmed in Johnstown. More recently he has had larger roles in “Swipe,” a show filmed in Pittsburgh that is expected to be released later this year, and “The New-Fangled Adventures of Alexia & Z,” a kids mystery where he plays the father of the young investigators.

At the same time, he and Nate have launched Johnson Twins Productions. They’re currently developing “Breakthrough Season,” a look at the lives of five people driven by seemingly impossible dreams as they attempt to get a foothold in different facets of the entertainment industry all over the world.

Johnson’s message to the middle schoolers he addressed Thursday focused on three principles he has honed in acting but that he said apply elsewhere, whether it’s the basketball court or the business world: “Communication, teamwork and application,” he said.

Even when you apply those principles, however, the results may not be evident immediately. Johnson recalled his first audition, which saw him perhaps aiming too high for someone just starting off.

“I auditioned for a Lifetime movie. It was a Toni Braxton movie and I got involved in that, auditioning for the role of her husband,” Johnson recalled. “Needless to say, I didn’t make that role, but it opened my eyes up to see how they do the process and to see what I wanted to do.”

In an intimidating atmosphere, Johnson began to gain confidence as he eventually won uncredited roles and committed himself to learning everything he could about the industry.

It’s a lesson that students in the area may not hear, so meeting with someone like Johnson, who used to walk the same hallways and play in the same gym, can be inspiring, according to Frye.

“In this area we get very little exposure to professions and experiences outside of the local area, so a lot of kids don’t even realize that they could be an actor or that they can produce or that a camera does mean something,” he said. “Any type of exposure we can provide for our students, I think, is key.”

Mike Crowley can be reached at (814) 724-6370 or by email at mcrowley@meadvilletribune. com.