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Theodore Bikel (born May 2, 1924) is an Austrian-born character actor, folk singer and musician. He made his film debut in The African Queen and was nominated for an Academy award for his role as the Southern Sheriff in The Defiant Ones.
He played the Captain in the original Broadway cast of The Sound of Music, and also played Tevye in the original run (but not the original cast) of Fiddler On the Roof. He has performed the role of Tevye more often than any other actor (2094 times to date.)
Bikel was a co-founder of the Newport Folk Festival (together with Pete Seeger and George Wein) in 1961. In 1962 he heard Bob Dylan give his premiere performance of "Blowin' In the Wind." Bikel then went to his scheduled performance and became the first singer besides Dylan to perform the song in public. He also appeared in Frank Zappa's 200 Motels.
In the early 1990s, he appeared on Star Trek: The Next Generation, in the episode "Family", playing Sergey Rozhenko, the Russian-born adopted father of Worf, who, as a petty officer on the Starfleet vessel Intrepid, had found Worf at the site of the Khitomer Massacre, and taken him home and to raise as his son. Bikel performed two roles in the Babylon 5 universe. The first was as Rabbi Koslov in the first season episode TKO. He later appeared in the TV movie, Babylon 5: In the Beginning as Anla'Shok leader Entil'Zha Lenonn.
Other work
Bikel was president of Actors' Equity in the late 1970's and early 1980's. President Jimmy Carter appointed him to serve on the National Council for the Arts in 1977 for a six year term. Bikel is also a lecturer.
Bikel's autobiography Theo was published in 1995 by Harper Collins, and re-issued in an updated version by the University of Wisconsin Press in 2002.
External links
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