You've seen him on TV. Now see him chart a new course for actors' dignity--one of many sequels in Ed Hooks' life.

In his Palo Alto apartment on a weekday afternoon, Ed Hooks looks the part of a mild-mannered, middle-aged suburban husband and father. He is making coffee in the small tidy kitchen. He puts the parakeet in another room so it won't interrupt by screeching, ''All I want is a room somewhere!''

If Hooks looks familiar, it may be because you've seen him on a sitcom. He plays the second banana-the manager of a movie theater on ''Full House,'' a guy in the ''Tool Time'' audience on ''Home Improvement,'' the fix-it man on ''Perfect Strangers,'' a mechanic, a car salesman, a guidance counselor. He's an affable Everyman, the friendly schlemiel next-door; medium height, round-faced, lopsided grin.

But in real life, Ed Hooks plays many roles: actor, teacher, writer and self-styled ''champion-of-the-underdog''--the underdog here being actors.

Hooks, 50, talks slightly louder than the average person and leans forward intently to listen-partly because of a childhood injury that caused complete hearing loss in his left ear, partly because of an urgent need to communicate. With an actor's easy access to his emotions, pain and joy register clearly on his face. In a profession in which who you know (not to mention who you sleep with) is of primary importance, Hooks has refused to kiss up to powerful people to enhance his career. He has firm ideas about how to operate ethically in an industry not known for high-mindedness. And he does not hesitate to speak out, especially about the treatment of actors and the survival of the art form he loves, the theater.

Hooks airs those opinions regularly: He fires off e-mail to Congress and the White House over arts funding and other issues. He writes frequent letters to the editor of the Mercury News. But his main forum is Callboard, the trade magazine for local actors.

Some casting directors and actors' agents consider him a busybody. A fellow acting teacher once complained that he's self-serving because he writes, gratis, a helpful hints column in Callboard, in which he also buys advertisements for his classes.

But to many novice actors, Hooks is a hero, one of the few show business veterans willing to speak openly about exploitation in the industry.

Five years ago, Ed Hooks was living in L.A., making a decent living in sitcoms and commercials. But he and his wife, Cally, an actress, wanted a better environment for their daughter, Dagny, who was about to start first grade. Hooks had occasionally come to the Bay Area to teach acting classes, and he and Cally decided to move to Palo Alto.

He teaches in Palo Alto and San Francisco, and commutes to Los Angeles for auditions and acting jobs. ''It's a Rube Goldberg contraption of a life,'' he says. ''We try to economize as much as we can on my income alone so [Cally] can be a mom. Neither of us had at-home moms when we were kids and this is something we've wanted.''

Hooks grew up in Georgia, and his family life had a lot to do with his attraction to the theater. He describes his mother as a Southern belle, a ''real Scarlett O'Hara'' who married four times and threatened suicide throughout Ed's youth. (She shot herself to death in 1981.) His father was gone by the time Ed was 13. Theater rescued the boy from his troubled home.

''I went to 16 different schools,'' Hooks says. ''I had no sense of place, no sense of family, no friends. I felt 'not seen.' Then I was in a play at 13 and people applauded! I finally felt visible, understood.''

He studied at the American Academy of Dramatic Art and the esteemed Herbert Berghof Studios in New York. He worked off-Broadway, in regional theater, in dinner theater and, he says, in too many commercials. ''Agents saw dollar signs across my nose,'' he recalls. ''But I wanted to be taken seriously as an actor.''

In 1976, he moved to Hollywood.

Television, not movies, turned out to be his natural medium. ''I love doing film, but I don't think I'm your ideal film actor,'' he says. ''I'm very animated. Actors in films are dangerous.'' (Think of, say, Robert DeNiro in ''Raging Bull.'' Could you watch that for 12 minutes and then concentrate on a Wheaties ad?) ''The purpose of TV shows is to deliver good-humored consumers to the commercials,'' Hooks says. ''Although I believe I have a Chekhovian heart, I'm likable, and that makes me good for television.''

