--- name: "Kevin Smith" canonical: "https://film.one/person/kevin-smith-80406" roles: ["Actor"] born: "16 March 1963" died: "15 February 2002" reviewed_on_fi1m: 1 updated: "2026-09-16T23:22:39.353983+00:00" licence: "© Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL." --- # Kevin Smith Actor. Born 16 March 1963 in Auckland, New Zealand. Died 15 February 2002. ## Details - **Work:** Actor - **Born:** 16 March 1963, Auckland, New Zealand - **Died:** 15 February 2002 - **Also known as:** Kevin Tod Smith ## Fi1m on Kevin Smith > Kevin Smith played the god of war as a man in black leather who would rather seduce than shout, and he made Ares the best reason to sit through a weak episode of *Xena*. The wider career never got the chance to catch up. Ares arrives in *Xena: Warrior Princess* (1995) and does something most villains in that show never manage: he lowers his voice. Around him the warlords bellow and the wigs do their worst. Smith leans in instead. He plays the god of war as a man who has lost a favourite pupil and takes it personally, half flirting and half threatening, and who regards Xena's repentance as an insult aimed at him. The performance lives in the pause before the line rather than the line itself. He was a New Zealand actor first, a rugby player who fell into acting after an injury put him in front of an audition, and he worked in local theatre and television from the late 1980s, in series such as *Gloss* and *Marlin Bay* and the film *Desperate Remedies* (1993). In 1995 he joined *Hercules: The Legendary Journeys* as Iphicles, the hero's half-brother, and the same year took on Ares in *Xena*. For the next six years he played the god across *Hercules*, *Xena* and *Young Hercules* (1998) at the same time, until 2001, with time left over to lead a run of New Zealand television films as John Lawless in *Lawless* (1999). He died in 2002, as a Hollywood part was being prepared for him. The trick of Ares is that Smith plays a different god depending on whose show he is on. Opposite Kevin Sorbo on *Hercules* he is an aggressor with a grudge; opposite Lucy Lawless he is a suitor, and everything is about winning her back. Smith understood this better than the writing sometimes did. His own account of the part was that Ares "isn't evil" and is "just a working stiff who goes home after a hard day at the office", and that is what makes him funny: the sulk of a middle manager who has been passed over. In the flatter hours of the first season we found ourselves waiting for him, and cheering up when the black leather came round the corner, because nobody else in the cast could make a threat sound like an invitation. The reservation is the obvious one. Nearly everything he did that anyone outside New Zealand has seen is syndicated fantasy television, made quickly, and the material rarely asked him for more than charm and menace in alternating scenes. *Lawless* suggests there was more, but we have not seen enough of it to say how much. He was still finding out what else he could do when the chance went. If you want to know why a supporting player in a show about wigs and thunderbolts is still talked about, pick any *Xena* episode with Ares in it and watch him wait for his cue. He is never in a hurry. The shows around him usually were. ## Biography Kevin Tod Smith, also credited as Kevin Smith, was a New Zealand actor and musician. Born in Auckland on 16 March 1963, he attended Timaru Boys’ High School and Canterbury University in Christchurch. He played rugby and performed in bands before entering acting after an audition for an Elvis Presley tribute show. Smith gained international recognition for his recurring role as the god of war Ares in the series *Xena: Warrior Princess* (1995–2001), *Hercules: The Legendary Journeys* (1995–1999) and *Young Hercules* (1998). He also appeared in New Zealand productions including the soap opera *Marlin Bay*, for which he received a New Zealand Film and Television Award for Best Supporting Actor in 1995, and the film *Desperate Remedies* (1993). Smith died on 15 February 2002 in Beijing, China, aged 38, from injuries sustained in a fall while filming. *Sources: en.wikipedia.org, imdb.com, themoviedb.org.* ## On Fi1m (1) - *Xena: Warrior Princess* (1995), Fi1m 74, as Ares — [page](https://film.one/tv/xena-warrior-princess.md) ## Also known for - *The Fast and the Furious* (2001), Big Rig Driver (uncredited) - *Hercules: The Legendary Journeys* (1995), Ares, Jerry Patrick Brown / Ares, Iphicles - *Young Hercules* (1998), Ares, Bacchus - *The Adventures of Sinbad* (1996) - *Riverworld* (2003), Valdemar - *Hercules and Xena - The Animated Movie: The Battle for Mount Olympus* (1998), Ares (voice) --- © Fi1m Ltd. Written by AI under a human editor; checked against sources before publication. Quote with attribution and a link to the canonical URL. Canonical: https://film.one/person/kevin-smith-80406