Thomas Mark Harmon (better known as Mark Harmon) (born September 2, 1951) is an American actor. Since 2003, Harmon has starred as Leroy Jethro Gibbs in the CBS series NCIS.
Harmon was born in Burbank, California. His father was University of Michigan football All-American and Heisman Trophy winner Tom Harmon, and his mother is actress Elyse Knox, the daughter of World War II Secretary of the Navy, Frank Knox. Mark has two older sisters: actress and painter Kristin Nelson and actress Kelly Harmon, who was once married to car magnate John DeLorean.
After attending Los Angeles Pierce College as a student and quarterback, Harmon transferred to UCLA and, following in his father's athletic footsteps, was the starting quarterback for the UCLA Bruins in 1972 and 1973, engineering a stunning upset of the two-time defending national champion Nebraska Cornhuskers in 1972. He received the National Football Foundation Award for All-Round Excellence in 1973.
Harmon landed his earliest acting credits by guest-starring on episodes of Adam-12 and Emergency! (the Emergency! episode that Harmon starred in: 905-Wild, centered around two L.A. County Animal Control Officers, and was a pilot episode for a possible new series, which did not sell) in mid-1975. Producer/creator Jack Webb, who was involved in both series, later cast Harmon in the very short-lived Sam, about an LAPD officer and his K-9 partner, in 1978. In 1979, he starred in the action series 240-Robert as Deputy Dwayne Thibideaux, which centered around the missions of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department Emergency Services Detail. Harmon has spent much of his career portraying law enforcement officers.
After several years of supporting guest roles on episodic television shows such as Police Woman, Laverne & Shirley and The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries, Harmon landed his first prominent role in the 1980 primetime soap opera Flamingo Road where he played Morgan Fairchild's husband Fielding Carlisle. The series was short-lived, however, and following its cancellation he landed the role of Dr. Robert Caldwell on the prestigious NBC Emmy-winning series St. Elsewhere in 1983. In 1986, Harmon left the series as his character contracted HIV through unprotected heterosexual intercourse - a storyline that was notable for being one of the first ever instances in television history where a major recurring character contracted the virus (the character's subsequent offscreen death from AIDS would be mentioned two years later). Following this, Harmon had a limited engagement on the series Moonlighting playing Cybill Shepherd's love interest Sam Crawford for four episodes in 1987. Harmon's next regular television role would be as Chicago police detective Dickie Cobb for two seasons (1991-1993) on the NBC series Reasonable Doubts. He followed this with the eponymous role of Charlie Grace, a private eye series which lasted only one season on ABC. He returned to ensemble medical shows on the series Chicago Hope, in which he played Dr. Jack McNeil from 1996-2000. He later had a limited four episode run playing secret service Special Agent Simon Donovan on The West Wing. Since 2003, Harmon has starred as Special Agent Leroy Jethro Gibbs, in CBS' drama television show NCIS.
Harmon has also made several television and theatrical films throughout his career. In the late 1970s, he had supporting roles in Comes A Horseman and Beyond the Poseidon Adventure. His most prominent starring roles were in the 1986 romantic comedy Prince of Bel Air and 1987 comedy Summer School in both of which he co-starred oposite Kirstie Alley, and the 1988 thriller The Presidio in which he co-starred with Sean Connery and Meg Ryan. He also portrayed serial killer Ted Bundy in the 1986 television movie The Deliberate Stranger.
Harmon was named People magazine's Sexiest Man Alive in 1986.
Harmon is married to actress Pam Dawber, with whom he has two sons: Sean Thomas Harmon (born April 25, 1988) and Ty Christian Harmon (born June 25, 1992). He was the brother-in-law of the late Ricky Nelson and the uncle of singers Matthew and Gunnar Nelson of the pop duo Nelson and of actress Tracy Nelson. Harmon dated singer Karen Carpenter in the seventies.
