Veteran Actor Earl Boen, Who Played Hapless 'Terminator' Doctor, Dead At 81

Mary Papenfuss
·3 min read
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Earl Boen as Dr. Peter Silberman in a scene from “Terminator 2: Judgment Day.
Earl Boen as Dr. Peter Silberman in a scene from “Terminator 2: Judgment Day.

Earl Boen as Dr. Peter Silberman in a scene from “Terminator 2: Judgment Day."

Earl Boen, a veteran character and voice actor best known for his role as the hapless Dr. Peter Silberman in “The Terminator” movies, died Thursday in Hawaii, Variety reported. He was 81.

Boen had been diagnosed with lung cancer last year, his family told Variety.

Boen played a criminal psychologist who was brought in to question Michael Biehn’s character, Kyle Reese, in the first “Terminator” film. Reese had traveled back from the future in a bid to kill the terminator, a cyborg played by Arnold Schwarzenegger, in a desperate move to save the human race from machines in James Cameron’s popular 1984 sci-fi film.

Boen also appeared in the sequels “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” — when he discounts hero Sarah Connor’s (Linda Hamilton) cyborg warning — and “Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines.” He was also in archival footage in 2019’s “Terminator: Dark Fate.”

Linda Hamilton (as Sarah Connor) confronts Earl Boen's character Dr. Peter Silberman in a scene from
Linda Hamilton (as Sarah Connor) confronts Earl Boen's character Dr. Peter Silberman in a scene from

Linda Hamilton (as Sarah Connor) confronts Earl Boen's character Dr. Peter Silberman in a scene from "Terminator 2: Judgment Day."

Actor Robert Patrick, who played the evil cyborg in “Terminator 2” (Schwarzenegger was the good guy), hailed Boen on Twitter as a “wonderfully gifted actor, and a good guy.”

Boen worked on several other films, TV series and video games in his career.

His film credits include “9 to 5,” “Living in Peril,” “The Prince,” “Sioux City,” “Marked for Death,” “Alien Nation,” “The Main Event,” “Naked Gun 33⅓: The Final Insult” and “Nutty Professor II: The Klumps.”

His voluminous TV work included roles on “The Streets of San Francisco,” “Hawaii Five-O,” “Wonder Woman,” “Police Woman,” “Barnaby Jones” and “The Dukes of Hazzard.”

He was also the voice of Mr. Bleakman in “Clifford the Big Red Dog,” of Ghost Pirate LeChuck in the Monkey Island video games and of Charles “Rhino” Daly in the animated “Batman” series, among a number of other voice roles.

But his iconic role will always be Dr. Silberman, a slightly nerdy, well-intentioned doc who doesn’t quite get what’s really going on.

He is survived by his wife, Cathy, daughter Ruby and two grandchildren.

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