B.C.'s Emmanuelle Vaugier cast in comic-book adaptation
Last Updated Wed, 05 Jan 2005 17:13:03 EST
CBC Arts

LOS ANGELES - British Columbia actress Emmanuelle Vaugier has been cast to play the lead in a television adaptation of the comic Painkiller Jane.

The Vancouver native is known as much for her turns on shows like Smallville and One Tree Hill as her appearances on the covers of magazines aimed at young men.

The two-hour pilot will have her in the role of a young Marine officer who gains superheroic healing powers when she is accidentally exposed to biochemical weaponry.

The character originated in the pages of Joe Quesada and Jim Palmiotti's Event Comic title.

Painkiller Jane will air on the Sci Fi Channel in the U.S.

Canada's Space network often picks up Sci Fi programming for later broadcast.

"She's a strong female superhero paradigm, not simply someone in spandex fighting crime," Sci Fi executive Mark Stern told the Daily Variety trade paper in October, when the project was initially announced.

"It's really the drama of a normal person who finds themselves with powers that they don't know what to do with or how to handle."

Walker Howard has also been cast in the pilot.

Along with Alberta's Evangeline Lily, Vaugier is considered one of this country's most promising young performers.

Vaugier's biggest role to date has perhaps been as Dr. Helen Bryce, the love interest of Lex Luthor on Smallville.

She also appeared opposite Hayden Christensen on Higher Ground.

On the big screen, Vaugier has appeared alongside Michael Caine and Robert Duvall in Secondhand Lions, and in the Josh Hartnett vehicle 40 Days and 40 Nights.