Joshua Jackson

Joshua Jackson, actor (b at Vancouver 11 Jun 1978). Joshua Jackson attended Kitsilano Secondary School in Vancouver and had appeared onscreen as a very young child, deciding at age 11 to make acting his career. His first major role was as Charlie Conway in the hockey comedy The Mighty Ducks (1992), and he reprised the role in 2 sequels.

In 1998 he was cast as Pacey Witter in the coming-of-age television drama Dawson's Creek, and his adeptness at playing brazen yet likeable characters stood out. Noteworthy feature film appearances from this period included major Hollywood productions Cruel Intentions (1999) and The Skulls (2000) as well as ambitious but smaller-budgeted films like Apt Pupil (1998) and The Laramie Project (2002).

In 2005, just 2 years after Dawson's Creek ended its successful run on television, Joshua Jackson entered the romantic comedy genre with lead roles in the independent pictures Americano, Aurora Borealis and The Shadow Dancer. He also had a supporting role in the political farce Bobby (2006), and earned a Screen Actors Guild Award nomination for his work with the film's ensemble cast. Jackson went to the United Kingdom for his extended West End debut performing in David Mamet's two-man play A Life in the Theatre, a backstage satire about petulant theatre actors.

In 2008 Joshua Jackson returned to episodic television with a lead role as the impossibly resourceful semi-genius Peter Bishop in the sci-fi/ fantasy Fringe, and then returned to Canada to executive-produce and star in an existential road movie entitled One Week. He appeared with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Bruce Williams in the comedy Lay the Favourite (2012).

Director Ruba Nadda's Inescapable debuted at the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. Jackson played consular officer Paul, a Canadian bureaucratic apple-polisher who assists an Arab-Canadian father with extradition requests following his daughter's arrest in Syria. Paul's hidden demons emerge once he swaps his privileged lifestyle for an uncertain journey to the heart of the Middle East, and Jackson's portrayal of an atypical character won wide acclaim.

Jackson received the 2009 Genie Award for best actor for One Week, in which he plays a young man with one week to live.

See also Cairo Time.