David Ian Hewlett

David Ian Hewlett, actor, director (born at Redhill, Surrey, UK 18 Apr 1968). David Hewlett moved to Ontario as a child and displayed an early interest in computer science and the performing arts. As a young man he pursued careers in acting and as a corporate networking/IT troubleshooter, starting a web design business before turning it into a media production company called Darkyl New Media.

Hewlett was lucky in his early film roles, mostly within the horror and sci-fi genres; he appeared in the inexplicably venerated Scanners II: The New Order (1991) and in the lead role in a minor masterpiece of Canadian "fromage" horror called Pin (1988). His breakthrough role came in 1996 when cast as Grant Jansky in the hit Canadian pecuniary drama Traders. As Jansky, a particularly popular character on the series, Hewlett was nominated for a GEMINI AWARD for best supporting actor in both 1997 and 1998. The following year he won a lead role as Worth the architect in Vincenzo Natali's sci-fi/horror flick Cube (1997). A minor commercial success both in Canada and abroad, Cube propelled Hewlett to the top ranks of B-movie stars amongst fans of marginal genre narratives. In 2002 he was cast as Dr Rodney McKay on Stargate SG-1; his was a recurring guest role that eventually became so popular among fans that Hewlett's character was made the lead in the well-liked series' first syndicated spinoff, Stargate: Atlantis (2004-09).

He wrote, directed and starred in the feature-length comedy A Dog's Breakfast (2007). A completely independent project, and eventually picked up by MGM, it is about a man who plots to kill his sister's celebrity spouse and ultimately chooses to make his beloved dog culpable in the crime. He has appeared in the films Splice (2009), Helen (2009) and The Whistleblower (2010) and as Rodney McKay in the Stargate series: Stargate Universe.

In 2011 he became narrator of the quasi-documentary series New Urban Legends, a sort of satire on the real life horror/disaster stories that have dominated cable television programming in recent years. He won another standout role as an indefatigably meddlesome neighbour, and eventual typhoid Mary, in 20th Century Fox's remake Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011).