Steven Pasquale

A wide-eyed, watchfully intelligent, and squarely handsome actor who appears onstage more often than he does onscreen, Steven Pasquale has nevertheless carved out a few choice parts in film and television. More prone to sensitive roles than one might assume upon first glance at his burly frame and jut-jawed visage, he initially made TV waves in 2001 as a fun-loving but caring suitor of socially repressed funeral director David Fisher on the harrowing family drama "Six Feet Under." The portrayal prepared him for a small handful of roles in such rawly emotional indie projects as the tender "Aurora Borealis," in which he plays a son coping with his father's death, and the slyly humorous "The Last Run," in which he plays a bar buddy who convinces his recently broken-up friend to sow his wild oats.

In '07, he landed his first lead role in a major Hollywood production, as an unlikely suburban hero in the rip-roaring alien-invasion thriller "Aliens vs. Predator: Requiem." He's developed what is arguably his most nuanced and well-known portrayal on the explosively dramatic firefighter series "Rescue Me." As the dimwitted but genial Sean Garrity, he consistently provides the anchoring heart of a show that often flirts with the darker side of the human psyche.