Shawn Hatosy

What's the deal with the star of Outside Providence, Shawn Hatosy?

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The Heat: Twenty-three-year-old Shawn Hatosy seems to harbor a deep-down streak of discontent that's the perfect complement to his natural, boy-next-door freckled looks, and Hollywood took quick note of that. He was cast to exploit those qualities in both In & Out and The Faculty. This fall, Hatosy is all over the big screen.--as the blue-collar kid uprooted to a swanky prep school in Outside Providence, as the younger version of Nick Nolte's character in Simpatico, and as Natalie Portman's love-him-hate-him cousin in Anywhere But Here.

The Back Story: Hatosy grew up extroverted and popular in Frederick, Maryland ("I had a cool social life--there wasn't a social group that I didn't have a good friend in, whether it was the jocks or the drama queens. Even the rednecks liked me"). He got into acting when he was only 10 ("I started with local theater and got an agent who would send me out on Maryland Public Television spots and, like, terrible industrial films about gonorrhea").

The Secret Weapon: Hatosy is both affable and driven, a winning combination of traits for an actor. He can gush generously about a hyped young costar like Natalie Portman ("She's an effortless creature. It's so great when you have expectations for a person you've admired and then they're as special as you imagined"), and all the while keep a self-aware eye on his own strength: "When I get involved in something, I don't stop until I can show off." No wonder he's sharing the marquee with stars like Portman and Susan Sarandon (Anywhere But Here), Alec Baldwin (Outside Providence), and Jeff Bridges, Nick Nolte and Sharon Stone (Simpatico).

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Jeanne Fay