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Moore: Forever young and restless

As heartthrob Malcolm Winters on The Young and the Restless, former fashion model Shemar Moore made a lot of female fans swoon. Although the gig made him a household name around the world, five years into the daily soap opera, Moore himself began to feel antsy.

"I felt myself outgrowing it," says the Daytime Emmy award winner. "I felt myself anxious and hungry to try other things."

After a few years of dabbling in projects that never quite took flight, the former Soul Train host landed a starring role the CBS hit Criminal Minds.
The somewhat rocky transition from the The Young and the Restless did not phase Moore. He sums up his approach to life thus: "I think when you believe in something and you're very positive about something, it may not happen the way you think it should happen and what you want to happen may not happen, but something will come about from that."

Moore has been gleaning such lessons about life from his experiences in Hollywood. Take for instance the 1994 Circus of the Stars, which he participated in shortly after his debut on The Young and the Restless. He began to practise by walking on a wire two feet off the ground and was certain he could not do even that. What happened after ten weeks of training?

"I walked on a high wire 25 feet off the ground," Moore says. "The fact that I was able to overcome my fear of heights and do this on television in front of such a large audience showed me that if you want something bad enough, you can accomplish it. It was a great, empowering moment for me."

He adds, though: "The only bad part about it was the tights I had to wear and the little ballet shoes."

Building confidence is a theme he comes back to repeatedly during the course of a 30-minute interview.

The 37-year old Moore was the only child of a Caucasian mother and African American father who separated shortly after his birth. His mother's career took them across the globe. He says this gave him an interesting, eclectic upbringing, but recognizes it also meant an unstable childhood.

"I never lived in any one place more than four years, so it was hard for me to make friends," Moore says.

He resorted to sports to cope.

"I learned very quickly that one of the ways to I could make friends was to be good at sports. And I enjoyed sports, but it was survival though; I had to be good at sports in order to fit in."

During his college years, the communications major seriously considered following the footsteps of his mother's brother, a semi-professional baseball player. But another one of his coping strategies soon overtook his life.

"When I was a kid I was really shy," Moore says. "I think the reason I really embraced acting is because it scared me to death. It forced me to challenge the shyness in me. By being an actor and taking on characters, I was able to give myself permission to emote things for the sake of these characters that I wouldn't give myself permission to in my everyday life."

Modelling gigs soon led to the role on The Young and the Restless. And that was that.

While he is enjoying Criminal Minds and sees himself having a long Hollywood career, Moore believes he will always embody the spirit of the title of the soap on which he got his break.

"I always want to be challenged," he says. "I don't ever want to find a comfort zone, and if I get comfortable then it's time to try something new. Criminal Minds is something new for me and I'll ride this ride and then one day I'll get off this ride and get on another ride."

A Monaco Revue "Up Close And Real Interview"; filmed at the Monte Carlo Television Festival.

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