 He was 19 when he appeared in his first film, in 1965 ("A Falecida"), starring Fernanda Montenegro.In Rio, Wilker also got involved with the Teatro Ipanema theater group, headed by Rubens Corrêa and Ivan de Albuquerque.At Teatro Ipanema he rose to underground fame with his role in Fernando Arrabal's "O Arquiteto e o Imperador da Assíria" ("The Architect and the Emperor of Assyria") (1970), and starred in his own "A China é Azul" ("China is Blue") (1972).