The actor who’s a stiff

last updated 8 January 2015

Mike Doyle had died at least seven times, says Michael Wilson in The New York Times. Over the course of his career the 36-year-old actor has had many parts. But he may be best known for the ones in which he gets knocked off. “I’ve been shot with a shotgun,” he says. “I’ve been blown up in a boat. I’ve been burned in a submarine fire. I’ve been strangled. Oh—and I was electrocuted on a fence.” Doyle’s most recent professional death was last week, on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit. Though he’d been on the show in a semi-recurring role more than 50 times since 2003, the producers decided he would be stabbed to death for the season finale. “There’s nothing worse,” he said during filming, a prop knife sticking out of his bloodied chest, “than sitting there holding your breath and concentrating on not moving your eyelids.” His first bit the dust in Loss of Innocence, a 1996 movie of the week, wherein he succumbed to a supposed hunting accident. He takes his serial deaths in stride, but his mother is a different story. “She’ll call me and say, ‘I know it’s not real, but I just want to make sure you’re okay.’”