Supernatural has a fandom second to none. Millions love the dark fantasy series and
the actors who are part of it. But where was the cast before all of this fame? Let's uncover some
of the roles of the Supernatural stars before they were slaying demons and raising hell.
Before Jensen Ackles was saving people and hunting monsters on Supernatural,
he already had a variety of credits to his name. The Texas native's first big break came on the
long-running soap opera Days of Our Lives. He played Eric Brady for 54 episodes. Ackles also
had a recurring guest role on the biggest teen drama of the new millennium, Dawson's Creek.
He left the world of soaps behind in 2000
for a significant role in James Cameron's TV series, Dark Angel.
The two-season Fox show familiarized him with the world of sci-fi, which he continued to
explore in a 22-episode arc on Smallville, where he played assistant football coach Jason Teague.
While fans can't possibly imagine Ackles as anyone but the scruffy older Winchester brother,
he actually tried out for Sam before snagging his iconic role as Dean.
Before Jared Padalecki started slaying demons as Sam Winchester, the actor played Dean Forester,
Rory Gilmore's first love on Gilmore Girls. He was part of the show from the 2000 pilot
through 2005. So, both Ackles and Padalecki had a working relationship with the WB-turned-CW
network prior to landing their respective Supernatural roles.
In 2004, Padalecki starred in the Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen film New York Minute,
playing the love interest to Mary-Kate's character Roxy. Stepping away from his more comedic roles,
Padalecki then played John Davis in the desert island film Flight of the Phoenix.
Right before his Supernatural debut, he starred as Wade in the horror film House of Wax,
a part that prepared him for his career as a ghoul hunter in the creeptastic world of Supernatural.
Action, horror, romance—this is one actor who's done it all.
Misha Collins brought a boatload of new fans to Supernatural upon making his season four
debut as Castiel. Before that, he made his mark on Hollywood with a range of roles.
Between his portrayal of Alexis Drazen on 24 to appearing in procedurals like CSI:
Crime Scene Investigation, ER, NCIS, CSI: NY, and Without a Trace, Collins kept plenty busy.
He also starred with Laura Prepon in Karla, his most regrettable film to date. Collins
played serial killer Paul Bernardo. Collins told fans to avoid the movie. Happily,
Collins himself is nothing like the character, having started the charity Random Acts
and running GISHWHES, a hugely popular charitable international scavenger hunt.
Before Jeffrey Dean Morgan literally made heads roll as Negan, on The
Walking Dead, he played Sam and Dean's revenge-driven father on Supernatural.
But even before that, the actor already had a host of acting credits to his name.
Yet Morgan didn't always dream of being an actor. Unlike most Hollywood origin stories,
acting basically fell into Morgan's lap when he helped a friend move to Los Angeles.
Following his debut as Sharkey in Uncaged, Morgan went on to appear in TV series like Walker,
Texas Ranger, ER, CSI: Crime Scene Investigation, Star Trek: Enterprise, Monk, The O.C., and Weeds.
That's a lot of guest star roles. His movie credentials are just as vast, but, acting isn't
Morgan's only passion. He and friend Paul Rudd co-own Samuel's Sweet Shop in Rhinebeck, New York.
The duo saved the shop from closure when the owner passed in 2014. Morgan told Jimmy Fallon,
"He passed away suddenly, and we didn't want the store to be anything else than what it was."
When Samantha Smith took on the role of Mary Winchester on Supernatural,
she likely expected her first week on set to be her last.
Not many characters who die in the pilot episode end up coming back, after all—especially not
ones who get burned to death. Yet Smith's warm and compelling performance as Mama Winchester cemented
her as a fan-favorite, and the writers kept finding new ways to write her back into the show.
But before she brought the OG Winchester hunter to life and death, Smith had a vast number of acting
credits to her name. In the early '90s, she scored TV roles in Seinfeld, Pacific Blue, Friends,
and Two of a Kind. She then kicked off the 2000s with her role as Kate Wilton on Profiler.
Jim Beaver's performance as Bobby Singer, a surrogate father to the Winchester brothers,
resonated immediately with many fans. However, before Beaver donned a wardrobe of plaid and
baseball caps to hunt monsters, he had already amassed a whole slew of acting credits.
Before Beaver became an actor, he entered the US Marine Corps just after his high school
graduation in 1968. Following his return to the US, Beaver scored his first acting role in 1977
on Semi-Tough. For the next three decades, he guest starred in a multitude of TV shows
including Matlock, Reasonable Doubts, NYPD Blue, and 3rd Rock from the Sun.
He also earned significant roles in shows like The Young and the Restless and Days of Our Lives.
Not long after a stint on the show The Ranch, Beaver starred in Deadwood from 2004 to 2006,
ending shortly after his run on Supernatural began.
Supernatural has brought a lot of couples together. One particularly prominent duo
emerged when then Genevieve Cortese was cast as Ruby in season four. She and Jared Padalecki's
Sam ended up finding love in a demonic place. Today, they are married with three children.
But before the couple was canoodling on-screen or in real life,
Genevieve Padalecki earned a bundle of acting credits.
