After earning a degree in Agricultural Economics – with a minor in Communications - from Virginia Tech, Alpha Trivette set out on the corporate world, working for the Virginia Farm Bureau. Within a year or so, he was offered the position of Director of Public Relations for the Kentucky Association of Electric Cooperatives in Louisville, KY.

It was in Louisville that he got involved in community theater and performed in several stage plays.  He found an agent and began booking a few TV commercials and radio voice over jobs.  Then one day in the Courier Journal newspaper, he saw an ad for a nightclub in Cincinnati…about 70 miles away…looking for standup comics. He had done so much public speaking and much of those appearances included joke-telling and humor, he decided to gave it a try.

He drove to Cincinnati, where he performed for a very enthusiastic audience – receiving in the end a handshake from the bar’s owner, two dollars and a free beer.  He became a professional standup comic that night. He began to pursue and book more comedy gigs…even getting booked for several weeks at the Playboy Club in Cincinnati and touring the country, opening for the country musician Little David Wilkins and booking comedy tours across the country through his agent.  Eventually, he ended up in Charlotte, NC as his homebase for his tours.

While he was in Charlotte, he began dabbling in acting and film – landing roles in Rockin’ Road Show,” “Rutherford County Line,” “King Kong Lives” and “A Time To Triumph.”

After a headlining a show one night at the Comedy Zone in Charlotte, Jack Murphy, who was star of the Q-Morning Zoo at WROQ approached and asked if I’d like to do radio.  “Sure…why not!” he responded.

That began his 25-year career in morning radio, working in some of America’s great cities; Charlotte, St. Louis, Seattle, Kansas City, Tampa/St. Pete, Denver and finally Atlanta, where he headlined the morning show on B98.5 “Kelly and Alpha in the Morning”.

Once his run on radio ended, he decided to focus entirely on acting, with parts in a number of movies and television shows.

His first network series was the Cinemax drama “Banshee”, where he had a three-year run as Israel Proctor the Amish Elder whose son Kai Proctor was shunned from the family and sect for actually protecting the family farm but was violent in doing so.

His first series regular role was in Tyler Perry’s Too Close To Home on TLC, where he played Dr. Allen, a character who suffers from dementia in a tiny town called Happy, Alabama. The town has many family and community secrets, many of which are hidden away in the Doctor’s cloud of dementia.

Among many other roles, he’s had a guest starring role in Drop Dead Diva, playing the memorable Judge Stone, starred as Grandpa Walton in the revival of “The Waltons, portrayed Bert the Tailor in Tulsa King and most recently plays Neville Warton in the long-running series Sweet Magnolias.

 Gregory Alan Williams is an American actor, author, and former U.S. Marine, best known for his role as LAPD Officer Garner Ellerbee in Baywatch.

He began his professional acting career in 1978 with the Penumbra Theater Company in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he worked alongside Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright August Wilson. He made his film debut in 1988 opposite Steven Seagal in Above the Law and gained widespread recognition in 1989 when he was cast as Garner Ellerbee in the NBC series Baywatch, a role he played until 1998, including appearances in Baywatch Nights.

He has appeared in numerous television series, including The Sopranos, The West Wing, The District, Drop Dead Diva, Necessary Roughness, Secrets and Lies, Greenleaf, and The Righteous Gemstones. His film credits include Remember the Titans (2000), Old School (2003), Be Cool (2005), Oliver Stone's W. (2008), The Collector (2009), MacGruber (2010), Terminator Genisys (2015), Miracles From Heaven (2016), and Birdie (2021)

In 1992, during the Los Angeles race riots, he rescued a Japanese-American man who had been pulled from his car and beaten by a mob. For this act of bravery, he became the first recipient of the Salem Award for Human Rights and Social Justice through Voices Against Injustice Wikipedia+1.

An accomplished author, he has written four books. His memoir, A Gathering of Heroes: Reflections on Rage and Responsibility, chronicles his life experiences, including the 1992 Los Angeles riots and his reflections on racism. Other works include For Black, Brown, & Beige Baby Girls Born Too Beautiful To Watch the Bay, Boys To Men: Maps For the Journey, and Heart of a Woman.

With a career spanning over three decades, Williams has made significant contributions to television, film, theater, and literature. His combination of artistic talent, military service, and humanitarian efforts has established him as a respected figure in both the entertainment industry and his community

Marietta native Robert Patrick is the recipient of the inaugural CIFF Lifetime Achievement Award.

Known for portraying villains and authority figures, Robert is a Saturn Award winner with four other nominations.

Patrick dropped out of college when drama class sparked his interest in acting and entered film in 1986. After playing a supporting role in Die Hard 2 (1990), he came to prominence as the T-1000, the antagonist of Terminator 2: Judgment Day (1991) - a role he reprised for cameo appearances in Wayne's World (1992) and Last Action Hero (1993). His other film credits include Fire in the Sky (1993), Striptease (1996), Cop Land (1997), The Faculty (1998), Spy Kids (2001), Charlie's Angels: Full Throttle (2003), Ladder 49 (2004), Walk the Line (2005), Flags of Our Fathers (2006), We Are Marshall (2006), Bridge to Terabithia (2007), The Men Who Stare at Goats (2009), and Safe House (2012).

In television, Patrick played FBI Special Agent John Doggett in The X-Files, Colonel Tom Ryan in The Unit, DHS agent Cabe Gallo in Scorpion, Auggie Smith / White Dragon in Peacemaker and Shane Langston in Reacher. He has played ongoing roles in series such as 1923, The Outer Limits, The Sopranos, Elvis, Burn Notice, Last Resort, Sons of Anarchy, its spin-off Mayans M.C., Jamie Hawkins in The Night Agent, and From Dusk till Dawn: The Series.