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René Murat Auberjonois (English pronunciation: /rəˈneɪ oʊˈbɛərʒənwɑː/; born June 1, 1940) is an American actor, known for portraying Father Mulcahy in the movie version of M*A*S*H and for creating a number of characters in long-running television series, including Clayton Endicott III on Benson (for which he was nominated for an Emmy Award), Odo on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and attorney Paul Lewiston on Boston Legal.
Auberjonois was born in New York City. His father, Swiss-born Fernand Auberjonois (1910–2004), was a Cold War-era foreign correspondent and Pulitzer Prize-nominated writer. His grandfather, also named René Auberjonois, was a French Swiss post-Impressionist painter. His mother was Laure Louise Napoléone Eugénie Caroline Murat (1913-1986), a great-great granddaughter of Joachim Murat, son of a farmer, one of General Napoleon's loyal band awarded royal positions, in this instance the throne of Naples, despite his ardent republicanism; his wife was Caroline Bonaparte, sister of the Emperor Napoléon. His maternal grandmother, Hélène Macdonald Stallo (1820–1860), was an American, from Cincinnati, Ohio; his maternal grandfather's mother was a Russian noblewoman, Eudoxia Michailovna Somova (1830–1870), and his maternal grandfather's paternal grandmother, Caroline Georgina Fraser, was also an American, from Charleston, South Carolina.
Auberjonois has a sister and a brother and also two half-sisters from his mother's first marriage. His family moved to Paris after World War II, where at an early age he decided to become an actor.