Twilight Zone Companion (26 page)

We go back out of the studio and he hasnt opened one goddamn piece of mail except this. We get to the car and he says, You drive, and I thought, Oh God, somethings wrong, because he never let me touch one of his cars, he wouldnt even let me put my finger on it let alone drive it. Were driving and hes still looking at this brochure. All of a sudden, he closes it and says, Bob, suppose you had a jet over the Atlantic and it picked up a freak tail wind of such velocity that its ground speed was something like eight thousand miles an hour and it went so fast that it went through a time barrier, and when it came in over Idlewild Airport there wasnt any more airport, they were back in prehistoric times. This was The Odyssey of Flight 33.

Bob Serlings involvement with the episode didnt end there. He calls me up about two weeks laterI was back in Washingtonand he says, Hey, I need cockpit dialogue for that jet that goes back in time. I said, You need what? Cockpit dialogue, what happens in the cockpit when they pick up the tail wind. I said, Rod, youve got an impossible, implausible situation to begin with, so how in the hell can I give you the cockpit dialogue? He said, Well, give me something about the radio checkpoints they try to reach, something about what would be happening in the airplane, the groundspeed versus the true airspeed and all that stuff. I said, Okay, Ill try.

There was a TWA International captain living in Washington. He commuted up to New York to take his flights out. I called him. He came over to the house one night and I guess we killed a bottle of bourbon between us and came up with the dialogue in the cockpit. I kept telling him the story and wed act out the roles. Then I called Rod back I never could write to him, I always had to call him, he was always in a hurry and gave him the dialogue over the phone.

Somewhere, hes got letters from some pilots who said it was the most technically accurate piece that anybody had ever done on an airplane flight. It was. The checkpoints were perfect; the dialogue was just what a crew would say.

Under Justus Addisss direction, John Anderson, Paul Comi, Harp McGuire, Wayne Heffley, and Sandy Kenyon, as captain and flight crew, give performances that are cool, understated, and credible. Aerial stock footage of the 1939 New York Worlds Fair is well integrated into the episode. Of course, the real shocker of the show is contained in two brief but very convincing shotsbirds-eye views of a brontosaurus. These wonderful shots were accomplished using a tabletop landscape and a miniature, jointed model of a brontosaurus, moved frame by frame in the classic technique known as stop-motion animation.

The dinosaur was one of the puppets used in the Jack Harris picture, Dinosaurus, for which Project Unlimited did the special effects, explains special-effects wizard Wah Chang. The partners in Project were Gene Warren, Tim Barr, and myself. We also did the effects for The Time Machine, Seven Faces of Dr. Lao, Wonderful World of the Brothers Grimm, as well as the TV series Outer Limits, some of the effects for Star Trek, and many more.

The most expensive piece of film ever shot for Twilight Zone was the dinosaur watching the plane go by, says Buck Houghton. It cost us $2500 and, God, Business Affairs raised hell with me about it.

Thanks to this kind of attention to detail, The Odyssey of Flight 33 has left an indelible impression on many. John Anderson, the captain (and previously the angel Gabriel in A Passage for Trumpet,), recalls: Waiting to tee off at a golf course several years ago, a man from the foursome behind us approached and said, Didnt you do that Twilight Zone about the flight that got lost in time? I said, Guilty. And he came back with, Thats one of my favorite of all these shows, and added, I fly for United and you know, sometimes up there during a long flight you do get crazy thoughts like what happened to your ship on that flight.

VIDEOTAPE INVADES THE TWILIGHT ZONE

In November of 1960, The Twilight Zone tried an experiment. So far, sixteen episodes of the second season had been filmed, but all was not well. Says Buck Houghton, We were inching up to around $65,000 an episode, which at that time was frightening. In an attempt to cut costs, the network suggested that six episodes be done on videotape rather than film. Tape was less expensive than film, and the editing costs were negligible since most editing was done on the spot, switching from camera to camera as in live TV. Ultimately, the shows would be transferred from tape to sixteen-millimeter film for broadcast. If the experiment succeeded, more episodes would be done on tape, thus keeping costs under control.

This method had its limitations, though. At the time, tape was still at an extremely primitive stage of its development. Except for the integration of stock footage, none of the taped shows could have any exterior locations; everything had to be shot on a soundstage. Also, since tape couldnt be edited as cleanly as film, there could be fewer different camera setups and fewer complex camera movements. Obviously, this limited the range of story possibilities. Serling wasnt happy about this but, the network being the network, he agreed to give it a try.

