Rod Serling and The Twilight Zone: The 50th Anniversary Tribute by Douglas Brode and Carol Serling (Reviewing pgs. 21-38)
Brode calls Chapter 2 "What Dreams May Come: Nightmares at Noon."
He starts with a biographical tidbit saying that while Serling was at Antioch, a bit from Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew fascinated him. Two characters dress an unconscious drunk in finery, and when he wakes, they persuade him that he is really a nobleman, and that all he remembers of his previous life was just a nightmare.
Brode then examines the following Twilight Zone episodes: "Where is Everybody?," "King Nine Will Not Return," "Perchance to Dream," Nightmare as a Child," "Shadow Play," and "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge."
Each of these episodes involve dreams/hallucinations, and some also involve confusion of identity.
Brode sees "King Nine Will Not Return" as an attempt to redo "Where is Everybody?" Brode says Serling added enough new elements to "King Nine" that the stories don't seem too similar to viewers. Brode claims Serling aimed to correct shortcomings in "Where is Everybody?"
"Where is Everybody?" is one of my favorite episodes. Sure, it was the pilot episode, and Serling hadn't quite struck on a signature style for the show. He ended the episode with everything rationally explained and without one final reality bending jolt. Serling later supplied that jolt when he turned "Where is Everybody? into a short story for the book Stories from the Twilight Zone.
In "King Nine," Serling accomplishes this with the unexplained presence of sand following a "rational" explanation of the protagonist's dream that he'd seen images of his old crew and been to the site where the bomber he flew in W.W. II crashed in the Sahara Desert.
Brode supplies interesting insights and biographical details on "Nightmare as a Child." Helen Foley, a teacher and the story's protagonist, was named after one of Serling's teachers.
Discussing episodes which Serling didn't write, including, "Perchance to Dream," Shadow Play," and "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge," Brode continues developing his argument that Serling was The Twilight Zone's auteur.
"Auteur" usually identifies directors whose work complies with "auteur theory," the idea that directors are the chief creators of films and give the films their distinctive style. Of course, Serling didn't direct Twilight Zone episodes. He did write more scripts than anyone else. He narrated. Plus, he had a lot of creative control. For instance, in The Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling Volume I (Gauntlet, 2004), Tony Albarella while discussing "Where is Everybody? quotes the producer as saying that he told Serling that Serling's original pilot script wouldn't work as a pilot. and that he wanted something else. The producer said Serling could have had him removed from the show. Serling didn't do this however, and instead came back with the script for "Where is Everybody?"
Brode believes that Serling - as a writer, a narrator, and with his influence over the show's creative direction - gave the show its distinct style, even on episodes he didn't script.
I find this persuasive on the Richard Matheson scripted "Perchance to Dream." Seeing Serling's "The Time Element" from Desilu Westinghouse Playhouse, and reading the script for it, I noticed it shared a lot of plot elements with The Twilight Zone episode "Perchance to Dream" broadcast about a year later.
In both stories, a man sees a psychiatrist about a reoccurring dream which he believes will go a little further one day. In both stories, the dream leads to the men's death. The difference is in what the men dream about. One dream is about traveling through time and space to Pearl Harbor on December 6, 1941. The other dream is about being stalked by a mysterious woman.
Brode relates elements of "Shadow Play" (script credited to Charles Beaumont) to other episodes.
Brode's argument sounds far-fetched when it comes to "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge." It's actually a French short film adapting an Ambrose Bierce story. Serling had no involvement in its creation.
However, Brode contends that the work reflected many of Serling's interests and viewpoints. So Serling's choice to use it as an episode provides another example of him supplying The Twilight Zone with its distinctive style.
Sunday, August 16, 2009
Saturday, August 8, 2009
Rod Serling and The Twilight Zone: The 50th Anniversary Tribute Review Part I
Rod Serling and The Twilight Zone: The 50th Anniversary Tribute by Douglas Brode and Carol Serling. (Barricade Books, Fort Lee, N.J., 2009, 245 pages) Reviewing pages i-xxviii and 1-20.
I confess to being a little confused. I'm glad I bought this book, and I'm excited to read it, but there's something I don't understand.
