Peter Macon

Peter Jerrod Macon is an American actor. He is best known for his roles as Lt. Commander Bortus in the Fox/Hulu television series The Orville (2017–2022), and Raka in Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes (2024).

Early life
Macon was raised in Minneapolis and attended North Community High School, where he acted in school plays. His mother was a teacher, and his father was a truck driver.

Macon later attended the San Francisco Art Institute and the Yale School of Drama, where he earned a master's degree in acting.

Macon married Lucia Brawley, an actress who also attended Yale, in 2005. Former New York City Mayor David Dinkins officiated. They divorced several years later. In 2018, Macon married Jacquelyn Woods.

Stage theater
Macon acted for nearly 30 years at Twin Cities theaters including Penumbra, Illusion, and Children's Theatre Company, and he starred in the title role of Othello at the Guthrie Theater, as well as productions of the play in Dublin, Colorado, and Oregon.

Television
Macon has appeared in episodes of Nash Bridges, Law & Order, Without a Trace, Supernatural, The Shield, Dexter, Bosch, SEAL Team, and Shameless.

In 2017, Macon began playing Bortus in The Orville, a comedy-drama science fiction television series created by Seth MacFarlane that premiered on FOX on September 10 of that year.

Awards
In 2002, Macon won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance for narrating the episode "John Henry, the Steel Driving Man" of the television series Animated Tales of the World.