This is not Melton’s first major role. The 32-year-old actor first gained popularity when he starred on The CW teen drama Riverdale and made his feature film debut in the 2019 film The Sun Is Also a Star.
Here are 13 facts that you may not know about Melton.
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Charles Melton used to be a dog walker
Melton has said in numerous interviews that he used to walk dogs to make money after moving to Los Angeles for an acting career. He told the Los Angeles Times that he became a top-rated employee on a dog-walking app called Wag and walked over 300 dogs in two months.
In an Actually Me GQ YouTube video that was published in 2020, Melton said that he still had the app and customers still send him requests to walk their dogs. “It boosts my morale sometimes on lonely days,” Melton added. “I’ll have like five notifications on my phone all from like dog requests, that’s it. Not my mum, nothing.”
Melton is the eldest of three children
Melton has two younger sisters, Tammie and Patricia, who he has posted about several times on Instagram. In July, Melton shared a birthday post when Tammie turned 25, captioning the picture slide show: “to the icon, happy birthday bb sis @tammieymelton 💛 ily”.In another post in May, Melton also thanked Tammie for being by his side during his May December journey and going with him to his first Cannes Film Festival. “To my incredible sister @tammieymelton who has been such a rock for me on this journey and during the filming of #maydecember. I’m so grateful to have you by my side,” he wrote.Meet Michael Jackson’s nephew Jaafar, who’s playing MJ in the coming biopic
Melton is a global ambassador for Special Olympics
Over the last several years, Melton has been working with Special Olympics, an organisation that aims to combat discrimination against intellectual disabilities through sports and education.
In September 2018, Melton first shared on Instagram that he visited Warren High School in Downey, California, where he got to meet students from the Special Olympics Unified Champion Schools (UCS) programme for the first time. A year later, Melton hosted an advanced screening of his film The Sun Is Also a Star to UCS students in New York. In 2021, he was named a global ambassador for the Special Olympics organisation.
Melton was a college football player before he was an actor
Melton played football for Kansas State University, where he was coached by Bill Snyder. Melton confirmed on The Late Late Show with James Corden that his nickname when he played was “the kamikaze” for the way that he played the game. During his football career, he said that he sustained multiple injuries, including concussions and a broken hand.
Melton would go on to portray football player Reggie Mantle in the CW series Riverdale.
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Melton’s mother immigrated to the US from Korea with his father
Melton’s mother, Sukyong, is Korean, and moved to the US from Korea in 1990 after marrying his father Phil, who had been stationed in South Korea. Melton told Good Morning America that a year after his parents moved to the United States, his father received orders to serve in the Gulf War in 1991 while Sukyong was pregnant with Melton.
“I can’t imagine being a woman and coming from a different country to being pregnant with a baby, with me,” he told GMA. “Then spending a year with your in-laws and your sisters-in-law, who you’ve never met, while your husband is at war for the next year, not knowing if he’s gonna come back, and that takes a lot and my mum did that.”
Melton and his family moved around a lot during his childhood
Melton’s father’s military occupation took his family around the world, from Juneau, Alaska (where Melton was born), to South Korea, Germany, Texas and eventually Kansas, where he attended college, per the Los Angeles Times.
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Melton calls his mother his “queen”
Melton said that when he moved to Los Angeles to pursue his acting career, his family – including his mother, grandmother, father and siblings – supported him. He told GMA that his mother packed him cans of tuna and chicken noodle soup, while his halmoni (maternal grandmother) gave him assorted nuts and almonds.
Melton and his mother are still close. “I wouldn’t change my relationship with my mother for anything – like anything,” Melton told GMA. “That’s my queen.”
Melton was a model in New York City
Before Melton moved to LA to pursue his acting career, he modelled for brands including Dolce & Gabbana, Kenneth Cole and MAC.
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Melton had guest appearances on Glee and American Horror Story
Melton is credited for an appearance in the season five Glee episode “New New York” in 2014, as well as a two-episode appearance in season five of American Horror Story as hotel guest Mr Wu.
He started to consider acting after hearing a radio ad
Melton told the Los Angeles Times that he first started to seriously consider acting after hearing a radio advertisement for a programme titled the Arts Showcase while he was still in college. He received a callback after attending a reading in Kansas – and then convinced his parents to lend him US$3,000 to attend the actual showcase in Florida.
He was inspired by Oprah Winfrey while trying to get acting gigs
Melton told the LA Times that he turned to Winfrey’s advice as he was trying to get started in Los Angeles.
“Oprah said something about doing things with purpose – if you’re going to do something, be the best at what you do,” he said. “I couldn’t just hate walking dogs. I had to love doing it, because in my mind, I was thinking, ‘I’ll walk dogs and work Chinese takeaway for the rest of my life until the day I die so long as I get to do what I’m passionate about.’ That’s when I realised I was willing to do anything to be an actor.”
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But The Matrix was a big inspiration for Melton, too
Melton told Yahoo!’s In The Know in 2022 that Neo from The Matrix was his biggest inspiration, sharing with the LA Times that after seeing the film with his father as a child, he told his dad that he wanted to “be in the movies”.
Melton studied Brokeback Mountain while preparing for May December
Melton told Vanity Fair that while getting ready for May December, director Todd Haynes circulated a list of films to watch including The Graduate and Sunday Bloody Sunday. Melton, however, continuously circled back to Brokeback Mountain – specifically Heath Ledger’s performance.
“He has this repression, this internal grit that really inspired me,” Melton said.
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