Nicholas D'Agosto
Nicholas D'Agosto is an actor, born 1980.
D'Agosto's first credit is a small one in Election, which is a fine film to appear in and a very hard one to be noticed in. Recognition arrived a decade later through television: West Rosen in the second season of Heroes and Hunter in the third season of The Office, neither among the credits gathered here.
Rocket Science is the early performance worth finding, a comedy about high school debate in which he plays Ben Wekselbaum, and the first time he is allowed to be genuinely unlikeable. Final Destination 5 then handed him a franchise lead, which mostly means staying credible while worrying, and he is credible.
Comedy has always been the better fit. Shawn Colfax in Fired Up!, Joel in Dirty Girl, Edward Ferris in From Prada to Nada: he plays a certain clean-cut American who is either exactly what he appears to be or is hiding something, and the films usually spend their runtime deciding which. Josh Segal in Trial & Error is the best use of him, asking him to be the only sane person in the room, which is the least showy job in a comedy and the one that decides whether it works.
Masters of Sex gave him Ethan Haas and the closest thing here to a dramatic showcase. It is a solid career of second leads, and second leads are how television actually gets made.
Movies (11)
TV (6)
Where to start with Nicholas D'Agosto
Trial & Error is the place to start, a sitcom that never found its audience and deserves a second life; his straight man is doing the structural work while everybody around him gets the jokes.
Follow it with Rocket Science, which is small, sour and much better than the teen comedies it shared a decade with. Final Destination 5 is the biggest thing on the list and the most fun if you want that franchise at its most inventive. Masters of Sex is the drama credit, though the character serves the show more than he interests you on his own. Election is the trivia answer. Of the late-2000s comedies, Fired Up! is the silly one and Dirty Girl is the one with something on its mind.