Brian was third of four children born to Willard and Alice Shoop near the Ohio shoreline of Lake Erie. His two older brothers followed their father into the oil business, but Brian wandered off into construction. He married his childhood sweetheart and moved her and two boys west to find work in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 1980. It was in Tulsa, of all places, that he discovered his love for acting. But by then, he felt obligated to win the bread for his family, so the new career had to wait. Finally, the boys left for college, and he began pursuing his craft full time at 47. Ironically, he landed his first major motion picture role in The Rookie (2002), a story of the oldest rookie in professional baseball.