Tom Skerritt, Alien Captain and Top Gun Mentor, Dies at 93

Tom Skerritt, the actor who captained the spaceship Nostromo in Alien and trained young fighter pilots as Viper in Top Gun, died on Wednesday, October 21, of natural causes. He was 93. His family announced the death on Thursday, October 22, in a statement shared through his representative.

"While the world knew Tom through his remarkable acting career, we knew him for his humor, curiosity, wisdom, generosity and the love he brought into our lives," the family said. The statement said he cared deeply about imagination, creativity, storytelling, service, veterans and the natural world, and about helping others find and share their own voices.

The roles audiences remember

Skerritt broke through in Robert Altman film MASH in 1970, playing a surgeon in a mobile Army hospital during the Korean War. In 1979 he played Captain Dallas in Alien, the calm commander of the Nostromo who goes into the ship air vents to hunt the creature on board. In 1986 he played Commander Mike Viper Metcalf in Top Gun, the instructor who teaches Tom Cruise character, Pete Maverick Mitchell, what it takes to survive at the Navy fighter school.

He kept that steady presence for decades. He played a small town sheriff in the film The Dead Zone and fathers in Ice Castles, Steel Magnolias and A River Runs Through It, released in 1992. Colleagues often described the same quality the Associated Press noted in its obituary: a rugged look, a mustache, and a cool, calm bearing that made him believable as a man in charge.

A sheriff on television

Television gave Skerritt his biggest award. On the CBS drama Picket Fences he played Sheriff Jimmy Brock, the lawman holding together a small Wisconsin town. He led the show for all four of its seasons, from 1992 to 1996, and won the Emmy for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Drama Series in 1993. He was nominated for the same award twice.

A working class start

Skerritt grew up in Detroit, the son of a blue collar family, and served in the United States Air Force before he went to UCLA and turned to theater and acting. He spent his early Hollywood years in television work, with guest parts on shows including My Three Sons and The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, before the film roles arrived.

In later life he lived in the Pacific Northwest. He promoted independent film and theater there and co-founded The Red Badge Project, a program that gives veterans storytelling courses so they can share their own experiences.

Family

Skerritt is survived by his wife, Julie Tokashiki, and by his children Andy, Erin, Matt, Collin and Emiko. He is also survived by grandchildren Sara, Maddison, Sunny, Louisa and Georgia, and by great-grandchildren Marigold and Ravi.