Criminal Minds

Shemar Moore started his acting career as Malcolm Winters on The Young and the Restless. After graduating from Santa Clara University (where he attended on a baseball scholarship), Shemar moved to New York to pursue his modeling and acting career. He landed a job as a GQ model and then, with no acting experience, became Malcolm Winters on Y&R.. That worked out well - he won a Daytime Emmy in 2000 for outstanding supporting actor in a drama and was nominated for several others.
Moore said in an interview for The Philadelphia Inquirer,

I come from a soap, that’s what I’m most known for, so now I’m changing the conversation people are having about me. Being on Criminal Minds is opening doors that were once shut to me.

Apparently it’s difficult to have a “serious” acting career when you start on a soap opera. Inquirer writer Michael D. Schaffer writes: “Moore…is trying to do something that few actors have done: build a serious acting career on the slippery foundation of soap.”

Shemar is definately as well-known for taking off his shirt as he is for acting. There will be no disrobing on Criminal Minds though. He says:

As soon as I take my shirt off, they’re going to say, ‘He takes his shirt off because that’s the only reason people will watch him.’

Costar Kirsten Vangsness agrees, saying:

When you look at him, you think that’s all there is because there’s so much to look at, but the way he looks is nothing compared to the way he is as a person…I can always do a scene better when he’s there. He’s absolutely connected to you as an actor.

Shemar hopes to use Criminal Minds as a stepping stone for a career in movies. In a Boston Globe story, Moore says:

The soap opera was high school. I graduated. Now I’m in college with ‘Criminal Minds.’ In a couple of years I will graduate from ‘Criminal Minds,’ and hopefully that will be the start of a long, long film career.

Until then, you can see Shemar Moore Wednesday nights at nine on CBS. You can also check out this youtube clip of Shemar as Malcolm Winters on Y&R. I chose this one because in it he’s very reluctantly modeling with his shirt off.