Robert Picardo

Robert Alphonse Picardo, born October 27, 1953, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, is an American actor whose career has spanned Broadway, television, and film. Of Italian heritage, his father's family originated from Montecorvino Rovella in Salerno, and his mother's parents came from Bomba in Abruzzo. His father's name was Joe Picardo. Picardo graduated from William Penn Charter School in 1971 and enrolled at Yale University initially as a pre-medical student before shifting his focus to acting. He earned a bachelor's degree in drama from Yale, then continued his training at the Circle in the Square Professional Theater Workshop.

During his undergraduate years at Yale, Picardo was a member of the Society of Orpheus and Bacchus, the second-longest running undergraduate a cappella group in the United States. He also took part in the 1973 European premiere production of Leonard Bernstein's Mass in Vienna, a production conducted by John Mauceri that was televised by ORF and later broadcast on PBS. After completing his education, he worked as a waiter for several years before his theatrical career began gaining momentum around 1976. Early stage work included appearances in David Mamet's Sexual Perversity in Chicago and The Primary English Class alongside Diane Keaton.

Picardo made his Broadway debut in 1977, appearing in Gemini, and returned to Broadway in 1978 with Tribute. Around the same period, he made television appearances on Kojak in 1977 and Taxi in 1979. His feature film debut came in 1981, when he played Eddie Quist, the serial killer werewolf, in Joe Dante's The Howling. Dante became a frequent collaborator, and Picardo subsequently appeared in Dante's Explorers (1985), Innerspace (1987), The 'Burbs (1989), Gremlins 2: The New Batch (1990), Matinee (1993), Small Soldiers (1998), and Looney Tunes: Back in Action (2003). In Innerspace, he played the Cowboy. Outside of Dante's projects, Picardo portrayed Meg Mucklebones in Ridley Scott's Legend, voiced and portrayed the robotic Johnny Cab in Total Recall, and appeared as a funeral director in John Landis's Amazon Women on the Moon.

From 1988 through 1991, Picardo held simultaneous recurring roles on two ABC series: he played Dr. Dick Richard on the Vietnam drama China Beach and Coach Cutlip on The Wonder Years. In 1993, he appeared on the sitcom Home Improvement as Joe "the Meat Man" Morton, a butcher and neighbor to Tim Allen's character. He also appeared in a 1995 episode of ER as Abraham Zimble and voiced Pfish in two Pfish & Chip shorts for Cartoon Network's What-A-Cartoon! Show that same year. Additional television credits include recurring appearances on Alice, a guest role on The Golden Girls, four episodes of E-Ring, a guest appearance on Cold Case, a role on CSI: NY, two episodes in season seven of Smallville, and a season-six episode of Supernatural titled "Clap Your Hands if You Believe," in which he played a leprechaun.

From 1995 to 2001, Picardo starred as the Emergency Medical Hologram in Star Trek: Voyager, a role for which he had originally auditioned as Neelix before being cast in the lead holographic part. He also directed two episodes of the series. His portrayal of the EMH extended into the 1996 film Star Trek: First Contact and the 1997 Star Trek: Deep Space Nine episode "Doctor Bashir, I Presume?" In addition, he played Dr. Lewis Zimmerman, the creator of the EMH, in episodes of both Deep Space Nine and Voyager. In 2002, he authored The Hologram's Handbook, published by Pocket Books. In 2007 and 2008, he participated in Star Trek: The Music, a multicity orchestral tour alongside John de Lancie, during which the two narrated the history of music in Star Trek. In 2015, Picardo reprised the role of Dr. Lewis Zimmerman in the pilot of the fan series Star Trek: Renegades. In 2024, he returned as the EMH in the second season of Star Trek: Prodigy and is set to appear as The Doctor in the forthcoming series Star Trek: Starfleet Academy.

Beginning in 2004, Picardo joined the Stargate franchise as Richard Woolsey, a member of the International Oversight Advisory, appearing in both Stargate SG-1 and Stargate Atlantis. His first appearance in the franchise was in the Stargate SG-1 episode "Heroes (Part 2)." On February 5, 2008, it was announced that he would join the regular cast of Stargate Atlantis for its fifth and final season, taking on the role of mission commander of the Atlantis Expedition.

Among his other later credits, Picardo played Principal White in the 2007 television film Ben 10: Race Against Time, appeared in four episodes of The Mentalist from 2012 through 2013 as Jason Cooper, and played Professor Ildis Kitan in the first-season Orville episode "Firestorm" in 2017, reprising the role in the 2019 episode "Home." In 2009, he appeared in Pushing Daisies, Chuck, and Castle. He provided the voice of Loki in the Xbox 360 video game Too Human and voiced Robert McNamara in Call of Duty: Black Ops. In 2014, he was announced as a guest voice actor in the second season of the animated series Bravest Warriors.

Beyond acting, Picardo served on the Board of Directors' Advisory Council of The Planetary Society from 1999 through 2015, after which he was elected to serve on the board itself.