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Paul's Becoming A Cop?! (named by Paul Walker Online)
CREDIT: Teen Hollywood.com

After finishing "The Fast and the Furious," Paul Walker bought himself a flashy import car, not unlike the one he drives in the movie, which opens Friday. Now, when he tools around his native Los Angeles, he does so in style.

"I've gone 170 mph in that car," says Walker proudly of his Nissan Skyline (available only in Japan). "It's an amazing vehicle; it's the Ferrari of Japanese sports cars."

Casting directors clearly see Walker as something of an amazing vehicle. At 27, the blue-eyed, blond-haired actor is being groomed as the next Hollywood golden boy.

After making his film debut in the comedy "Meet the Deedles," Walker provided support for James Van Der Beek in "Varsity Blues," for Freddie Prinze, Jr. in "She's All That" and for Joshua Jackson in "The Skulls."

In "The Fast and the Furious," the young actor gets top billing and the opportunity to prove just how fanatical his teen following is. 

"It was so cool how this movie came about," says Walker. "I was on the set of The Skulls when Rob Cohen and producer Neal Moritz approached me and said, Hey Paul, what do you want to do next?'

"I told them I always wanted to play a cop. Well, a few months later, they came back to me with this script. They told me the backdrop was modern-day drag-racing. They said, You get to play a cop. You get to race around in cool cars. And you get to make out with a hot chick. It's like every guy's dream come true." In the high-octane adventure, Walker plays a hot-rod-loving undercover cop named Brian who is investigating a string of hijackings.

One of the suspects is Dominic Toretto (Vin Diesel), an infamous street racer. Things get complicated when Brian falls for Dominic's sister (Jordana Brewster) and quickly finds himself torn between love and duty.

Reportedly, "The Fast and the Furious," which cost $35 million, scored so high with test audiences that it was pulled from spring release and re-scheduled as a summer attraction. 

That said, it will be interesting to see if the film can rev up interest in the sputtering genre of car-race movies. The recent failure of Sylvester Stallone's "Driven" suggested that racing movies are running out of gas.

"A lot of recent driving movies have been unsatisfying," acknowledges Walker on the Universal Studios backlot not far from where he the movie was shot.

"But I knew ours would work because Neal and Rob were going for authenticity. This is not a no-brainer, visual-feast of an action movie.

This one has a very real, urban, gritty street vibe to it. The way street-racing is depicted in the movie is just the way it is. We didn't Hollywoodize the import car scene one bit."

Already, the film has drawn fire from some organizations like Races Against Street Racing for its glamorization of hot-rodding. "Kids have always been racing their cars," says Walker. "This is America, and this is what Americans do. Boys are into souping up their cars. It's been like that since the Forties and Fifties.

"I think the movie shows the dangerous side of street-racing, too. It shows that a lot is at stake. I'm hoping the film opens up people's minds about these kids, because street-racers aren't out there slinging crack. They're underneath the hoods of their cars. They are just smart kids who like to race."

Growing up in the Glendale suburbs of Los Angeles, Walker was never involved in street-racing, but he was consumed by those other Southern California pursuits surfing and acting.

"Surfing soothes me," he says. "It's always been a kind of zen experience for me. The ocean is so magnificent, peaceful, and awesome. The rest of the world disappears for me when I'm on a wave."

As for acting, Walker has his mother to thank for helping him get his foot in the door. "My mom was a model, and my father was a boxer who was a two-time Golden Gloves champion," he says. "They both gave up their careers when they fell in love and got married. My dad didn't want my mom to work, and she didn't want him getting pounded in a ring." 

But Walker's mom didn't stay retired for long. "After I was born, my mom's old agent moved to L.A. and looked her up. She asked my mom to come in and do a little modeling. When my mom told her she had a baby, the agent said, Bring the baby along!"

Soon, Walker's face was gracing print ads for Pampers and Purina Dog Chow. He made the move into acting with a series of TV guest shots on "Charles in Charge", "Highway to Heaven," "Who's the Boss?," "Different Strokes," and "The Young and The Restless."

Walker briefly retired from show business to pursue a degree in marine biology. But during his second year of school, he accepted an offer to guest-star on "Touched By an Angel." "This casting director told me that I was a fool for not pursuing acting," recalls Walker who gets back behind the wheel for his next movie, the road picture "Joyride," which co-stars Steve Zahn and Leelee Sobieski.

"He said that even if I went at it half-assed, I'd probably work all the time. I didn't take it to heart but I thought, What the hell? I don't have anything to lose. I'll go for it. Within a month, I landed Pleasantville. And I haven't stopped working ever since.

"Now, I love it so much I can't imagine doing anything else. But I want to see continuing improvement in my acting. That's important to me."

Although he lives in Los Angeles, Walker makes an effort to keep a distance from the Hollywood party scene. He is the father of a 2-year-old daughter (by an ex-girlfriend) and he takes the responsibility of raising a youngster seriously.

"I'm into being a dad," he says. "That's where my focus is most of the time. I'm an actor that's my job, but it's not my life. I have a lot of other interests too. I'm into ceramics. I love to take pictures.

If I'm not out there promoting a movie or making one, I get back to my roots. I get back to my family and friends. That's what keeps everything real." Keeping it real is a big goal of his, says Walker. "I've been presented as the smiley-faced all-American boy but I have a darker side.

I don't care that much about being a leading man. I'd love to be the guy in Braveheart who gets his head cut off. I just want to be in cool movies."