Early on, Hooks understood the brutal economics of acting, in which supply way outstrips demand. Clawing to separate themselves from the competition, actors can be seduced in many ways, from falling for false advertising (paying big bucks for classes with a teacher they believe will make them overnight stars), to not getting paid on time, to being sold on expensive services they don't need, such as cosmetic dental work, overproduced photo compositions, listings in books that casting directors presumably consult.

Although Hooks' favorite motto, in his advice-to-actors column, is ''caveat emptor,'' he refuses to leave matters there.

''I've always felt,'' he says, ''that if something is wrong, you should stand up and say so. If it's going to cost you a lot, then it just will.

I also think it goes to the heart of what an artist is. Actors aren't just a blank slate that a playwright writes on. A strongly held view and a willingness to stand in fire--that's part of what a good artist is.''

He is quick to point out that he wasn't exploited in Hollywood. But he felt the utter helplessness that many young actors feel at auditions. ''I was stunned by the power you run into with agents and casting directors,'' he says. Actors are at the mercy of (and usually in the dark about) the whims and tastes of those who control their careers: the agents they hire to get them auditions and the casting directors who serve as gatekeepers for film or TV companies, deciding who gets to see directors and producers, and who gets turned away.

In Los Angeles, Hooks fought to convince the actors' union to prevent casting directors from trading on their names and connections to offer pricey ''showcases'' and classes for aspiring actors. (A recent Los Angeles five-day workshop cost $995.) ''The element of actors paying to meet people who they think will help them up the ladder strikes me as wrong-headed and unfair,'' he says.

Casting directors, however, are not under the jurisdiction of the Screen Actors Guild, so the battle went nowhere.

When Hooks moved to Palo Alto, he was appalled that some agents in the Bay Area were supplementing their incomes by providing non-agenting services, particularly acting classes. He describes the scenario: ''Some agents were saying to actors, 'You're a wonderful type and you're going to be a star but first you need to take $2,000 worth of this training that I'm offering, and then go to this photographer that I'm associated with,' and so on.''

When Hooks complained to the Screen Actors Guild, ''the basic response was that I should mind my own business and go back to Hollywood,'' he says. ''But I couldn't. There was exploitation going on. Supply and demand again. Actors become crazed, their standards change, they will not say things that should be said.''

Hooks finally convinced the union to enforce its own rules forbidding agents from doing any business with actors other than finding jobs for them. ''The Guild and Ed are moving in the same direction,'' says Rebecca Rhine, the union's executive director. ''I have great admiration for his tenacity.''

Hooks also took his fight to Sacramento: He directed his Callboard readers to send Assemblywoman Jackie Speier, D-South San Francisco, horror stories about agents. Speier wrote legislation, signed by Gov. Pete Wilson just before Christmas 1994, which protects actors. The law prohibits agents from referring actors to casting schools, photographers or other businesses in which the agent has a financial stake; it also provides financial penalties for late payments to actors.

The battle was not an unqualified success. The Association for Talent Agencies in Los Angeles, whose membership includes agencies that represent Hollywood's biggest stars, lobbied heavily, and got the bill weakened by eliminating criminal penalties. ''When you change the state law, that affects the big power players,'' Hooks says, shrugging. ''The stuff we were trying to change didn't apply to them, but they didn't like the precedent at all.''

Meeting Ed Hooks, you wonder: Has his activism hurt his career, consigning him to second-string parts? Why does he play this role of actors' advocate?

''Ed is one of the few people that I've ever met who plays it straight in life,'' says his wife, Cally, who has performed with Palo Alto Players. ''What you see is what you get. Part of the reason that we moved from Hollywood is that we couldn't stand that environment. I think part of the reason he may not be a big player in the pool down there is that he's not willing to be phony. In Hollywood, it doesn't matter what you do, if you can make money, all is forgiven. But Ed has higher standards than that and I think that's rare.''

