​Levardis Robert Martyn Burton Jr. is an actor, director, and children's television personality from the United States. He is best known for his roles as Kunta Kinte in the ABC miniseries Roots (1977), Lt. Commander Geordi La Forge in the Star Trek: The Next Generation franchise (1987–1994), and as host of the PBS Kids educational television series Reading Rainbow for over 23 years (1983–2006), for which he won 12 Daytime Emmy Awards and a Peabody Award as host and executive producer. ... Read more