Four months after James Vander Beek’s death, the Dawson’s Creek star made his final acting appearance in the new Legally Blonde prequel series, Elle.
On July 1 the Amazon Prime Video series released, starring Lexi Minetree as a young Elle Woods, the famous character which was first played by Reese Witherspoon back in 2003.
And James, who passed away in February at the age of 48, made the posthumous appearance as Dean Wilson in four episodes of the eight-episode series. His character was introduced in the third episode, “You’re Not the Girl I Thought You Were.”
The end credits of the episode showed cards saying, “In loving memory of James Van Der Beek.”
In the series, Dean, who is a mayoral candidate and the school district’s superintendent, becomes friends with Elle’s parents after they move from Los Angeles to Seattle.
However, Dean has been blackmailing the school head to steal school money and later get arrested.
Jacob Moskovitz, who plays star athlete at Elle’s school, said of James to The Post, “We didn’t have a ton of overlap, but he sat and ate lunch with us and talked with us. And he was just an absolute light on our set, and we miss him very much.
“We’re really honored that he was a part of the show.”
After he died, Reese, who serves as producer on Elle, paid a tribute to James on Instagram, writing: “Devastated to hear about James Van Der Beek. What an extraordinary, talented man who also showed great kindness and grace in every action. Praying all the angels watch over his family during this difficult time.”
For those unversed, James had been battling stage 3 colorectal cancer since August 2023.
He is survived by his wife Kimberly and kids Olivia,14 Joshua, 13, Annabel, Emilia, eight, Gwendolyn, six, and Jeremiah, three.
