Michael Joel Zaslow (November 1, 1942 — December 6, 1998) was an American actor. He is best known for his role as villain Roger Thorpe on CBS's Guiding Light, a role he played from 1971 to 1980 and from 1989 to 1997.
He had earlier played Dick Hart on the CBS soap opera Search for Tomorrow and Dr. Peter Chernak on Love is a Many Splendored Thing. He also played David Renaldi on ABC's One Life to Live from 1983 to 1986. Zaslow was also a writer for the NBC soap opera Another World.
Zaslow guest starred on a number of other television shows and soap operas, including Barnaby Jones and Law & Order. In the episode "The Man Trap," the series' September 8, 1966 premiere of Star Trek, he played Crewman Darnell, the first starship Enterprise crewmember to be killed off. He also appeared as "Jordan" in the episode I, Mudd.
Zaslow's Broadway theatre credits included Fiddler on the Roof, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, and Onward Victoria.
In 1997, he began to experience difficulty speaking. When it became noticeable on screen, he was placed on leave at Guiding Light. (There are conflicting stories as to whether Zaslow was then fired; there was for some time a legal action against Guiding Light and sponsor Procter & Gamble, which eventually was settled.) It was some time before Zaslow was finally diagnosed with ALS, or Lou Gehrig's disease. Zaslow did not return to GL and his role was briefly recast before being written off. (In 2004, Zaslow's character on GL died off-screen.)
In a show of support, Zaslow was hired at One Life to Live in 1998 to play David Renaldi again; his condition was written into the storyline. Zaslow made several appearances before he was too ill to continue working; his final appearance on One Life to Live was televised December 1 1998, days before his death.
His widow, psychologist/writer Susan Hufford, and his daughters, Marika and Helena, founded ZazAngels, a foundation that wishes to raise funds in order to find a cure for Lou Gehrig's disease. Several of his Guiding Light and One Life to Live castmates, along with many Broadway-based theater luminaries, have participated in tributes to Zaslow that were fundraisers for ZazAngels.
In 2004, Zaslow and Hufford's daughter Helena died. Hufford released a book last year about Zaslow and his fight with ALS, titled Not That Man Anymore. Zaslow had begun writing the book several years earlier.
In 2006, Zaslow's widow Susan Hufford lost her battle to cancer. http://www.soapcentral.com/gl/news/2006/1127-hufford.php
Godfather of Christian Slater
He and his wife, Susan, have two adopted Korean daughters.
He was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's disease in 1997.
The first person to die in the Star Trek universe.
Not only the first person to die in a Star Trek universe, but the first one for whom Dr. McCoy's fabled line, "He's dead, Jim." was uttered.
Met his second wife and widow, actress turned physical therapist Susan Hufford, when they were both in the Broadway production of "Fiddler on the Roof" in the early 1970s.
