Unless you frequently find yourself on the horror side of Reddit, you have probably never heard of actor Corteon Moore. So, who exactly is the actor featured in fan theories about the show “From” and seen in TikTok edits about his character, Ellis Stevens?
Moore grew up in Toronto and attended the Wexford Collegiate School for the Arts. He still frequents Canada to film the MGM+ television series “From,” which is about to begin filming its fourth season, but now his home base is New York City. Bouncing back and forth from Canada to New York, he manages to keep up with the culture of his original home and his new one.
“Bacon, egg and cheese spinach wrap and a black coffee is on the daily,” Moore said about his regular bodega order.
Moore’s breakout role was Ellis Stevens in “From,” a show that follows a group of people who mysteriously get stuck in a town with human-like monsters who hunt them at night. Ellis is the son of the town’s sheriff, Boyd Stevens, played by actor Harold Perrineau, whose primary goal is to find an escape from the town.
This type of character development is rare nowadays, with many shows getting canceled before they can build a fanbase or get their bearings.
Moore’s character has grown tremendously throughout the show’s run. In the first season, Ellis is a moody teenager who refuses to acknowledge his father’s goal of escape and stays mainly in the shadows of the other characters. During the show’s third season, Ellis begins to move into the spotlight, finding himself stuck in dangerous situations as he improves his relationship with his father. This type of character development is rare nowadays, with many shows getting canceled before they can build a fanbase or get their bearings.
Streamers and television networks want shows that will be instant successes, but this is not always the case. Shows like Netflix’s “Bridgerton” are rare, having accumulated millions of views within two weeks of its premiere, or “Severance,” which has exploded in popularity after the release of its second season. It is more likely that a show will have the same fate as Hulu’s “High Fidelity,” starring Zoë Kravitz, which was canceled roughly six months after it premiered.
When auditioning for his role in “From,” Moore expected the same fate.
“It was going to be a cool summer-spring gig, and then I’d probably be unemployed after it got canceled and then go on to another show and keep doing that for the rest of my life,” Moore said.
Thankfully, “From” broke that cycle. It is a testament to the fans and the conversations they facilitate, he said, which Moore sneaks a peek at every once in a while.
“It’s really cool to slowly watch it build up organically, strictly because of the people at home that watch it,” Moore said. “We haven’t had the same in-your-face push a lot of shows get in their first season.”
One of the perks of long-running shows is that the cast and crew form a lifelong bond. Moore said they are like a family, especially after spending half a year together filming. He considers Ricky He, who plays Kenny Liu in the show, as a best friend, and he loves running into Scott McCord, who plays Victor Kavanaugh, in the city. He said Perrineau is not only his character’s father in the show, but also a father figure and mentor in real life.
“Any time I get to stand opposite of him, I’m just in awe because he’s truly one of the greatest actors to ever live,” Moore said.
Despite those first few takes, where he was scared out of his mind and forgot how to breathe, Moore understood that he had to rise to this occasion. It was an incredible opportunity that he had to seize. He knew that working with Perrineau, along with the rest of the “From” cast, would make him a better actor.
“When I started acting, it was out of a need to be seen and heard,” Corteon Moore
“There’s no one way to do it, and I think I really learned that on the set of ‘From,’” Moore said. “Everybody is so different, but somehow in the same show, on the same set, in the same place, it all works.”
Moore’s success and experience have taken him into a different genre: comedy. He plays Gabe on the upcoming Amazon Prime and A24 sitcom, “Overcompensating,” written and executive produced by Bennito Skinner. Because Moore came from a background in horror and science fiction, he said that transitioning to acting in a comedy has required some adjusting and a return to his older ideas about the art form.
“When I started acting, it was out of a need to be seen and heard,” Moore said. “I was a class clown. I would never shut up in class. The approach then was really just like, ‘how loud can I be and how much space can I take up?’”
Moore’s “class clown” approach to acting may have faded on the set of “From.” Still, his experience building meaningful and long-lasting friendships with his “From” castmates was essential to working with the actors in “Overcompensating.” Moore said that working alongside the cast’s comedy pros helped him revive his louder and funnier self.
“I was just looking around at my fellow castmates and just going off of what they were doing and what they were bringing to the table. The one thing I knew about my character is he just had absolutely no ceiling, so if they would do something, I would just try to go even bigger,” Moore said. “I was just lucky enough to be surrounded by some of the best comedians working and some of the funniest people in the industry.”
Despite diverging from the comfort zone he fostered on the set of “From,” working on “Overcompensating” felt like a return home for Moore. He spoke about his childhood love for “Even Stevens” and working in an environment that allowed him to channel these beloved comedic characters with a matured perspective on acting.
“It started as this very wild, very hectic, chaotic thing,” Moore said about his acting process. “It has turned into something almost meditative and pure.”
Moore’s success and experimentation in these various acting roles increased his ambition for the rest of the year. He has always envisioned seeing his work on the screen. 2025 seems to be the year he will finally make that happen after years of writing and developing multiple projects. Now, Moore said he has some feature scripts that he is ready to execute.
Until then, Moore said he is proud and excited about the upcoming release of “Overcompensating” on May 15. He said it is the perfect show to watch with friends.
“If you go out with your friends on a Saturday night, they all sleep over and you guys start it on Sunday, then you can watch the entire show that day,” Moore said. “It’s really, really, really heartwarming and we haven’t had something like that in so long.”
Speaking of shows to watch with friends, Moore is a fan of “Severance.” After watching the season two finale, he said he is officially on team Mark’s innie.