Doing a show on tape was closer in procedure to live TV than to film, so Houghton was careful to only hire directors who had experience in live television. Instead of one day of rehearsal and three shooting days, the tape shows had four days of rehearsal and two days of taping. We actually rehearsed them like we were doing a live show, says Jack Smight, director of three of the six. Then wed go into the studio and block it and have a run-through, a dress rehearsal, and then actually tape it.

The six shows were taped at CBS Television City in Los Angeles. They had no director of photography as such. Instead, a technical director sat up in a booth with the director. On the set were the actors, a lighting man,

sound men, and four cameramen. The four cameras were hooked up to monitors in the booth. As taping progressed, the technical director, at the command of the director, would switch from one camera to another. Today this is standard procedure for nearly all situation comedies, but in 1960 tape was something quite innovative. Actually, says Buck Houghton, I enjoyed the experience on tape. It was like getting a new set of toys that were different than Id used before.

THE LATENESS OF THE HOUR (12/2/60)

Written by Rod Serling

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: Justus Addiss

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Music: stock

Cast:

Jana: Inger Stevens Dr. Loren: John Hoyt Mrs. Loren: Irene Tedrow Nelda: Mary Gregory Robert the Butler: Tom Palmer Gretchen: Doris Karnes Suzanne: Valley Keane Jensen: Jason Johnson

The residence of Dr. William Loren, which is in reality a menagerie for machines. We’re about to discover that sometimes the product of man’s talent and genius can walk amongst us untouched by the normal ravages of time. These are Dr. Loren’s robots, built to functional as well as artistic perfection. But in a moment Dr. Loren, wife, and daughter will discover that perfection is relative, that even robots have to be paid for, and very shortly will be shown exactly what is the bill.”

Dr. Loren lives in what he feels is the ideal environment: a house built to his specifications staffed by human-looking robot servants. But his daughter Jana feels the sanctuary is actually a prison, and that her parents reliance on the robots is turning them into vegetables. She gives her father an ultimatum: either he dismantles the robots or she leaves home. Reluctantly, Loren complies. Jana is ecstatic, but when she tells her parents that soon shell meet a young man and have children, their alarmed expressions fill her with a terrible suspicion. Frantically, she searches in vain through the family photo album for pictures of herself as a child. The truth becomes evident: Jana is a robot. Sobbing uncontrollably, she collapses at the top of the stairs. Realizing that things will never be the same, Dr. Loren erases Janas memory and reprograms her as a maid.

Let this be the postscript: should you be worn out by the rigors of competing in a very competitive world, if youre distraught from having to share your existence with the noises and neuroses of the twentieth century, if you crave serenity but want it full time and with no strings attached, get yourself a workroom in a basement and then drop a note to Dr. and Mrs. William Loren. They We a childless couple who made comfort a lifes work, and maybe there are a few do-it-yourself pamphlets still available in the Twilight Zone.

In the first of the tape shows, Serling tried to overcome the physical limitations imposed on him by making physical limitation a theme of the script.

I thought it had a good atmosphere to it, says director Jack Smight. Thats really what we were working on. I dont think the plot was that good really, but when we were rehearsing it we were working on atmosphere more than anything else, and I think we accomplished that. Then theres the ending of the episode, in which Jana, having discovered the truth about herself, is reprogrammed as a mindless maidservant. Its a surprising shock, and it packs a wallop.

Particularly welcome is the presence of John Hoyt as Dr. Loren. With a career that spans more than five decades, Hoyt is one of that small band of character actors who infuse individuality into every role they play, never letting a character become invisible or anonymous. Here he brings a cool and superior bearing, seeming totally believable as a restrained and brilliant inventor who is almost always in control.

