page_title: Jared Padalecki
section_title: Career
hierarchical_section_title: Jared Padalecki / Career
caption_attribution_description: Jensen Ackles and Jared Padalecki at the 2008 Red Bull Soapbox Race
context_page_description: Jared Tristan Padalecki is an American actor. He is best known for playing the role of Sam Winchester in the TV series Supernatural. He grew up in Texas and rose to fame in the early 2000s after appearing on the television series Gilmore Girls as well as the films New York Minute and House of Wax.
context_section_description: Padalecki won Fox Broadcasting's 1999 "Claim to Fame Contest"; he subsequently appeared at the Teen Choice Awards, where he met an agent. His first role was a minor role in the 1999 film A Little Inside. In 2000, he was cast as Dean Forester on the television series Gilmore Girls, a role he played until 2005. Throughout the early 2000s, he appeared in several made-for-television films, including Silent Witness, Close to Home, and the Disney Channel Original Movie A Ring of Endless Light.
  Padalecki had an uncredited role as a high school bully in 2003's comedy Cheaper by the Dozen, which he played after being asked by fellow actor and friend Tom Welling, who played Charlie Baker, and the director of the movie, who wanted someone larger than Charlie to pick on him. Padalecki originally auditioned for Welling's role, but gave it up in order to film a pilot titled Young MacGyver which was never picked up.
  In 2004, he appeared in the Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen comedy New York Minute as Trey Lipton, a cute boy to whom the Olsens' characters are attracted. He also landed a short role in the thriller Flight of the Phoenix alongside Dennis Quaid and Hugh Laurie. In 2005, Padalecki starred opposite Elisha Cuthbert, Chad Michael Murray, and Paris Hilton in House of Wax as Wade. In 2005, he appeared in Cry Wolf, another horror film, as Tom.
  That same year, Padalecki was cast as Sam Winchester on the WB series, Supernatural. Sam and his brother Dean (Jensen Ackles) drive throughout the United States hunting paranormal predators, fighting demons and angels, and dealing with all manner of fantasy & sci-fi genre. The show is currently in its fifteenth and final season on the CW. It owns the title of the longest-running North American sci-fi series in history.
  In 2007, Jared served as the host of MTV's horror reality series, Room 401, which was discontinued after only eight episodes due to poor ratings.
  He had the lead role in 2008's The Christmas Cottage as Thomas Kinkade, alongside acclaimed actor Peter O'Toole.
  He also had the lead role in the 2009 version of Friday the 13th as Clay Miller, a character who heads out to Camp Crystal Lake in search of his sister who has gone missing.
  On September 23, 2019, it was announced that Padalecki was cast as the titular role in a reboot series of Walker, Texas Ranger, which is currently in development at The CW. The reboot was ordered to series in January, 2020.
caption: Padalecki with Supernatural co-star Jensen Ackles
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon PowerShot S5 IS", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "180", "Image YResolution": "180", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image DateTime": "2008:09:07 14:08:28", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Centered", "Image ExifOffset": "196", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "180", "Thumbnail YResolution": "180", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "5108", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8495", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/640", "EXIF FNumber": "8", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "400", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0220", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:09:07 14:08:28", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:09:07 14:08:28", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "5", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "149/16", "EXIF ApertureValue": "6", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "29/8", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "116/5", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3264", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2448", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "Interoperability RelatedImageWidth": "3264", "Interoperability RelatedImageLength": "2448", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "3346", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "43520/3", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "2448000/169", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}