René Auberjonois

René Marie Murat Auberjonois (pronounced rə-NAY oh-BAIR-zhən-WAH) was born on June 1, 1940, in Manhattan, New York City, and died on December 8, 2019. An American actor with Broadway credits spanning 1968 to 2004, Auberjonois accumulated more than 200 screen credits across film and television alongside a distinguished stage career. His family name, uncommon in the United States, translates from French as "armorer." His father, Fernand Auberjonois, was a Swiss-born foreign correspondent and Pulitzer Prize-nominated writer. His mother, Princess Laure Louise Napoléone Eugénie Caroline Murat, was a great-great-granddaughter of Joachim Murat, one of Napoleon's marshals and King of Naples during the First French Empire, whose wife was Napoleon's youngest sister, Caroline Bonaparte. Auberjonois' paternal grandfather, also named René Auberjonois, was a Swiss post-Impressionist painter.

After World War II, the family relocated to Paris before returning to the United States and settling in the South Mountain Road artists' colony in Rockland County, New York, a community that also included Burgess Meredith, John Houseman, and Lotte Lenya. The family later lived in London, where Auberjonois completed high school while studying theater. He went on to earn a Bachelor of Fine Arts from the Carnegie Institute of Technology, now Carnegie Mellon University, graduating in 1962.

Following graduation, Auberjonois spent three years at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C., which he later described as his unofficial graduate school. He subsequently worked with Bill Ball's American Conservatory Theater, first in Pittsburgh, where he played the title roles in both Tartuffe and King Lear, and then in San Francisco after the company relocated. His pre-Broadway theater work also took him to the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles and the Brooklyn Academy of Music Repertory Company in New York City. In 1968, Auberjonois joined the original faculty of the Juilliard School's Drama Division when it opened under John Houseman.

That same year, Auberjonois made his Broadway debut in three productions during a single season. He played the Fool opposite Lee J. Cobb in King Lear, which became the longest-running production of that play in Broadway history. Running in repertory with King Lear, he appeared as Ned in A Cry of Players alongside Frank Langella. He also appeared in Fire! that season. In 1969, he originated the role of Sebastian Baye in Coco, the André Previn and Alan Jay Lerner musical starring Katharine Hepburn, earning the Tony Award for Best Featured Actor in a Musical in 1970. In 1972, he played Malvolio in Twelfth Night on Broadway, a role he also performed at the Mark Taper Forum.

Auberjonois received three additional Tony Award nominations over the following two decades. He was nominated for his work opposite Christopher Plummer in Neil Simon's The Good Doctor in 1973, the same year he appeared in Tricks, playing Scapin. His performance as the Duke in Big River, Roger Miller's 1985 musical, earned him both a Tony nomination and the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Musical. A fourth Tony nomination followed for his portrayal of Buddy Fidler and Irwin S. Irving in Cy Coleman's City of Angels in 1989, the same year he also appeared on Broadway as Mr. Samsa in Metamorphosis. His later Broadway credits included Professor Abronsius in Dance of the Vampires, the English-language adaptation of Jim Steinman's Tanz der Vampire, and Jethro Crouch in Sly Fox in 2004, for which he received an Outer Critics Circle Award nomination for Outstanding Featured Actor in a Play. In 2018, Auberjonois was inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame.

On screen, Auberjonois was widely recognized for his roles in several long-running television series. He played Clayton Endicott III on the sitcom Benson from 1980 to 1986, a performance that earned him an Emmy Award nomination. He subsequently portrayed the shapeshifter Odo on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine from 1993 to 1999, and Paul Lewiston on the legal comedy-drama Boston Legal from 2004 to 2008. His film work included Father John Mulcahy in Robert Altman's M*A*S*H in 1970, the expedition scientist Roy Bagley in King Kong in 1976, and Reverend Oliver in The Patriot in 2000. He provided the voice of Chef Louis in The Little Mermaid in 1989, performing the song "Les Poissons," and reprised the role in the film's sequel. In 2019, he portrayed U.S. president James Buchanan in the title role of Raising Buchanan. Auberjonois also received two additional Primetime Emmy nominations and one Daytime Emmy nomination over the course of his career.