STATIC (3/10/61)

Written by Charles Beaumont

Based on an unpublished story by OCee Ritch

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: Buzz Kulik

 Music: stock

Cast:

Ed Lindsay: Dean Jagger Vinnie Broun: Carmen Mathews Prof, Ackerman: Robert Emhardt Mrs. Nielsen: Alice Pearce Roscoe Bragg: Arch W. Johnson Boy: Stephen Talbot Miss Meredith: Lillian OMalley Mr. Llewellyn: Pat OMalley Junk Dealer: Clegg Hoyt Rock & Roll Singer: Jerry Fuller Real Estate Pitchman: Eddie Marr Girl in Commercial: Diane Strom Disc Jockey: Bob Crane TV/Radio Announcer: Roy Rowan Man #1: Bob Duggan Man #2: Jay Overholts

No one ever saw one quite like that, because that’s a very special sort of radio. In its day, circa 1935, its type was one of the most elegant consoles on the market. Now, with its fabric-covered speakers, its peculiar yellow dial, its serrated knobs, it looks quaint and a little strange. Mr. Ed Lindsay is going to find out how strange very soon when he tunes in to the Twilight Zone.

Disgusted by television, Lindsay, a cantankerous old bachelor, retrieves his old radio from the basement of the boardinghouse in which he lives and installs it in his room. He soon finds that it can receive programs from the past, but only when hes alone. Vinnie Broun, an old maid to whom he was once engaged, is convinced he hears the shows only in his mind, the result of a profound nostalgia for the good old days when the two of them had a chance for happiness. Lindsay utterly rejects this view and isolates himself with the radio. Concerned for his sanity, Vinnie gives the radio to the junk dealer. Furious, Lindsay retrieves it, praying that it still works. It does indeed when he calls Vinnie to come hear, it is an adoring, younger version who appears. The year is 1940, and Lindsay himself a young man again has been given a second chance.

Around and around she goes, and where she stops nobody knows. All Ed Lindsay knows is that he desperately wanted a second chance and he finally got it, through a strange and wonderful time machine called a radio … in the Twilight Zone

In anyone who mourns the demise of the old radio shows and the advent of television, this story of a radio that receives Tommy Dorsey, Major Bowes, and Fred Allen must surely strike a responsive chord.

Static was based on a story by OCee Ritch, a friend of Charles Beaumont. The idea for it came from a party given by Richard Matheson attended by both Ritch and a fan of old-time radio who performed bits of radio nostalgia. At the time, Ritch recalls, I think I said something like, Hey man, wouldnt it be great if you could just tune in those old things? So I went home and wrote a story called Tune in Yesterday. It was Chucks suggestion that I make it into a Twilight Zone instead of submitting it as a short story. I submitted it to Twilight Zone and they accepted it as a story on Chucks recommendation and asked him to do a teleplay based on it.

In reworking Ritchs story, Beaumont made substantial alterations. While the original concerned a middle-aged, unhappily married man who uses the radio to escape into the past, Beaumonts script deals with a sour, aging bachelor who lives in a boardinghouse under the same roof with the woman who might have been his wife had things not gone wrong. The magic radio gives the man a second chance, transporting him to an idyllic past in which he and his beloved did not let life pass them by.

Static also gave Beaumont a chance to take a few satiric jibes at television, utilizing the medium itself. Although not figuring at all in the original story, in Beaumonts teleplay television is presented as an antagonist, a destructive and stupefying force. The TV shows and commercials in Static are fictitious, but they bear a striking resemblance to reality:

ANNOUNCERS VOICE

GREEN … green, cool grass, the touch, the smell of green, cool grass, now brought to you for the first time in GREEN, the new chlorophyll cigarette, the smoke that doesnt smell like tobacco, but smells good, green, cool, like grass …

And this:

PITCHMANS VOICE (Hard sell) … if you act now, you can get your acreagein Splendid Flats for the fantastic, the unbelievable price of twenty-five cents an acre! A week! Look at this land!

Its flat! Its gray! Its undeveloped! But within ten years with the coming of water and people, it will be a veritable oasis of loveliness! Get in on it now, folks! Before the land value skyrockets!

Most of all, Static is a loving remembrance of something dear that is gone. In his book of nostalgic essays, Remember? Remember? (Macmillan, 1963), Beaumont wrote, The world of radio was real to us. There are squirts and small fry today who will soon be as old as the Us of Then, and I know some who havent turned a radio on in their entire lives. I try to tell them what it was like, but they dont understand. They cant believe Im talking about the little plastic box in the kitchen that plays rock-n-roll and gives us the news, and Im not sure I believe it, either. Television is the substitute for what we had, and I deem it a bad one. It inspires neither loyalty nor awe. It does not thrill, transport, terrify or enchant. It only entertains … The point is made even more succinctly by a line that Lindsay says in the episode: Radio is a world that has to be believed to be seen. Its true, and Static reminds us of that.