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Every hero's quest is fraught with challenges, and in Extraordinary Measures, actor Jared Harris' character is the closest thing there is to a villain. But, if you ask Harris, Dr. Kent Webber—a fictional, mishmash of people John Crowley has encountered in his life—has something to say.

"He represents the faceless, by-the-book world of corporate governance," Harris says. "But what I find very interesting about the part and curious about it is: He wasn't wrong. He was like Cassandra in the tale of the fall of Troy, warning about what was going to happen, and no one paid any attention to that person. ... He wasn't someone who was necessarily bad at what he was doing; he just had very bad people skills, I imagine."

He may not like him as a person, but Harris says he was determined to argue Dr. Webber's side of a medical debate as passionately as possible. "I believe if I can articulate that in a way that makes people think, 'Well, maybe he does have a point,' I've made the story stronger," he says.

After all, this is the kind of story that defines courage and inspires those faced with the impossible. "You like to believe that you'd have the guts to do what Brendan's character does and to take those risks," Harris says. "Not always the case in real life."

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