Twilight Zone Companion (38 page)

Mr. Paul Radin, a dealer in fantasy, who sits in the rubble of his own making and imagines that hes the last man on Earth, doomed to a perdition of unutterable loneliness because a practical joke has turned into a nightmare. Mr. Paul Radin, pallbearer at a funeral that he manufactured himself… in the Twilight Zone

In One More Pallbearer, the audience is clearly supposed to sympathize with the authority figures of the preacher, the colonel, and the schoolteacher; however, it just doesnt come off. Joseph Wiseman plays his role as the neurotic millionaire with such vulnerability and the others their roles with such unfeeling coldness that we cannot help but feel pity for him and contempt for the others. The dialogue doesnt help dissuade us from these feelings:

colonel: Are we to understand, Mr. Radin, that you will permit us this luxury, you will allow us to stay?

radin: Of course, colonel. As a matter of fact, its precisely why Ive asked you to come. Each of you in his own way has tried to destroy me, but Ill not repay the compliment. That is to say, I will not require an eye for an eye, nothing as primitive or as naked as that.

colonel: What is your price, Mr. Radin? Id be interested.

radin: The colonel would be interested. I presume the reverend and the schoolmarm would be interested. I submit, dear friends, youre not just interested. Its probably the only thing in Gods Earth that has any meaning left at all! But the price, colonel. You will beg my pardon, you will ask for my forgiveness, and if need be you will get down on your hands and knees to perform the function.

teacher: Pretty please with sugar on it.

radin:

Whats that, teacher?

teacher: Pretty please with sugar on it. Its what children say to exact a favor. I dont want your favor, Mr. Radin, let me out of here! If Im to spend my last half hour on Earth, Id rather spend it with a stray cat, or alone in Central Park, or in a city full of strangers whose names Ill never know.

reverend: The door, Radin, will you open the door now?

colonel: Open up, Radin!

radin: Youre too blind or youre too stupid, because none of you seem to understand. All you have to do, literally all you have to do, is to say a sentence. Just a string of silly, stupid words, like a command, colonel, or like a lesson, teacher, or like a prayer, reverendall you have to do is say youre sorry!

Needless to say, they dont apologize. In the end, Radin goes mad, and the three escape untouched, either physically or emotionally, safe in their sanctimonious hypocrisy, to destroy yet more peoples lives. Unintentionally an unhappy ending … in the Twilight Zone.

DEAD MANS SHOES (1/19/62)

Written by Charles Beaumont

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: Montgomery Pittman

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Music: stock

Cast: Nate Bledsoe: Warren Stevens Chips: Ben Wright Wilma: Joan Marshall Sam: Harry Swoger Maitre D: Eugene Borden Dagget: Richard Devon Daggets Woman: Florence Marly Ben: Ron Hagerthy Jimmy: Joe Mell

Nathan Edward Bledsoe, of the Bowery Bledsoes, a man once, a specter now. One of those myriad modern-day ghosts that haunt the reeking nights of the city in search of a flop, a handout, a glass of forgetfulness. Nate doesnt know it but his search is about to end, because those shiny new shoes are going to carry him right into the capital of the Twilight Zone.

After slipping on a pair of expensive shoes hes removed from the body of a murdered gangster, Bledsoe is taken over by the spirit of the dead mana spirit intent on revenge. He locates the killer Dagget, the deceased former business partner and tries to shoot him, but is instead gunned down himself. Before he dies, the ghost inside Bledsoe makes a pledge: to keep coming back until he succeeds in killing Dagget. Bledsoes body is dumped in an alley. Assuming Bledsoe is asleep, a fellow vagrant steals the fancy shoesand the cycle begins anew.

Theres an old saying that goes, (If the shoe fits, wear it. But be careful. If you happen to find a pair of size nine black-and-gray loafers, made to order in the old country, be very carefulyou might walk right into the Twilight Zone.

Originally, the idea of this episode was to have the haunted item be a cowboy hat, but this was soon altered. I think it was a good change, says Buck Houghton, because it seems to me that shoes would take you places you werent intending to go, whereas a hat wouldnt.

