Javon Walton Steps Into the Ring

Javon Walton could feel like he’s on top of the world. Just past his eighteenth birthday, he’s in the driver’s seat of two careers with big momentum: As a boxer, he made his professional debut and fought before a crowd of eighteen thousand earlier this year—a high-stakes graduation for the boy who started boxing in rural Georgia. As an actor, he followed his breakthrough as Euphoria’s precocious drug dealer Ashtray with a string of high-profile projects, most recently a central role in Hulu’s true crime stunner Under the Bridge, in which he stars alongside Riley Keough and Lily Gladstone.

If he doesn’t feel like he’s on top of the world, it’s because he’s aiming higher. “I just want to prove myself. I’ve felt like that my whole life,” he says of the mindset that drives him. When he was four, he was told by the coach at his local gym in Winder, Georgia, that he was too young to box. His response was to hop in the ring anyway—and Coach Travis changed his mind. “Now, it’s fighting on the big stage and proving them wrong in my next fight,” he says, referencing his last pro fight, which ended in a draw. “There’s always another level to what you have to prove. To everyone, but to yourself, too.”

Walton brings the same attitude to acting. In Under the Bridge, he plays Warren Glowatski, one of eight teenagers involved in the real-world murder of fourteen-year-old Reena Virk in 1997. Reconciling the brutality of the crime with Glowatski’s otherwise sweet-natured disposition was a tricky task that called for an empathetic, assured performance at ease in grey areas. Walton was up for it: “I just want to show people that I’m a good actor. I like a test. I want something that’ll push my abilities, every time. I’m older now, so I want people to see that I can hang in the acting world.”

As a bonus challenge, it was his first time playing a nonfictional character on TV. Little about Glowatski is publicly available but, through Rebecca Godfrey, author of the book the series is based on, the production was granted access to interviews in which he took part while in jail. “I felt extremely responsible to make Warren as real as possible,” Walton says of the experience. “When I was on set, I was always extremely locked in. I would step away from everybody and really dial in because I needed my performance to be top-notch.”

What stands out as Under the Bridge’s defining quality is the care with which it handles its source material. At the time, the murder of Reena Virk rocked Saanich, British Columbia. Its perpetrators, primarily teenage girls, were sensationally dubbed the ‘Shoreline Six’ by the press; as news spread, the case gave rise to a national moral panic over violence by girls and youths. The series, however, dials down the spectacle to focus on the quiet tragedies the headlines missed. Walton and his co-stars (notably Chloe Guidry, who brings equal depth to foster-care queen-bee Josephine Bell) shine a light on who the Shoreline Six really were: teenagers left behind, with no one to count on or look up to. The success of Under the Bridge lies in its ability to balance their responsibility for the crime with the pathos of their everyday realities.

“We wanted to show what these kids were like and how they grew up. They are more than just villains, even though they did an absolutely awful thing,” Walton says of the intentions behind the series. “The most important thing was making sure there was some form of justice for Reena and the Virk family.”

Reena was the daughter of an Indian father and an Indo-Canadian mother, both devout Jehovah’s Witnesses. Long before her death, she was bullied by her peers and felt stuck between the rigidity of her family’s faith and a local culture that never accepted her. “To me, the most important scenes are the little, sweet, wholesome moments, like when Reena is listening to Biggie in the bedroom,” Walton explains. “I like that it shows what she was like and the impact she made on people.” Maybe more so than being about her death, then, Under the Bridge is about Reena’s life.

Once the series’ promotional tour slowed down, Walton headed back to Georgia to prepare for his next pro fight, scheduled for later this year. Following that, he’s lining up another acting project. “My goal is to be able to balance both," he says. "It’s a very hard thing to do, but there’s a lot in this boxing game that I need to accomplish. I haven’t been able to show how good I really am yet.”

His acting career may be catching fire, but boxing came first—and still does. He recounts a story of watching a televised fight with his father when he was two years old and saying, “I want to do that.” Two years later, he hopped in the ring for the first time and, shortly after, his father started coaching him. Neither of them has ever had second thoughts.

“He took me to my first-ever gym,” Walton, whose ring name is ‘Wanna,’ explains. “We got into it together.” His father, who now runs his own amateur sports training program, was the first to believe in him—something Walton doesn’t take lightly. “There’s no relationship like a father-son relationship. If you have that bond, you’ll go very far in any world. When your dad can be your coach, there’s a different level of chemistry there. I can mute everybody in the crowd and just tune in on him.”

Walton’s place in the entertainment world has the potential to bring new opportunities, and eyes, to the sport. In 2022, he became Jordan Brand’s youngest signee and the only active boxer on its roster, following in the footsteps of legends like Roy Jones Jr. and Andre Ward. When asked how he would feel about boxing experiencing a Challengers-style pop culture takeover, he lights up. “I would absolutely love that. I think it’s cool how they’re starting to bring boxing into the fashion world. Now, you can see boxers wearing custom Rick Owen trunks and things like that. I’d love to play in that space.”

The more he speaks about it, the clearer it becomes just how fundamental boxing is to who he is. The defiance of his mindset, the rigor of his work ethic, and his trust in his own abilities are all learned from the sport. “There’s always a lesson. Whether you get a first-round KO, whether you get a draw. Even if it stings and you don’t want to think about it at all. There’s always something to take away.” And once he does, he moves on. “Why hold on to a loss and talk about it three months later? If you had won, you wouldn’t be doing that.”

The most important lesson so far? Perhaps unsurprisingly, one of self-belief. “There are days where you’re in the ring and you’re getting some work put on you, and that’s rough. But if I can spar for ten rounds with blood everywhere, then I can do anything.“

That there isn’t an obvious path laid out for a boxer-actor-designer doesn’t bother Walton. Going his own way was always the plan, even if life throws a few punches at him along the way. “Nine times out of ten, things are not going to go the way you want them to. You've got to put trust in yourself. Anything I want to do, I know that I’m going to work very hard at it, and I know that if I put in the hours, I’m going to succeed. I’m a workhorse,” he says. “And the rush from that one time out of ten keeps me going.”

Under the Bridge is now streaming on Hulu.