Jack Donner (born 1928) in Los Angeles, California) is an American actor. He was worked steadily in television and film since the 1950s including early work on The Guiding Light and As the World Turns. Honing his craft, he performed in seven successive seasons of New York regional and stock theater.
In the 1960s and 70s he started to receive guest star and co-starring roles in shows such as The Streets of San Francisco, Mannix, Kojak, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., and eleven episodes (the most by any guest star) of Mission: Impossible. However, Donner is probably best known for his role of Romulan Subcommander Tal in the original Star Trek.
He would later return as a Vulcan priest in the episodes "Kir'Shara" and "Home" of Star Trek: Enterprise. Along with Joseph Ruskin and Clint Howard, he is one of only three actors to appear in both the original Star Trek series and Star Trek: Enterprise.
He founded Oxford Theater with fellow actor Lee Delano. Their students included Barry Levinson, Craig T. Nelson, Barbara Parkins, and Don Johnson.
He has a recurring role on General Hospital as Nikolas and Spencer Cassadine's butler.
Widely known and admired as Romulan Subcommander Tal in the original "Star Trek" (1966), Jack Donner has worked steadily in TV, film and theater since the 1950s. Born and raised in Los Angeles, he did his first professional theater and TV work there before heading for New York during the glory days of TV, appearing in many prestigious early shows like "Studio One" (1948), and soap operas such as "As the World Turns" (1956) and "Guiding Light, The" (1952). He also did seven seasons of New York regional and stock theater. Returning to L.A., he worked his way up to guest star and co-star status in shows like "Streets of San Francisco, The" (1972), "Mannix" (1967), "Kojak" (1973), "Man from U.N.C.L.E., The" (1964), the aforementioned "Star Trek" (1966) episode "The Enterprise Incident", and eleven episodes (the most by any guest star in any series) of "Mission: Impossible" (1966). He also founded, with fellow actor Lee Delano, his own theater and drama school. His students included Barry Levinson (I), Craig T. Nelson, Barbara Parkins, and Don Johnson (I). Recent TV credits include "Baywatch" (1989), "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" (1997), "Frasier" (1993), "Charmed" (1998), "General Hospital" (1963), "Chicken Soup for the Soul" (1999), "G vs E" (1999), "Malcolm in the Middle" (2000) and "Roswell" (1999), and as a regular in Privateers, The (2000) (TV). Donner has assayed a wide variety of roles in recent feature films such as Gideon (1999) (with Christopher Lambert (I) and Charlton Heston), and Family Tree (1999) (with Robert Forster (I)). With his deep, resonant voice, silver-white hair and patrician profile, he has recently been compared with Vincent Price (I) for his roles in a run of classy horror flicks, as Afzel the sorcerer in Retro Puppet Master (1999), the mysterious Father Almeida in Stigmata (1999), the manipulative Dr. Bassett in Demon Under Glass (2002) (V), and the obsessed Father Lansing in Exorcism (2003).
