Jonathan Harris, 87, who appeared in the 1960s CBS sci-fi series "Lost In Space" as the dastardly yet endearing Dr. Zachary Smith, who sabotaged the spaceship Jupiter II causing the hapless if courageous Robinson family and inadvertently himself to become lost, died of a blood clot in his heart Nov. 3 in a hospital in Encino, Calif.
Although "Lost in Space," producer Irwin Allen's futuristic take on "The Swiss Family Robinson," ran only from 1965 until 1968, it became an international cult favorite. Set in 1997, the series left the exploring family -- and Smith -- still trying to return to Earth.
In 1998, Mr. Harris reprised the smarmy Smith in a one-hour television special, "Lost in Space Forever." At the time of his death, he was working on a television movie for NBC -- "Lost in Space: The Journey Home."
Unlike others in the cast, Mr. Harris rejected a cameo in the 1998 movie version of "Lost in Space." Mr. Harris reasoned that if he could not play his character, he wanted nothing to do with the movie.
Smith did not appear in the series pilot, which was not telecast. When CBS decided that the show needed a bad guy, Allen considered such actors as Carroll O'Connor and Eddie Albert before settling on Mr. Harris.
It didn't take Mr. Harris long to steal the show from the rest of the cast -- Guy Williams, June Lockhart, Mark Goddard, three children and Robot, patterned after Robby the Robot of the film "Forbidden Planet."
"I realized that the original concept of Smith was a deep-dyed, snarling villain, and he bored me to death," Mr. Harris said in 1998, explaining how he developed the character. "There's no longevity in a part like that. They'd have to kill me off in five episodes, and I'd be out of a job, unemployed again, right? So I began to sneak in the things for which I am -- at the risk of seeming immodest -- justly famous. Comedic villainy."
Initially, the character contracted with foreign enemies to sabotage the spaceship's control panel, ruining the Robinsons' planned five-year exploratory trip to a planet in the Alpha Centauri star system. But Smith managed to trap himself aboard as well. When the Jupiter II crash-landed, Smith had to make an uneasy truce with those he sought to maroon. The curmudgeon was always trying to make deals with extraterrestrial life-forms to return him -- but not the Robinsons or Robot or their pilot -- to Earth.
Mr. Harris was born Jonathan Charasuchin in the Bronx, N.Y., to poor Russian Jewish immigrants. A pharmacy graduate of Fordham University, he worked for a time as a pharmacist.
He began working in repertory theater, and within three years, he had been in 125 plays in stock companies across the country. He made his Broadway debut in 1942, starring in Gilbert Miller's production of "Heart of a City."
He moved to Hollywood in 1953 and made his film debut in "Botany Bay" with Alan Ladd and James Mason. In addition to dramatic classic television series including "Studio One" and "General Electric Theater," Mr. Harris appeared frequently in such popular series as "The Twilight Zone," "Outlaws" and "Bewitched."
After "Lost in Space," Mr. Harris switched to voice-overs for commercials and children's animated series, including "Freakazoid." He was the voice of Manny the Praying Mantis in the animated motion picture "A Bug's Life" and the voice of the Fixer in "Toy Story II."
Jonathan Harris, shown with Billy Mumy, played Dr. Zachary Smith in the CBS series. He had recently been working on a TV movie based on the '60s show.
