- Born
- Died
- Birth nameHenricus Wilhelm Vollaerts
- Best known for doing three things: for scripting an episode of the cult 1960s series Star Trek (episode title: For The World Is Hollow And I Have Touched The Sky), for scripting six episodes of the semi-cult 1960s series Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. He also did a Batman adventure. However, his constant jumping to various tv genres, and not sticking to the one genre, means that he is a hard man to describe.
His Star Trek came in the show's third season when some were saying the series was dropping in quality. However, Vollaerts was able to surprise some viewers as he presented a love story where Dr McCoy was dying. The opening scene of this hour ranks as one of season three's most powerful moments. His touching script put some female viewers into tears.
He remained with Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea for six episodes and, for this writer, that is a long period. Vollaerts invaded the submarine Seaview with amphibians, a giant fish that attacks the Seaview, a power-mad General, a human body snatching space brain, a human body snatching Shadowman, and finally, a human body snatching Deadly Cloud.
His Voyage scripts ended up sounding great when acted out by talents such as Richard Basehart (Admiral Nelson), Del Monroe (Seaman Kowalski) Dick Tufeld (space brain), Lloyd Bochner (power-mad General), Jim Mills (Shadowman), etc.
He also scripted a two-part episode of 1960s Batman, done in season one when things were less silly and over-the-top than they would become. His Batman adventure was about a new bad guy called, "The Bookworm", played by Roddy McDowall. Perhaps the most memorable part of the script was the amusing moment when Batman (Adam West) struggles with the idea of fighting with people wearing spectacles.
When you put this all together, you could say that Vollaerts added something special to 1960s tv fantasy.- IMDb Mini Biography By: StuOz
- SpouseRosalind Leane(December 9, 1944 - ?)
- He also invented the mini-sub for Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (1964).
- He created the villain known as The Bookworm (portrayed by Roddy McDowall) on the 1960s live action show Batman.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content