David Warner

David Warner (born 1941) is a British actor who originally made his name in the British acting scene with his Hamlet. He missed the boat when it came to A-list stardom in the U.S. Warner is well-known among serious movie fans and sci-fi geeks but not the general populace. This puts him dangerously close to being a character actor when his acting skills and presence are of a better caliber. He has been nominated for a number of awards and won a daytime Emmy for "Masada."

Warner was in a few odd movies in his youth, including From Beyond the Grave (1973), but his career in genre roles really kicked off with his famous role as the reporter who is decapitated in The Omen (1976). A string of roles as the baddie in Time After Time (1979), Time Bandits (1981) and TRON (1982) as well as playing Nazis a few times cemented Warner as villain par excelence. He even played Frankenstein's monster in a TV version of Frankenstein, which also starred Carrie Fisher.

In the 90's and beyond Warner played good-guy roles such as a peace-seeking Klingon in Star Trek VI (1991) ,the leader of the underground libertarians in the mini-series "Wild Palms," (1993) and a mild-mannered ape elder in "Planet of the Apes" (2001). He had a role in the very popular 1997 Titanic. He's also done a lot of TV and voiceover work for cartoons and video games in the past two decades. One TV appearance of note was his appearance in Star Trek: Next Generation as Gul Madred, the Cardassian who tortured Captain Picard and very nearly broke his will.

David Warner always shines best as a villain, in my mind, so here we'll focus on a few of his roles as dubious characters.

Jack the Ripper - Time After Time (1979)

A dapper Ripper

Malcolm McDowell is nearly insufferable as H. G. Wells in this so-so time-travel suspense flick. Warner is the saving grace as the cynical gentleman surgeon John Stevenson -- Jack the Ripper -- fleeing into the future where he can commit more crimes with impunity in San Francisco, circa 1979.

H.G. catches up with the Ripper

Evil - Time Bandits

Warner played the villain in another time-travel flick, Terry Gilliam's "Time Bandits." The Evil character is strange, a Monty Python-esque villain with little resemblance to any known version of Satan or Lucifer that I'm aware of, beyond his use of temptation and deception. The role gave Warner a chance to play it bad to the point of silliness but not beyond, to really get his British sneer on and engage in some dark comedy.

Classic Evil scene

Tron

Here Warner played a triple villain role: Dillinger, the boss man in the real world; Sark, the servant of the Master Computer Program in the virtual realm; and the (heavily altered) voice of the Master Computer Program itself which straddles both realms.

This Tron clip has some scenes of Warner as Sark in an admittedly goofy outfit.

Star Trek: Next Generation

Not much to say here except bravo on the casting of Warner as a fascist, torture-happy Cardassian. STNG is a ho-hum show to me, but I did get a kick out of Warner tormenting Stewart. (Nice gams, Patrick!)

Unfinished business

Warner Rarities

Thanks to the magic of YouTube you can now see many of his lesser-known and harder to obtain work. There are snippets of his much-famed Shakespearean acting. Fans of the "weird unsettling 70's movie" will enjoy From Beyond the Grave, where Warner gets the first vignette as a man possessed by a mirror. Peter Cushing and his trinkets do away with a number of other unfortunates, in a malevolent horror Twilight Zone sort of way.

From Beyond the Grave pt.1

David Warner as Frankenstein's monster

Warner on MST3K

An actor can hardly get around as much as Warner did and not feel the sting of MST3K's sharp collective tongue. In Quest of the Delta Knights, Warner plays the goodie and the baddie in a pretty stinky Renaissance Faire movie. Crow T. Robot quips "just in it for the money, folks" and I'd call that a fair assessment.

Best of the Quest of the Delta Knights

Eww, wizard whizz!