Star Sign

Actor Corin Nemec's résumé includes '90s sitcoms and B-movie howlers, but it's his role as Stargate SG-1's Jonas Quinn that has brought him to this weekend's Oz Comic-Con, writes Guy Davis.

Corin Nemec is tough to pin down, which can be a good thing for an actor. After all, typecasting can be a real drag but Nemec, who's been working consistently since he was a kid, doesn't seem to have fallen prey to the typecasting curse. He's equally well-known for playing the too-cool-for-school title character in the so-'90s-it's-awesome sitcom Parker Lewis Can't Lose and the pathetic, psychopathic Harold Lauder in the TV miniseries of Stephen King's apocalyptic epic, The Stand.

He's played heroic types in B-grade science-fiction movies with marvellous titles such as Mansquito and SS Doomtrooper and he's played real-life serial killers like Ted Bundy and Richard Speck. And while all of these projects (and more) tend to come up in conversation when he attends pop-culture conventions the world over, it's usually his role as Jonas Quinn on the TV series, Stargate SG-1, that gets the fans fired up. So Nemec expects he'll be fielding a few questions about just that when he's in Melbourne this weekend for Oz Comic-Con, a geeky ground-zero featuring appearances from the likes of Star Trek: The Next Generation star Patrick Stewart, Marvel Comics mastermind Stan Lee and actors from shows such as Game Of Thrones, Dexter and Buffy The Vampire Slayer.

Nemec's Stargate character Quinn entered the series late in its run and somewhat under a cloud as he was viewed as a replacement for fan favourite Daniel Jackson, played by actor Michael Shanks. But Nemec views that short-lived backlash as a “totally natural” reaction for a small but outspoken part of the Stargate fan base, and he found that his character came to be liked and accepted by the show's followers by the time he exited the series a couple of years later.

“The writers did a great job introducing the character, segued quite nicely from the character being introduced to making him a member of the SG-1 team,” says Nemec. “They didn't do it all in one episode, which I think gave the audience a bit of time to digest this new character. For me, I'm excited to get a job on any show that is as high-quality and well-received as Stargate so I was just thinking about what I had to do.”

Since his Stargate SG-1 run, Nemec has continued to enjoy a diverse run of roles, doing guest spots on the likes of CSI: NY, NCIS and Ghost Whisperer, as well as a brief but memorable run on another cult favourite, Supernatural.

But he's also been busy behind the scenes, developing projects with his production company Everyday Tomorrow Pictures – their slate includes an animated political satire called The American President (with Chappelle's Show's Paul Mooney in the title role) and a comedy called Puppet Dicks (with two puppets as private eyes in an otherwise flesh-and-blood cast).

And of course he has a number of acting roles coming up, a couple of which are in films that sound like mandatory Friday-night viewing for you and a few of your more disreputable chums. “Wait till you see Sand Sharks!” he laughs. “I have that one and another one called Dragon Wasps coming out. Sand Sharks is a bit more of a comedy and it's just priceless. It's not often you get to do one of these low-budget science-fiction movies that has an actual sense of humour. But they're a lot of fun, those movies, and as an actor I love it. My acting teacher always said 'You're only an actor when you're acting,' and when I am there's a real magic that I enjoy very much.”