Background and career
Richard Lawrence Hatch (May 21, 1945 – February 7, 2017) was an American actor and writer. He began his career as a stage actor before moving on to television work in the 1970s. Hatch is best known for his roles as Captain Apollo in the original Battlestar Galactica television series and Tom Zarek in the reimagined series.
Hatch was born on May 21, 1945, in Santa Monica, California, to John Raymond Hatch and Elizabeth Hatch (née White). He grew up with four siblings. While in high school, he aspired to become an athlete in pole vaulting, and only had a passing interest in acting, as he considered himself too shy and insecure. The assassination of President Kennedy in 1963, while Hatch had just started college, turned him towards acting; he had been enrolled in a required oral interpretation course at the time, and following the assassination, presented an article written about Kennedy upon which he said: "As I began to read this article, I got so affected by what I was saying that I forgot myself. I was expressing feelings and emotions I tended to keep locked inside of myself."
Hatch began his theatrical career with the Los Angeles Repertory Theater, as well as shows in Chicago and Off-Broadway.
Hatch began working in television in 1970 when he starred as Philip Brent in the daytime soap opera All My Children, a role he played for two years. In the following years, he made guest appearances in prime time series such as Cannon; Nakia; Barnaby Jones; The Rookies, Hawaii Five-O; and The Waltons; as well as appearing in several made-for-TV movies such as F. Scott Fitzgerald and 'The Last of the Belles' (1974) with Susan Sarandon; The Hatfields and the McCoys (1975) with Jack Palance; ‘The Waltons’ (1975); Addie and the King of Hearts (1976) with Jason Robards; and the 1978 television movie Deadman's Curve, in which he portrayed Jan Berry of the musical duo Jan and Dean, alongside Bruce Davison as Dean Torrence.
In 1976, Hatch gained his first major television role as Inspector Dan Robbins on the detective series The Streets of San Francisco, as the replacement for Michael Douglas, who had played Inspector Steve Keller in the series, but had resigned from the cast that year. Though the role was for only one season, Hatch won Germany's Bravo Youth Magazine Award for the role. Following this, he had a recurring role on the series Mary Hartman, Mary Hartman, also for one season in 1977. In 1978, Hatch gained a starring role in Glen A. Larson's sci-fi series, Battlestar Galactica (1978), which aired for a single season before its high cost motivated its cancellation by ABC-TV. Hatch was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for the role. However, because Hatch held out for more money in the series' toy merchandising with Mattel, his character was conspicuously absent in its action figure line, although Apollo would appear in subsequent revival Battlestar Galactica toylines over the decades. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, Hatch made guest appearances on such series as Hotel; Murder, She Wrote; The Love Boat (romantically opposite 20-year-old Teri Hatcher in her first on-screen speaking role); Fantasy Island; Baywatch; Dynasty; and MacGyver. In 1990, Hatch returned to daytime soap operas and appeared on Santa Barbara, originating the character Steven Slade. In 2013, Hatch made a guest appearance in an adult-oriented episode of The Eric Andre Show on Cartoon Network's Adult Swim.
Hatch made several low-key theatrical film releases, including Charlie Chan and the Curse of the Dragon Queen (1981) and Prisoners of the Lost Universe (1983). An abridged version of the pilot episode of Battlestar Galactica was released in cinemas, initially overseas and then for a limited run in the U.S., as was a sequel film, Mission Galactica: The Cylon Attack, which was also made from episodes of the series. He starred with Leif Garrett in Party Line (1988) and with Arte Johnson in Second Chance (1996).
