00s TV star, 45, reveals he has no plans to return to acting

An actor who starred in a hit 00s supernatural teen drama series has revealed his acting career ‘is in the rear-view mirror’.

Ian Somerhalder played Boone Carlyle in the drama series Lost from 2004 until 2010, then going on to be cast as Damon Salvatore in the CW supernatural teen drama series The Vampire Diaries.

The series, which ran for eight seasons from 2009 until 2017, followed Elena Gilbert (played by Nina Dobrev), a teenage girl who falls in love with a 161-year-old vampire named Stefan Salvatore (Paul Wesley).

However, when his older brother Damon returns to their small town with plans to bring back their past love, who is Elena’s doppelganger, a love triangle then emerges.

The series was the most-watched show on the network for a time, and was so successful it also spawned the spin-off series The Originals.

However, in the years since it ended Ian has only appeared in one other series – the Netflix science fiction horror V Wars, which ran from 2019 until 2020.

He’s also worked on two environmental documentaries and launched a bourbon brand with his former co-star Paul, 42.

This week Ian, 45, spoke about his acting career, sharing he had no plans to step in front of the camera again anytime soon.

‘I think it’s in the rearview mirror. I do,’ he said of his acting career in an interview with People.

‘Well, I dunno, we got the rights back for V Wars, but I just don’t know how the hell we would ever make a TV show,’ he added, referring to the series his wife Nikki Reed also starred in.

‘We’re building three companies at the same time, raising kids.’

After getting married in 2015 Ian and Nikki, who is best known for playing Rosalie Hale in The Twilight Saga, left Los Angeles and moved to a farm ‘very outside the city’.

They share two children – Bodhi, 7, and a baby boy, who is a year old.

Last year, the couple co-founded The Absorption Company – a tech-powered supplement brand.

Nikki, 36, also told the publication that while there was ‘no door closed’ to acting, she was busy ‘working over 90 hours a week, running a company full time and launching another company’.

Earlier this year Ian referenced how it had been five years since he was professionally on camera as an actor and he’d ‘stepped away to build companies, launch films and raise my kids’.

He also said that while he ‘loved what he did for a very long time’ he ‘didn’t miss any of it’.

Nikki, whose other screen credits included The O.C. and Sleepy Hollow, last appeared on screen in V Wars too.

The Vampire Diaries is streaming on ITVX.

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