Quick Facts
Biography
Matthew Walker is a New Zealand-born Australian character actor and performer.
Background
Walker was born on 11 May 1982 in Hamilton, New Zealand.
Towards the end of high school, Walker was cast in the television series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys and Dark Night. After school, he completed a business and arts degree at Victoria University of Wellington, majoring in marketing, and theatre and film.
In 2001 he travelled to Melbourne after backpacking around Asia where he auditioned for, and was accepted into, the National Institute of Dramatic Art NIDA, Australia's leading drama school.
Professional debut
He graduated in 2004, and was cast as the over-achieving rich kid Heath Forbes in Seven Network's drama HeadLand.
Television roles
Walker appeared in the TVNZ drama "Dirty Laundry" as bad guy Nikki Rossini, and plays a recurring character in the upcoming second season of TVNZ's big budget drama "Filthy Rich". Other television and film credits include Chinese war epic The Children of Huang Shi appearing alongside Jonathan Rhys-Meyers. "Rake" and The Cut for the ABC (playing identical twins in "The Cut"), and "Legend of the Seeker" for Disney.
Walker is perhaps best known for his role as Justin Jefferies, the elder brother of Aden Jefferies in the popular channel 7 soap Home and away.
Stage
He has appeared on-stage at the Sydney Opera House with the Bell Shakespeare Company, and with Griffin Theatre Company in the world premiere of Colder, and the Austrlasian premiere of Tracey Letts "Bug". He played Lysander in A Midsummer Night's Dream by Mendelssohn with the Sydney Symphony Orchestra under Vladimir Ashkenazy.
Personal life
Walker's mother and stepfather ran a theatre company Theatrevue in New Zealand when he was a child.