‘Star Trek,’ ‘Twilight Zone’ Star Has Passed Away At 97

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A commanding presence on film and television for decades, actor Michael Forest has passed away. Among his many credits were classic TV series “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” “The Twilight Zone” and “Star Trek.”

Forest’s friend, James A. Brown took to social media to reveal he’d passed on October 14, at the age of 97.

“It is with great sadness that I report that we have lost Michael Forest (Gerald Michael Charlebois) April 17, 1929 – October 14, 2026,” Brown wrote in a heartfelt Facebook post.

“I knew him as an actor and loved him as a friend,” he added. “I’m sure others will share, but that’s all I’m capable of right now.”

A Start in B-Movies

Forest was an imposing figure onscreen, standing six-foot-three inches tall with a muscled 215-lb frame.

Per The Hollywood Reporter, Forest got his start in Hollywood when he met iconic B-movie director Roger Corman in an acting class, which led Corman to cast him as a ferocious barbarian warrior in his 1957 movie “The Saga of the Viking Women and Their Voyage to the Waters of the Great Sea Serpent.”

That led Corman to cast him in more movies, including “Beast From Haunted Cave,” “Ski Troop Attack,” and “Atlas.”

He eventually headed to Europe, making more than 20 pictures in France, Spain and the U.K., including the 1969 feature “100 Rifles,” co-starring with Jim Brown and Raquel Welch. During the 1960s and ’70s he lived in Rome, where he dubbed more than 500 Italian movies into English.

An Iconic ‘Star Trek’ Role

During the 1960s, Forest was a frequent guest star on the TV series of the era, including Rod Serling’s “The Twiight Zone.”

He appeared in a memorable 1964 episode titled “Black Leather Jackets,” playing one of three extraterrestrial bikers intent on destorying Planet Earth.

That same year, he landed a guest spot on “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” playing the former love interest of Laura Petrie (Mary Tyler Moore).

However, Forest will remain best known for his role in the Season 2 “Star Trek” episode titled “Who Mourns for Adonais?” In that fan-favorite episode, he portrayed Greek god Apollo, who demands that Captain Kirk (William Shatner) and the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise worship him, while he falls in love with Starfleet office Lt. Carolyn Palamas (played by Leslie Parrish, who passed away in August 2026).

Forest would reprise that role nearly 50 years later, when he once again portrayed Apollo in the fan-produced series “Star Trek Continues” in 2013. He co-starred with his late wife, Diana Hale, who played the goddess Athena.

Among the many other 1960s TV series in which he appeared are “Zorro,” “Bat Masterson,” “Maverick,” “Bonanza,” “Have Gun — Will Travel,” “Lawman,” “The Rifleman,” “Death Valley Days,” “Wagon Train,” “Dr. Kildare,” “Gomer Pyle: USMC,” “The Outer Limits,” “Perry Mason,” “The Man From U.N.C.L.E.,” “Gunsmoke,” “Combat!,” “Gilligan’s Island” and “Get Smart.”

After his years spent in Europe, Forest returned to the U.S. From 1980 to 1982, he played Greek restaurant owner Nick Andropoulos in CBS soap opera “As the World Turns,” and subsequently portrayed a kinky millionaire in the Madonna-starring “Body of Evidence” and a pilot in Tom Hanks‘ “Cast Away.”

“I look back, and it certainly hasn’t been what you might call a distinguished career, but on the other hand, it hasn’t been bad,” Forest once said, per The Hollywood Reporter. “Some of the things that I’ve done, I take a great deal of pride in. But, like all actors, you do work in material and situations that are not what you want, and you try to make it the best you can. Acting has its ups and its downs.”