'My life's passion:' Dover native Justin Gentry appears on 'Blue Bloods' & 'Law & Order'

DOVER ‒ Local residents tuning into "Blue Bloods" and "Law & Order" in recent weeks might have seen a familiar face while those TV programs.

Justin Gentry, a 2003 Dover High graduate, appeared on both shows. On an episode of "Blue Bloods," which aired Jan. 13, he portrayed a high-tech car thief. On an episode of "Law & Order," which aired on Feb. 23, he played a police officer.

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"Doing 'Blue Bloods' and 'Law & Order' is some exciting first steps because there are a lot of things that shoot in New York City," said Gentry, an actor based in New York. "Unless you end up as a dead body on a show, you can come back and do as many roles as you want."

Gentry has spent most of his acting career in musical theater, but these were the first on-screen credits he has received in New York. He has recently begun focusing on doing more film and television.

TV shows were like 'a well-oiled machine'

He said he found the experience eye-opening.

"I'm very fortunate in the fact that these two shows have been around for a very long time, and so everything feels like a well-oiled machine when you step on set," he said. "Everybody is lovely. What's not really ever seen is the crew and everybody responsible for putting these shows on. At any given point when you see a scene with two actors and it's intimate, it's intense, what you're not going to see is the 30 people who are also crammed in that tiny corner who are responsible for lighting and sound and direction and props and costumes.

"It can be a bit daunting when you walk on set for the first time, especially if you're used to live theater performance."

The people on the shows were welcoming and made him feel at home, Gentry said.

He had been scheduled to appear on "Law & Order: Organized Crime" in 2022, but between his costume fitting and the shooting date, he contracted COVID-19.

"It was a little bit of wind out of the sails, but honestly I'm really glad that everything happened the way that it did because this most recent 'Law & Order' role was much better," Gentry said. "There was a lot more to chew on that."

Playing a police officer on "Law & Order" had personal meaning for him. His father, Gary "Flash" Gentry, was a Dover police officer for 25 years. The elder Gentry died March 25, 2022.

"I may not have been playing the best cop, in a little way I was trying to tip my hat to my dad," Gentry said. "He would have been ecstatic."

Gentry's grandparents were big supporters

One of Justin's biggest fans is his mother, Gail Pyles of Strasburg.

"Nothing makes a parent prouder than being able to watch their kids excel. I'm very, very proud," she said.

She watched both shows with her 96-year old mother, Jean Moran.

"It was funny whenever he was on 'Blue Bloods', whenever he first came on the thing, she (Jean) said, 'There he is! There he is!'" Pyles said "She's very happy that she was able to see her grandson on TV."

Jean Moran and her late husband, Jim, were big supporters of their grandson in everything he did. "His grandpa would be very, very proud," Pyles said.

"I kind of fell in love with acting'

When he was in the third grade at Dover East Elementary, Justin Gentry decided he wanted to become a magician after visiting a magic shop at Disney World. But if he was going to become a famous magician like David Copperfield and match his stage presence and choreography, he thought he should probably study acting first.

"As time went on, I started doing more of the high school musicals and I was involved with Little Theatre (of Tuscarawas County), I kind of became more interested in the acting part of things," he said. "Magic has always been a very large part of my life, and I've had a lot of amazing experiences doing magic, but I kind of fell in love with acting."

After graduating from high school, he attended the Ohio State University and then Kent State University, earning a degree in bachelor of fine arts in musical theater performance from KSU in 2008. He then went to New York to perform in a Kent State senior showcase and decided to stay in the Manhattan.

He spent seven years working on shows on different cruise lines. In 2015, he was cast in a production called "Magic to Do," a collaboration between Princess Cruises and Stephen Schwartz, the composer of Broadway shows like "Wicked" and "Pippin."

"While I was doing that, I did have to dust off the chops of doing magic shows, and I was performing my own show in addition to the main stage production, which was a musical," Gentry said.

'Magic has granted me these amazing opportunities.'

Magic also took him to Broadway. He worked on a show called "Secret," which marked the Broadway debut of British illusionist Derren Brown. The show ran from 2019 to 2020.

"I love acting," Gentry said. "Acting is probably my life's passion. It's the one thing that I love more than anything, but magic has granted me these amazing opportunities. I never thought in a million years that I would make a Broadway debut working in magic. I thought it was going to be a chorus member in some big musical, but it ended up being with magic."

He came back to Ohio during the COVID-19 pandemic and returned to New York in 2021.

What projects does he have coming up next after appearing on "Blue Bloods" and "Law & Order"?

"You're always plugging away," Gentry said. "You're always auditioning and working on your craft. That's kind of where I am now. I'm just celebrating the little victory of getting to be a part of such a huge television franchise and then just looking on to what's next."

Reach Jon at 330-364-8415 or at jon.baker@timesreporter.com.

This article originally appeared on The Times-Reporter: Dover native Justin Gentry appears on two network TV shows