Character Acting

In the teen screamer "Disturbing Behavior" (which opens today), Katie Holmes' classmates have their minds altered by a creepily upbeat school psychologist played by Bruce Greenwood. "Upbeat" is also a good word to describe Greenwood's acting career since his critical splash as a hardened mechanic who loses his children in last year's "The Sweet Hereafter." Greenwood recently finished shooting "Thick as Thieves" with Alec Baldwin and Andre Braugher and was just cast alongside Tommy Lee Jones and Ashley Judd in the Paramount thriller "Double Jeopardy." Although "Jeopardy" marks his highest-profile role ever, Greenwood refuses to get excited until the reviews are in. "I've never really thought of any role as a 'launching pad,'" he tells EW Online. "I'm too superstitious to say that a job is my big break before I've even done the work."

Although Greenwood has appeared in such films as "Exotica" and "Father's Day," the actor first caught Hollywood's attention on TV's "St. Elsewhere." Since then (1986), Greenwood has frequently returned to the tube, though his recent series haven't fared all that well: In 1995, UPN's "Nowhere Man" lasted only a season, and last year's "Sleepwalkers" was canceled by NBC after two episodes.