Brent Spiner portrays the android Data ; rumors before the film's release suggested that since Data's skin had been largely removed at the end of the story, it would allow another actor to assume the role.

To get into his role as Data, Spiner used the character of Robbie the Robot from the film Forbidden Planet as a role model.

Spiner also portrayed Data's manipulative and malignant brother Lore ( a role he found much easier to play, because the character was " more like me "), and Data's creator, Dr. Noonien Soong.

Spiner felt that he had visibly aged out of the role and that Data was best presented as a youthful figure.

Spiner also had a role in a Tales from the Darkside episode, " A Case Of The Stubborns ", as a priest who experiences a crisis of faith.

He played Governor Donald Cory in a 1969 episode of Star Trek entitled " Whom Gods Destroy ", and was going to play Doctor Noonien Soong in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode " Brothers " but illness prevented him from doing so ; Brent Spiner ultimately took over the role.

Ol ' Yellow Eyes Is Back is an album by Brent Spiner, best known for his role as Data in the American television series Star Trek: The Next Generation, first released in June 1991.

The show featured several defendants who appeared before the court again and again — notably the Wheelers, Bob and June ( Bob was played by Brent Spiner, later known for his role as Data in Star Trek: The Next Generation ), who initially pretended to be stereotypical hicks from West Virginia but were later revealed as Yugoslavians, and at one point even ran a concession stand in the courthouse.

* Eric Menyuk was originally intended for the role of Data in the series, but after Brent Spiner had been cast he was granted this guest appearance.

Menyuk was originally considered for the role of the android Data which was eventually given to Brent Spiner.

His first role on Broadway was in The Three Musketeers with Brent Spiner.

The fourth season saw Brent Spiner ( Data from Star Trek: The Next Generation ) as the imprisoned scientist Dr. Arik Soong, an ancestor of Data's creator ( Dr. Noonien Soong, also played by Spiner in at least two episodes of Star Trek: The Next Generation ), in a three-episode arc at the end of which Soong abandons the concept of improving mankind in favor of creating artificial intelligence: an allusion to what will eventually become Data.

Brent Spiner lent his voice to the finale, and is briefly heard as Data.

* Brent Spiner as Lieutenant Commander Data

He said: " When I got married my best man was Brent ( Spiner, who portrayed the ST: TNG character Lieutenant Commander Data ) and my groomsmen were Michael ( Dorn, Lieutenant Worf ) and Jonathan ( Frakes, Commander Riker ) and Patrick ( Stewart, Captain Picard ).

Lieutenant Commander Data ( ) is a character in the fictional Star Trek universe portrayed by actor Brent Spiner.

Gene Roddenberry told Brent Spiner that over the course of the series, Data was to become " more and more like a human until the end of the show, when he would be very close, but still not quite there.

" Spiner felt that Data exhibited the Chaplinesque characteristics of a sad, tragic clown.

Spiner said his favorite Data scene takes place in " Descent ", when Data plays poker on the holodeck with a re-creation of the famous physicist Stephen Hawking, played by Hawking himself.

In " Brothers ", Data reunites with Dr. Soong ( also portrayed by Spiner ).

Brent Jay Spiner ( born February 2, 1949 ) is an American actor, best known for his portrayal of the android Lieutenant Commander Data in the television series Star Trek: The Next Generation and four subsequent films.

In 1987 Spiner started his 15-year run portraying Lieutenant Commander Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation, which spanned 7 seasons and 4 feature films.

However, Spiner has opined that he is too old to continue playing the part, as Data embodies a " childlike innocence " that Spiner can no longer credibly exhibit, as his appearance had already begun to lose that quality by the time he filmed his last Trek films.

In 1991 Spiner recorded an album of 1940s pop standards entitled Ol ' Yellow Eyes Is Back, the title of which was a play on the yellow contact lenses Spiner wore as Data, and the title of a Frank Sinatra record, Ol ' Blue Eyes Is Back.

* Brent Spiner as Lieutenant Commander Data

Other Star Trek actors such as Michael Dorn ( Worf on TNG ), Brent Spiner ( Data on TNG ), Colm Meaney ( Miles O ’ Brien on TNG and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine ), LeVar Burton ( Geordi La Forge on TNG ), Nichelle Nichols ( Uhura on Star Trek: The Original Series ), Avery Brooks ( Benjamin Sisko on DS9 ), Paul Winfield ( Clark Terrell in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan ), David Warner ( various characters, most notably Gul Madred in " Chain of Command ", a two-part episode of TNG ) and Kate Mulgrew ( Kathryn Janeway on Star Trek: Voyager ) were guest or recurring stars in the series.

The fans range from people who dress as Klingons to members of Brent Spiner fan clubs and a club that is producing a Star Trek movie of their own.

In 2004 Spiner returned to Star Trek when he appeared as Dr. Arik Soong, an ancestor of Data's creator Dr. Noonien Soong, whom he also played, in a three-episode story arc of Star Trek: Enterprise: " Borderland ", " Cold Station 12 ", and " The Augments ".

In 2010 Spiner and fellow Star Trek: The Next Generation star LeVar Burton appeared on TWiT. tv's coverage of the Consumer Electronics Show.

Star Trek's Nichelle Nichols, who sang on some episodes of the show and also in Star Trek V: The Final Frontier, also recorded two musical albums, and Brent Spiner of Star Trek: The Next Generation has recorded two.

Other notable celebrity alumni include Jim Parsons, star of the television series The Big Bang Theory, Brent Spiner of Star Trek: The Next Generation, actors Robert Wuhl, Loretta Devine, Dennis Quaid, Randy Quaid, and Brett Cullen, former attorney and talk show host Star Jones, Project Runway contestants Chloe Dao and Laura Bennett, sportscasters Jim Nantz and Robert Flores, and country music star Larry Gatlin.

Spiner appeared as a media technician in " The Advocates ", a second season episode of the Showtime cable series The Paper Chase.

Spiner has appeared in the television series Deadly Games, Dream On, Frasier, Friends, Gargoyles, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Mad About You, and The Outer Limits.

In 2005 Spiner appeared in a short-lived science-fiction television series, Threshold, which was canceled in November of that year after 13 episodes.

On the album, Spiner is backed by the orchestra from that series as he sings a number of old pop standards, mostly from the 1930s and 1940s.

Wendy Neuss, associate producer for the series, and Dennis McCarthy, who scored the music for many of the episodes, co-produced the album with Spiner.

* Brent Spiner as Bob Wheeler, a down-on-his-luck urban hillbilly who was a frequent defendant in Harry's courtroom, usually as the result of a series of freak disasters befalling him and his destitute family.

Swackhamer and producer Martin Poll, which starred James Coburn, Hector Elizondo, Jean Simmons, Jason Miller, Nancy Addison ( as Gabriella ), and in a brief part, a pre-Star Trek Brent Spiner.

In 1992 she appeared alongside fellow cast members Patrick Stewart, Jonathan Frakes, Brent Spiner, and Colm Meaney in a production of Every Good Boy Deserves Favour, which was performed in four cities.

Brent Jay Spiner was born February 2, 1949 in Houston, Texas, to Sylvia and Jack Spiner, who owned a furniture store.

After his father's death, Spiner was adopted by Sylvia's second husband, Sol Mintz, whose surname he used between 1955 and 1975.

Spiner was raised Jewish.