Ellen Gray: 'Life Unexpected' big role for Exton's Smith

LIFE UNEXPECTED. 9 tonight, Channel 57.

PASADENA, Calif. – Kerr Smith isn't afraid to ask for what he wants.

And what he wanted from "Life Unexpected," a new drama premiering tonight on the CW, was a character who was more than a temporary plot device.

As Ryan Thomas, who shares a radio show - and a private life - with Cate Cassidy (Shiri Appleby), the Exton native could easily have found himself marginalized in a show that was written to show what happens when Lux (Britt Robertson), the daughter Cate gave up for adoption, comes looking for her birth parents. Cate and Nate "Baze" Basile (Kristoffer Polaha) got together for one night in high school and have barely spoken since, but they're about to get to know each other better.

"Before I signed on to do the role, Ryan wasn't one of the main" characters, said Smith, who graduated from West Chester's Henderson High in 1990 and whose most recent series was ABC's "Eli Stone."

"It was so early in the pilot season and I wasn't going to take myself out" of the running for other parts for a role that wasn't even guaranteed 13 episodes. "I told them that and they agreed to make it a main role . . . and really make him part of the show," he said.

Created by Liz Tigelaar - an exuberant writer who looks more like Robertson's Lux than either of the actors playing Lux's parents – told reporters the series was partly inspired by her own fantasies as an adopted child about the birth parents she hadn't yet met.

Even Tigelaar admits the fantasy element goes beyond that.

"I don't want a baby, but I would love it if a teenager showed up on my doorstep," she said. "That would be perfect. I like my ex-boyfriend from high school. We could totally have a baby."

Still, it's a fantasy that doesn't seem to leave much room for a current boyfriend.

"Kerr as an actor really changed that direction of that character," Tigelaar said. "I find Ryan to be kind of the epitome of a man. He's compassionate. He sees the world in a broad way. He doesn't bring every insecurity, kind of in fear and damage, that he has to the table, and he's able to really be supportive of Cate and listen to Cate, and then there's . . . a point at which Ryan will draw the line."

"I'm not going away," Smith said. "You're going to have that triangle there for the whole season, the whole series."

A few years ago, he admitted, he might not have had the confidence to push the issue, but "you just come to a point in your life [where you say] this is what I would like to do . . . There's always going to be another job around the bend, but I really, really wanted to be part of this one, and I told [Tigelaar] that. It's a great script and a great story and I wanted to help tell it."

Risks have worked out for Smith before.

He'd been on "Dawson's Creek" only three months when creator Kevin Williamson pulled aside the actor, who'd been hired to create a love triangle with Dawson (James van der Beek) and Joey (Katie Holmes), to tell him he wanted "to go down a different avenue" with Smith's character, Jack McPhee, whom Williamson had decided would be gay.

Smith said he asked for a couple of hours to decide, telling Williamson, " 'Let me make some phone calls, get some advice and I'll let you know.'

"I called my agent, manager, I called my dad. I called some friends," he said.

"He said do it. He said take the risk," Smith said of his father, Rick, a financial planner who sells life insurance and presumably knows something about risk.

But then, he's always been supportive, said his son.

After graduating from the University of Vermont with a business degree, the younger Smith quickly realized he had other ambitions.

"I remember telling my dad – I said, 'Dad, do you mind if I sell your truck, and with that money, I'll move to New York, I'll give myself five years and see if I can make this work?' And he said, 'Go for it.' "

Lifetime's "Army Wives," whose stars include Roxborough's Kim Delaney, returns for a fourth season April 11 . . . CBS News has named Russ Mitchell national correspondent, meaning Mitchell will be leaving as news anchor of "The Early Show," although he'll continue to anchor the Sunday edition of "The CBS Evening News" and as a correspondent for "CBS News Sunday Morning" . . . ABC Family's given new-season orders to its big hit, "The Secret Life of the American Teenager," as well as to "Make It or Break It" . . . "Hasta Que El Dinero Nos Separe" (For Love or Money), which premieres tonight at 8 on Univision, will be the Spanish-language network's first ever telenovela to be broadcast in high-def.

Ellen Gray is in Pasadena for the Television Critics Association's winter meetings. E-mail her at graye@phillynews.com, follow her on Twitter at @elgray or read her blog at go.philly.com/ellengray.