Dan Pastorini
- Actor
Dan played both football and baseball at Bellarmine College Prep and,
in 1968, he was drafted by the New York Mets who saw him as a potential
major-league shortstop. He decided, however, to attend the nearby
University of Santa Clara where he majored in political science and
continued to play sports. His interest in baseball soon fell to his
skill at football and he wound up playing in the East-West Shrine Game
and the Senior Bowl. These appearances prompted the Houston Oilers to
make him their #1 pick in the 1971 draft. Dan quarterbacked for the
Oilers for several years before moving on to the Oakland Raiders, the
L.A. Rams and the Philadelphia Eagles. During these years, he acquired
the image as a fast-living "playboy", an image enhanced by his ten-year
marriage (1972-1982) to buxom British actress,
June Wilkinson. Dan also tried
his hand at acting. In 1979's
L'invasion des piranhas (1979), he co-starred
with
'Lee Majors',
Karen Black,
James Franciscus,
Margaux Hemingway and
Gary Collins, but his part was
small and most critics agreed that his primary talent as a actor was
looking good with his shirt off. More than his shirt came off when he
posed for a December 1980 photo-spread in "Playgirl" which showed him
stripping and showering. Dan now lives in the Houston area where he's
hosted a sports show on local TV and continues to indulge his passion
for race-cars.
