Brent Spiner (b. 1949) is an actor best known for playing Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation and in related movies and spin-offs.

As a teenager, Spiner worked at AstroWorld in Texas where he appeared in The Pied Piper of Astroworld, working with Soupy Sales and Rufus.^[1]

Prior to his Star Trek role, Spiner recurred on Night Court as hapless Bob Wheeler (intended to become a regular before the actor was cast on TNG). On Broadway, he was in the original cast of Stephen Sondheim's Sunday in the Park with George (with Bernadette Peters and Mandy Patinkin) and reprised his roles for the American Playhouse TV version. He starred as John Adams in the 1997 revival of 1776 and was a replacement as the Duke in Big River.

Spiner's other credits include Hill Street Blues, the 1980s The Twilight Zone, Mad About You, the TV movie Geppetto (with Julia Louis-Dreyfus), the Tales from the Darkside episode "A Case of the Stubborns" (with Bill McCutcheon), Corrina, Corrina (with Whoopi Goldberg and Ray Liotta), and Independence Day and its sequel.

References[]

• On Sesame Street, the Spaceship Surprise segment parodying Next Generation features a Green Anything Muppet crew member caricatured after Data.

Sources[]

External links[]

• IMDb
• Internet Broadway Database