Gil Bellows worked steadily in film throughout the mid-'90s before he achieved TV fame on the whimsical Fox comedy Ally McBeal. Born and raised in Vancouver, British Columbia, Bellows left Canada to study acting at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts in Southern California. He then headed East, appearing in New York theater as well as on TV's Law & Order. Though he made his film debut in Frank Darabont's acclaimed prison drama The Shawshank Redemption (1994) and co-starred alongside Sarah Jessica Parker in Miami Rhapsody (1995), Bellows followed more in the direction of his first starring film, Love and a .45 (1994), appearing primarily in independent features. After a supporting role in The Substance of Fire (1996), Bellows starred in the British-Canadian adaptation of Bernard Malamud's The Assistant (1997) and the Canadian romantic comedy Dinner at Fred's (opposite indie queen Parker Posey), as well as the French supernatural romance Un Amour de Sorci