Jensen Ross Ackles (born March 1, 1978) is an American television actor. He is notable for his television roles as Eric Brady in Days of Our Lives, Alec/X5-494 in Dark Angel, and Jason Teague in Smallville. He currently plays Dean Winchester on the CW series Supernatural.
Jensen was born in Dallas, Texas, to Alan Roger Ackles, an actor, and Donna Joan Shaffer. Ackles has an older brother, Joshua, and a younger sister, Mackenzie, and is of Irish, British and German ancestry. He had planned to study sports medicine at Texas Tech University and become a physical therapist but instead moved to Los Angeles to start his acting career.[1][2][3]
After modeling on and off since the age of 4, Ackles began to concentrate on an acting career in 1996. He appeared in several guest roles on Mr. Rhodes, Sweet Valley High, and Cybill before joining the cast of the NBC soap opera Days of Our Lives as Eric Brady in 1997. He won a 1998 Soap Opera Digest Award for Best Male Newcomer and went on to be nominated three times (in 1998, 1999, and 2000) for a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Younger Actor in a Drama Series for his work on Days of Our Lives.[4]
Ackles departed Days of Our Lives in 2000 and went on to appear in the mini-series Blonde about the life of Marilyn Monroe. He also auditioned for the role as the young Clark Kent on Smallville, but it was offered to actor Tom Welling instead.[5] After failing to land the part, he appeared in a guest role on the James Cameron television series Dark Angel on Fox in 2001 as serial killer Ben/X5-493, the "brother" of main character Max/X5-452 (played by Jessica Alba). His character died in the episode, but Ackles returned to the show as a series regular in the second season as Ben's twin, Alec/X5-494. He remained with the show until its cancellation in 2002.
Ackles worked steadily throughout 2003. He joined the cast of the WB's hit show Dawson's Creek during the final season, playing CJ, Jen Lindley's lover. Afterward, Ackles filmed several episodes of the unaired series Still Life for Fox before it was abruptly dropped. He also had a small role in the 2004 short film The Plight of Clownana. Ackles was the producer's first choice to play Eliza Dushku's love interest on the second season of Tru Calling,[6], Ackles turned down the role, which was then offered to another actor and the character's name was changed to 'Jensen' because the producers of 'Tru Calling' liked Ackles' name. Ackles returned to Vancouver (where Dark Angel was filmed) in 2004 to become a regular on Smallville playing Assistant Football Coach Jason Teague, who was also the newest romantic interest for Lana Lang (played by Kristin Kreuk). He also had a lead role in the 2005 film Devour in which Ackles' father, actor Alan Ackles, also had a role playing the father of Ackles' character, Jake Gray.
Most recently, Ackles joined the cast of the WB horror/drama series Supernatural in 2005, where he stars as Dean Winchester. Dean teams with his brother Sam (Jared Padalecki) to road trip across the country investigating the paranormal while searching for their missing father John Winchester (Jeffrey Dean Morgan). The second season was picked up by The CW in 2006 for the 2006-2007 television season. The fourth season began broadcast on September 18, 2008.[7]
In the summer of 2006, Ackles took on the role of Priestly in the independent comedy Ten Inch Hero.[8] The film began hitting the film festival circuit in early 2007 and Ackles received high praise for his comedic timing in the role. The movie is currently waiting to find a distributor for feature film release. He also appeared on stage from June 5-10, 2007 with Lou Diamond Phillips in A Few Good Men at Casa Mañana Theatre in Fort Worth, Texas, as Lt. Daniel Kaffee. Ackles received strong praise for his work in this role, which was also his professional theatre debut.
Jensen is set to star in the 4th Resident Evil movie. He will be taking up the role as Leon S. Kennedy.