Born William Albert Burke in Bellingham, WA on Nov. 25, 1966, Burke began performing at the age of nine and was a regular in local bands by his teenaged years. Music and acting remained his focus while attending Western Washington University, and he soon graduated to stage work in local theater. Burke’s film debut came in 1990 with “Daredreamer,” a high school comedy shot in Seattle. The experience prompted a move to Los Angeles, where he began landing regular work in episodic television. Burke’s first role in a Hollywood motion picture came in “Mafia!” a Zucker Brothers spoof of gangster pictures that cast him as the unstable, Sonny Corleone-like son of Lloyd Bridges’ addled Mob patriarch. A modest success at the box office, the picture did not afford Burke a boost to bigger projects, so he continued to toil in the indie and TV fields. Among his more notable projects was “Dill Scallion” (1999), an amiable comedy about a ruthlessly ambitious country singer (Burke) who tears down all those around him on his way to the top.
Burke got his first shot as a series regular with “Wonderland” (ABC, 2000), a controversial series that took place in a mental institution. The program was pulled shortly after its network debut, so Burke returned to regular rotation in TV-movies and episodic work. His career got a boost in 2001 when he was cast as FBI agent Ben Devine, who assists Morgan Freeman’s forensic psychologist in tracking down a serial killer in “Along Came a Spider.” The exposure led to more work on television, most notably as Gary Matheson on “24.” The violence-prone boss of Agent Jack Bauer’s (Kiefer Sutherland) daughter, Kim Bauer (Elisha Cuthbert), he murders his own wife (Tracy Middendorf) after she attempts to aid her own daughter in fleeing from his anger. Gary was later murdered by Kim during an attack, which led to her arrest.
Burke returned to series work as a regular with “The Jury” (Fox, 2004), a legal drama produced by Barry Levinson and Tom Fontana. Burke was one of four New York attorneys trying cases that were eventually decided by a jury of 12, who were played by a rotating list of guest stars. Despite the abundance of talent in front of and behind the camera, the series failed to catch on and was axed after just 10 episodes. Despite the setback, Burke kept busy in features and television, most notably the firefighting drama “Ladder 49” (2004), starring John Travolta. He also penned a tongue-in-cheek horror movie, “Dead and Breakfast” (2004), which pitted teens against a horde of undead creatures called up by David Carradine’s malevolent mystic.
In 2007, Burke played a corrupt police detective who attempts to plant evidence in order to convict millionaire and accused murdered Anthony Hopkins in the intricate thriller “Fracture.” Though not a substantial hit, the picture kept Burke in the public eye, and he followed it with several independent features, including the romantic drama “Feast of Love” (2007), which reunited him with “Spider” co-star Morgan Freeman. In 2008, he was cast as Charlie Swan in the highly anticipated “Twilight,” based on the Gothic romance novels by Stephenie Meyers. Swan was a small town police officer and father to the story’s female lead, Bella (Kristen Stewart). His lack of relationship with his daughter after his divorce from her mother spurs her to investigate the town around her, which in turn introduces her to its clan of vampires. Bella becomes involved with one of its members, Edward (Robert Pattinson), much to the consternation of her father.