San Francisco talent agent Joan Spangler, owner and president of Look Talent, does not question Hooks' motives. ''Ed sees as his function being the good guy,'' Spangler says. ''I think the casting directors are a little reluctant to chummy up with him because he doesn't allow any margin for error. Of course, Ed's in a position to be able to afford the luxury of righteousness. A lot of actors can't afford to take that position. I do respect what he does, although sometimes his tactics are a little ridiculous, and when he doesn't have a big issue to fight, he goes after a little one.

''Maybe,'' Spangler adds wryly, ''he could practice six months out of the year not having an agenda.''

Hooks winces at the criticism.

''I don't look for issues,'' he says. ''I would love it if there were no issues. I don't make this stuff up. Usually people come to me with problems.

''Actually, I only deal with about half the stuff that comes across my desk. I don't rabble-rouse for the sake of rabble-rousing, and I lead the applause for good stuff when I see it.''

That attitude is an important lesson for the aspiring actors who take Hooks' classes; they say they learn a lot more from him than professional technique. ''I have a lot of respect for that: his willingness to fight for what he believes in,'' says Karen Criswell, a musical comedy actress who is taking Hooks' class to learn how to make the transition to TV.

Her scene partner, Stephen Walker, agrees: ''Ed said in class that you have to take risks and speak up.''

''I tell my students,'' Hooks says, ''if George C. Scott walked into the room right now, and you didn't know he was an actor, you would know this is a person who has strong convictions. The actors whose work you most admire almost invariably are people who have strong convictions.''

In his classes, Hooks generally leaves his political agendas behind and concentrates on his art. He's casual, in baggy chinos, flannel shirt and tennis shoes. The students, whose levels of experience vary widely, are relaxed, joking with Hooks, going over their lines. Hooks is, as always, energetic, bustling about with chairs, a video camera, a boom mike. He is light-hearted, less intense than his activist persona. He laughs about a recent audition for a role he didn't get.

His students this evening are stage actors learning how to perform on screen. ''Ed has a good understanding of the mechanics of both film and theater,'' Criswell says. ''That's very rare.''

As the students perform two-person scenes in front of the video camera, Hooks watches intently from every angle. He is gentle, encouraging and honest.

''Much better! Nice tension!'' he tells two actresses who are doing a scene from ''sex, lies and videotape.'' He shows them how to sit down slowly enough to stay within camera range.

''We gotta loosen this thing up,'' he says to a novice who is struggling through a scene from ''Dragnet.''

''Actors like to play Perry Mason in interrogation scenes,'' he says. ''Don't do that. Be like Connie Chung talking to Newt Gingrich's mother. Don't stare into the other person's eyes; we don't do that in real life.''

Hooks teaches four classes, and he cannot seem to stop worrying about each new crop of actors. ''They're still dreaming the Hollywood dream,'' he says. ''Actors need to educate themselves about this business, not have their head in the clouds. I don't mean to be grandiose about it, but I think an actor is an artist. Actors need to find the art.''

With 100 TV shows behind him, Hooks is growing frustrated with his own art: He is a comedy character actor who'd rather be playing serial killers. He's looking for new challenges. He recently he wrote two books for actors: ''The Audition Book,'' which sold about 30,000 copies and will be reissued in 1996, and ''The Ultimate Scene and Monologue Sourcebook,'' a directory of more than 1,000 scenes and monologues for auditions.

For his birthday, his wife gave him a trip to Italy. Now he's thinking about writing a guide for Americans who want to move abroad (don't get him started on America's political situation). He's also thinking about film directing. (His wife thinks that what he needs is a relaxing year at Walden Pond.)

''I don't want to be perceived as a firebrand hell-raiser nut,'' he says. ''I'm a very peacable person. I get very stressed out from it all. I've taken to fast-walking three miles a day to de-stress, and I ride my bike some. It's just that I have to speak up when I see injustice or else I can't sleep at night. I tell my students, If you feel that you understand something and you want to communicate it-that's an artistic impulse.''

JEAN SCHIFFMAN writes about the arts. Her last piece for West was about Santa Cruz choreographer Tandy Beal.