Updated: June 29, 2024

By Bruce Fedow:

This page is a prime example of the visual beauty that the television series Lost in Space. L.B. Abbott and Howard Lydecker hung a model on three wires past a painted background and made us believe the Jupiter-2 was currently orbiting a mysterious planet, or the Space pod was descending to said planet, or a Chariot full of optimistic Robinsons was trekking across the barren desert of Priplanus.

Paul Zastupnevich was the creative genius behind the costumes for Lost in Space and almost all of Allen's other projects both television and films. From palm tree bark he made a giant cyclops; he made skintight suits for Noble Niolani and Athena and showed the world how Saticons dressed. Dawson Palmer was usually the man in the monster suit, ready to shuffle forward awkwardly in whatever suit he was handed.

John Chambers was the uncredited hero responsible for most of the Lost in Space makeup as well as many other 60's shows. He brought the "Invaders From the Fifth Dimension" to life, created the Protos for the "Target: Earth" episode, and when makeup magic was needed to transform Will Robinson into a small Smith John rose to the occasion. The following year he won a well-deserved Oscar for his work on the first "Planet of the Apes" film.

William Creber created the full-scale Gemini-12 that crashed on the unknown planet for the Lost in Space pilot episode "No Place to Hide" and when the show went to series and a lower deck was needed Bob Kinoshita came up with one of the best sci-fi sets ever created. Who among us wouldn't have wanted to wakeup in one of the Jupiter-2's cabins when we were kids? Bob also created the robot suit at a reputed cost of seventy-five thousand dollars in 1965 money, a costume rivalled only by his predecessor Robby the Robot, star of "Forbidden Planet", "The Twilight Zone" and two episodes of Lost in Space, also designed by Kinoshita.

No show could survive for three seasons without a talented cast and amazing array of guest stars to keep the audience watching. Talented actors like Michael Rennie, Kurt Russell, Michael Ansara, Daniel J Travanti, Dennis Patrick and John Carradine kept millions of Americans, and in later years, the world in front of their TV sets, enthralled by the adventures of the Robinson family, hopelessly Lost in Space!