[1] Two of his best-known roles were as the prudent accountant Bradford Webster in the television version of The Third Man and the fussy villain Dr. Zachary Smith of the 1960s science-fiction series Lost in Space.

[3] The second of three children, Harris was born on November 6, 1914, in the Bronx, New York City, to Russian Jewish immigrants Jennie (née Buchowitsky) and Sam Charasuchin.

[citation needed] While there was little money for luxuries, Jonathan's father made an effort to expand his son's cultural horizons with occasional trips to see Yiddish theatre and by listening to opera on the dining room radio.

[citation needed] Harris was a popular character actor for 30 years on television, making his first guest appearance on the episode "His Name Is Jason" on The Chevrolet Tele-Theatre in 1949.

Harris appeared in two 1961 episodes of The Twilight Zone, including a heroic role in "The Silence", in which he ended up defending a young man challenged to be silent for a whole year at a prestigious gentleman's club.

He played Mr. Phillips, the pompous manager of a posh hotel who is constantly at odds with his bumbling Bolivian bellhop, the Bill Dana character José Jiménez.

"The series was successful upon its debut and, midway through the first season, Harris began to rewrite his own dialogue to add more comedy because he felt that his strength was in portraying a comic villain.

Harris subsequently stole the show, mainly via a seemingly never-ending series of alliterative insults directed toward The Robot, which soon worked their way into popular culture.

According to Bill Mumy, Harris moved quickly to develop the character: "And 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.

While the series was still solidly placed in the middle of the ratings pack, the writers appeared to run out of fresh ideas, and the show was unexpectedly canceled in 1968 after 83 episodes, despite protests from its fans.

[citation needed] In the mid-1970s, Harris starred in live-action roles in two Saturday morning children's series, Space Academy and Uncle Croc's Block, and was a well-known TV spokesman for the International House of Pancakes.

[citation needed] In a 1971 episode of Night Gallery, titled "Since Aunt Ada Came to Stay", Harris played Professor Nicholas Porteus, an expert on witchcraft.

[citation needed] Harris also provided the voice of the Cylon character Lucifer, an antagonist on the original ABC version of Battlestar Galactica (1978).

[citation needed] Harris spent much of his later career working as a voice actor, and during it he was heard on television commercials as well as on cartoons such as Channel Umptee-3, The Banana Splits, My Favorite Martian, Rainbow Brite, Darkwing Duck, Happily Ever After, Problem Child, Spider-Man, A Bug's Life, Buzz Lightyear of Star Command, and Toy Story 2.

"[citation needed] In 2001, a year prior to his death, he recorded voice work for the animated theatrical short The Bolt Who Screwed Christmas.

[citation needed] Harris refused to make a cameo appearance in the 1990s re-imagined film version of Lost in Space (1998), unlike many of his co-stars in the original series.

Wardlaw asked Lost in Space co-stars Bill Mumy, Angela Cartwright, and Marta Kristen to contribute their voices to the film.