Bradley Hawkins was born in Encino, California on September 2, 1956. After a successful career during the 1980s as the founding director of an internationally acclaimed youth music organization, Hawkins began his acting career in the San Francisco Bay Area during the early 1990s starring on stage in several theatrical productions and working as an on-camera actor in commercials, shorts, industrial films, television shows, and feature films. Upon moving to Lancaster, Pennsylvania in 1997, Hawkins taught film studies, acting, and humanities courses at the high school level, and directed several stage productions throughout his 12 years as a public school educator.
Since retiring from service as a high school teacher in 2012, Hawkins returned to acting on-camera, and three years later, branched out as an award-winning indie film director. His debut comedy short, Roller Coaster (2015) earned 27 film festival awards across the country and launched his own boutique film production company, Dadley Productions, for his family-friendly content that Hawkins describes as being in the vein of live-action, Pixar-esque material.
His second short, the comedy-fantasy, Filling In (2016), more than doubled the award count of Roller Coaster and was not only screened in 19 states across the country but also overseas in Australia, Canada, England, Italy, and Lithuania,
as well.
Hawkins is best known for his third short film, the coming-of-age family drama, Calf Rope, which was released in June 2020 and exceeded the success
of his two previous films, combined, winning over 150 awards from around the world. Calf Rope is currently distributed on PureFlix throughout the U.S., on the New Faith Network in the U.K. the Netherlands, Australia, and New Zealand, and on HolyFlix in Brazil.
Hawkins' newest short, Night Voices, is a faith-adjacent psychological thriller, co-written by award-winning screenwriter, Peter Fenton, which has already won over 50 awards throughout the U.S., as well as abroad in France, India, and Italy, since its release onto the film festival circuit in March of this year.
Hawkins is currently in development on the feature-length adaptation of Calf Rope with its screenplay already winning awards, co-written by award-winning screenwriter, Jake Stetler. Additionally, Hawkins is also developing the feature-length faith-based western, Wrangled, based on the novel,
The Trail Ends in Texas, by author and award-winning screenwriter, T.W. Lawrence.
As a result of Hawkins' notoriety as a multi-award-winning film director, his decades of on-camera experience and expertise at drawing powerful performances out of his actors who have won over 100 awards for their work in leading and supporting roles in each of the four short films that he has directed.
Over the past 30 years, Hawkins has studied with some of the best-known acting coaches in the country, and as a result, he has developed his own unique coaching style for actors of all ages which he continues to enjoy working with between film projects.