After Dawson's Creek wrapped in 2003, James Van Der Beek took a while to find his footing. There was The Plaguea direct-to-video horror flick produced by Clive Barker about kids mysteriously falling into comas. There was Final Drafta similarly questionable horror movie about a writer who loses his mind trying to pen a script about a killer clown. He played a doctor on the medical drama Mercy and a psychotic killer with multiple personalities on the CBS procedural Criminal Minds. But where he really seemed to thrive — or at least where audiences noticed him most — was when he poked fun at himself and shed his perceived self-seriousness, like in Kesha's video for “Blow,” and in skits for Funny or Die (DILF khakis, anyone?).
Nahnatchka Khan never thought she'd actually be able to land Van Der Beek when she was putting together her first show, Don't Trust the B—- in Apartment 23, a raunchy ABC sitcom about Indiana hayseed June (Dreama Walker) who moves to the big city and shacks up with the titular B, Chloe (Krysten Ritter). Khan knew that she wanted Chloe's best friend to be a famous actor around their age, playing himself, and when the casting director brought in a sheet of suggested names, Van Der Beek's stuck out. “I never thought that James would even be close to being available, so I could never have even imagined that he would want to do it,” she said at the time. But he was blown away by the script, and the Van Der Beek-aissance was underway. “I think once the [Dawson’s Creek] residual money ran out is really when it became okay to make fun of it,” he told NBC New York in 2012, when the sitcom premiered. “Thankfully they've kept me around Hollywood long enough to kind of have a second coming.”
Van Der Beek leaned into the fictionalized version of himself that the show presented, a horndog actor not above putting on his famous flannel to excite a girl in bed. He plays the counterpart to Chloe's titular B, an international party girl; the pilot establishes that Chloe and James dated briefly in the past, but decided they'd be better as friends, landing him the role of “straight-gay BFF.” Together they drink and fuck their way across New York, with James leaning into the oversexed, overconfident persona, dropping stories about partying with Kevin Sorbo, playing with action figures of himself, launching a brand of jeans that are so tight he can't walk down the street, and battling Dean Cain on Dancing With the Stars.
Van Der Beek loved the role, and his joy of both acknowledging his teen-soap fame, as well as creating a decidedly non-Dawson version of himself, resonated with fans, too. Despite starting mid-season in a dead time slot — Wednesdays at 9:30 pm — the show was a cult hit, getting picked up for a second season.
“This has been the most fun I think I've ever had doing anything,” Van Der Beek told NBC New York. “By Episode 3, I thought it bore less and less resemblance to me, which just made it even more fun.”
In reality, the life of Van Der Beek, who died Feb. 11 at age 48, was nothing like his wild portrayal on Don't Trust the B—-. There were no models dancing their way down his stairs in a bikini made of whipped cream, or girls mobbing a coffee shop to see him perform Shakespearean monologues. In August 2010, he and his wife Kimberly married; that September, they welcomed their first of six children. “The reason I could do Apartment 23 is I've had a kid. It's changed my life in the best possible way and totally rearranged my priorities,” he told The Hollywood Reporter. “It makes it much easier to go out and have a laugh at your own expense when suddenly something comes into your life that shows you what's really important. The show and how it's being received — and even our time slot — I don't know whether it's just dumb luck or what. I'm incredibly grateful for it.”