The book carries the byline "Douglas Brode and Carol Serling." Yet in her Foreword, Mrs. Serling, Rod's widow, calls this "Douglas Brode's remarkable book." So far, I haven't seen Brode's explanation for the coauthor credit.
It's understandable that someone publishing a book about Rod Serling and The Twilight Zone wants Mrs. Serling's name on the cover. Rod and Carol Serling met as students at Antioch after he returned from World War II. This, of course, was long before he became famous. As young, married college students, they lived in a trailer without heat or running water.
Carol Serling encouraged her husband's writing. How many other wives would've insisted instead that their husbands get a "real" (please don't overlook the quotation marks) job? She served as a first reader, critiquing her husband's writing. She also gave him important career advice. Since Rod Serling's death, Carol Serling has been a caretaker of his legacy. So for this fan, at least, hers is a prestigious name on a Twilight Zone project.
Maybe Brode's being generous with the byline, or maybe it's Mrs. Serling who's generous in her Foreword. If I see an explanation elsewhere, I'll mention it in a future post. Anyway, it's easy to envision, Mrs. Serling providing valuable source material and insights. So far, Brode places great importance on how personal experiences influenced Serling's work. So source material and insight is key.
In her Foreword, Mrs. Serling promotes the work which follows. She also theorizes about why The Twilight Zone still appeals to so many people decades after its original run ended.
In his introduction, Brode explains the scope and purpose of the book. Brode says, "This volume will concentrate on those Zones which touch a common core, focusing on classics written by Serling himself. Key episodes by other contributors will be discussed in passing so Zone's full impact will be fully represented." (xxvii) Brode cautions that this book isn't intended to have encyclopedia like entries on every episode, and notes that Mark Scott Zicree's The Twilight Zone Companion already fulfills that purpose.
As you can see, Brode uses both italics and bold font when referring to The Twilight Zone, which he often abbreviates as Zone or, in his manner, Zone.
Brode includes a biographical sketch of Serling which could work as a chapter of its own. Brode didn't use footnotes, and I'll have to read further to see if he cited sources for the information. (Did Carol Serling contribute heavily in providing biographical info?)
Minor errors pop up in places. One I recall was dating Twilight Zone The Movie as 1978 instead of 1983
The introduction struck one sour note.
If Brode intends to prompt greater appreciation of Serling, then he made a counterproductive statement near the start. He said something which may close minds against Serling rather than open them. It won't bother fans who put Serling ahead of all other writers, or at least all other genre writers. (Me? I include my favorite genre writers among my favorite writers period.) Brode's statement may bother fans who recognize the wonderful creativity displayed by other writers besides Serling. It may garner hostility toward Serling from those devoted to other writers and who placed Serling in a lesser rank but who had been willing to reconsider his work.
In his second paragraph, Brode refers to "Serling's stellar reputation as the most imaginative of all American writers since Edgar Allan Poe." (xv) This is unnecessarily confrontational and prompts argument as well. Fans (fanatics) devoted to other writers will take this as an insult to their favorite writers. Sure, that's close minded. For instance, had someone argued that "Clifford Ball was the most imaginative writer since Poe," I'd like to think I could keep an open mind toward Ball's work even though I think other writers were more imaginative.
Unfortunately, that's not the way I see fans react when someone makes such "my writer is better than your writer" statements. They usually grow hostile and go ad hominem toward the rival writer to diminish him and make their favorite look better in comparison. So, if your goal is to show people what's great about Serling's work and why he deserves greater respect, then it's counterproductive to push them into closing their minds.
Brode's claim makes me wonder if he's even knowledgeable enough about science fiction, fantasy, and horror to make such an assessment. Hemingway and Fitzgerald didn't choose to focus on tales of time travel, space travel, aliens, androids, and the supernatural. Still is Serling really more imaginative than H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Robert Heinlein, Stanley Weinbaum, Edmond Hamilton, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Clark Ashton Smith, or Ray Bradbury to name just a few American writers whose careers began between Poe's time and Serling's?
For instance, consider Bradbury.
I know Bradbury harbors bad feelings toward Serling. Despite Bradbury's influence on the show, his own script submissions missed what Serling wanted. At the same time, many episodes contain similarities to a number of Bradbury's stories. Bradbury went overboard though when he accused Serling of plagiarism. His contention that Serling lifted "Walking Distance" from "The Black Ferris" is particularly off-base.
