Lawrence Montaigne Obituary

Lawrence Montaigne, an actor who had two notable roles on the original “Star Trek” TV series, died Friday, March 17, 2017, according to multiple news sources. He was 86. Montaigne played the first Romulan on the show, Decius, in the first season's episode “Balance of Terror.” He later returned in the second-season premiere as Spock’s Vulcan pon farr rival, Stonn, in the episode “Amok Time.” At one point, Nimoy was rumored to be leaving “Star Trek” for a role on “Mission: Impossible.” Montaigne, who resembled Nimoy, was asked by producers to replace him.

However, Nimoy returned, and a couple of weeks later Montaigne was given the role of Stonn. “I moved on. This was the 1960s, and I was doing a whole bunch of shows and films and having the time of my life. So, when Spock didn’t happen, it really didn’t change my life in any way,” Montaigne told StarTrek.com in an interview.

Among other shows on which he was featured at the time were “Batman,” “The Man from U.N.C.L.E.”, and “The Time Tunnel.” In his 2006 autobiography, “A Vulcan Odyssey,” he singled out “The Great Escape,” in which he played Haynes, a Canadian prisoner of war, as his favorite of the many films in which he appeared. In 2008, he reprised the role of Stonn on “Star Trek: Of Gods and Men,” an unofficial miniseries featuring several actors from various ’Star Trek’ series and films, including original Enterprise regulars Nichelle Nichols and Walter Koenig.