Guy Williams was born of Sicilian parentage on January 14, 1924, as Armando Joseph Catalano in the Washington Heights area of New York City. His parents, insurance broker Attilio Catalano and Clara Arcara, were from the island of Sicily, and were by then living in poverty. Attilio was the son of a wealthy timber grower in Messina, who purchased land in New Jersey. Williams grew up in the Little Italy neighborhood of The Bronx.
In Public School 189, Williams stood out in mathematics. Later, he attended George Washington High School, while he occasionally worked at a soda fountain. He then left to attend the Peekskill Military Academy, where he was an enthusiastic student. His interests included American football and chess.
Williams wanted to be an actor, spurred by his good looks and 6’3″ height. When he decided not to continue studying, his mother, who later became an executive of a foreign film company, was disappointed because it was expected that he would follow in his father’s footsteps as an insurance broker.
After working as a welder, cost accountant and aircraft-parts inspector during World War II, Williams became a salesman in the luggage department at Wanamaker’s. While there, he decided to send his photos to a modeling agency. He quickly found great success with assignments resulting in photographs in newspapers and magazines, including Harper’s Bazaar as well as on billboards and book covers. He then adopted the name Guy Williams (1940s).
In 1946, he signed a single-year contract offered by MGM and moved to Hollywood. Williams had a featured role as a pilot in the film The Beginning or the End (1947), about the first U.S. deployed atom bomb. He appeared in only a few films and soon moved back to New York.
In 1948, to advertise cigarettes while skiing, Williams did an extensive filming trip accompanied by Janice Cooper, a John Robert Powers model. During the long photographic sessions, they fell in love, marrying on December 8, just after they returned to New York City. They had two children, Guy Steven Catalano (aka Guy Williams Jr.) and Antoinette Catalano (aka Toni Williams), both became actors.
By 1950, Williams was filming some of the pioneering television commercials in the U.S. His father died in 1951, never to witness his son’s rise to fame. In 1952, Williams obtained a new one-year contract with Universal-International and moved to Hollywood. He also appeared in an episode of the Lone Ranger, playing town sheriff.
In 1953, he suffered a serious accident when he fell from a horse and was dragged over 200 yards, resulting in a long scar on his left shoulder. Because of this he returned to New York to continue acting and modeling there and temporarily abandoned his film career. In 1953, he left Universal and became a freelancer for movies produced by Allied Artists and Warner Brothers.
Early in 1957, Williams appeared twice in the role of Steve Clay in the television series Men of Annapolis, a military drama set at the United States Naval Academy. He also appeared in the Rod Cameron drama State Trooper in the episode “No Fancy Cowboys” about the defrauding of guests at a dude ranch.
About this time, the Walt Disney Company was casting for Zorro, a television series based on the character created in 1919 by Johnston McCulley. To play the main character, the chosen actor would have to be handsome and have some experience with fencing. Walt Disney interviewed Guy Williams, telling him to start growing a mustache “neither very long or thick.” The exclusive contract paid Williams the then very high wage of $2,500 per week. Williams resumed his professional training in fencing with the Belgian champion Fred Cavens (who also trained Douglas Fairbanks, Errol Flynn and Tyrone Power), since the show required sword fights in most episodes. He also took guitar lessons with the famous Vicente Gomez. Guy’s first appearance as Zorro was on the Disney anthology television series “The Fourth Anniversary Show”, wherein he challenged the notion that Zorro was a fictional character.
The series of half-hour episodes debuted on ABC on October 10, 1957. It was an instant hit in the U.S. Seventy-eight episodes were produced over two seasons (1957–1959), and two movies were edited from TV episodes: The Sign of Zorro (1958) and Zorro the Avenger (1959).
In 1962, Williams played Sir Miles Hendon in the Walt Disney’s The Prince and the Pauper, shot in England.
In 1965, Guy Williams returned to weekly television in the popular science-fiction series Lost in Space.
Guy Williams played Professor John Robinson, an expert in astrophysics and geology, who commanded the mission of the Jupiter 2 spaceship, taking his family in a voyage to colonize the Alpha Centauri star system.
After Lost in Space, Guy Williams decided to retire in order to better enjoy his wealth which had been generated by investments in several businesses, buying and selling on the stock market.
When Williams had first visited Argentina in 1973, he was taken by the admiration and fascination the Argentine people expressed for him and his character of El Zorro. In return, Williams fell in love with the culture and people of Argentina. In the late 1970s, he retired, except for personal appearances, to Recoleta, an upscale neighborhood of Buenos Aires.
In subsequent years, Williams also brought to Argentina some of the original cast members of the Zorro series, including Henry Calvin who performed as Sergeant Garcia. Williams even formed a circus (Circo Real Madrid) with the local fencing champion -and later actor- Fernando Lupiz, traveling all over South America (1977).
Later in 1989, while spending solitary months in Argentina, Williams disappeared. The local police searched his apartment in Recoleta on May 6, 1989, finding his body. He had died of a brain aneurysm. Owing to his great popularity in Argentina, his ashes lay for two years at the Argentine Actors’ Society cemetery at La Chacarita Cemetery, Actor Pantheon & Crypt 278. In 1991, in accordance with his wishes, Williams’ ashes were spread over the Pacific Ocean in Malibu, California.