James Van Der Beek, best known to many as Dawson Leery in his breakout role late-’90s drama Dawson’s Creek, died aged 48 on Wednesday. Although to many he will forever be Dawson, the young film director, Van Der Beek, who battled colorectal cancer, built an impressive, diverse career in the entertainment industry.
In his last screen role, the actor played Dean Wilson, a school district superintendent and mayoral candidate in Elle, Legally Blonde a prequel series is set to premiere Main Video on July 1. Here’s a look back at seven of Van Der Beek’s best roles.
Two shows, CSI: Cyber, in which he played FBI Special Agent Elijah Mundo, and Don’t Trust the B—- in Apartment 23, in which Van Der Beek played a fictional version of himself, are currently unavailable for streaming.
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Dawson’s Creek is the first soap opera that made James Van Der Beek a household name. The series, which ran for six seasons from 1998-2003, featured a talented young cast, including Katie Holmes, Michelle Williams and Joshua Jackson. The show followed Dawson Leery, an aspiring filmmaker, and his friends as they faced the many challenges of transitioning from youth to adulthood.
This 1999 film is the title that helped him launch his career. Varsity Blues follows junior football player Jonathan “Mox” Moxon (Van Der Beek), who ends up being called in to fill in for the high school football team’s quarterback (played by Paul Walker). Now he must face this new responsibility — to the team and to his city — and the enormous pressures that come with it.
James Van Der Beek made many cameo appearances throughout his career. In 2001’s Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back, he appears as himself alongside Jason Biggs, dressed as Jay and facing Biggs as Bob. Filter. Things get meta when it’s revealed that both actors are filming a movie based on Bluntman and Chronic, the fictional superhero alter egos of the movie’s titular slackers.
It was clear from his choice of roles that there was more to Van Der Beek than his work on Dawson’s Creek. 2002’s The Rules of Attraction is a prime example of an actor’s range and need to distance himself from the role that made him a star. The film, based on the novel by Bret Easton Ellis, stars Van Der Beek as Sean Bateman (the younger brother of Patrick Bateman of American Psycho) and follows him and his friends as they use drugs, have sex and navigate the hedonistic, privileged college life of the 1980s.
Van Der Beek has taken a number of creative turns throughout his career. One of his most under-appreciated roles came in 2017 when he played a fictional version of Diplo, a world-renowned DJ and music producer. This short-lived comedy was put together by Van Der Beek and executive-produced by Diplo, and told a variety of humorous, sometimes ironic, life lessons through the eyes of a legendary DJ.
James Van Der Beek played Matt, a powerful Donald Trump-like character, in the first season of Ryan Murphy’s ’80s-’90s-set drama Pose. The series, which ran from 2018-2021, explored the football underground of the decade, with prominent white actors like Van Der Beek in supporting roles helping to increase the game’s representation. For an actor who made a name for himself as a kind and loyal family man, he really excelled in playing this unlikable young man.
Van Der Beek can be heard in Castle in the Sky, the 1986 Studio Ghibli classic directed by Hayao Miyazaki. He is not in the original Japanese version, but he did a voice role when the movie was later dubbed into English by Disney in 2003. The film is about a girl named Sheeta who falls from the sky with a mysterious amulet. He embarks on a journey with a boy named Pazu to uncover his lineage and connection to a floating castle in the sky. James Van Der Beek provided the voice of Pazu. Anna Paquin, Cloris Leachman and Mark Hamill also star.
