Every celebrity has gone through a terrible interview, and while some gleefully let it go off the rails (I’m looking at you, Ryan Reynolds and Jake Gyllenhall), some gamely try to maintain their composure. James Van Der Beek is in the latter category, and he deserves some sort of prize for enduring a painful interview on British television.
James, now 40, appeared on Britain’s ITVs This Morning show on Wednesday to promote his role on the sitcom Carters Get Rich. The show’s hosts, Phillip Schofield and Holly Willoughby (an admitted Dawson’s Creek fangirl) seemed only to want to talk about the role that made James famous.
They started off the segment by talking up James’ Dawson’s co-stars and their achievements – Katie Holmes’ marriage to Tom Cruise, Michelle Williams’ Oscar nods and Joshua Jackson’s role on The Affair – and then introduced James as if he had fallen off the face of the earth since Dawson’s left the airwaves in 2003. Even the lower third super on the screen touted the fact that he was “Famed for playing Dawson Leery.” Ouch. James, having none of it, declared, “I HAVE been on television in the last 20 years.” And, when asked if he imagined people would still want to talk to him about the show now, he emphatically replied, “NO.”
The conversation eventually led to why James was actually there. On Carters, he plays a “really obnoxious American billionaire” who buys a dating app developed by an 11-year-old boy. Sounds wacky. James said that the characters he likes to play the most are the ones with “zero shame,” kind of like the exaggerated version of himself he played on Don’t Trust The B—- in Apartment 23. (I still miss that show. Sigh.)
James said he enjoyed working in England and, despite the fact that he backpacked through the UK at 19 and loves the country, said he can’t help but feel “absolutely, hopelessly American” there. When asked how, he noted the differences “in basic speech, in mentality” and added, “There really is such a difference, I think, between the UK and America and every time I come here, it’s pointed out to me.” Check out the awkwardness below. I do think James handles it pretty well.
Surprisingly, for someone who wants to distance himself from his most famous role, James is 100% on board about the crying Dawson meme, recently telling Digital Spy:
I did a television show for six years that has been boiled down to a two-second loop of me crying. Six years of my career and it’s just those two seconds. It’s like…well, we never called that! But it’s hilarious, I love it.
What I find hilarious about it was it was one of the more sincere moments of that entire shooting experience. For me, that’s the reason it tickled me so much. I don’t think I was scripted to cry – it’s just one of those gifts that happens when you play a character for so long…
I remember that moment, it happening… so the fact that it’s now used to mock people online just gives me endless amusement. So that’s one of the happy accidents, you might say, of my career!
So, there you have it. I love me some James. Now, let’s allow him to reprise the role he was truly born to play and get Don’t Trust the B back on the air!
Photos: WENN.com, Getty Images
In the last photo Holly looks like the UKs Kelly Rippa
He is so handsome and charismatic isn’t he? He is also aging wonderfully. I hope he gets back on a hit TV show or something.
He is and I hope it too.
He is better looking now. I always prefer him to Pacey. I love that he mocks himself.
On DC, I was a Pacey fan, but I have loved James in interviews. His appearance on How I Met Your Mother was one of my favorite episodes. He is so funny.
That was comical. He completely pushed back – good for him!
I don’t think James is trying to distance himself from Dawson. I think he was just annoyed and offended that the interviewers made it sound like he was some loser trying to make a comeback. I loved the “Don’t the B”. It baffles me some of the dumbest shows are on for years and really good shows barely get a few episodes to find their footing.
I never watched Dawson’s Creek for more than an episode here and there. It ended when I was 13.
But watching the B in Apartment 23 made me fall madly in love with both Krysten Ritter (who I previously couldn’t stand) and James Van Der Beek. They were HILARIOUS together – and watching him be able to play himself in a ramped up, ridiculous sort of way is just gold.
Ditto on everything you said, Erinn (except I was too old for Dawson’s Creek). I miss Apt 23!!
Yes me too too old for Dawson’s creek (or at least I thought I was) fell in love with James because of DTTB in 23. That interview was like a scene out of that show. He really handled it with such class.
