Farewell To Fantasy Island

During those cold winter months growing up, we used to watch two sun filled shows on Friday nights. The American Broadcast Network aired Love Boat at 8:00 followed by Fantasy Island at 9:00. Love Boat was cute and had plenty of guest stars who always seemed to work out their relationship issues over the course of an hour. Fantasy Island was similar in that the guests to the island managed to figure out the obstacles that led to their misery and become happy and adjusted over the sixty minute show. Of the two, I enjoyed Fantasy Island mainly because Carol Channing and Charo were not on it every other week. The other plus was the cool way Mr. Roarke, the mysterious owner of Fantasy Island performed his magic every week.

Mr. Roarke was actually Ricardo Montalban. He was of Mexican heritage, suave, and exuded a kind of cool that only The Fonz had at the time. He was also known for his commercials for Chrysler Corporation back in the 70's. When Chrysler went to the government for loans to stay afloat, he was doing commercials for the Chrysler Cordoba. His catch phrase was soft Corinthian leather. He made it sound like it was something more than it actually was. After Fantasy Island ended, he starred in one of the Star Trek movies as the character Khan, a clone with super human strength and cunning. He had starred in the series as that character and reprised the role for the movie. His bulging muscles became the talk as he bulked up for the role.

Well, Ricardo Montalban passed away January 14 of this year. He did not make a big splash like other actors, but his parts were always memorable and enjoyable. I last saw him as the grandfather in Disney's Spy Kids series. He was still cool as ever. We will always be able to watch him in reruns and hear those memorable lines again; De plane, de plane and Welcome to Fantasy Island.

Icool

Cobb