That said, is "Walking Distance"(a man steps into the past and meets his boyhood self) more imaginative than "The Black Ferris" (criminal carnies turn into children by riding a Ferris wheel backwards)? Is "Where is Everybody?" (a man finds himself in a strange, abandoned town) more imaginative than Bradbury's earlier "The Silent Towns" (a man wanders through abandoned towns on Mars)? Is Serling's adaptation of Matheson's "Third From the Sun" (2 families fleeing an impending nuclear holocaust head for another world) more imaginative than Bradbury's earlier "The Million-Year Picnic" (2 families fleeing an impending nuclear holocaust arrive on a new world)?
Brode at least shows familiarity with Bradbury though. He appears unaware of several other noted genre writers. On pages xvi-xvii, Brode discusses horror and how Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Wolfman had grown quaint, the stuff of jokes and comedy. He cites Serling, Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, and Ray Bradbury as writers of a new kind of horror. Brode demonstrates no familiarity with H.P. Lovecraft, who three decades before The Twilight Zone, had already created a new brand of horror, distinct from tales of vampires and werewolves as it was from Serling and co.'s stories.
I love Serling's work. I love The Twilight Zone. Serling is one of my favorite writers. Despite that, I see no evidence that Serling is more imaginative, than Bradbury, Lovecraft, Howard, the other writers I listed, and others whom I didn't. Yet he certainly had a great imagination.
Calling Serling "one of the most imaginative American writers since Poe" would be more accurate, fair, and productive than saying he is the most imaginative of all American writers since Poe" (emphasis added). The first statement is inclusive recognizing that other writers may equal or surpass Serling in terms of pure imagination. The second one dismisses the possibility that a Ray Bradbury or an H.P. Lovecraft was as imaginative as or possibly even more imaginative than Serling.
I think Serling was too humble when he said, "I don't have the imagination most writers have." While, I understand Brode's desire to balance Serling's statement, it would be a shame to let such hyperbole reflect badly on Serling, especially considering Serling's own humility when comparing himself to others.
As I mentioned earlier, Brode groups his analyses in chapters by theme. Chapter 1 examines nostalgia. He includes "Walking Distance," "A Stop at Willoughby," and "The Incredible World of Horace Ford." Other episodes such as "No Time Like the Past" deal with nostalgia, but also fit in the chapters where Brode placed them instead.
As he promised in the introduction, Brode goes in depth on Serling's better known stories while devoting less time to "The Incredible World of Horace Ford."
Brode's interpretations of a few of these episodes differ slightly from my own. Brode's views provoked thought.
For instance in "Walking Distance," Martin Sloan enters a drugstore without realizing he's stepped 35 years back into the past. He's surprised to learn 3 scoop ice cream sodas only cost a dime. He says that nobody sells sodas for a dime any more and says, "you're gonna lose your shirt."
To me, this hints that something is amiss. It foreshadows that Sloan has entered the past, and it evokes the nostalgia which infuses the episode. One of the common things people discuss when waxing nostalgic is to note how low prices were. Look at those birthday cards themed around remembering the year someone was born. They include pictures, list popular songs, movies, and the prices of a few things which cost much more now. One everyday thing people notice most when looking back at the modern past is prices. When I was a kid plunking down 35 cents for a comic book, I'd have gotten rich if I had a dime every time an adult said "Back when I was a kid, comics only cost 10 cents!"
So for me, this statement ties in with nostalgia and going back in time, but for Brode there's something else. It indicates that Sloan's "flight to freedom is doomed to failure; how can you run away from the contemporary money culture when you carry it around inside?" (3)
Brode earlier discussed how he saw Serling's work as criticizing, the post-war, upwardly mobile, suburban life style. It's a critique from the inside rather than the outside. Brode paints Serling as someone who enjoyed that lifestyle, but who had some misgivings.
In these episodes, The Twilight Zone explores nostalgia with varying outcomes. They range from accepting change and resolving to find the good things still around us to a total surrender and retreat into an idyllic dream world. "The Incredible World of Horace Ford" warns us that we often remember the good things and forget the bad. Kinda like how we remember those lower prices but forget the lower wages.
