An off-center character lead of stage, film, and TV since the early 1980s, Von Dohlen, angular, oddly handsome, and sporting strikingly blue eyes, is somewhat reminiscent of the young Anthony Perkins and tends to be cast accordingly: as obsessive hitmen ("Love Kills" 1991); deceptively wholesome child molesters (a 1985 ABC Afterschool Special entitled "Don't Touch"); and weird yet sympathetic neighbors ("Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me" 1992). He was a strangely apt choice to play an extraterrestrial TV enthusiast in "Distant Signals," a superior installment of the syndicated "Tales From the Dark Side."