Joe Flanigan was born on January 5, 1967 in Los Angeles (USA), but grew up near Reno on a small ranch from age 6.
He attended boarding school in Ojai, California at the age of 14. While at this school, Joe was Stanley Kowalski in a school production of “A Streetcar Named Desire”. Joe Flanigan received a degree in History from the University of Colorado, where he aso appeared in “Coriolanus”. During his first year of college, he joined the Junior Year Abroad program which allowed him to study in Paris as a part of his studyprogram.

After graduating from college Flanigan worked at a variety of jobs, from banking to politics. He was never completely comfortable in any of theese jobs.
After he got fired from the Interview magazine, he was broke, and lived in New York City. His nextdoor neighbour was an actor, and he convinced Joe to give it a try. He then studied acting at New York’s Neighborhood Playhouse.

His first acting jobs were commercials. In 1994 he got his first role in television, in the NBC miniseries “Family Album”. He was also a regular on the series “Sisters” and “First Monday”.
Flanigan had guest starring roles on “Birds of Prey” and “Judging Amy” as well as “Murphy Brown”. Flanigan made repeat appearances on the series “Providence”, “Cupid” and “Dawson’s Creek”, “Women’s Murder Club” and also had lead roles in a number of television pilots including “The Precinct”, “Sherman’s March”, “The Force”, “Man-Made”, “Club Paradise”, and “111 Gramercy Park”. He guest starred in the made-for-television movies “Edna Buchanon” and “Tell Me No Secrets”.

In Stargate Atlantis he plays John Sheppard, the leader of the first Atlantis Team.

About Stargate Fans

Gateworld.net: “Any final thoughts to your fans who are going to be watching you for these years to come?”
Joe Flanigan: “Ahh. I just am very grateful with the support. I’m very grateful of everybody watching the show. Get more people to watch the show!
I really believe in the show. I really do. I was saying to a few people that I believe in the show because it’s an increasingly divided world. We’ve got a show that young people can watch and old people can watch. People from all over the world watch this show, and I think that’s a very hard thing to accomplish. I’m proud of it in that regard.”

Paul McGillion was born on January 5, 1968 in Paisley (Scotland/UK).
He is the sixth of seven children. His family emigrated to Canada from Paisley when he was just 2 years old. His family spent time in Ireland before moving to Canada and returned to Paisley when Paul was 11 for 3 and a half years. Paul studied both education (major) and theatre (minor) at University, and also got involved in various sports including becoming a freewrestling champion. After graduating the actor began his career teaching theatre in Toronto, but he also found time to attend auditions.

His theater work includes leading roles in productions such as “The Foreigners”, “Piano”, “Savage in Limbo”, “El Salvador”, and “Reservations for Two”. The last one in that list McGillion produced and directed.

McGillion has worked extensively in film, tv and the theatre for the last years, as well as teaching scene study in 1998 & 1999 at the Vancouver Film School.

In some movies or series he worked with other Stargate Crew members.

2006 McGillion starred with Amanda Tapping (Samantha Carter) and Peter DeLusie in the Movie “Engaged to Kill”.
He also is seen in David Hewlett’s movie “A Dog’s Breakfast” (2006).
With a lot of other Stargate Cast members he worked for the Web Series “Sanctuary” (2007).

In Stargate Atlantis he plays Dr. Carson Beckett.
He also played the part of young Ernest Littlefield in Stargate SG-1’s first season episode “The Torment of Tantalus”.

About Stargate Atlantis and the fans

Paul McGillion: “To me, if you can do that and affect somebody like that, it made the whole trip worthwhile. It was so nice. And I think a lot of the fans, I think they bond. It’s time for them to bond. They go on their holidays. They spend their entire year meeting new friends and going to these [Stargate] conventions and I see a lot of the same faces at these conventions. So it’s really sweet. I think some people watch soccer. Some people watch football. And these people watch Stargate. And I think it’s a great way to get together and share a common interest. And that’s Stargate.
[...] I think everybody that works on the show generally has a great time. What a great way for me — I’ve never had an experience in my life like that. It’s really be in a dream job as far as an actor goes. You travel all over the world and you go to places and fans really appreciate you. They’re really thankful for what you do. I think we all wish for that in any job that we have, that you can be appreciated. And certainly that’s been the case for me.”

More information:
Imdb.com (McGillion)
TV.com (McGillion)
Paulmcgillion.com
Imdb.com (Flanigan)
TV.com (Flanigan)