René Murat Auberjonois was born on June 1, 1940, in the vibrant city of New York, to a family rich in artistic heritage. His mother, Princess Laure Louise Napoléone Eugénie Caroline (Murat),was born in the City of Light, Paris, while his father, Fernand Auberjonois, hailed from Switzerland. This artistic legacy was already evident in René's family, with his grandfather being a renowned Swiss painter and his father being a Pulitzer-nominated writer and Cold War-era foreign correspondent.
The Auberjonois family relocated to Paris shortly after World War II, and it was there that René made a pivotal career decision at the tender age of six. When his school put on a musical performance for the parents, René was given the honor of conducting his classmates in a rendition of "Do You Know the Muffin Man?" After the performance, René took a bow, realizing that he was not the actual conductor, and imagined that he had been acting. This moment sparked a deep-seated desire in him to become an actor.
After leaving Paris, the Auberjonois family settled into an Artist's Colony in upstate New York, where René was surrounded by a community of musicians, composers, and actors. Among his neighbors were the renowned Helen Hayes, Burgess Meredith, and John Houseman, who would later become a valuable mentor to René. Houseman gave René his first theater job at the age of 16, as an apprentice at a theater in Stratford, Connecticut. René would later go on to teach under Houseman at Juilliard.
René attended Carnegie-Mellon University, where he immersed himself in the study of theater, learning not only about acting but also about the entire process of producing a play. After graduating, René acted with various theater companies, including San Francisco's American Conservatory Theater and Los Angeles' Mark Taper Forum. In 1969, he won a role in his first Broadway musical, "Coco," alongside the legendary Katharine Hepburn, earning him a Tony Award.
Throughout his illustrious career, René acted in a diverse range of theater productions, films, and television presentations. He is perhaps best known for his iconic roles as Clayton Endicott III on the comedy series "Benson" (1979) and as Odo on the popular sci-fi series "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" (1993). René also lent his voice to dramatic readings of various books on tape and appeared in notable projects such as "The Patriot" (2000),"Sally Hemings: An American Scandal" (2000),and episodes of "Frasier" (1993) and "The Practice" (1997).
