David Soul

David Soul hid behind a ski mask in his national debut. It was 1966, and he appeared on The Merv Griffin Show under the name The Covered Man. He just wanted audiences to appreciate his baritone voice without judging his square jaw.

His father was a Lutheran pastor who worked for the government on Germany's reconstruction after the war. That nomadic childhood gave him a cosmopolitan air that never quite fit the rigid molds of Hollywood.

Television signed him early for Here Come the Brides in 1968. But fate had a co-pilot's seat reserved for him in a red Ford Gran Torino with a white stripe.

The Shadow of a Red Car

The release of Starsky & Hutch in 1975 changed the rules of the police genre. Soul played Ken Hutchinson, the thoughtful, blond counterpoint to the energy of Paul Michael Glaser. The chemistry between them wasn't in the original script but worked from the first rehearsal.

They sold millions of posters.

The series ran for four seasons and 92 episodes full of car chases and dry humor. Soul used the momentum to relaunch his music career in 1976. His ballad Don't Give Up on Us hit number one in the UK and the US at the same time.

He sold more than a million copies in the British market alone that winter. But commercial success doesn't always bring peace of mind.

The industry never forgets a mistake.

He tried to break away from his leading-man image by starring in the miniseries Salem's Lot in 1979. It was an adaptation of Stephen King that still gives viewers nightmares with its dense atmosphere. Despite solid ratings, the major studios began to turn their backs on him.

A Refuge on the British Stage

In the late nineties, he decided to move to London. He was looking for the anonymity California denied him, and he found it on the West End stage. In 2004, he surprised critics with his role in Jerry Springer: The Opera, where he played the famous TV host.

He obtained British citizenship in 2004.

His personal life was a battlefield of alcoholism and several failed marriages. In 1982 he was jailed after a domestic violence incident. It was an event that marked his reputation for decades. He got sober and spent much of his later years visiting prisons to talk with inmates about anger management.

In 2012 he made a brief cameo in the film Starsky & Hutch alongside Ben Stiller. It was a quick nod for a generation that no longer remembered the smell of burning rubber from the seventies.

David Soul died in London on January 5, 2024, at the age of 80. His net worth at the time of his death was estimated at around $ 5 million after decades of financial ups and downs and residual royalties.