Ken Wahl

Ken Wahl (born February 14 , 1957) is an American retired actor. He is best known for his starring role as undercover FBI agent Vinnie Terranova on the television series Wiseguy (1987–90), for which he won a Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Television Series Drama.

Early life Wahl is elusive about his personal life, and has given more than one birthdate. A syndicated article in 1988, citing records checked by the CBS publicist for Wahl's television series Wiseguy, gives February 14, 1957, suburb of Midlothian reveals Wahl graduated from there in June 1975, presumably at age 18." The 1988 NEA article states that Wahl was the ninth of 11 children from a blue-collar German/Italian family and "attended different high schools as the family moved to the [Chicago] suburbs of Midlothian and Worth, Illinois." He was cast in Fort Apache, The Bronx (1981) and played the lead in movies, including Race for the Yankee Zephyr (1981), The Soldier (1982), Jinxed! (1982), and Purple Hearts (1984). In 1984, he suffered another motorcycle crash while on his way to meet with Diane Keaton about the role that eventually went to Mel Gibson in the film Mrs. Soffel. Not wearing a helmet, Wahl needed 89 stitches in his scalp.

Wahl retired from acting in 1996.

Personal life and injury By 1981, Wahl's father had remarried. Between acting jobs, Wahl stayed in Chicago with his father and stepmother or with his sister.

Wahl's acting career was derailed by a broken neck. He initially said that in 1992 he had endured another motorcycle crash, but later said he had fallen down a flight of stairs at the home of comedian Rodney Dangerfield's girlfriend and eventual wife Joan Child. "We were dating casually...I stayed over at her house one night, fell down these stairs, and she begged me not to say that in the press", Wahl said in 2004. They divorced in 1991.

In 1995, Wahl was charged with disturbing the peace and arrested on an outstanding warrant for a drunken-driving charge, eventually pleaded no contest to both charges and receiving probation. A year later, he was arrested for allegedly threatening a bartender with a hunting knife for refusing to serve him alcohol. He pleaded no contest again and was ordered to enter a live-in alcohol rehabilitation program.

Activism When his career declined because of injury, Wahl and his wife Shane turned their attention to supporting animal rights and disabled United States military veterans.

On 19 January 2010, he offered his Golden Globe Award as part of a reward then being assembled by the Second Chance Rescue Center in Sioux Falls, South Dakota to help find and convict the person who glued a 7-month-old orange tabby to Minnesota State Highway 60, where travelers found it on 18 December 2009; the cat, which rescuers called Timothy, died days later.

In 2012, Wahl stood against the Hayden Law Repeal, which would have revoked the Hayden Law for shelter pets in California, which had extended the number of days owners had to find their lost pets or for injured animals to receive donations or to be adopted.

For Memorial Day 2012, Wahl sent a message saluting the military, alongside the group Pets for Patriots, supporting adoption of pets for veterans. Later that year, he took part in the documentary Saving America's Horses, about both wild and domestic horses and the issues that plague them. In December 2012, he reiterated the need to support wounded veterans, and help reduce suicide rates, by pairing rescued animals with veterans.

Filmography

Film

Awards and nominations