Kerr Smith Says 'Dawson's Creek' Coming-Out Story Left Him 'the Fifth Wheel'

Kerr Smith publishes his memoir, "I Don't Want to Wait," on Tuesday, Nov. 10, and its centerpiece is a story he has waited 26 years to tell in full: the day "Dawson's Creek" creator Kevin Williamson told him, over coffee on Front Street in downtown Wilmington, that his character Jack McPhee would come out as gay — and that the show could replace him if he refused.

Smith was roughly six episodes into season two when Williamson walked up to him at video village between shots and said: "Kerr, let's go get a cup of coffee." Smith's first thought, he writes, was that he was being fired. His second was the truth.

What exactly was Smith told?

The memoir reconstructs the conversation verbatim. Williamson's words, as Smith records them: "Look, we want this to be Jack. We want to have Jack make an impact as a teen gay character on prime time. We can do it with you, or we can find somebody else to do it, and we'll just, ya know… figure out something else for Jack to do."

Smith read that as an ultimatum: "Do this, or I'll create some other character who will and nice knowin' you. To be honest, it hurt." Three months into what he calls his first big prime-time role, he asked for the rest of the day and called his father, his sister Alison, his manager, his agent — and, in his words, "one Horseman."

Everyone gave the same advice: do it. By day's end, back at video village, Smith said: "I'm in." He adds a caveat of his own: "I acted like I had a choice, but let's be real, I didn't."

How do the producers remember it?

The book interviews Williamson and writer Greg Berlanti, who was present in Wilmington that day. Berlanti supplies the context Smith lacked: "At that time, straight actors did not want to play gay. Nine out of ten actors who were straight did not want to play gay parts."

Williamson admits his own nerves — and his dependence on Smith's answer. "If you had said no, that would have disrupted my entire plan," he says. "Had that been your response, we would've had to do a lot of redeveloping." He recalls seeing "the fear in your eyes" and Smith asking: "Once I come out of the closet and I have this great storyline… do I then go away?" Williamson's answer then: "If this is where your character is going to go, you will be a part of this show forever."

Producer Julie recalls: "I was sweating bullets, feeling like 'Oh, we just sprung this on somebody!'"

What does the memoir change?

Two disclosures stand out. First, the atmosphere around the production was openly hostile: John Wesley Shipp, who played Dawson's father, remembers "busloads of Baptists protesting outside the studio gates, 'No more gay promo!'" Smith heard the chants from the cafeteria. "Even with all the support I got from the cast and crew, hearing those people screaming about Jack and gay people and abomination, it was hard not to feel isolated," he writes — "I never felt more like the fifth wheel," looking at a hand-painted portrait of the show's "core four" on the wall that excluded him.

Second, the book defends the craft choice. Smith refused stereotypes; producers wanted to change his hair, and he pushed back. Williamson: "When you come out, you don't magically change your DNA. I wanted Jack to come out of the closet as Jack." James Van Der Beek, interviewed in 2025, says Smith "played him as a strong male. The stereotype at the time was, unfortunately and unfairly, not that." Mary Beth Peil reports that, at the stage door, most fan comments concern Grams and Jack's relationship.

Whether the memoir settles the account or reopens it, the book puts the industry's arithmetic on record: one actor, one day, and a threat of recasting behind a landmark storyline.