Best remembered for his roles as the suave host of TV’s Fantasy Island and the fierce alien general Khan Noonien Singh in Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, Montalbán’s prolific career spanned film, theater, and television, earning him an Emmy Award, a Screen Actors Guild Life Achievement Award, and a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

CLICK IMAGE TO START SLIDESHOW REMEMBERING RICARDO MONTALBÁN

Off-screen, he was equally respected as a tireless advocate for Hispanics in the performing arts. “One of the true giants of arts and culture,” as actor Edward James Olmos remembered him, Montalban “was a consummate person and performer with a tremendous understanding of culture … and the ability to express it in his work.”

A devoted husband and father, Montalbán was married for more than 60 years to actress Loretta Young's half-sister, Georgiana Young, with whom he had four children.

Career

Memorable Montalbán Ricardo Montalbán’s career spans more than 167 film and television performances, as well as guest appearances in dozens of documentaries, televised interviews and film anthologies. Here are a few noteworthy clips: American Television Archives - TV Legends (2008) Filmed a few months before his death, Ricardo Montalbán discusses his career in theatre and television in an extensive five-part interview. Part:  I - II - III - IV - V With Cyd Charisse in 1947’s Fiesta The young Mexican actor, son of Spanish immigrants to Mexico, delivers a performance that caught the eye of MGM studio bosses and establishes him as a Latin draw at the box office. With Jane Powell in 1950’s Two Weeks With Love By the time Montalbán played this role, he was firmly established as a debonair romantic lead on the silver screen. 1975 Chrysler Cordoba Commercial Montalbán’s “Corinthian leather” pitch would be famously parodied. Star Trek: Wrath of Khan (1982) Montalbán’s incarnation of the alien warrior Khan Noonien Singh was hailed as one of the most memorable of the Star Trek series. Fantasy Island (TV series) At the height of his TV career, Montalbán taught life lessons as the welcoming host of the aptly named Fantasy Island.

Elegant, genuine and incredibly versatile, Montalbán was already a star in his native Mexico when MGM tapped him to play a bullfighter in 1947’s Fiesta, opposite Esther Williams and Cyd Charisse. His dance scenes with Charisse helped typecast Montalbán in a series of comedies and musicals at MGM, where he shared a friendly rivalry with Fernando Lamas as the studio’s resident “Latin lovers.”

Eventually, Montalbán’s talent would see him share top billing with the likes of Clark Gable, Jane Powell, Lana Turner, Marlon Brando, and Debbie Reynolds. In his 1980 biography, Reflections: A Life in Two Worlds, however, Montalbán expressed regret that MGM never cast him in a dramatic leading role.

After breaking with MGM in 1953, Montalbán’s dancing and singing abilities led to leading roles on Broadway, most notably opposite Lena Horne in Jamaica, which ran for 555 performances and earned him a Tony nomination for Best Actor in a Musical in 1958.

It was television, however, that brought him his most famous roles: William Shatner’s nemesis Khan Noonien Singh in a 1967 episode of Star Trek, a role he reprised in the 1982 film sequel Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan; the starring role of Mr. Roarke in Fantasy Island, a prime-time favorite from 1978–1984; and an Emmy-winning role as Sioux chief Satangkai in the 1978 miniseries How the West Was Won. 

Montalbán was able to sustain the grueling pace of theater and television despite chronic pain from a spinal injury suffered while filming the 1951 western Across the Wide Missouri, opposite Clark Gable. Thrown off a horse and trampled, Montalbán was left with a limp he successfully disguised for decades. He would eventually undergo back surgery in 1993 to alleviate the pain. Unfortunately, the surgery only worsened his condition and relegated the actor to a wheelchair. This did not stop him from working; Montalbán simply incorporated the wheelchair into his film roles—most notably as Grandfather Cortez in the Spy Kids trilogy—and lent his unmistakable voice to animated films and narrated documentaries.

An inspiration and mentor to many Latino and minority actors, Ricardo Montalbán remained true to himself. Writing in the Palm Beach Post, author Scott Eyman, who interviewed Montalbán extensively for a biography of MGM boss Louis B. Mayer, remembers the actor this way:

“I remember a man who was proud to be the first Mexican to succeed as a leading man in Hollywood, but was considerably prouder of having survived after MGM cut him loose. It was then that Montalbán rediscovered the fact that he was an actor before he was a movie star.

“I remember a man who took as much pride in his marriage of more than 50 years and his children as he did in any performance he ever gave.

“I remember a man of deep pride who refused to allow a crippling injury to force him to play cripples.

“I remember one of the great class acts of show business.”