Kelli Garner’s acting career has had her playing a stewardess in the TV series “Pan Am” (with a then unknown Margot Robbie), Marilyn Monroe in “The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe” and Faith Domergue in Martin Scorsese’s “The Aviator.” That is just a tiny example of the acting work by the Bakersfield native.

Garner’s family moved to Southern California when she was 5 years old, but she has continued to return to the city to visit the family she has living here.

“I was just there. Everyone loves Bakersfield. Have you found this?,” Garner says.

The opportunities are rare for her to make visits because of her busy acting career. Her latest work is the thriller “Walden” that is available through the streaming service of On Demand and all other digital platforms on Dec. 12. The mild-mannered Walden Dean (Emile Hirsch) is a talented court stenographer who has witnessed all types of injustices in the courtroom as the guilty have often been set free. After discovering he has a terminal illness, repressed anger deep within him surfaces – taking justice into his own hands in the most gruesome ways imaginable. At the same time, he meets Emily (Garner) in a stenography contest, and they strike up a friendship. The question is whether Emily is really interested in Walden or just trying to throw off his stenography skills.

Garner played the role as a combination of both a person with an ulterior motive and someone who is just a naturally sweet person.

“I think really, she is lost,” Garner says. “Both of these characters are so lost. We included the shutdown due to COVID as a reason that this character was forced to move back home and not pursue her dreams.

“So, I just saw her as really lost and trying to figure out who she was and had a great imagination. She is also very competitive.”

Garner can understand playing a character with great imagination and competitiveness. She admits to being super competitive for fun such as when a board game is brought out.

“I love to play, and I love strategy,” Garner says. “I love risk and I love to play. But I mainly think I am very competitive with myself, especially with what I do for a living because I have been doing it for so long. It is like a game I play with myself.”

That fight for roles over the years started when she made her feature film debut when she was 17 in the 2001 thriller “Bully.” She’s had lead roles in “Thumbsucker,” “Man of the House,” “Horns,” “Lars and the Real Girl” and “G-Force.” She made her New York stage debut in the 2005 off-Broadway production of “Dog Sees God.”

Acting was something Garner knew from a very early age that she was going to do for the rest of her life.

“I knew I wanted to do it in a second but before that, my older sister was looking at acting and I was playing soccer. I think I wanted to do that but then this came so fast for me in such a unique cool way that I just stayed with it,” Garner says.

The diverse collection of acting roles has not been an acting plan by Garner. She considers herself fortune to have had parts from comedies to horror come her way.

“The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe” tested Garner’s competitive side. She initially balked at playing the movie star icon but eventually came to the conclusion it was a role she should face.

“You really want to play such a beautiful, complicated, dynamic, very original woman but it was very hard,” Garner says. “That one brought me to my knees. I had to dig in like I had never dug in before.”

The other role that tested Garner the most was playing Catherine Cameron on the short-lived ABC series “Pan Am.” Despite the massive amount of money the network put into the 14 episodes, the series could not attract a large enough viewership and it was canceled in 2012.

Garner appreciated the quality of the series but the demands of playing the character who was a stewardess, sister and international spy were extremely demanding.

“By the time it ended, I was ready for it to end,” Garner says. “The whole shooting of that season was so big with so much money being thrown at the show and with such big players.

“It was just so much responsibility and such a hard character to pull off as well.”

With “Walden,” Garner found a character as interesting to play but without all the outside burdens. That made the role a perfect test for the Bakersfield native’s very competitive spirit.