Travis (he/him) files for
Travis Michael Holder has been covering the LA theatre scene since 1987, reviewing for such publications as Entertainment Today (where he served as Theatre Editor for 21 years), Back Stage (12 years), Los Angeles Theatres Magazine, Beverly Hills Post, West Hollywood Weekly, Salon City Magazine, Arts in LA, and since 2017, exclusively for his own website, TicketHoldersLA. An actor since childhood, Travis has appeared in six Broadway productions, many national tours, and traveled the world performing in shows before coming to LA under contract to a major film studio—all before his 21st birthday.
After he refused to abandon his passion for the stage, a decision that resulted in dismissal from his studio when against their objections he joined the cast of Hair, he took a discouraged detour into the insanity of the music industry, touring the globe with a series of spoiled rock stars before settling in as Talent Coordinator at the infamous Troubadour in LA and San Francisco in its Golden Age, staying on in SF when Troubadour North became The Boarding House. Travis introduced Elton John to the US in his first stateside appearance and was responsible for bringing Bette Midler to the west coast on her inaugural national tour. He was instrumental in helping to launch the careers of, among others, such icons as Joni Mitchell, Laura Nyro, Jackson Browne, David Foster, Robin Williams, Tom Waits, Glenn Frye, Steve Martin, Carole King, James Taylor, Billy Joel, David Byrne and The Talking Heads, Tim Buckley, Bonnie Raitt, Kris Kristoferson, Linda Ronstadt, John Denver, The Tubes, Rickie Lee Jones, and Cheech & Chong.
Missing the horrific fluctuations inherent in a career in theatre, he returned to his first love in his mid-30s and, before he aged out as the only geriatric juvenile actor with a backside the size of Texas, his work was recognized twice with LADCC Awards before he became a member himself. He was also honored with a DramaLogue Award, an Inland Theatre League Award, as well as ReviewPlays, Sage, and Maddy Awards. He has received six acting nominations from LA Weekly, five Garland Award nominations, others from Theatre Alliance LA, GLAAD, the NAACP, and regionally he was up for Washington D.C.’s prestigious Helen Hayes Award.
He maintains an active schedule as a private coach for film and television and, from 2010 until the world fell apart in 2020, he taught acting, theatre history, Media in Society, and directed BFA production workshops at the New York Film Academy’s west coast campus. He has appeared several times since 2003 in performances and seminars at the annual Tennessee Williams Literary Festival in New Orleans and in 2023 he journeyed to three South American countries and to Spain teaching acting intensives in Buenos Aries, Santiago, Montevideo, Madrid, and Barcelona.
Travis’ first novel Waiting for Walk was published in 2022 by Incunabula Media and as a playwright, his Looking South on Cahuenga Hill, L.O.L., STR8 2 PRDRS, and River and Other Phoeni Rising have been produced nationally. His first play Surprise Surprise, which debuted at the Victory Theatre Center in 1994, became a 2010 feature film with a screenplay co-adapted by Travis and featuring him in a leading role. As an artist, Travis’ paintings have received national and international attention, with eight of his paintings featured on Ava DuVernay’s TV series Queen Sugar and his work formerly represented at the now-pandemic-snuffed Off the Beaten Way Gallery in New Orleans’ French Quarter.
Travis served as a member of the LADCC from 2001 to 2008, and joined again in 2023.