Kerr Smith, Flying High!

Kerr Smith is best known as the sweet, sensitive and gay Jack McPhee on Dawson's Creek, which is why he couldn't wait to twist his image in Final Destination, a new thriller about teenagers trying to cheat death. "I play a bully, a real jerk," he tells TV Guide Online. "This guy is a jock who lives on rage. It was going from one end of the spectrum to the other."

The film opens with a horrific plane crash and Smith admits that filming it was a little unsettling. "We were in this mock-up of a 747 fuselage that was rigged to twist and turn," he says. "We were sitting up there while some guy with a joystick was tilting us like crazy. It didn't take much acting to display fear. Actually, a couple of extras got sick. I thought I'd prepared myself by taking Dramamine, which turned out not to be a good idea. It made me drowsy and I kept falling asleep."

Smith doesn't deny that filming those scenes made it a little harder to get aboard a real plane. "I never had a problem flying before," he explains, but it makes you think. Now when there's a little bit of turbulence I'm like, 'What's going on?' "

He may have a fear of flying, but Smith is still willing to push the envelope to have a little fun. "After every film I buy myself a little present," he reveals. "This time I bought myself a jet ski because in Wilmington [NC], where we film Dawson's, I live right on the water. Now, some of the other members of the cast got them, too. So Josh, James, Michelle and I have a blast tearing around on the ocean."