Gary Lockwood was born in Van Nuys, California. He attended the University of California at Los Angeles on a football scholarship.
He began his career as a movie stuntman, and a stand-in for Anthony Perkins, prior to his acting debut in 1959 in an uncredited bit role in Warlock (1959). He also appeared as a police officer in Perry Mason: The Case of the Romantic Rogue (1959). Two series came early in his career, ABC’s Hawaii-set Follow the Sun (1961), in 1961-1962, cast him in as an adventurous magazine writer in Honolulu. In 1961, he appeared as a rodeo cowboy in love with an 18-year-old singer, played by Tuesday Weld, in ABC’s Bus Stop: Cherie (1961). He then starred with Jeff Bridges in The Lloyd Bridges Show: My Daddy Can Lick Your Daddy (1963).
In 1964, he starred as a young U.S. Marine lieutenant in the NBC series, The Lieutenant (1963), which was produced by Star Trek (1966) creator, Gene Roddenberry, and The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (1964) creator, Norman Felton.
He then starred in another NBC television series called Kraft Mystery Theater (1959), opposite Sally Kellerman, with whom he would again appear in the second Star Trek (1966) pilot, Star Trek: Where No Man Has Gone Before (1966), as “Lt. Cmdr. Gary Mitchell”, and Kellerman as the ship’s psychiatrist, “Dr. Elizabeth Dehner”, who both develop super powers.
In 1966, he guest-starred in the episode, The Legend of Jesse James: Reunion (1966), of ABC’s The Legend of Jesse James (1965), starring Christopher Jones. That same year, he appeared as “Danny Hamil” on the episode, The Long, Hot Summer: Day of Thunder (1966), of NBC’s drama, The Long, Hot Summer (1965), based loosely on the works of William Faulkner, as well as appearing as “Jim Stark” in the two-part episode “The Raid” of CBS’s Gunsmoke (1955), with James Arness.
He co-starred with Stefanie Powers (his wife at the time) in the episode, Love, American Style: Love and the Phone Booth/Love and the Doorknob (1969), of ABC’s Love, American Style (1969).
In 1968, he was cast as the co-star in director Stanley Kubrick’s legendary Sci-Fi film, 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968), starring as “Dr. Frank Poole”.
In 1983, he made a guest-starring role as “Alex Carmen” in the Hart to Hart (1979) episode, Hart to Hart: Emily by Hart (1983), starring Robert Wagner, and [his now ex-wife] Stefanie Powers.
Between 1959 and 2004, he had roles in some forty theatrical and made-for-TV features and made almost eighty TV guest appearances, including several as a villain on CBS-TV’s Barnaby Jones (1973), starring Buddy Ebsen.
