Leonard Nimoy: a life in clips

Though discouraged by his parents, Leonard Nimoy always wanted to be an actor. He tried his hand in the theatre growing up in Boston and had his first major role at 17 in a version of Clifford Odets’s Awake and Sing. After a series of bit parts in movies, Nimoy landed his first starring role, as the title character in Kid Monk Baroni, a film about a gang member who becomes a boxer to get off the streets. The film, in its entirety, is available on YouTube.

The movie was not a major success, Nimoy’s subsequent fame being the only notable thing about it. After that disappointment, he took on small parts both in films and on television, appearing in film serials like Zombies of the Stratosphere (he was one of the zombies, which were really Martians) and classic TV shows like Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Dragnet (twice), and Perry Mason. It wasn’t until 1966 when Nimoy got his big break playing Mr Spock, a very logical Vulcan who had a hard time fitting in with his human shipmates on the USS Enterprise. Here is he explaining how he is immune to cuteness on the show’s famous episode The Trouble with Tribbles.

Nimoy was nominated for an Emmy for Best Supporting Actor for all three seasons of Star Trek. When it ended in 1969, Nimoy joined the cast of spy drama Mission: Impossible in its fourth season. Nimoy played The Great Paris, a retired magician who was a master of disguise, could speak any language, and was great with accents. As you can see from this clip, his accents weren’t always as spectacular as advertised.

As well as his acting, Nimoy was celebrated for his deep, gravelly voice and he provided the voiceover or narration for many projects. From 1976 until 1982 he was the host and narrator of the pseudo-documentary series In Search Of … where cameras would go looking for things like Bigfoot, the Holy Grail and Jesse James.

Thanks to Star Trek, Nimoy could never duck his link to science-fiction and its very dedicated fan base, nor did he seem to want to. His filmography is peppered with gigs that involve aliens, time travel, multiple dimensions, and all sorts of things involving space. In 1978 he played one of the titular villains in a remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers starring Donald Sutherland.

Nimoy could never escape the gravitation pull of Mr Spock on his career. In 1979 Star Trek: the Motion Picture tried to capture the final frontier of the movies and, while a commercial success, was a critical flop. In 1982, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan fared much better both with fans and critics and the franchise was hot once again, though Spock sacrifices himself at the end of the second film to save the rest of the ship from the villain Khan. William Shatner parlayed his returned relevance into a starring role in TJ Hooker. Nimoy stopped by to guest-star in an episode and famously punched his once and future co-star on the mouth. It’s a pretty fake-looking punch.

Star Trek returned to the movies in 1984 with The Search for Spock where we find out that Spock is not dead – just missing. The film was well regarded and critics praised its pace and the dedication of the actors. This was especially meaningful for Nimoy, who directed. He was behind the camera once again for Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home where the crew of the Enterprise has to go back in time to 1986 to save some humpback whales.

Though the Star Trek movie franchise limped on for two more sequels in 1989 and 1991, they were the product of the law of diminishing returns. Nimoy, however, had a new career as a director to fall back on, not only with the Star Trek movies he helmed but also the 1987 smash hit Three Men and a Baby, something entirely outside of his sci-fi wheelhouse.

Nimoy stopped doing major work on either side of the camera in the mid-90s, instead doing voiceover work in animated movies or the narration on documentaries, including four years as the voice of the series Ancient Mysteries. Nimoy was mostly living the retired life but he would pop up here and there for a guest spot, most notably for a recurring role on Fox’s cult favorite show Fringe. When JJ Abrams rebooted the Star Trek franchise in 2009, Nimoy was the only original cast member to return, playing his former character in a time-bending twist that saw the old Spock meeting the new Spock, played by Zachary Quinto.

Nimoy returned to the role of Spock one more time in 2013 for Star Trek: Into Darkness where he advised his former self how to deal with Khan, the villain that killed Spock in a movie 30 years earlier. Though he played many different roles, big and small, over his varied career, its only fitting that Nimoy ended his career in the one role that defined him as an actor.