James Roy Patrick Whistle was born February 13, 1988, in Talladega, Alabama, the son of Roy Ring and Felice Patrick. Ring took off when Whistle was only eight months old, abandoning his infant son and ailing wife, who died two years later from epilepsy.
Young Roy was adopted and raised by his aunt and uncle, Frank and Janet Whistle, on a farm in Calhoun County, Mississippi. They often had trouble keeping the young scamp on his best behavior, and when he turned 12, they realized his shenanigans went beyond typical boyhood temperament. Roy was caught with four other students vandalizing the Calhoun County Middle School, using spray paint and fire extinguishers to coat the school walls with vile epithets and a heavy coat of chalky dust.
Frank put his son to work on his chicken farm in Bruce in an attempt to teach him discipline and keep him too busy to get into mischief with his peers. The strategy worked, and Roy not only graduated from high school but was also accepted into college.
In 2006, Whistle enrolled at Mississippi State University in Starkville. At school—his first time away from home—Roy fell in with the thugs and stoners, whiling away much of his time with drugs and alcohol and petty theft. He was charged in separate incidents with theft of road signs, public disturbance, and possession of marijuana at a fraternity party bust, in which the offense he was nabbed for was the least of many indiscretions he had performed that night.
Frank grew tired of his son's behavior at school, so he refused to keep funding his education, hoping it would make Roy get a job and earn his tuition. Instead, Roy dropped out and went on an extended road romp, which ended in El Paso, Texas, where Frank was summoned to bail him out of jail for public drunk, indecent exposure, and carrying an unregistered firearm. He brought Roy back to Mississippi and enrolled him in a rehabilitation program.
Today, Roy is classified as officially rehabilitated and has been working with his uncle at Whistle Farms, their chicken ranch in Bruce, for the last ten years. Frank has been so impressed with Roy's turnaround that he made him a partner in the farm.
Roy told Frank and Janet that his decision to join Dalton Kimbrough and his crew of actors came from "a secret desire" he'd always had to perform.
