American screen and stage actor with a career spanning over 70 years. He began as a child actor, the son of stage actors, he later became an adult actor of film and television. He was the star of the TV series Quantum Leap (1989-1993), then played Navy Secretary Edward Sheffield on JAG (2002–2004) and Brother Cavil on Battlestar Galactica (2004–2009).
Stockwell began his film career at age seven with MGM in The Innocent Voyage followed by the title roles in The Boy with Green Hair and The Secret Garden. He remained a popular child actor for years working for MGM. “For an adult, it’s high pressure work, but it can be even worse for children because they’re not allowed to be kids,” he said, “Fortunately, I had a sensitive and loving mother. If it wasn’t for her I probably wouldn’t be here.”
Nine years and 20 films later, he quit acting and spent his late teens traveling across country, working at a variety of jobs ranging from hammering railroad spikes to inspecting prunes. “I wasn’t going anywhere, I had no other crafts or education, so I went back into show business.” Stockwell made a successful comeback in the second phase of his career and appeared in five films from 1957 through 1962 including Compulsion (1959) and Long Day’s Journey Into Night (1962).
During the swinging sixties Stockwell spent much of his time in Topanga Canyon with Jack Nicholson, Neil Young and Eric Clapton. “I dropped out and stopped calling my agent, but then I found it was difficult to drop back in.”
Work came sporadically in the ’70s with a career surge in the ’80s in the films Dune and Paris, Texas, followed by that rare event in Hollywood, a second sensational comeback with his stunning performance in the 1986 film noir Blue Velvet, launching the third phase of his career. A string of films in the ’90s include McHale’s Navy, Restraining Order and Rites of Passage.
In 1989 he was nominated for an Oscar for Best Actor in a Supporting Role for Married to the Mob.
Also a visual artist, Stockwell exhibited collage and sculpture in Taos in 2009.
Stockwell’s 1960 marriage to actress Millie Perkins ended in divorce in 1962. In 1981 he married textiles expert Joy Marchenko; their son Austin was born in 1983 followed by daughter Sophia in 1985. The Stockwell family made their home in Santa Barbara, California. Stockwell and Marchenko divorced in 2004.
Dean’s older brother, Guy, died on 6 February 2002, Prescott, Arizona, leaving more than 250 TV episodes in his archives. Dean Stockwell died of natural causes at his home in Ranchos de Taos, New Mexico, on 7 November 2021 at age 85.
Link to Wikipedia biography