Scott Hylands, 1943 – 2026

Canadian actor Scott Hylands, 83, died of leukemia on July 29. Hylands was best known in the US for playing Detective Kevin “O.B.” O’Brien in the 1980s Canadian TV show Night Heat; he also costarred in the sci-fi series V. Born in Vancouver, Hylands started his career Off-Broadway and with San Francisco’s American Conservatory Theater (he also acted at the Mark Taper Forum and the Los Angeles Shakespeare Festival, and continued to act onstage for the rest of his life). He entered films in 1969 with Daddy’s Gone a-Hunting, and for the next six decades he bounced back and forth over the northern border, playing in both movies and TV: The Streets of San Francisco, Kung Fu, Earthquake, Police Woman, Wonder Woman, Centennial, The Waltons, Hart to Hart, Lonesome Dove, The Outer Limits, Fargo, Wynonna Earp, and many others. Hylands told writer Adrian Mack the woes of being a handsome actor: “I went down to try out for The Graduate. I was in this business partly because I thought I looked the part, but that day was gone because Dustin Hoffman got The Graduate and that began a whole era of less conventionally handsome leading men. And those of us in the line were screwed.”