Peter Weller
From Memory Alpha, the free Star Trek reference.
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Peter Weller (born 24 June 1947; age 61) is a veteran actor whose only Star Trek appearances to date have been the Enterprise episodes "Demons" and "Terra Prime", in which he played Terra Prime leader John Frederick Paxton.
He is perhaps best known to science fiction genre fans for playing the title role in 1987's RoboCop (co-starring Kurtwood Smith, Ronny Cox, Miguel Ferrer, Robert Doqui, and Ray Wise) and its 1990 sequel, Robocop 2 (with Robert Doqui, John Glover, Roger Aaron Brown, Jeff McCarthy, Mark Rolston, Gabriel Damon, and Bill Bolender, and Phil Rubenstein). He is also well known for playing Buckaroo Banzai in the 1984 cult classic The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension, in which he co-starred with fellow Trek alumni Christopher Lloyd, Robert Ito, Clancy Brown, Vincent Schiavelli, and Jonathan Banks.
In addition, he was the star of Manny Coto's sci-fi television series Odyssey 5 from 2002 through 2004. In 2006 Weller appeared as Christopher Henderson on the TV series 24, on which Manny Coto is a writer and producer. Weller has also gained recognition for starring as the William S. Burroughs-based "Bill Lee" in David Cronenberg's 1991 adaptation of Naked Lunch.
Weller made his film debut in 1979's Butch and Sundance: The Early Days, which also featured his future Buckaroo Banzai co-stars and fellow Trek actors Christopher Lloyd and Vincent Schiavelli. The cast of Butch and Sundance also included Jeff Corey, John Schuck, Peter Brocco, and Noble Willingham.
Weller co-starred with Teri Garr in the 1984 drama Firstborn, playing Garr's lover. In 1986, he appeared with his future Robocop 2 co-star John Glover in the film A Killing Affair (also with Bill Smitrovich) and the TV movie Apology. More recent film credits include Woody Allen's Mighty Aphrodite (1995, co-starring F. Murray Abraham and David Ogden Stiers), Screamers (a 1995 adaptation of the Phillip K. Dick story The Second Variety, featuring creature construction by Ken Niederbaumer), the 2000 independent film Shadow Hours (with Michael Dorn and Brad Dourif), the 2003 Brian Helgeland thriller The Order, and the 2005 drama Undiscovered.
Weller earned an Academy Award nomination for directing the 1993 short film Partners, which he also co-wrote and appeared in along with Ed Begley, Jr. and Seymour Cassel.
[edit] Other Trek connections
Additional film and television projects in which Weller worked with other Trek alumni include:
- The Silence (1975 TV movie) with George Hearn and Craig Wasson
- Mourning Becomes Electra (1978 TV mini-series) with Bruce Davison
- Shoot the Moon (1982 film) with George Murdock and Robert Costanzo
- Shakedown (1988 film) with Jude Ciccolella
- Leviathan (1989 film) with Meg Foster
- Cat Chaser (1989 film) featuring costume designs by Michael Kaplan
- Rainbow Drive (1990 TV movie) with Tony Jay
- Sunset Grill (1993 film) with John Rhys-Davies
- The New Age (1994 film) with Corbin Bernsen
- Present Tense, Past Perfect (1995 TV movie) with Julie Cobb and Bruce Davison
- Top of the World (1997 film) with Ed Lauter
- Tower of the Firstborn (1998 TV movie) with Ben Cross
- Contaminated Man (2000) with makeup effects by Richard Redlefsen
- The Handler episode "Body of Evidence" (2003) directed by Lou Antonio
- Monk episode "Mr. Monk and the Actor" (2006) with Stanley Kamel
- The Poseidon Adventure (2005 TV movie) directed by John Putch