The actress had stints on Death Valley, The Dead Zone, Kids in America, and Salted Nuts,
beginning in 2004. A year later, Genevieve landed a 51-episode lead role in the TV series Wildfire.
While Jensen Ackles and Danneel Ackles, formerly Harris, didn't find love on the Supernatural set,
she was a late addition to season 13. She plays Sister Jo, a vapid angel disguised as
a healer. Prior to her arc on Supernatural, Danneel had significant guest spots on TV
series like One Life to Live, What I Like About You, and Joey, the Friends spinoff. Danneel's
biggest claim to fame was her role as Rachel in 51 episodes of the CW teen drama, One Tree Hill.
Though Jensen and Danneel had previously met, their relationship bloomed after
they starred in the indie film Ten Inch Hero. The film chronicles the
lives of sandwich shop workers, featuring a delightfully feminist Danneel as Priestly.
Following this film, Danneel played a few small roles on various TV shows before landing a larger
part in the short-lived show Friends With Benefits. As far as movies are concerned,
she had parts in The Back-Up Plan, The Roommate, and A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas.
Before Felicia Day played Charlie, Supernatural's hacker-turned-hunter,
the actress had already carved out a significant corner of the nerd culture sphere. Though she'd
had a few small prior roles, her eight-episode arc as Vi on the seventh season of Buffy the
Vampire Slayer put her on the map. Day went on to star in Bring it On: Again and had a
variety of smaller roles in shows like Monk and Undeclared. She landed her second Joss Whedon
project in 2008 when she played Penny in the cult-classic Dr. Horrible's Sing-Along Blog.
In 2007, Day created The Guild, a web series inspired by Day's love of World of Warcraft.
Day even created a music video for the project, "Do You Wanna Date My Avatar," which riffs off
the idea of becoming an idealized, and often unattainable, version of yourself
online. From 2009 to 2010, Day appeared in two episodes of a third Whedon project, Dollhouse.
Did you catch this classic line from Dean in the episode "Lucifer Rising"?
"How 'bout this...the sweet life of Zack and Cas"
The show's playful pun was to honor Kim Rhodes, then a new guest star,
who starred on the Disney Channel show The Suite Life of Zack and Cody from 2005 to 2008.
But before either role, the actress had a long list of acting credits to her name.
Rhodes first made waves as Cindy in Another World, a character she played again in As The
World Turns. From there, she landed a series of guest roles in shows like Martial Law, Star Trek:
Voyager, Touched by an Angel, Without a Trace, and CSI: Crime Scene Investigation. A year before her
stint on The Suite Life of Zack and Cody, Rhodes had a small role in Christmas with the Kranks.
Rob Benedict, Richard Speight Jr., and Matt Cohen made a splash at conventions together back around
Supernatural season five. Rob Benedict's band, Louden Swain, has since become a staple at
conventions, and no one throws a costumed karaoke shindig like Speight Jr. and Cohen. Benedict and
Speight Jr. even created a series together called Kings of Con, in which they chronicle convention
shenanigans, often alongside Cohen. But where were they before they became Supernatural icons?
Speight Jr. came onto the acting scene in 1984, earning spots on TV movies and series,
including ER, Running the Halls, and Freddy's Nightmares. Later,
he earned roles in shows like Band of Brothers, The Agency, and Jericho.
Like Day, Benedict had a stint on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but instead of playing a slayer,
Benedict played a vampire. The actor also played significant roles in Felicity, Birds of Prey,
Come to Papa, and Threshold before snagging the role of Chuck, AKA God, on Supernatural.
Prior to his 2008 Supernatural episode, Cohen launched his acting career in
2005 with TV movie and series roles, including How to Get Away with Murder,
South of Nowhere, and Medium. Mark Pellegrino and Mark Sheppard
You can't have Lucifer without Crowley, and you can't have Mark Pellegrino without Mark Sheppard.
Before the duo's battle for the title of King of Hell, however,
Sheppard and Pellegrino enjoyed vibrant careers in Hollywood.
Launching his acting career in 1987, Pellegrino's big break was playing Billy Phelps in Lethal
Weapon 3. From there, he went on to projects like Midnight Witness, The Big Lebowski,
and A Murder of Crows. By the 2000s, Pellegrino had already amassed dozens of roles,
going on to appear in four episodes of NYPD Blue and eight of Dexter before taking on Lucifer.
Before signing onto Supernatural in 2009, most fans probably recognized
Mark Sheppard from his appearances on like-minded shows including Charmed,
Star Trek: Voyager, and Firefly. Sheppard got his start before those series, however, in 1992,
as Eddie Bryce in the TV series Silk Stalkings. He went on to appear in 20 episodes of Soldier
of Fortune and had numerous roles in shows like Sliders, 24, and Battlestar Galactica.
Supernatural has gone through more than its fair share of major guest stars, but few have
made quite as big of a splash as Alexander Calvert, who plays Jack, the son of Satan.
Calvert won fans over instantly, amassing a sea of immediate Jack stans. But before Supernatural,
the actor got his start in 2005 with a small role in The Dead Zone. His career immediately took off,
earning him guest roles on shows like Psych, The Troop, and Bates Motel. He
went on to play larger roles in Arrow and the movie Edge of Seventeen before landing Jack.
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