Donnie Wahlberg's POSITIVE life

[KiwiCoromandel]

Actor Donnie Wahlberg never heard of the power of positive thinking, but he's lived it.

"I watched Oprah Winfrey the other day and she had a panel who were very successful. They were talking about the secret, the laws of attraction, how you think something and you put it out there and it comes your way.

"I can honestly say that in my life I've experienced that many times without really knowing it," says Wahlberg.

His is not just another rags-to-riches story. Wahlberg, the second-youngest of nine kids, was destined for a life of addiction and crime.

"Where I grew up – and even in my family – it wasn't like 'Am I going to smoke pot or do drugs when I grow up?' It was, 'At what age am I going to start?' That was the question. It wasn't 'Am I going to be arrested?' It was. 'When?'

The older brother of actor Mark Wahlberg, Donnie spent much of his youth visiting another brother, Jim, in jail.

"In a jail of one form or another," says Wahlberg, who's dressed in Levi's, a white T-shirt, black leather jacket and black stocking cap pulled down over his ears.

"Whether it was his bedroom when he was real young and he was grounded for the whole summer – I'd be the one to spend the day with him keeping him company rather than playing baseball with my friends. Juvenile, or maximum-security prison, I was the one going to visit him.

"When you have older brothers getting in trouble it's kind of cool. But he didn't have to tell me to stay away from stuff. I just didn't want to end up in his shoes."

Though he didn't understand what it was, Donnie says he always knew there was something better out there for him. He channelled his energy into drama and music, later co-founding the boy band New Kids on the Block and escaping what seemed to be his destiny.

He enjoyed his first flush of success with the band, but that proved very short-lived. For a time Wahlberg produced Mark's records, but soon realised he had to actualise his own talent.

As an actor, Wahlberg has been able to conjure memorable performances as a stoic paratrooper in Band of Brothers, a deranged mental patient in The Sixth Sense and an introspective cop in Boomtown.

Most recently, he's doing double duty in A&E's thriller, Kings of South Beach. Based on a real person, Wahlberg's character is an undercover cop who infiltrates the heady nightlife and organised crime of Miami's underground.

It's been a bumpy road from boy-band wonder to gritty TV roles in South Beach and Runaway.

After that first rosy flush of success with New Kids, things went downhill fast.

Finally, after a year without a job, Wahlberg was given a part in Bullet by Mickey Rourke. The film didn't do well, but it gave him the confidence to keep trying.

"Having been in the New Kids, I was a lot better off than most actors who come out to Hollywood," he recalls.

"I could afford to have a roof over my head and drive myself to auditions in one of my cars. It wasn't as desperate an existence.

"But, on the other hand, it was more desperate because I've always had a problem with people labelling or pigeon-holing me.

"I've always had a belief there was something better out there for me at the same time. . . I hated people labelling me.

"When my older brother was in prison the older kids used to call me Junior Jail Bird. 'You're telling me that's what I'm going to be? I'm not going to be that!' And I always had that chip on my shoulder."

Finally a very small role in The Sixth Sense nudged that chip, but even then Wahlberg suffered doubts.

"When I was about three weeks into my preparation in an apartment in New York with no money and no credit cards and starving myself to death (he lost 18 kilograms for the role) – all for a day of work.

"I started to have second thoughts. What if I'm doing this for nothing? I saw that role as the opportunity of a lifetime. It was so necessary for me to go that extra mile because that script to me was so fantastic every part in the script deserved that level of commitment.

"But when you start to have second thoughts you wonder why am I doing this? I'm killing myself and I might end up on the cutting room floor.

"I said, 'It doesn't matter, you have to become this person, you have to suffer, you can be him.' I kept going."

Though he and his wife, Kim, have been married for seven years, they've been together for 15.

They met when he was searching for a woman to speak Spanish on one of Mark's records. "She walked in and. . . wow!," he smiles. They have two sons, 13 and 5.

"My goals were always very simple," he shrugs, "to achieve something better than the status quo that surrounded me – which was drive a truck, rob a bank or be a plumber, which isn't the worst thing. All I wanted to do was something better."

source:reuters

image:supplied:ACCENTUATE THE POSITIVE: Actor DONNIE WAHLBERG has overcome many hurdles on his road to Hollywood.