Kevin Sorbo

Kevin David Sorbo (born September 24, 1958) is an American actor. He has had starring roles in two television series: as Hercules in Hercules: The Legendary Journeys (1995–1999) and as Captain Dylan Hunt in Andromeda (2000–2005). Sorbo played his first leading film role in the 1997 fantasy film Kull the Conqueror.

Sorbo is also known for acting in Christian films, such as God's Not Dead (2014) and Let There Be Light (2017).

Sorbo was born in Mound, Minnesota, on September 24, 1958. He is of Italian and Norwegian descent. He was raised in a Lutheran family. Sorbo attended Minnesota State University Moorhead, where he double majored in marketing and advertising. To help pay for tuition, he began to work as a model for print and television advertising.

In the mid-1980s, Sorbo travelled around Europe and Australia working in television commercials and also modelling for print advertisements. During this period, he made his acting debut in an episode of the soap opera Santa Barbara in 1986. His second television appearance was in an episode of the sitcom 1st & Ten in 1988. He continued working in advertising and by the early 1990s, he had appeared in over 150 commercials. One of the popular commercials he appeared in was for Jim Beam bourbon whiskey, known for Sorbo's repeated catchphrase, "This ain't Jim Beam".

His acting career continued in the early 1990s with guest appearances in Murder, She Wrote and The Commish. In 1992, he played his first leading role in an unsuccessful television pilot for a medical drama series titled Condition: Critical, which was not picked up, but aired as a television film on ABC. In 1993, he was considered for and lost out to Dean Cain as Superman in the TV series Lois & Clark: The New Adventures of Superman and was one of the possible contenders for the role of Fox Mulder in The X-Files, which went to David Duchovny. In 1993, he made his film debut in Slaughter of the Innocents.

In 1993, Sorbo received his breakthrough leading role as the ancient greek demigod Hercules in a series of five television films that aired as part of Universal Television's Action Pack. The first film to premiere was Hercules and the Amazon Women, which aired in April 1994, the others following later in the year. The ratings success of the films paved the way for the commission of the television series Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, which started airing in syndication from January 1995 and ran for six seasons. The series made Sorbo an international star and was one of the highest rated syndicated television shows at the time.^{[better source needed]} The show was filmed in New Zealand.

The success of the show spawned the popular spin-off series Xena: Warrior Princess starring Lucy Lawless, who was introduced in a three-episode arc in the first season of Hercules. This allowed Sorbo as well as several other characters from both shows to make crossover appearances. In 1998, a spin-off direct-to-video, animated film titled Hercules and Xena – The Animated Movie: The Battle for Mount Olympus was released with both Sorbo and Lawless voicing the characters.

Hercules was canceled midway through the filming of Season Six, of which only eight episodes were produced. The final episode aired in November 1999. Although it was not revealed at the time, health issues reduced Sorbo's abilities to perform the physically demanding role during the later seasons. Sorbo made his final appearance as Hercules on Xena, in the Season Five episode "God Fearing Child", which aired in February 2000.