{"id":4415,"date":"2023-08-11T13:55:17","date_gmt":"2023-08-11T13:55:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/strongermarriages\/?p=4415"},"modified":"2023-08-11T21:32:27","modified_gmt":"2023-08-11T21:32:27","slug":"how-john-corbett-went-from-steel-plant-worker-to-bo-dereks-leading-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/strongermarriages\/2023\/08\/how-john-corbett-went-from-steel-plant-worker-to-bo-dereks-leading-man.html","title":{"rendered":"How John Corbett Went From Steel Plant Worker to Bo Derek’s Leading Man"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Actor John Corbett has won over audiences playing Aidan Shaw, the down-to-earth boyfriend of Sarah Jessica Parker\u2019s Carrie Bradshaw on \u201cSex and the City.\u201d Fans were ecstatic when he returned for the second season of \u201cAnd Just Like That\u2026\u201d However, Corbett grew up in West Virginia with his mother and stepfather before becoming an actor.<\/p>\n

While there, he got his first taste of the entertainment world, helping out at his uncle\u2019s club, where he first became interested in guitar. He watched country musicians like Waylon Jennings and Buck Owens perform, and eventually, his mother brought his first guitar. Corbett didn\u2019t stay focused on a music career and later moved to Southern California to work in a steel plant with his dad.<\/p>\n

In an essay in Guideposts in 2017, he said, \u201cI wanted to believe there was something else out there for me, something I was meant to do. But I had no idea what it was. Then one day, some pipes came off the assembly line and hit me in the back. Next thing I knew, I was on disability, walking with a cane, popping painkillers.\u201d After the injury, Corbett enrolled in community college at his father\u2019s suggestion, where he met friends who invited him to an improv class.<\/p>\n

He later switched his focus and enrolled as an acting student, taking classes in fighting and ballet. He was immediately hooked on performing. Before his first credited gig on an episode of \u201cThe Wonder Years,\u201d Corbett supported himself as a hairdresser, telling the Riverfront Times he was licensed in 1986 and joking that \u201cyou have to admit I still have pretty great hair. In fact, a lot of people think I must wear a wig.\u201d<\/p>\n