American actor, director and educator who starred as Benjamin Sisko, commander and later captain of Deep Space 9, across all seven seasons.
Avery Brooks is an American actor, director, singer and educator, born in 1948, who led the cast of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine as Benjamin Sisko from 1993 to 1999. Sisko was the first Black lead captain of a Star Trek series, and Brooks won the role over a large field of candidates.
Across seven seasons Brooks took Sisko from a grieving widower reluctant to accept his role as the Bajoran Emissary to a Starfleet captain leading the war against the Dominion. He also directed nine episodes of the series, including Far Beyond the Stars, in which he played a 1950s science fiction writer facing racism in his own era.
Before Star Trek, Brooks was widely known as Hawk on Spenser: For Hire and its spinoff A Man Called Hawk. His other work includes the film American History X and a long career in theater and music, alongside many years teaching theater at Rutgers University.