I confess to being a little confused. I'm glad I bought this book, and I'm excited to read it, but there's something I don't understand.
The book carries the byline "Douglas Brode and Carol Serling." Yet in her Foreword, Mrs. Serling, Rod's widow, calls this "Douglas Brode's remarkable book." So far, I haven't seen Brode's explanation for the coauthor credit.
It's understandable that someone publishing a book about Rod Serling and The Twilight Zone wants Mrs. Serling's name on the cover. Rod and Carol Serling met as students at Antioch after he returned from World War II. This, of course, was long before he became famous. As young, married college students, they lived in a trailer without heat or running water.
Carol Serling encouraged her husband's writing. How many other wives would've insisted instead that their husbands get a "real" (please don't overlook the quotation marks) job? She served as a first reader, critiquing her husband's writing. She also gave him important career advice. Since Rod Serling's death, Carol Serling has been a caretaker of his legacy. So for this fan, at least, hers is a prestigious name on a Twilight Zone project.
Maybe Brode's being generous with the byline, or maybe it's Mrs. Serling who's generous in her Foreword. If I see an explanation elsewhere, I'll mention it in a future post. Anyway, it's easy to envision, Mrs. Serling providing valuable source material and insights. So far, Brode places great importance on how personal experiences influenced Serling's work. So source material and insight is key.
In her Foreword, Mrs. Serling promotes the work which follows. She also theorizes about why The Twilight Zone still appeals to so many people decades after its original run ended.
In his introduction, Brode explains the scope and purpose of the book. Brode says, "This volume will concentrate on those Zones which touch a common core, focusing on classics written by Serling himself. Key episodes by other contributors will be discussed in passing so Zone's full impact will be fully represented." (xxvii) Brode cautions that this book isn't intended to have encyclopedia like entries on every episode, and notes that Mark Scott Zicree's The Twilight Zone Companion already fulfills that purpose.
As you can see, Brode uses both italics and bold font when referring to The Twilight Zone, which he often abbreviates as Zone or, in his manner, Zone.
Brode includes a biographical sketch of Serling which could work as a chapter of its own. Brode didn't use footnotes, and I'll have to read further to see if he cited sources for the information. (Did Carol Serling contribute heavily in providing biographical info?)
Minor errors pop up in places. One I recall was dating Twilight Zone The Movie as 1978 instead of 1983
The introduction struck one sour note.
If Brode intends to prompt greater appreciation of Serling, then he made a counterproductive statement near the start. He said something which may close minds against Serling rather than open them. It won't bother fans who put Serling ahead of all other writers, or at least all other genre writers. (Me? I include my favorite genre writers among my favorite writers period.) Brode's statement may bother fans who recognize the wonderful creativity displayed by other writers besides Serling. It may garner hostility toward Serling from those devoted to other writers and who placed Serling in a lesser rank but who had been willing to reconsider his work.
In his second paragraph, Brode refers to "Serling's stellar reputation as the most imaginative of all American writers since Edgar Allan Poe." (xv) This is unnecessarily confrontational and prompts argument as well. Fans (fanatics) devoted to other writers will take this as an insult to their favorite writers. Sure, that's close minded. For instance, had someone argued that "Clifford Ball was the most imaginative writer since Poe," I'd like to think I could keep an open mind toward Ball's work even though I think other writers were more imaginative.
Unfortunately, that's not the way I see fans react when someone makes such "my writer is better than your writer" statements. They usually grow hostile and go ad hominem toward the rival writer to diminish him and make their favorite look better in comparison. So, if your goal is to show people what's great about Serling's work and why he deserves greater respect, then it's counterproductive to push them into closing their minds.
Brode's claim makes me wonder if he's even knowledgeable enough about science fiction, fantasy, and horror to make such an assessment. Hemingway and Fitzgerald didn't choose to focus on tales of time travel, space travel, aliens, androids, and the supernatural. Still is Serling really more imaginative than H.P. Lovecraft, Robert E. Howard, Robert Heinlein, Stanley Weinbaum, Edmond Hamilton, Edgar Rice Burroughs, Clark Ashton Smith, or Ray Bradbury to name just a few American writers whose careers began between Poe's time and Serling's?
