Dirk Benedict

Actor Dirk Benedict played the womanizing, cigar-smoking, card playing and incredibly skilled Colonial Warrior known as Lieutenant Starbuck in the Original Battlestar Galactica series.

Born in Montana in 1945, Benedict was a excellent high school athlete and aspiring musician.

His acting career began with an odd bet with his college football team members, which landed him in a leading role in a show at Whitman College in the state of Washington, and starring in many other productions. Graduating from college with a degree in Music, Benedict decided to pursue acting as a career, under the tutelage of John Fernald. Benedict played many roles in summer stock, performing many roles in classic plays by Shakespeare and Ipsen.

Benedict moved to New York and found supporting roles in several Broadway shows, including the leading role in the play, "Butterflies Are Free" with the late Gloria Swanson, who portrayed his mother.

Benedict found himself in small but interesting roles in some TV series, including work in "Hawaii Five-O" and the lead in a one-season show by TV show mogul Aaron Spelling called "Chopper One." Benedict left acting for a few years in a lifelong desire to visit every state in the U.S.

Benedict's casting as "Starbuck" in "Battlestar Galactica" made him nationally famous. He made an appearance on the final episode of "Galactica 1980", entitled "The Return of Starbuck". This episode is considered by fans of the Original Series as the only significant contribution from "Galactica 1980", a show otherwise considered noncanonical by many.

After these series, Benedict found popularity again as the character of Templeton "Face" Peck on the long-running early-1980s TV series, "The A-Team", produced by "Galactica"'s owner, Universal. In the show's opening credits in later seasons, a Cylon Warrior is shown walking by Benedict's character, who gives an peculiarly humorous look of recognition of the robot as an in-joke to the actor's past role as Starbuck.

Benedict returned to the stage after "Galactica" as well, gaining fame in many popular roles there, and played guest and starring roles in a handful of TV movies and series.

As casting for the Singer/DeSanto Continuation Project of a new "Battlestar Galactica" series in 2001 began, Benedict was slated to play an older Starbuck in the new series. However, the project folded due to Bryan Singer's movie directing committments and delays caused by the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the TV industry.

Benedict has yet to see a casting in the Re-imagined Series. At one point, he was considered to play a cigar-smoking God of the Cylons in a dream sequence with Gaius Baltar in a Season 1 episode, but the idea was later dismissed.

Benedict (with fellow Original Series actor Richard Hatch) loaned his voice talents as the Original Series Starbuck to the Battlestar Galactica video game that appeared in 2003. The characters of Starbuck and Apollo are available as wingmen pilots for the game player, using a game cheat.