Miguel José Ferrer was a Puerto Rican-American actor and voice actor. His breakthrough role was in the 1987 film RoboCop. Other film roles include Quigley in Blank Check, Harbinger in Hot Shots! Part Deux, Shan Yu in Mulan, Eduardo Ruiz in Traffic and Vice President Rodriguez in Iron Man 3. Ferrer's notable television roles include FBI Agent Albert Rosenfield on Twin Peaks, Dr. Garret Macy on Crossing Jordan, Tarakudo on Jackie Chan Adventures and NCIS Assistant Director on .
Early life
Ferrer was born in Santa Monica, California, the oldest of five children of Academy Award-winning actor José Ferrer and singer Rosemary Clooney, who was of Irish and German descent. Ferrer's siblings were sisters Maria and Monsita, and brothers Gabriel and actor Rafael. He also had an older half-sister, Letty Ferrer, from his father José's prior marriage to Uta Hagen. He was the cousin of actor George Clooney and the nephew of journalist Nick Clooney. Ferrer was raised in Hollywood, California; as a teenager, his interests tended toward music. He played the drums on Keith Moon's Two Sides of the Moon.
Career
Ferrer's friend Bill Mumy cast him as a drummer in the series Sunshine, his first television role. Ferrer was also Mumy's bandmate in Seduction of the Innocent, a band that also consisted of Steve Leialoha, and Max Allan Collins. Sharing a love of comics Ferrer and Mumy co-created Comet Man and Trypto the Acid Dog plus co-wrote the Marvel Graphic NovelThe Dreamwalker. Ferrer began his acting career in the early 1980s making guest appearances on episodic television. He played the younger version of his father's character on Magnum, P.I. in 1981. In 1983, he was given a small part as a waiter in The Man Who Wasn't There. He also had a minor role in ' as the U.S.S. Excelsior helm officer. In 1984, he directed the Mark Medoff play “When Ya Coming Back, Red Ryder?” at the Coconut Grove Playhouse in Miami, Florida. He had a major role in the 1987 action movieRoboCop as the cocaine-snorting aspiring corporate executive Bob Morton. Ferrer's notable later roles include a sinister biker in Valentino Returns, an overzealous engineer in DeepStar Six, a resourceful vigilante in Revenge, Commander Arvid Harbinger in the comedy Hot Shots! Part Deux, Lloyd Henreid in the Stephen King miniseries The Stand, and a drug informant in Traffic. He occasionally took on lead parts as well, such as The Harvest and The Night Flier. In the early 1990s, Ferrer appeared on three primetime TV series simultaneously: as D.A. Todd Spurrier in Shannon's Deal, as Cajun cop Beau Jack Bowman in Broken Badges, and as cynical, wittily abrasive FBI forensics specialist Albert Rosenfield in Twin Peaks. Ferrer reprised the role of Rosenfield in the movie '. Ferrer played a super-villain called "The Weatherman" in the failed 1997 TV pilot, Justice League of America. Later in the same year, he provided the voice for a similar character, the Weather Wizard, in the ' episode "Speed Demons |Speed Demons." In 1999, Ferrer voiced Aquaman in another Superman: Animated episode, "A Fish Story." The same year, at the 41st Grammy Awards, Ferrer was nominated for "Best Spoken Word Album for Children" in Disney's The Lion King II, "Simba's Pride Read-Along." He was also the protagonist of the American rock band Toto's music video for the song I Will Remember, appearing alongside actor Edward James Olmos. Ferrer again played a medical examiner on the small screen, Dr. Garret Macy, in the television crime/drama series Crossing Jordan. In August 2003, Ferrer made his New York stage debut in the off-Broadway production of The Exonerated. In 2004, Ferrer performed as the voice of the Heretic leader in the video game Halo 2. Ferrer took voice-over roles in the TV series Robot Chicken and American Dad!. He played Jonas Bledsoe on NBC's Bionic Woman series and in 2009 also starred in another NBC series, Kings, as a military commander of Gath. Ferrer played Los Angeles Police Lieutenant Felix Valdez in the 2011 Lifetime police procedural drama, The Protector. Also in 2011, he had a multiple-episode guest role on the final season of Desperate Housewives. Signed to a recurring role in ' as Naval Criminal Investigative Service Assistant Director Owen Granger, Ferrer was promoted to a series regular for the fifth season on February 6, 2013. He also appeared in the 2013 film Iron Man 3 as the Vice President. Ferrer reprised his role of Albert Rosenfield in the 2017 revival of Twin Peaks.
Death
On January 19, 2017, Ferrer died at his Santa Monica home of throat cancer at the age of 61. He is buried at Santa María Magdalena de Pazzis Cemetery in San Juan, Puerto Rico, next to his father José Ferrer. Miguel O'Hara, the alter ego of the Marvel Comics superheroSpider-Man 2099, was named after Ferrer by his friend, writer Peter David, who co-created the character. The seventh episode of the third season of was dedicated to him. Ferrer had voiced the character Vandal Savage in the first two seasons. As a result of his death, David Kaye took over Ferrer's role as Savage as well as his role as Jonathan Rook/Stretch Monster in Stretch Armstrong and the Flex Fighters.