Although the show is credited to Charles Beaumont, at the time Beaumont was too loaded down with other assignments to do the script, so he farmed the job out to OCee Ritch, who had originated the idea for Static. At the very least, Ritch ghostwrote the entire first draft of the script, a fact of which Buck Houghton was totally unaware at the time. Perhaps as a result of all these subterranean dealings, the writing is very muddy, the characterizations extremely sketchy. The idea is a good one, but the story lacks a feeling of authenticity. The characters all feel like old carbon copies of various B-movie types, rather than being based on real people, and this is death for Dead Mans Shoes.

A PIANO IN THE HOUSE (2/16/62)

Written by Earl Hamner, Jr.

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: David Greene

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Music: stock

Cast: Fitzgerald Fortune: Barry Morse Esther Fortune: Joan Hackett Marge Moore: Muriel Landers Marvin the Butler: Cyril Delevanti Gregory Walker: Don Durant Throckmorton: Phil Coolidge

Mr. Fitzgerald Fortune, theater critic and cynic at large, on his way to a birthday party. If he knew what is in store for him he probably wouldnt go, because before this evening is over that cranky old piano is going to play Those Piano Roll Blues with some effects that could happen only in the Twilight Zone.

Fortune buys his wife a player piano for her birthday, then discovers it has magical propertiesi ts music reveals peoples hidden faces. A hardhearted curio-shop owner gushes with sentimentality; a solemn butler bursts out with gales of laughter. Using it on his wife, Fortune discovers that she actually detests him. Fortune decides that the piano is the ideal tool to humiliate his wifes party guests. Under the musics spell, a seemingly jaded playwright admits to being passionately in love with Fortunes wife. A boisterous fat woman reveals fantasies of being a delicate, graceful little girl and a beloved, beautiful snowflake. Delighted with his cruel game, Fortune hands his wife another roll to put in the piano, but she substitutes a different piece, one that bewitches Fortune and strips him of his facade. In truth, he is no more than a frightened, sadistic child. Disgusted and embarrassed, the guests depart along with Fortunes wife.

Mr. Fitzgerald Fortune, a man who went searching for concealed persons and found himselfin the Twilight Zone.

Earl Hamner, Jr.s A Piano in the House unfortunately suffers from superficial characterization. The main character is a sadistic theater critic (Barry Morse) with the unlikely name of Fitzgerald Fortune. He buys a magic player piano that has the ability to reveal peoples inner selves and

uses it to humiliate his wife (Joan Hackett) and various of her friends. In the end, of course, the piano is turned against Fortune himself and we see that he is nothing more than an ill-tempered child. The episode boasts competent performances by Joan Hackett as Fortunes wife and Cyril Delevanti as his butler, plus an exceptional performance by Muriel Landers as a fat woman with a fragile and secret soul.

Again the problem was the writer dealing with characters not at all connected with reality. Says Earl Hamner, Id never known a critic, but it was my idea of what a critic was like.

SHOWDOWN WITH RANCE McGREW (2/2/62)

Written by Rod Serling

Buck Houghton

Director: Christian Nyby

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Music: stock

Cast: Rance McGrew: Larry Blyden Jesse James: Arch Johnson Director: Robert Cornthwaite TV Jesse James: Robert Kline Property Man: William McLean Cowboy #1: Troy Melton Cowboy #2: Jay Overholts TV Bartender: Robert J. Stevenson Old Man: Hal K. Dawson Double for Ranee: Jim Turley

Some one-hundred-odd years ago, a motley collection of tough moustaches galloped across the West and left behind a raft of legends and legerdemains, and it seems a reasonable conjecture that if there are any television sets up in cowboy heaven and any of these rough-and-wooly nail-eaters could see with what careless abandon their names are bandied about, theyre very likely turning over in their gravesor worse, getting out of them. Which gives you a clue as to the proceedings that will begin in just a moment, when one Mr. Ranee McGrew, a three-thousand-buck-a-week phony-baloney discovers that this weeks current edition of make-believe is being shot on location-and that location is the Twilight Zone.

