Tom Morga

Tom Morga is a stuntman, stunt actor, and stunt coordinator who holds the record for being the most seen stuntman in Star Trek. Between 1979 and 2005 he appeared in six feature films and all four spin-off television series, doubled main actors and guest actors, and played almost every major species.

He also is the only actor/stuntman to have portrayed three of the most iconic horror film characters on screen ever in Michael Myers, Jason Voorhees and Leatherface.

Morga also served as assistant stunt coordinator to Dennis Madalone on Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Star Trek: Voyager for fourteen years. This position included fight choreography for episodes such as "Blood Oath" and the creating of props such as the blade weapons in "Battle Lines". For the majority of his appearances he received no on-screen credits.

Morga was born in Mission Hills, Burbank, California. While in college, he worked as a smoke jumper, stationed in Missoula, Montana, between 1969 and 1974. Morga's work as a smoke jumper landed him his first television appearance when he was featured in an episode of the animal documentary television series Mutual of Omaha's Wild Kingdom. In the episode in which he appeared, his team saved a wild buffalo herd from a forest fire. This experience inspired him to take up a stunt career.

He began his career in the stunt industry in the '70s and performed in several live stunt shows, including one for the Universal Studios Tour. He moved on to work as stunt double for Patrick Duffy in the television series The Man from Atlantis (1977-1978), where he performed alongside Gene LeBell and Hubie Kerns under the coordination of the late Paul Stader. His work included doubling for Duffy in scenes outside the water and on the surface. This was also the first time he worked as stunt coordinator for an episode.

He also doubled Duffy in a few episodes of the long-running soap Dallas and landed parts in films such as the three-time Golden Globe-nominated Movie Movie (1978) and the first Star Trek feature film, Star Trek: The Motion Picture, in which he doubled Spock actor Leonard Nimoy.

In the 1980s, Morga doubled actor Jeff Goldblum on the television series Tenspeed and Brown Shoe (1980), which starred Ben Vereen and was coordinated by Dennis Madalone. He then doubled Bruce Boxleitner on Scarecrow and Mrs. King (1983-1987), after which he was Ron Perlman's double in the fantasy series The Beauty and the Beast (1987-1990).

In 1982 Morga became a member of the "Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures". He received screen-time on series such as Dynasty (starring Joan Collins), Hart to Hart, MacGyver, The Six-Million-Dollar Man, Matlock, Fantasy Island (starring Ricardo Montalban), Spenser: For Hire (starring Avery Brooks), and the first spin-off Star Trek series Star Trek: The Next Generation. Other actors he doubled for film and television projects include James Keach, James Coburn, David Hasselhoff, John Travolta, Walter Matthau, and Steve Railsback.

Besides his television work he was busy on the big screen, as well. He doubled Harold Ramis in Ghost Busters (1984) and performed in Police Academy 2: Their First Assignment (1985, with the late David Graf), Remo Williams: The Adventure Begins (1985, alongside Kate Mulgrew, Joel Grey, George Coe, Patrick Kilpatrick, and Michael Pataki), the sequel Jaws: The Revenge (1987), the science fiction film Alien Nation (1988, with Earl Boen, Roger Aaron Brown, Frank Collison, Jeff Kober, Brian Thompson, and Keone Young), and three more Star Trek feature films.

During this period he stepped into another genre he became famous for: the horror film. Morga played the lead villain, Michael Myers, in Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988). He also played another iconic villain, Jason Voorhees in Friday the 13th: A New Beginning (1985) and also appeared in The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 (1986) where in one scene he covered for another stuntman to played yet another iconic killer, Leatherface.

In the 1990s he continued his work in feature films, appearing in Hudson Hawk (1991), Child's Play 3 (1991), Sam Raimi's Army of Darkness (1992), the seven-time Academy Award-nominated The Shawshank Redemption (1994), Batman Forever (1995), Independence Day (1996), Deep Impact (1998), and The Mask of Zorro (1998). He again doubled Jeff Goldblum in the sequel The Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997) and performed in the sixth Star Trek feature, Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country.

He also continued appearing on television shows, including NYPD Blue, Babylon 5, Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, She Spies, Dragnet, and as stunt double for Michael Richards on Seinfeld (co-starring Jason Alexander).

In 2001 he doubled Keith Carradine in the film Cahoots and appeared in Dr. Dolittle 2. He acted in Dennis Madalone's music video "America We Stand as One" (2002), on which he was also assistant director.

His additional credits include: the comic adaptation Spider-Man (2002), Steven Spielberg's Catch Me If You Can (2002); Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World (2003), National Treasure (2004), Star Trek Nemesis, the tenth Star Trek film; and all three Pirates of the Caribbean films (2003, 2006, and 2007).

In 2006, Morga served as co-producer for the television documentary UFO: The Greatest Story Ever Denied and was interviewed for the television special Halloween: 25 Years of Terror.

In 2007 he was part of the stunt team that was awarded with a Taurus World Stunt Award for best fight sequence in Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest.

Morga served as stunt coordinator for Corbin Bernsen's horror film Dead Air (2009), and for the short comedy The Van Pelt Family (2008), and completed interviews for the documentary His Name Was Jason: 30 Years of Friday the 13th (2009).  He also performed stunts on the comedy Bald (2008)and on the drama series Castle (2010).

Also in 2010 Morga worked as stunt coordinator on the episode "Big Time Live" of the musical series Big Time Rush.  In 2011 he worked as stunt rigger on the Castle episode "Pretty Dead".

More recently, Morga worked as sword fight choreographer for a sword fight scene in the Academy Award nominated drama The Artist (2011). Also in 2012, Morga received a Lifetime Membership Award from the Stuntmen's Association of Motion Pictures.

Morga was interviewed for the 2013 documentary Crystal Lake Memories: The Complete History of Friday the 13th.  In 2014 he completed filming on the Wayne Bauer action film Dogmike (2014) where he played Morgan Blackstone.

In 2009 Morga made an interview for the newly digital remastered and with new special features endowed DVD box Star Trek: Original Motion Picture Collection. In this about four minutes long interview he told that he is probably the person who holds the record for playing the most different aliens on Star Trek, including Klingons, Romulans, Vulcans, Borg, Nausicaans, Cardassians, and Jem'Hadar. He also told that the beauty being on Star Trek is that your face is never used up so he was able to have fights in one episode and probably die but also to appear on the next episode.