Brent Spiner: From ‘Star Trek’ android to ‘Man of La Mancha’

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Call him the ‘Android of La Mancha.’

Brent Spiner, the actor best known as Data the pallid android on TV’s ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ and various film incarnations of the show, is boldly going where no one from the planet Omicron Theta has gone before -- to L.A.’s Reprise Theatre Company to star in the Broadway musical ‘Man of La Mancha.’

Before gaining fame as a brother from another planet, Spiner made a number of on- and off-Broadway appearances in his early career, including ‘A History of the American Film,’ ‘Sunday in the Park With George,’ ‘Big River,’ ‘The Three Musketeers’ and the New York Shakespeare Festival’s ‘The Seagull.’

Also among his credits: a return to Broadway in the non-android role of John Adams in the Roundabout Theatre Company revival of ‘1776,’ which netted him a Drama Desk Award for best actor in a musical, and co-starring in Yasmina Reza’s comedy ‘Life (x) 3’ at Circle in the Square Theater in 2003.

‘Man of La Mancha,’ which will play at UCLA’s Freud Playhouse from Feb. 14 to March 1, will be directed by Michael Michetti, co-artistic director of Pasadena’s Theater @ Boston Court.

-- Diane Haithman