James Van Der Beek Doesn't Let His Kids Watch Dawson's Creek: They Don't Need to See 'Their Dad Pretend to Go Through Puberty'

James Van Der Beek is just “Dad” when it comes to his kids.

During his performance on December 4 View, The 47-year-old actor opened up about his career, his recent diagnosis of colon cancer and his family. Reflecting on my time at Dawson’s Creek, Van Der Beek revealed whether he allows his children to watch his favorite teenage drama series.

“I don’t know,” he said. “It’s a great show, I love it, I think other kids can watch it. I don’t think my kids need to watch their dad pretending to go through puberty. That’s my take on it.”

“It was a very well-intentioned show, people were really trying to do the right thing and spoke incredibly eloquently about how they were trying to do the right thing,” he added, acknowledging its huge success. “I think that seed of good intentions is breaking through.”

James Van Der Beek is selling merchandise from past movies to help families with the ‘financial burden of cancer — including mine’

James Van Der Beek and wife Kimberly with their six children.

james van der beek/instagram

Still, Van Der Beek can’t fully protect her children from Dawson Leery. In 2022, he shared a funny moment when his daughter Olivia found him online.

“For some online learning, we got them iPads and they discovered memes right away,” he told PEOPLE at the time. “That’s how it started, my oldest sent me a meme of himself.”

He jokingly sends back “one of me at a dance or something,” College blues star said Olivia then responded with a picture of his famous crying face from Dawson’s Creek.

“She immediately hit me with a crying face,” he laughed. “I thought, ‘That’s aggressive.'”

Van Der Beek has six children with his wife Kimberly: Olivia, 14, Joshua, 12, Annabel, 10, Emilia, 8, Gwen, 6, and Jeremiah, 3. The couple met in 2009 and married in 2010, welcoming their first child that same year. years — but they didn’t intend to have that many.

“It just happened. We had one planned child,” he told PEOPLE in its November 2024 cover story. “One! Out of six. One was 100% intentional. The only thing we were really bad at was not get pregnant. But thank God, honestly, because it’s such a struggle for people, and we really don’t take it for granted. I joke and laugh, but like, yeah, we got really lucky.”

The Six Children of James Van Der Beek: All About His Sons and Daughters

James Van Der Beek and Kimberly Van Der Beek at the premiere of HBO’s “Room 104” on July 27, 2017 in Hollywood, California.

Phillip Faraone/WireImage

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A few years before he was diagnosed with cancer, Van Der Beek said he underwent a vasectomy. He and Kimberly revealed that they had experienced five miscarriages during their marriage.

“Two of them were late-stage near-death experiences,” she told PEOPLE. “We’ve weathered many storms together.”

Despite Van Der Beek’s cancer being another hardship, Kimberly said they continue to live a happy life.

“It’s been a really tough year, but there’s this fundamental way we enjoy life differently,” she explained. “We seem to understand what real true presence is, what it feels like to enjoy life, to find beauty in it all.”

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Source: HIS Education