American character actor (1905–1991) who played Dr Philip Boyce, Captain Pike's ship's surgeon and confidant, in the first Star Trek pilot, The Cage.
John Hoyt was an American actor, born in 1905, with a long list of film credits including Julius Caesar (1953), When Worlds Collide (1951), Blackboard Jungle (1955) and Spartacus (1960).
In The Cage, filmed in 1964, he played Dr Philip Boyce, chief medical officer of the Enterprise under Christopher Pike. Boyce mixes the weary captain a martini in his quarters and talks him out of resigning, a scene that set the pattern for the later friendship between Kirk and McCoy. Footage of Hoyt was reused in the two-part episode The Menagerie.
When the series was recast for the second pilot the doctor's role passed to Paul Fix and then to DeForest Kelley. Hoyt later played Grandpa Kanisky in the sitcom Gimme a Break! He died in 1991.