Tom Skerritt, ‘Picket Fences’ and ‘Alien’ Star, Dies at 93

Tom Skerritt, who starred in the TV series “Picket Fences” and appeared in movies ranging from “MASH” to “Alien,” “Top Gun,” “A River Runs Through It” and “Ted,” died on Wednesday of natural causes, Variety has confirmed with his publicist. He was 93.

The lean, rugged, mustachioed actor won an Emmy in 1993 and was also nominated in 1994 for playing Jimmy Brock, sheriff of the oddball town at the center of David E. Kelley’s CBS dramedy “Picket Fences.” He also shared SAG Award nominations for outstanding performance by an ensemble in a drama series for “Picket Fences” in 1995 and 1996 while also being nominated for outstanding performance by a male actor in a drama series in 1995.

In the 2000s he guested on “The West Wing” as a senator, on “Law & Order: SVU” as a biased judge and on HBO’s “Huff” as the father of Hank Azaria’s title character, replacing Robert Forster in the role. He recurred from 2006-09 on ABC’s “Brothers & Sisters” as family patriarch William Walker and guested on “The Good Wife” in 2014 and on “Madam Secretary” in 2015.

In Robert Altman’s “MASH” (1970), Skerritt played Duke Forrest, one of the insubordinate but excellent surgeons. The actor was third billed, after Donald Sutherland and Elliott Gould but before Sally Kellerman and Robert Duvall.

In Ridley’s classic sci-fi horror film ”Alien” (1979), Skerritt played Dallas, the captain of the Nostromo, and was first billed, ahead of Sigourney Weaver; he had originally turned down the part when the project had a low budget and no director attached. The actor also worked for Tony Scott, co-starring in the monumental 1986 hit “Top Gun” as Commander Mike “Viper” Metcalf, chief instructor at Miramar Naval Air Station’s so-called top gun school, where Tom Cruise’s Lieut. Pete “Maverick” Mitchell is training.

The Robert Redford-directed 1992 adaptation of Norman Maclean’s much-admired 1976 novella ”A River Runs Through It” afforded Skerritt with a relatively rare opportunity to do some serious acting in a film. He played a Presbyterian minister who is father to the characters played by Brad Pitt and Craig Sheffer, with the family only really united when they go fly fishing. Variety said: “Tom Skerritt discreetly reveals the loving core inside the reedy exterior of the boys’ preacher father.”

Skerritt was among the celebrities who cameo’d as themselves in Seth MacFarlane’s scabrous 2012 comedy “Ted.” He appeared in supporting roles as an academic in the 2013 campus-set romantic comedy “At Middleton,” starring Vera Farmiga and Andy Garcia, and as Ulysses S. Grant in “Field of Lost Shoes” (2014).

The year after “MASH” he appeared in “Harold and Maude” as a motorcycle cop.

He worked with Altman again in 1974’s “Thieves Like Us,” starring Keith Carradine and Shelley Duvall, and also appeared that year as a bank robber in Roger Corman cult classic “Big Bad Mama,” in which he was third billed after Angie Dickinson and William Shatner. Skerritt starred with Ernest Borgnine and Shatner in 1975 horror film “The Devil’s Rain.”

In Herbert Ross’ esteemed 1977 film “The Turning Point,” in which Anne Bancroft plays an aging dancer at New York’s Ballet Theater and Shirley MacLaine her old friend who moved to Oklahoma City and started a family, Skerritt played the MacLaine character’s husband, earning the National Board of Review’s best supporting actor award.

Skerritt also had a notable role in a very different vein in the 1978 Cheech and Chong movie “Up in Smoke,” in which he played Strawberry, the Cheech character’s cousin — a Vietnam vet who has a flashback during a police raid, believing the cops to be Viet Cong.

The actor had a sizable role in David Cronenberg’s 1983 adaptation of Stephen King’s “The Dead Zone.” Roger Ebert said: “The movie is filled with good performances [including] Tom Skerritt as the local sheriff who wants to enlist this psychic to solve a chain of murders.”

In 1988 he starred with Nancy Allen and Lara Flynn Boyle in “Poltergeist III.”

He played the father of Julia Roberts’ bride-t0-be in Herbert Ross’ “Steel Magnolias,” a 1989 hit movie that found little use for the men in the cast; the actor played the estranged father of Charlie Sheen’s character in Clint Eastwood’s “The Rookie” (1990). In the steamy 1992 thriller “Poison Ivy,” he played a father who’s all but ravished by the best friend of his daughter (Sara Gilbert): the evil, seductive Ivy, played by Drew Barrymore.

In the sixth season of the hit NBC sitcom “Cheers” (1987-88), Skerritt had a story arc as Evan Drake, boss to Kirstie Alley’s Rebecca Howe, who has an unrequited crush on him.

He starred as a small-town sheriff investigating a homicide in the well-regarded TV movie “The China Lake Murders” (1990).

After appearing in “Picket Fences” from 1992-96, he had a supporting role in Robert Zemeckis’ “Contact” (1997), starring Jodie Foster.  The actor appeared in a series of TV movies and had supporting roles in “Texas Rangers” (2001) and Antoine Fuqua’s mercenary war drama “Tears of the Sun” (2003), starring Bruce Willis and Monica Bellucci. In 2010 he appeared in Mario Van Peebles’ “Redemption Road”; Variety said: “Tom Skerritt contributes a pitch-perfect supporting performance as the sage owner of a small-town honkytonk.”

Thomas Roy Skerritt was born in Detroit and attended Wayne State University and UCLA. He did a stint in the U.S. Air Force.

He made his feature debut in the Korean War drama “War Hunt” (1962), starring John Saxon and Sydney Pollack; Robert Redford had a small part, and Francis Ford Coppola had an uncredited role. He next appeared in the 1965 feature “Those Calloways.”

Skerritt made guest appearances on series including “The Alfred Hitchcock Hour,” “My Three Sons,” “Wagon Train,” “My Favorite Martian,” “The Fugitive” and “Gunsmoke” during the decade and on “Hawaii Five-O,” “Cannon,” “Barnaby Jones” and “Baretta” in the 1970s before his appearance in 1979’s “Alien” dialed up his career.

Skerritt was thrice married, the first time to Charlotte Shanks (1957-72), the second time to Sue Oran (1977-1992). Both of these marriages ended in divorce.

He is survived by third wife Julie Tokashiki, whom he married in 1998; sons Andy and Matt, a director, and daughter Erin by Shanks; and son Colin by Oran.