Temperamental TV cowboy star McGrew is about to film a scene in which Jesse James shoots him in the back when he abruptly finds himself in a genuine Old West saloon. The real Jesse James enters and explains that he and the other famous desperadoes are dismayed at how they are portrayed on McGrews show. He challenges McGrew whos never shot a gun in his lifeto a showdown. McGrew tries to run away, but Jesse corners him and draws. McGrew falls to his knees, saying hell do anything if only Jesse will spare him. Jesse accepts; McGrew is returned to the set. But then McGrews agentb Jesse himself arrives. He intends to stay and insure that the outlaws consistently have the upper hand beginning with the TV Jesse throwing McGrew through a plate-glass window.

The evolution of the so-called adult western, and the metamorphosis of one Ranee McGrew, formerly phony-baloney, now upright citizen with a preoccupation with all things involving tradition, truth and cowpoke predecessors. Its the way the cookie crumbles and the six-gun shoots … in the Twilight Zone.

This is what Serling had to say about the episode: Fred Fox had an interesting notion, which was quite serious, about a modern-day cowpoke, not a television star, who found himself living in the past. It had no sense of humor in it. It was a straightforward piece. But it struck me that it would be a terribly interesting concept to have a guy who plays the role of a Hollywood cowboy suddenly thrust into the maelstrom of reality in which he has to do all these acts of prowess against real people… . And it just occurred to me, My God, what would happen if the Ranee McGrews of our time had to face this? I used to think this about John Wayne all the time, who had fought most of our major wars. In truth, of course, they were fought on the backlot of Warner Brothers, in which the most deadly jeopardy would be to get hit by a flying starlet. And I always wondered what Waynes reaction would be if he ever had to lift up an M-l and go through a bloody foxhole on attack sometime. But this is the element of humor that I was striving to get.

An intriguing concept, but Showdown With Ranee McGrew fails to come off, specifically because the real Old West presented in the episode is every bit as TV-phony as the bogus Old West in the episode. The sets are identical and the look is the same. The real Jesse James is no closer to historical reality than the phony one. Had it been done correctly, with the Old West presented as it really was, the show probably would have been quite entertainingand it might have helped to deflate a few myths. As it is, though, Showdown With Ranee McGrew is just dated, tedious, and silly.

THE LITTLE PEOPLE (3/30/62)

Written by Rod Serling

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: William Claxton

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Music: stock

Cast: Peter Craig: Joe Maross William Fletcher: Claude Akins Spaceman #1: Michael Ford Spaceman #2: Robert Eaton

The time is the space age, the place is a barren landscape of a rock-walled canyon that lies millions of miles from the planet Earth. The cast of characters? Youve met them: William Fletcher, commander of the spaceship; his copilot, Peter Craig. The other characters who inhabit this place you may never see, but theyre there, as these two gentlemen will soon find out. Because theyre about to partake in a little exploration into that gray, shaded area in space and time thats known as the Twilight Zone.

After their ship is damaged by meteors, Fletcher and Craig set down in the canyon to effect repairs. While Fletcher works on the engines, Craig investigates the terrainand discovers an Earth-type civilization populated by beings no larger than ants. Craig becomes a full-blown megalomaniac, terrorizing the little people by stamping on their city and proclaiming himself a god. When Fletcher informs him that the ship is fixed and that they can leave, Craig pulls a gun on him and orders him to depart alone; he intends to stayand theres no room for two gods. Fletcher blasts off. But then another ship lands. Two spacemen emerge, bigger than mountains, towering over Craig. Hysterically, he screams at them to go away. Drawn by the sound, one of the spacemen picks Craig up, inadvertently crushing him to death.

The case of navigator Peter Craig, a victim of a delusion. In this case, the dream dies a little harder than the man. A small exercise in space psychology that you can try on for sizein the Twilight Zone.

Of The Little People, Buck Houghton remembers, For the final shot we were having a hell of a time, because scale is very hard to achieve. And what we did was to take a shot that had been made for I Shot an Arrow Into the Air. We were in Death Valley, and because the fellow in

search of where the hell they were decided to go over that mountain and somebody said, Geez, we cant get over that,’ we had a point-of-view shot straight up to the mountains, very tall, very ominous, shot quite close to the foot of it. I recalled a painting I once ran across, I forget by whom, a fairly famous painter of former times, that posed a genie who was looming up over mountains that gave him scale. So what we did was take an up shot of the two astronauts and matted this shot that we had of the mountains over it, so that they looked like they were standing over something that had some scale.