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Jonathan Harris

Best known as the pompous, scheming, fussy Dr. Zachary Smith from Irwin Allen's 1960s CBS sci-fi TV series "Lost In Space," Jonathan Harris was known for making high camp into high art with his fun, indulgently hammy portrayals of foppish villains. Born Jonathan Charasuchin in the Bronx to poor Russian- Jewish immigrants, Harris changed his surname to one more easily pronounced by Americans and earned a pharmacy degree at Fordham University. But while working as a pharmacist he was bitten by the acting bug and learned elocution-that elevated, vaguely British way of speaking which became his trademark-in an attempt to rid himself of a "dese and dose" Bronx accent. Working in repertory theater he appeared in 125 plays in stock companies across the country before making his Broadway debut in a 1942 production of "Heart of a City."