Finding it easy to step back into the shoes of a high school student, Walker particular liked his role as Dean in She’s All That.

“I loved playing the jerk,” he said. “I didn’t have a problem becoming a teenager because just listen to how I talk. I am a teenager.”

Nicknamed “the Vagrant” by his close friends, the actor lives from couch to couch, taking his possessions in his Ford Explorer.

“I always have my surf board strapped on top of the car since I don’t live in one place,” Walker said.  “Costa Rica would be the ideal place to live if I were going to settle down.  I love nature and the green, but I hate the city.”

Filming in Austin for Varsity Blues, Paul received a big taste of Texas summer heat.
“It was brutal in Austin with the heavy football pads on since the temperature never got below 100,” he said.

While in the state capital, Walker filmed for five days during the week instead of the usual six and enjoyed extra time to see the city.  On the set, he met his girlfriend, Bliss Ellis, a junior at the University of Texas.

“I learned about the film when my friend, who is a theatre major at UT, was going to be an extra,” Ellis said.

Dating the actor since last April, Ellis said she gets to see him every two to three weeks.  She attended the Varsity Blues premiere with Walker and has yet to encounter overexcited fans.

Although fans of the actor may not have made their affection known to him in person, the number of websites devoted to him is quickly increasing.

One of the first virtual shrines, entitled Paul Walker: an ode to a beautiful actor, has made the movie star feel “weird” about fame.

“He doesn’t ever like to watch his own movies,” Ellis said.

When the actor was featured in Cosmopolitan magazine, Walker’s friends decided to decorate his mirrored closet doors with Xeroxed copies and messages of “I love Paul” written in lipstick.

“I’ve known them since we were little, so to them, I’m still a scrub,” he said.
To his growing number of fans though, Walker is far from the “scrub” his friends know.
Messages, such as “what a hottie!” and “beautiful is an understatement,” grace the guestbooks at such websites.

Junior Erin Wasson of MacArthur H.S. in Irving described him as drop dead gorgeous in person.

 “I didn’t think that he would be so open,” Wasson said.  “He was completely laid back and down to earth.”

As a model for Kim Dawson Modeling Agency, Wasson understands his point of view on starting in a high demand business.  Walker strongly advised anyone wanting to get into the business to avoid the Hollywood scene.

“Everyone just thinks that if you come out to Hollywood, you’ll make it big,” he said.

Keeping a level head about fame, Walker hopes to one day continue in the movie business as a producer, but he feels a director needs to earn the right to be one.

“Directors just decide on how the scenes are put together, but a producer gets to decide on the director,” he said.

Beyond teen flicks, Walker said he would like to expand his acting roles.

“I would love to do Brad Pitt’s role in 12 Monkeys and I have a fascination with the Medieval Period like in Braveheart,” Paul said  “The Cohen brothers are also way up there.  I loved Raising Arizona and I’d like to work with Harrison Ford and Paul Newman.”

Looking up to actors such as Jeff Daniels and Tom Hanks, Walker respects their ability to do roles from serious to funny.  However, while working on different movies back to back, he ran into complications with some of the other actors.

“I didn’t click with Freddie [Prinze, Jr.] at first, but we got along,” he said.

On the set of Varsity Blues, Walker found James van der Beek to having an ego and being a bit self-absorbed.

Although he may not have gotten along with the leading men, the actor made friends with Erik MacArthur from Pleasantville and thought Scott Caan from Varsity Blues was extremely funny.

"It was actually his idea to walk nude in the movie,” Walker said.  “He liked to show me his butt too.”

Other secrets he revealed from the sets included the first shot in She’s All That, which was actually five to six minutes of filming with a Steadicam.

“Since it’s a long continuous shot, it’s really difficult to get it to look that good,” Walker said.

From his visit in Dallas, Walker continued on to the Sundance Film Festival and will be featured in Brokedown Palace this fall, starring along with Claire Danes, Bill Pullman and Lou Diamond Phillips.