Rob Estes

A stalwart of American television in both prime-time and daytime venues, performer Rob Estes capitalized on his devastatingly slick and suave image throughout his career. A native of Norfolk, VA, Estes attended USC after high school. The actor first turned viewers' heads in the soap opera venue, as passionate lifeguard Glenn Gallagher on NBC's seminal Days of Our Lives -- a role he held from 1986 to 1987. Thereafter, he landed a string of guest assignments on various series and roles in TV movies, but scored his next major career coup on an after-dark drama, the "guilty pleasure" series Silk Stalkings (1991-1999) -- in which he played the lead, sex crimes expert Chris Lorenzo. The program had an unusual history: NBC and the USA cable network originally co-produced it and ran it concurrently on each Thursday from November 1991-November 1993, but from 1993 on, CBS dropped it, the USA network produced new episodes in exclusive syndication, and Estes remained with the cast for two additional years.

Thereafter, Estes amassed a long and extensive series of ongoing roles on prime-time series. These included restaurant proprietor Kyle McBride on the fifth, sixth, and seventh seasons of Melrose Place (1996-1999); multi-episode guest turns as John Hemming and Oliver Browne in, respectively, the medical drama Providence and the Brooke Shields sitcom Suddenly Susan; and obnoxious, abusive ex-husband Nick Townsend on the blockbuster procedural series CSI: Miami. In 2007, Estes signed on to portray Lt. Tom Hogan on the short-lived ABC procedural drama Women's Murder Club. Shortly after that program's May 2008 cancellation, the CW network announced Estes' enlistment to play Mills family patriarch-cum-Beverly Hills high-school principal Harry Mills on its much anticipated series drama 90210, a spin-off of the original Beverly Hills 90210. - Nathan Southern, All Movie Guide