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Mitch Pileggi (born April 5, 1952) is an American actor, best known for playing FBI assistant director Walter Skinner on the longrunning popular series The X-Files.

A native of Portland, Oregon, he was one of several children to Vito Pileggi, a defense contractor, and his wife Maxine. Pileggi was a high school athlete, concentrating on wrestling and football. His family moved quite a bit due to his father's occupation (which also gave him a first-hand understanding of government in his future role as Skinner) and he lived variously in Oregon, California, and Texas, with most of his adolescence in Turkey.^[1] He attended the University of Texas in Austin, receiving a degree in business. For a while he worked in Iran as a defense contractor, until the 1979 Iranian revolution caused him and his brother to have to flee the country, escaping to Greece.

Pileggi began acting while he was a high school student in Turkey, playing musical theater.^[2] After returning to Austin from Iran, he performed in local theaters, and continued his acting career with small roles in B-movies, and guest roles in television shows such as Dallas, Married with Children, Walker, Texas Ranger; and China Beach.

In the 1980s, Pileggi starred in several films including Three O'Clock High as Duke "The Duker" Herman, an over zealous tough-as-nails high school parking lot security guard, and in Wes Craven's Shocker as body-possessing serial killer Horace Pinker.

Pileggi's recent work included starring on the short-lived TV show Tarzan and co-starring with Barbara Hershey and Oliver Hudson on the short-lived TV show The Mountain. In 2005, he began a role as recurring guest character Colonel Steven Caldwell in the second and third seasons of the television series Stargate Atlantis. He also acted in an episode of CSI: Crime Scene Investigation and in 2006 had a regular guest role on Day Break as Robbery/Homicide Detective Spivak.

Pileggi has also done some voice acting, for example playing the githzerai Dak'kon in the video game Planescape: Torment. Another voice acting role he plays is Commissioner James Gordon on the new Kids WB! animated show The Batman. He also hosted the controversial FOX specials Breaking the Magician's Code: Magic's Biggest Secrets Finally Revealed and Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon?^[3]

His first marriage was to Debbie Andrews, which lasted from 1978-1983. During Christmas 1996, he married his second wife, Arlene Warren. They have one daughter, Sawyer, born May 24, 1998. They were originally introduced to each other by David Duchovny, who was later the best man at their Hawaii wedding. Arlene worked on the set of The X-Files as a stand-in for Gillian Anderson. Later on in the series, the real-life Arlene can be seen occasionally on the show as Skinner's fictional secretary, Arlene.^[4]

He currently has a recurring role on Stargate Atlantis as Lieutenant Colonel Steven Caldwell, Commander of the Earth Battlecruiser, Daedalus. He also portrayed Detective Armen Spivak on ABC's shortlived series, Day Break.

His most notable role was as the FBI's Assistant Director Walter Skinner, a part for which he had to audition three times before being cast. It resulted in a performance in a first-season episode of The X-Files in 1994. The role was originally a small one, but he kept getting asked back for several episodes of the second season (one report is because it was revealed that he had a "hunky" physique under his suit), and in 1996 he became a regular member of the cast. The character gradually became the most important character besides the two leads. He remained with the show until its end in 2002,^[5] and also played the character in the 1998 X Files film.

1. ^ Mitch Pileggi biography at tvguide.com
2. ^ Scifipedia
3. ^ Mitch Pileggi at the Internet Movie Database
4. ^ Mitch Pileggi Online
5. ^ "Mitch Pileggi", US Magazine, July 1998, pp 90-91