For instance, consider Bradbury.
I know Bradbury harbors bad feelings toward Serling. Despite Bradbury's influence on the show, his own script submissions missed what Serling wanted. At the same time, many episodes contain similarities to a number of Bradbury's stories. Bradbury went overboard though when he accused Serling of plagiarism. His contention that Serling lifted "Walking Distance" from "The Black Ferris" is particularly off-base.
That said, is "Walking Distance"(a man steps into the past and meets his boyhood self) more imaginative than "The Black Ferris" (criminal carnies turn into children by riding a Ferris wheel backwards)? Is "Where is Everybody?" (a man finds himself in a strange, abandoned town) more imaginative than Bradbury's earlier "The Silent Towns" (a man wanders through abandoned towns on Mars)? Is Serling's adaptation of Matheson's "Third From the Sun" (2 families fleeing an impending nuclear holocaust head for another world) more imaginative than Bradbury's earlier "The Million-Year Picnic" (2 families fleeing an impending nuclear holocaust arrive on a new world)?
Brode at least shows familiarity with Bradbury though. He appears unaware of several other noted genre writers. On pages xvi-xvii, Brode discusses horror and how Frankenstein, Dracula, and the Wolfman had grown quaint, the stuff of jokes and comedy. He cites Serling, Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, and Ray Bradbury as writers of a new kind of horror. Brode demonstrates no familiarity with H.P. Lovecraft, who three decades before The Twilight Zone, had already created a new brand of horror, distinct from tales of vampires and werewolves as it was from Serling and co.'s stories.
I love Serling's work. I love The Twilight Zone. Serling is one of my favorite writers. Despite that, I see no evidence that Serling is more imaginative, than Bradbury, Lovecraft, Howard, the other writers I listed, and others whom I didn't. Yet he certainly had a great imagination.
Calling Serling "one of the most imaginative American writers since Poe" would be more accurate, fair, and productive than saying he is the most imaginative of all American writers since Poe" (emphasis added). The first statement is inclusive recognizing that other writers may equal or surpass Serling in terms of pure imagination. The second one dismisses the possibility that a Ray Bradbury or an H.P. Lovecraft was as imaginative as or possibly even more imaginative than Serling.
I think Serling was too humble when he said, "I don't have the imagination most writers have." While, I understand Brode's desire to balance Serling's statement, it would be a shame to let such hyperbole reflect badly on Serling, especially considering Serling's own humility when comparing himself to others.
As I mentioned earlier, Brode groups his analyses in chapters by theme. Chapter 1 examines nostalgia. He includes "Walking Distance," "A Stop at Willoughby," and "The Incredible World of Horace Ford." Other episodes such as "No Time Like the Past" deal with nostalgia, but also fit in the chapters where Brode placed them instead.
As he promised in the introduction, Brode goes in depth on Serling's better known stories while devoting less time to "The Incredible World of Horace Ford."
Brode's interpretations of a few of these episodes differ slightly from my own. Brode's views provoked thought.
For instance in "Walking Distance," Martin Sloan enters a drugstore without realizing he's stepped 35 years back into the past. He's surprised to learn 3 scoop ice cream sodas only cost a dime. He says that nobody sells sodas for a dime any more and says, "you're gonna lose your shirt."
To me, this hints that something is amiss. It foreshadows that Sloan has entered the past, and it evokes the nostalgia which infuses the episode. One of the common things people discuss when waxing nostalgic is to note how low prices were. Look at those birthday cards themed around remembering the year someone was born. They include pictures, list popular songs, movies, and the prices of a few things which cost much more now. One everyday thing people notice most when looking back at the modern past is prices. When I was a kid plunking down 35 cents for a comic book, I'd have gotten rich if I had a dime every time an adult said "Back when I was a kid, comics only cost 10 cents!"
So for me, this statement ties in with nostalgia and going back in time, but for Brode there's something else. It indicates that Sloan's "flight to freedom is doomed to failure; how can you run away from the contemporary money culture when you carry it around inside?" (3)
Brode earlier discussed how he saw Serling's work as criticizing, the post-war, upwardly mobile, suburban life style. It's a critique from the inside rather than the outside. Brode paints Serling as someone who enjoyed that lifestyle, but who had some misgivings.
In these episodes, The Twilight Zone explores nostalgia with varying outcomes. They range from accepting change and resolving to find the good things still around us to a total surrender and retreat into an idyllic dream world. "The Incredible World of Horace Ford" warns us that we often remember the good things and forget the bad. Kinda like how we remember those lower prices but forget the lower wages.
Saturday, August 1, 2009
Twilight Zone: Third From the Sun
(Spoiler Alert: In a review or a teaser, it’s easy enough to hide the ending. However, it’s tough examining a story and its meaning without discussing the ending. If you want to read Richard Matheson’s story “Third From the Sun” or watch The Twilight Zone episode first, do it. You can watch it at: http://www.veoh.com/collection/CBS-The-Twilight-Zone#watch%3Dv18437885QaDeEpHM
It's on DVD too. Otherwise, if you don’t mind risking a spoiler, read on. I’ll try not to give away the ending, but there will be clues and things that come close.)
Rod Serling adapted this episode’s script from Richard Matheson’s short story of the same name. Matheson already had published short stories and books including I Am Legend and even a filmed screenplay to his credit. Along with others in the Bradbury/Beaumont circle, he was urged to contribute to the fledgling Twilight Zone. He, Beaumont, and Serling became the top three Twilight Zone writers. While Matheson later contributed original screenplays and adapted his own prose stories including “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” (“There’s a man on the wing!”), Serling adapted this story.
Often fans want adaptations which adhere faithfully to the original. However, Serling altered Matheson’s work, expanding it and adding his own thematic elements to Matheson’s among other changes. The story needed expansion because it was very short, and the episode had to fill a half-hour time slot. Serling didn’t pad the script though. He made the additions count. Matheson’s story provides most of the characters, their problem, their solution, and the twist ending. Serling fleshed things out and added thematic elements mirroring some he used in his own stories. Ranking TZ adaptations of his short stories in order of preference, Matheson placed Serling’s two adaptations last, but adds, “Pure ego at work on these last two, although I certainly appreciate the problem Rod faced in expanding what is essentially a short-short story (“Third from the Sun”) into a full half-hour program; and, as matter of fact, “Disappearing Act” was not really adapted at all, only the smallest aspect of its premise being used.” (Matheson “Introduction” 6)
Even though a member of his circle wrote the original story, this episode could have fueled Bradbury’s frustration with The Twilight Zone. Some of Matheson’s plot elements echo Bradbury’s “The Million-Year Picnic.” If the destinations weren’t different, and Matheson altered his characters a tad, his story could be a prequel to Bradbury’s. Yet, the stories are different giving contrary messages and views. “The Million-Year Picnic” first appeared in Planet Stories’ Summer 1946 issue and later in 1950’s The Martian Chronicles. “Third From the Sun” first appeared in Galaxy Science Fiction’s October 1950 issue.
Serling changed the viewpoint character from the unnamed pilot to the pilot’s neighbor whom Serling names William Sturka. Serling called the pilot Jerry Riden and created a villain, a government agent named Carling. He added a confrontation, some fights, and a chase. Matheson’s characters use a scheduled test flight to cover their escape. Serling’s protagonists try sneaking aboard and escaping with help from a bribed guard and others. Plus, where Matheson’s characters flee a nuclear holocaust which may occur within few years, Serling sets a forty-eight hour deadline. Sturka, after months of planning the escape, learns his government intends a preemptive strike within forty-eight hours. Along with Carling, the deadline increases suspense. Besides his contributions to Serling’s themes, Carling reinforces Matheson’s picture of a world committing suicide. During the Cold War, there really were people like Carling who saw nuclear war as winnable and who gambled on “acceptable” losses. For Carling it’s the possibility of losing “only” 35 million lives instead of 50 million. During the Cold War, leaders with that attitude made nuclear war seem more likely. In “Third from the Sun” they make it imminent. Carling represents authority in Serling’s oft explored theme of authority and conformity against individualism. Carling evokes both the KGB and McCarthyism. His views echo the recent Bush Administration which through its mouth pieces questioned the patriotism of dissenters. “You a defeatist, Sturka? That’s dangerous thinking. You better mind what you say.” (Serling 4) His name also suggests Quisling, the Nazi collaborator. Strangely, Carling voices Sturka’s hopes and dreams with unnerving accuracy. Consider the conclusion of Carling’s unexpected visit.
