New York: James Van Der Beek, the actor who became a household name at the turn of the millennium as the sensitive teenager Dawson Leery in the hit US drama Dawson’s Creek, has died at the age of 48.

A statement posted on the actor’s family Instagram account said Van Der Beek “passed peacefully” and described him as a “loving husband, father, son, brother and friend”. The family said he faced his final days “with courage, faith and grace” and asked for privacy as they grieved.

Van Der Beek had publicly revealed in 2024 that he was being treated for colorectal cancer. In September of that year he made a surprise video appearance at a Dawson’s Creek reunion charity event in New York City, having previously withdrawn because of illness. He appeared via a projection on stage during a live reading of the show’s pilot episode at the Richard Rodgers Theatre, while Lin-Manuel Miranda stood in for him.

Career

The actor, who first rose to fame in the late 1990s, was best known for playing Dawson, a 15-year-old aspiring filmmaker, in Dawson’s Creek. The series ran from 1998 to 2003 on The WB and followed a group of high school friends navigating love, friendship and growing up. With Paula Cole’s I Don’t Want to Wait as its theme tune, the show became emblematic of the network’s teen-focused programming and helped launch the careers of Katie Holmes, Michelle Williams and Joshua Jackson.

The series was also notable for its frank discussions of sexuality, including storylines such as a pupil’s relationship with a teacher and a romantic encounter in a bedroom window, scenes that helped pave the way for later teen dramas such as Euphoria and Sex Education.

Van Der Beek later acknowledged that it was difficult to escape the shadow of his breakthrough role, but he embraced the association by frequently lampooning himself. He appeared in comedy sketches on Funny or Die and in Kesha’s music video for Blow, in which he fought a laser gun battle in a nightclub.

“It’s tough to compete with something that was the cultural phenomenon that Dawson’s Creek was,” he told Vulture in 2013. “It ran for so long… So it’s natural that they associate you with that.”

One of the show’s most enduring moments came at the end of the third season, when Dawson is seen crying as his best friend begins a relationship with his romantic interest. The scene later became a widely shared GIF, a moment Van Der Beek recreated in 2011 for Funny or Die.

While still on Dawson’s Creek, Van Der Beek hosted Saturday Night Live and secured a leading role in the football drama Varsity Blues. In the film he played Mox, a second-string quarterback who unexpectedly becomes the team’s star, despite having little interest in the sport and a dream of escaping his small-town life through education. Film critic Roger Ebert praised his performance as “convincing and likable”.

Van Der Beek went on to appear in a range of television shows, including Criminal Minds, One Tree Hill and How I Met Your Mother. He played a fictionalised version of himself in the sitcom Don’t Trust the B— in Apartment 23 and appeared in the CSI spinoff CSI: Cyber. He also took part in the 2019 series Dancing with the Stars, reaching the semi-finals.

In 2016 he co-created and starred in What Would Diplo Do?, a mockumentary satire in which he played a dim-witted music producer. He also appeared in films such as Kevin Smith’s Jay and Silent Bob Strike Back and its 2019 sequel, as well as the adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’s The Rules of Attraction.

In 2025 he was unmasked as Griffin on The Masked Singer, performing covers of John Denver’s Take Me Home, Country Roads and Post Malone and Morgan Wallen’s I Had Some Help.

Early background

Born and raised in Cheshire, Connecticut, Van Der Beek began acting at 13 after suffering a concussion playing football. He went on to perform in school productions and, at 16, secured off-Broadway roles in works by Edward Albee and a revival of Shenandoah at the Goodspeed Opera House.

He later attended Drew University in New Jersey on a scholarship, but left early after being cast in Dawson’s Creek. In 2024 he returned to accept an honorary degree from the university, which praised his “selfless service and exemplary commitment” to its mission.

Drew University president Hilary Link referenced one of his character’s most famous lines: “Edge is fleeting, but heart lasts forever,” she said. “So on this morning, we pay tribute to that heart.”

Van Der Beek is survived by his wife, Kimberly, and their six children: Olivia, Joshua, Annabel, Emilia, Gwendolyn and Jeremiah.

Tributes poured in from colleagues and fans. Sarah Michelle Gellar wrote to his widow on Instagram: “While James’ legacy will always live on, this is a huge loss to not just your family but the world.” Katharine McPhee Foster described the news as “beyond devastating,” while Jenna Dewan and Olivia Munn also posted messages of mourning.