Ah yes. Katie Holmes: accomplished husband finder.
James van der beek as James van der beek: best friend of Chloe, was JVDB’s role of a lifetime
it was wasn’t it! I had never gotten JVDB’s appeal before that show!
Katie Holmes isn’t really a leading Hollywood actress so that part of the segue was kind of weird. Maybe that look on his face stemmed from them praising her for marrying Tom Cruise. I know I was looking at the screen funny..
His career is probably better off than hers right now.
Dont know if you are a JVB superfan or just really hate Katie Holmes but I dont even have to glance at their filmographies to know this is bull. Katie was on broadway with an Arthur Miller play. She directed and starred in her first movie last year, the one about mental illness. And she has been in a bunch of others. When she does TV its prestige TV like a HBO mini series. JVB on the other hand has been stranded on bleh TV like that CSI that nobody watches and making one episode guest appearances on even more bleh TV. Even the role he is best remembered for here involved playing himself which frankly is either the mark of a true living legend like Gloria Swanson showing up as herself on Beverly Hillbillies or a true hasbeen grasping for any job available. Even so, he couldnt save that show from cancellation and while Kristen Ritter almost immediately moved on to star in Jessica Jones, the best reviewed superhero on TV among other things, he went on to a supporting role in the new CSI that nobody is watching and now to a new show that has no buzz and in which he doesnt even have the starring role.
Dont get me wrong, what those hosts did was incredibly rude and he handled it better than most. But the fact is, he has the worst career of those four. And i find that fascinating because it was assumed back in my youth that HE would be the breakout and not the others.
No, I’m not a fan of either. I don’t get why this assumption would be made just because I think marrying Tom Cruise was a terrible idea from Katie Holmes’s end. Who doesn’t think that was the dumbest idea ever?
When you look at where her career was before she married Tom Cruise, and where she is now, I didn’t get the praise for her in that segment. Her career trajectory isn’t the same as Michelle William’s. She doesn’t command the same level of respect for her talent- that’s not dislike, just general observation.
I don’t know much about JVB. But as far as I can tell, JVB is working steadily and no one makes jokes at the Golden Globes about him marrying for power at money. Even if she works now, people look at Katie Holmes differently now than before she married Cruise during his couch-jumping phase. Maybe what I should have said is that in the end his reputation is better off than hers, even if he is a “nobody.”
“His career is probably better off than hers right now”.
Thats what you wrote and thats what I responded to. Michelle of course has had the undeniably best trajectory, I couldnt be more pleased. I always loved that woman. But whats that got to do with that bs line you typed? JVB has had the absolute worst of those four and even some of their other caastmates like Busy Phillips. This is fact.
I hadnt even pulled up their IMDB pages when I said that, I was typing from the land of obviousness. But now I have and I suggest you do the same before you die on a pointless hill. She beats him in both quality and quantity of projects. This is what a hasbeen filmography looks lik. Its a real stretch to say he is working steadily. Before DTTBIA23, he was stuck doing one episode guest roles on mediocre proceedurals. Then after that, everything other than CSI:Cyber (which he was only on for a season and a half) is a guest appearance or a movie short. Sad.
Look if he can turn his fortunes around, then good for him but then dont act like he isnt down on his luck or that he is playing in the same league as the woman who was able to get financiers to produce her first directorial effort to the tune of three million, which isnt much but its way more than he would get. He cant even get a starring role in the US fgs.
“Thats what you wrote and thats what I responded to.”
You began your post by implying I was a JVB superman and hated Katie Holmes, and suggested that coloured my perception of things. I’m not even a fan. I don’t actually have a strong opinion either way on JVB. I may not have even liked him on Dawson’s Creek much (of what I can remember about it).
If you had said he simply was less successful (although considering she had to get her dad to bail her out of a cult and her marriage, I think most people would rather just have a regular person’s life like JVB’s), I would accept that. But being a fan or not a fan has nothing to do with the fact that I don’t think Katie Holmes’s marriage to Tom Cruise has turned her into a Hollywood leading lady. That’s what the commentators said and it doesn’t make any sense. She’s not a leading lady right now. She had a slim shot after the Batman movie, but of course she blew that by acting stupid with Tom Cruise on the red carpet.
