“Oh, the pain, the pain! Save me, William!” Watch this supercut of the of the villainous Dr Smith shrieking like the little bitch he was on the ’60s sci-fi campfest Lost in Space. On playing the villainous Dr Smith, actor Jonathan Harris once said:
“I was deliciously wicked. I was selfish, self-pitying, pompous, pretentious, peremptory, conniving, unctuous, scornful, greedy, unscrupulous, cruel, cowardly, egotistical and absolutely delightful. The boy [Billy Mumy as young Will Robinson] loves me, but I would have gladly sacrificed him to achieve my ends.
“I realized that the original concept of Smith was a deep-dyed, snarling villain, and he bored me to death. 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.”
Says Billy Mummy who played Smith’s young side-kick William, said in 2002:
“…we’d start working on a scene together, and he’d have a line, and then in the script I’d have my reply, and he’d say, ‘No, no, no, dear boy. No, no, no. Before you say that, The Robot will say this, this, this, this, this, this, and this, and then, you’ll deliver your line.’
“He truly, truly singlehandedly created the character of Dr. Zachary Smith that we know — this man, we love-to-hate, coward who would cower behind the little boy, ‘Oh, the pain!’ That’s all him!”
(via Dangerous Minds)
See also: Dr Smith vs the Robot:
And Dr Smith vs Major West:
