The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic

1368 Pages·2014·7.42 MB·English

by  Martin Grams Jr

The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic
© 2014 Martin Grams Jr. All Rights Reserved.

Foreword Title © 2014 George Clayton Johnson. All Rights Reserved.

“The Twilight Zone” is a registered trademark of CBS, Inc. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, digital, photocopying or recording, except for the inclusion in a
review, without permission in writing from the publisher.

This version of the book may be slightly abridged from the print version.

Published in the USA by:
OTR Publishing, LLC
PO Box 252
Churchville, Maryland 21028
www.martingrams.com

ISBN 978-0-9703310-9-0

Cover Design by Darlene & Dan Swanson of Van-garde Imagery, Inc..
eBook construction by Brian Pearce | Red Jacket Press.
Table of Contents

Foreword
Introduction

History of The Twilight Zone
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine

The Episode Guide
Season One
“WHERE IS EVERYBODY?”
“ONE FOR THE ANGELS”
“MR. DENTON ON DOOMSDAY”
“THE SIXTEEN MILLIMETER SHRINE”
“WALKING DISTANCE”
“ESCAPE CLAUSE”
“THE LONELY”
“TIME ENOUGH AT LAST”
“PERCHANCE TO DREAM”
“JUDGMENT NIGHT”
“AND WHEN THE SKY WAS OPENED”
“WHAT YOU NEED”
“THE FOUR OF US ARE DYING”
“THIRD FROM THE SUN”
“I SHOT AN ARROW INTO THE AIR”
“THE HITCH-HIKER”
“THE FEVER”
“THE LAST FLIGHT”
“THE PURPLE TESTAMENT”
“ELEGY”
“MIRROR IMAGE”
“THE MONSTERS ARE DUE ON MAPLE STREET”
“A WORLD OF DIFFERENCE”
“LONG LIVE WALTER JAMESON”
“PEOPLE ARE ALIKE ALL OVER”
“EXECUTION”
“THE BIG, TALL WISH”
“A NICE PLACE TO VISIT”
“NIGHTMARE AS A CHILD”
“A STOP AT WILLOUGHBY”
“THE CHASER”
“A PASSAGE FOR TRUMPET”
“MR. BEVIS”
“THE AFTER HOURS”
“THE MIGHTY CASEY”
“A WORLD OF HIS OWN”

Season Two
“KING NINE WILL NOT RETURN”
“THE MAN IN THE BOTTLE”
“NERVOUS MAN IN A FOUR DOLLAR ROOM”
“A THING ABOUT MACHINES”
“THE HOWLING MAN”
“EYE OF THE BEHOLDER”
“NICK OF TIME”
“THE LATENESS OF THE HOUR”
“THE TROUBLE WITH TEMPLETON”
“A MOST UNUSUAL CAMERA”
“THE NIGHT OF THE MEEK”
“DUST”
“BACK THERE”
“THE WHOLE TRUTH”
“THE INVADERS”
“A PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS”
“TWENTY TWO”
“THE ODYSSEY OF FLIGHT 33”
“MR. DINGLE, THE STRONG”
“STATIC”
“THE PRIME MOVER”
“LONG DISTANCE CALL”
“A HUNDRED YARDS OVER THE RIM”
“THE RIP VAN WINKLE CAPER”
“THE SILENCE”
“SHADOW PLAY”
“THE MIND AND THE MATTER”
“WILL THE REAL MARTIAN PLEASE STAND UP?”
THE OASIS COMMERCIALS
“THE OBSOLETE MAN”

Season Three
“TWO”
“THE ARRIVAL”
“THE SHELTER”
“THE PASSERSBY”
“A GAME OF POOL”
“THE MIRROR”
“THE GRAVE”
“IT’S A GOOD LIFE”
“DEATHS-HEAD REVISITED”
“THE MIDNIGHT SUN”
“STILL VALLEY”
“THE JUNGLE”
“ONCE UPON A TIME”
“FIVE CHARACTERS IN SEARCH OF AN EXIT”
“A QUALITY OF MERCY”
“NOTHING IN THE DARK”
“ONE MORE PALLBEARER”
“DEAD MAN’S SHOES”
“THE HUNT”
“SHOWDOWN WITH RANCE MCGREW”
“KICK THE CAN”
“A PIANO IN THE HOUSE”
“THE LAST RITES OF JEFF MYRTLEBANK”
“TO SERVE MAN”
“THE FUGITIVE”
“LITTLE GIRL LOST”
“PERSON OR PERSONS UNKNOWN”
“THE LITTLE PEOPLE”
“FOUR O’CLOCK”
“HOCUS-POCUS AND FRISBY”
“THE TRADE-INS”
“THE GIFT”
“THE DUMMY”
“YOUNG MAN’S FANCY”
“I SING THE BODY ELECTRIC”
“CAVENDER IS COMING”
“THE CHANGING OF THE GUARD”

Season Four
“IN HIS IMAGE”
“THE THIRTY FATHOM GRAVE”
“VALLEY OF THE SHADOW”
“HE’S ALIVE”
“MUTE”
“DEATH SHIP”
“JESS-BELLE”
“MINIATURE”
“PRINTER’S DEVIL”
“NO TIME LIKE THE PAST”
“THE PARALLEL”
“I DREAM OF GENIE”
“THE NEW EXHIBIT”
“OF LATE I THINK OF CLIFFORDVILLE”
“THE INCREDIBLE WORLD OF HORACE FORD”
“ON THURSDAY WE LEAVE FOR HOME”
“PASSAGE ON THE LADY ANNE”
“THE BARD”

Season Five
“IN PRAISE OF PIP”
“STEEL”
“NIGHTMARE AT 20,000 FEET”
“A KIND OF A STOPWATCH”
“THE LAST NIGHT OF A JOCKEY”
“GENTLEMEN, BE SEATED”
“LIVING DOLL”
“THE OLD MAN IN THE CAVE”
“UNCLE SIMON”
“PROBE 7, OVER AND OUT”
“THE 7TH IS MADE UP OF PHANTOMS”
“A SHORT DRINK FROM A CERTAIN FOUNTAIN”
“NINETY YEARS WITHOUT SLUMBERING”
“RING-A-DING GIRL”
“YOU DRIVE”
“THE LONG MORROW”
“THE SELF-IMPROVEMENT OF SALVADORE ROSS”
“WHAT THE DEVIL?”
“THE DOLL”
“NUMBER 12 LOOKS JUST LIKE YOU”
“BLACK LEATHER JACKETS”
“NIGHT CALL”
“FROM AGNES — WITH LOVE”
“SPUR OF THE MOMENT”
“AN OCCURRENCE AT OWL CREEK BRIDGE”
“QUEEN OF THE NILE”
“WHO AM I?”
“WHAT’S IN THE BOX”
“THE MASKS”
“I AM THE NIGHT — COLOR ME BLACK”
“MANY, MANY MONKEYS”
“SOUNDS AND SILENCES”
“CAESAR AND ME”
“THE JEOPARDY ROOM”
“STOPOVER IN A QUIET TOWN”
“THE ENCOUNTER”
“MR. GARRITY AND THE GRAVES”
“THE BRAIN CENTER AT WHIPPLE’S”
“COME WANDER WITH ME”
“THE FEAR”
“THE BEWITCHIN’ POOL”

Appendix A: Production Credits
Appendix B: The Twilight Zone Books
Appendix C: The Twilight Zone Comic Books
Appendix D: List of Stations Carrying The Twilight Zone: The First Season
Selected Bibliography
About The Author
A Belated Letter to Rod Serling
by George Clayton Johnson
September 22, 2008
Mr. Rod Serling
Somewhere in The Twilight Zone

Dear Rod:
I believe that your name, Rod Serling, has become as recognizable as the title
of your landmark show itself. I also believe that someone who wanted to carry
on the Twilight Zone tradition might call their new series simply “The Rod
Serling Show” without infringing the CBS trademark title and still reach the
Twilight Zone audience.
By now, having watched most of the episodes several times I can easily
picture you in my imagination as a character, very dapper in your neat black suit,
living in cyberspace made out of pixels like Max Headroom knowing everything
that is happening on the World Wide Web and in the lives of the people who log
on ready to intrude into the scene itself with a trenchant commentary to provide
a necessary moral dimension to the lives of those young cell-phone viewers who
love surfing the net and will track down the show if those new stories are any
good.
Congratulations, Rod, on your well-deserved Global celebrity. A lot of people
are now giving you a lot of attention, including one fellow in particular. You
may be aware that one of your devoted fans, writer Martin Grams Jr., has been
working his butt off forever on a massive book about the making of The Twilight
Zone television series for that self-same audience. He showed me part of his
manuscript. I believe you will be pleased. I congratulate the guy for his
admirable dedication to getting the details straight. I also praise OTR Publishing
for having the wisdom to recognize the singular contribution that you have made
to television history. The book will get a lot of attention from the fans of the
show of which, as you know, there are many. Next year is the 50th anniversary
of your series and the show is as hot as ever with all of the episodes available on
DVD from Image Entertainment. Barry Hoffman of Gauntlet Press is publishing
The Complete Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling in many volumes. Almost all
of the other scripts are now in print and selling well. They show up here and
there with increasing frequency as stage-plays.
What an astonishing shelf-life for a piece of television entertainment and a
great testament to the timeless nature of the program and the quality production
you brought to the project.
At first, The Twilight Zone had a small audience which helped keep executive
hands off, thankfully, and allowed you and Buck Houghton to run things the way
you wanted.
Although you were legally obligated to write the bulk of the scripts you were
permitted to hire other writers to help out which brings in Charles Beaumont and
Richard Matheson to take up the slack but as fast and as good as these two gifted
men were there was a need occasionally for other writers to add their sparkle to
The Twilight Zone which brings in Earl Hamner and Reginald Rose and
Montgomery Pittman and a few others including me.
This was long ago when, with my wife Lola’s permission, who said, “You
can’t tie a man’s legs together and expect him to run,” I had quit my drafting job
at U.S. Steel after buying a house on the G.I. Bill with neither of us knowing
how we’d make the necessary monthly payments without a regular income.
I’d then spent five solid, anxiety-ridden years becoming a beatnik
existentialist trying to write slightly surreal off-beat short stories without any
success whatever.
By that time my house was facing foreclosure and I was in debt with doors
closing on all sides.
When I got that $500 check from Cayuga Productions as payment for the non-
exclusive right for you to adapt my story “All Of Us Are Dying” into an episode
of your excellent television series, The Twilight Zone, it heartened me as you can
well imagine.
“All Of Us Are Dying” was my first sale to television, indeed, my first short-
story sale and it was, fortunately, enough money for me to pay several months of
delinquent house payments and to buy groceries besides. It gave me hope.
The suspenseful job you did with my story transforming it into “The Four Of
Us Are Dying” episode of The Twilight Zone taught me a lot about television
drama.
The episode aired on New Year’s day, 1960.
Change was in the air.
I noticed that many of your finest pieces and many of the stories you bought
to adapt were basically filmed stage plays which was something I believed I
could learn to write. You and Buck Houghton gave me a chance to prove I could
do it with “A Penny For Your Thoughts.”
Your acceptance of my script put me on a permanent search for story ideas
dealing with the imaginary — some of which found their way to the screen. The
hidden hand was at work that day for your decision to buy my material had far-