Young rapper Dylan Gilmer is the new Fresh Prince of TV in Tyler Perry’s Young Dylan

Dylan Gilmer has packed more into his 11 years than many people do into a lifetime. The young rapper who won over the judges on America’s Got Talent and so impressed Ellen DeGeneres that she gave him his own regular segment on her show, has performed with Will Smith and Cardi B and now gets to star in his own TV show. “I was just awe-struck, it was just crazy — the best feeling ever,” Gilmer says when he was told he would get his own show. Writer, actor and director Tyler Perry is behind the show, which is called Tyler Perry’s Young Dylan and has just launched on Nickelodeon. The plot of the show is similar in feel to 1980s classic The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. Gilmer plays an aspiring rapper from the rough side of the tracks forced to move in with his rich uncle and straitlaced cousins. Gilmer, who has met and performed with Smith, is naturally excited by the idea that he could be following in his idol’s footsteps. “It’s really big shoes to fill,” Gilmer says. “He’s a role model for me and I hope to be a role model for the next generation. “I love rapping and I love acting, so there’s a lot of similarities. “It’s crazy to think I could be the next Will Smith.” While he won plenty of fans by appearing on AGT, none was bigger than DeGeneres, who created the segment Young Dylan’s Mixtape, where he got to meet and perform with music stars. “I had so much fun, it was just so fun,” Gilmer says. And, despite recent media reports that implied a bullying culture on The Ellen Show, Gilmer claims he had a very different experience. “Ellen is a very kind and nice person,” he says. “She always gave me presents.” Gilmer says he started rapping along to his father’s music, copying other rap artists, when he was about “five or six” and hasn’t stopped since. And he isn’t about to let acting get in the way of that, claiming if he had to choose between acting and rapping, there would be no doubting which way he would go. “I would choose rapping,” he says. “My passion is rapping and rapping is my life. “I never knew I would be into acting.” But his ambitions don’t stop there, the budding quarterback says he would like to play American football professionally. So is there anything he’s not good at? “I cannot cook,” he says solemnly. “My mum and dad have to do that.” Gilmer says he hopes his show will impart a message. “It’s a black TV show and I want it to give a message to kids that look like me that you can be happy, successful, have a loving family and have fun no matter the colour of your skin.” Tyler Perry’s Young Dylan is now screening on Foxtel’s Nickelodeon.