HOLLYWOOD MOURNS AS TOM SKERRITT, BELOVED STAR OF ‘TOP GUN’ AND ‘PICKET FENCES,’ D*ES AT 93 — LEAVING BEHIND A REMARKABLE SIX-DECADE CAREER AND MEMORIES THAT GENERATIONS OF FANS WILL NEVER FORGET. From his unforgettable role alongside Tom Cruise in Top Gun to his Emmy-winning performance in Picket Fences, Tom Skerritt became one of Hollywood’s most familiar and respected faces. His passing marks the end of an extraordinary chapter in film and television, with a career that spanned everything from gripping dramas to some of cinema’s most iconic productions. Yet beyond the famous roles and accolades, there is a more personal side to the actor’s life and legacy that makes this farewell especially poignant.

Tom Skerritt, the veteran actor who appeared in seminal films like Top Gun and popular TV shows like Picket Fences, died Wednesday of natural causes. He was 93.

His family announced the news in a statement provided to Entertainment Weekly, adding that they were “heartbroken” by the loss.

Skerritt was “a loving husband to Julie; father to Andy, Erin, Matt, Collin, and Emiko; grandfather to Sara, Maddison, Sunny, Louisa, and Georgia; and great-grandfather to Marigold and Ravi,” the statement said.

“While the world knew Tom through his remarkable acting career, we knew him for his humor, curiosity, wisdom, generosity, and the love he brought into our lives,” the family continued. “He cared deeply about imagination, creativity, storytelling, service, veterans, the natural world, and helping others find and share their own voices. We are incredibly grateful for the love and support being shown by his friends, colleagues, and fans.”

Skerritt was perhaps best known for playing Commander Mike “Viper” Metcalf in 1986’s Top Gun, which saw him sternly instruct Pete “Maverick” Mitchell (Tom Cruise) and Nick “Goose” Bradshaw (Anthony Edwards) at the titular San Diego naval training program.

“I think we had a rapport, right from the beginning,” Skertitt said in a 2022 interview with San Diego’s Fox 5, reflecting on his dynamic with Cruise in the film. “This is a father-and-a-son situation, is really what it comes down to. And that’s really the way I thought about it.”

Skerritt also won an Emmy for his turn as Sheriff Jimmy Brock on CBS’ Picket Fences in 1993. He led the show for all four of its seasons, from 1992 to 1996.

“That show itself was well crafted, wonderfully written,” he said in a 2015 interview with CreativeLive. “[When] the Emmy came, the first thing i had to say was, ‘None of us can do anything without script. None of us should be doing anything without a well-written, well-worked screenplay.’”

Born in Detroit in 1933, Skerritt served in the Air Force for four years upon graduating from high school. He studied at Henry Ford College, Wayne State University, and eventually UCLA, but left the university to pursue acting.

Skerritt’s first film came in 1962 with War Hunt, which was also a breakthrough project for Robert Redford and marked the first film appearance of Sydney Pollack. Skerritt’s first TV appearances came that same year with episodes of Combat (directed by Robert Altman), a show that he would return to in various other small roles over the next several years.

After consistent TV work on shows like Death Valley Days, 12 O’Clock High, and Gunsmoke and supporting roles in movies like One Man’s Way and Disney’s Those Calloways, Skerritt delivered a breakthrough performance in Altman’s 1970 war satire M.A.S.H., portraying surgeon “Duke” Forrest.

Skerritt reunited with Altman in 1974’s Thieves Like Us, and appeared in numerous supporting roles in major movies throughout the 1970s, including Harold and Maude, Up in Smoke, The Turning Point, and most notably Alien, which saw him portray Dallas, the captain of the doomed spaceship Nostromo who is killed by the titular creature about two-thirds of the way through the film.

“You don’t try to make a classic, you just try to put something together when you’re editing the damn thing,” Skerritt said of Alien in a 2024 interview with Syfy Wire. “Shoot enough footage that you can play with the edit to make a film that’s maybe not what the studio wanted or anticipated, but becomes a larger experience for an audience [so] that they are moved by this film in a way they never experienced and never will again.”

Aside from Top Gun, Skerritt’s most notable film in the 1980s was Steel Magnolias, in which he played Drum, the husband of Sally Field’s M’Lynn and the father of Julia Roberts’ Shelby. He also appeared in David Cronenberg’s The Dead Zone, the sci-fi adventure SpaceCamp, and the horror sequel Poltergeist III. On the small screen, Skerritt headlined NBC’s short-lived medical drama Ryan’s Four and recurred on Cheers’ sixth season as Evan Drake, the boss and object of desire for Rebecca (Kirstie Alley).

Skerritt portrayed the fly-fishing father of Brad Pitt and Craig Sheffer’s characters in Robert Redford’s A River Runs Through It, and worked with a number of major stars and filmmakers throughout the ’90s, including Jodie Foster and Robert Zemeckis in Contact, Clint Eastwood in The Rookie, Cameron Crowe in Singles, and Drew Barrymore in Poison Ivy. He also directed the 1997 TV movie Divided by Hate.

Skerritt reunited with Field on ABC’s Brothers and Sisters, which saw him play her character’s late husband in flashback scenes. He also appeared in episodes of The West Wing, Will & Grace, Leverage, The Good Wife, and Madam Secretary in the later chapter of his career, and made a cameo as himself in 2012’s Ted.

His final screen appearance came in the 2025 Western Broke, which also starred Wyatt Russell and Dennis Quaid.

Skerritt also helped found Seattle’s TheFilmSchool as well as the nonprofit the Red Badge Project, an organization committed to helping veterans with mental health challenges.

“It’s been great working with the veterans that are returning from places such as Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s important we help them find a voice because a lot of these young guys and girls went into the service not knowing who they were,” Skerritt said in a 2014 interview with The Sydney Morning Herald. “Out in civilian life not knowing who they were, just what they’d done, can be a tough one to deal with.”