She turned into a joke after she married him, and in some ways I think it’s better to be a nobody than be tethered to Tom Cruise’s name in his current incarnation. Whenever I see Katie Holmes’s name, I think of her as the lady who sold her soul to get more fame and fortune and it blew up in her face. Sure, she (or her dad) managed to get her out of the mess, but the fact that she auditioned to be Tom Cruise’s wife, even when people like Scarlett Johannson and Jennifer Garner thought he was nuts, is what I think of whenever I see her name. Even if JVB is less successful, I don’t consider what Katie Holmes to have “accomplished” in marrying Tom Cruise to be success either, which is what the commentators on the show tried to insinuate. Their original commentary made no sense, which is what I responded to and what my point was about. Even if she gets to play Jackie Kennedy in a movie, I don’t think it’s worth it reputation-wise to be thought of as the lady who completely sold herself out to Scientology to get greater fame and fortune.
Jesus, Cherise. You come off over-the-top aggressive to a very innocuous comment that, by the way, was prefaced with the word “probably”, so the poster wasn’t even trying to assert anything as factual… just chancing a guess.
A cursory glance at Katie Holmes tells me she is very adventurous in her endeavors, though not terribly successful. Still, she’s accomplished a lot and I think many people are rooting for her.
Lol never seen that user before and they seem particularly pressed over a washed up teen idol from two decades ago. So I have to ask, is that your sock puppet account Perplexed? I’m sorry but I couldnt read your whole Tom Cruise rant again. Katie is generally viewed with compassion and sympathy from that prison-marriage so I dont even know what you are trying to distract the discussion with. You said that JVB now has a better career than Katie and the filmography evidence shows you are wrong. You go diversionary trails because you are too proud to just retract that bs statement.
I referenced Tom Cruise because the commentators in the video did. Their own commentary and the video itself was the origin and basis of my point.
I really don’t see her career as particularly successful by the measure the commentators are using. People may be rooting for her, but she’s not a leading lady like Jennifer Lawrence. It’s not even clear to me if the movies she’s been in, even as a bit player, have gotten wide distribution. And both she and JVB were on How I Met Your Mother. Their filmographies don’t look strikingly different to me. He’s starred in tv shows as a character that comes in over a longer period of time and she gets billing way down the line in most of the movies she stars in. I don’t really see how what she’s done is the same as what a leading lady does (not that there’s anything wrong with that, but the word leading lady doesn’t apply to her).
When I was in Scotland I felt absolutely like he describes. I adored Scotland and the people, but with every step I felt my body launguage, my smile, my mannerism screaming “American!”. I thoight in a country that had the same language and somewhat general same customs I would feel a little less like a tourist but no, I felt every bit the foreigner and it wasn’t due to how people treated me (actually people sweetly commented on my “Scottish face”, because my dad’s family has ancestry in Scotland and you can tell looking at me).
I totally get it.
I was so in love with him. We had just gotten out first computer and the internet during my obsession, and when it was my turn to use the internet (lol) I have find memories of spending lots of my time on his fan websites! Memories 🙂
“They started off the segment by talking up James’ Dawson’s co-stars and their achievements – Katie Holmes’ marriage to Tom Cruise,”
ugh, a marriage is not an achievement…
Plus, they divorced. So the whole thing sounded off.
I think he’ll be one of those actors who hits in movies in the next decade…he’s become great at comedy, especially.
This is too typical of British and Aussie talk shows though…always so damn rude.
He was great in Don’t Trust the B! I liked him ok in Dawson’s Creek, but there came a point where I found Dawson whiny & annoying. Him playing himself on DTTB made me love him though!
I second this. He was hysterical on that show
Holly Willoughby – pretty face, not much talent, yet ITV insist on her presenting most of their programmes… I suppose the fact that she’s married to a producer, who is also involved in a lot of ITV shows, helps greatly.