47. TRACK SHOT WITH THEM
As they leave the living room and go to the foyer. They pause at the front door. Sturka opens the screen door for him. Carling takes a step out and stands there looking up.
CARLING
Pretty night. Clear as a bell. Nothing but stars.
(Pause)
Ever think, Sturka, that those stars may have people on them too? Maybe people like us?
STURKA
(quietly)
That thought’s crossed my mind.
CARLING
(whirls around toward him)
Ever think. . . maybe you’d be happier on one of those than you are here?
STURKA
That thought’s crossed my mind, too.
CARLING
(with a smile)
I have no doubt.
He turns and walks out into the night. Sturka closes the screen door and then slams the regular door behind it. He leans against it, his eyes closed, for a moment in relief. (From Serling 22-23)
Has Carling learned Sturka’s hopes through spying, or is he good at “reading” people? Although, Carling seems cynical and hostile toward such dreams, there’s something that suggests Carling shares or once shared such thoughts himself. In trying to stop Sturka, it’s as if Carling is trying to crush a part of himself. On the other hand, maybe Carling’s a realist when it comes to human nature.
Considering his outburst to his daughter Jody, Sturka misses the contradiction in reaching for a world with “people like us.” Sturka said, “People are afraid because they make themselves afraid. They are afraid because they subvert every great thing that’s ever discovered – every fine idea ever thought, every marvelous invention ever conceived. They subvert it, Jody. They dirty it up. They make it crooked and devious and too late… far too late they ask the question –“Why?” Sitting in their own rubble… in their own tears… they ask the question – why?” (Serling 8) Yet Carling was right. At the conclusion, Sturka sounds hopeful asking Riden about the new world having “people like us.”
Unlike some individualists, Serling doesn’t reject society altogether. He resists the most overbearing, most crushing aspects of conformity. Here Serling shows us authority (personified by Carling) forcing people to do absurd things for the “good” of a society when those things will actually destroy the society. During the Cold War when all-out nuclear war loomed, “Third From the Sun” like The Watchmen carried greater emotional freight. Reading a story about a doomed world is one thing. Watching characters live out your hopes and fears when your world really faces destruction is another. However, with Serling’s additions, the Sturkas and Ridens flee more than a nuclear holocaust. They also flee authoritarianism.
Serling changed the story’s physical and emotional atmosphere. Matheson’s story starts in a cold, chilly bedroom in the early morning. It ends that same morning. Serling’s story is hot, summery, stifling. We meet Sturka at work and follow him home through the afternoon, evening and night. Serling’s script date is July 16, 1959 with revisions on August 4th and 6th. (The first date coincides with the first successful atomic bomb detonation. The last, with the bombing of Hiroshima. Coincidence?) Maybe the weather in Serling’s script just matched his surroundings. However, the physical atmosphere also reflects the different emotional atmospheres in the short story and the script. Matheson’s characters show jitters and sadness about leaving home forever. They pause and reflect, grab a handful of dirt from the home planet. They take a last look after blast off and wave good-bye. In Serling’s story, oppressive heat compliments the oppressive dangers posed by the government and imminent Armageddon closing in on the characters. The fight or flight response rolls full speed ahead. The characters fear capture and not escaping in time. That overwhelms any jitters relating to their “move.” In the end, the protagonists’ narrow escape gives them little time for sentiment.
The episode, broadcast in January 1960 uses some weird camera work. In his essay, “Earthbound,” Tony Albarella quotes director Richard Bare on the reasons for his approach. It created a sense of subtle oddness which prepared viewers for the ending which, although cliché now, surprised viewers in 1960. Fritz Weaver, Edward Andrews, Joe Maross, and the lovely Denise Alexander are memorable in their roles as Sturka, Carling, Jerry Riden, and Jody Sturka. Lori March as Sturka’s wife Eve and Jeanne Evans as Ann Riden also performed well.
The broadcast contains slight differences from the published script. In the broadcast’s opening, Sturka lacks patience for the guard’s questions. In the script, the guard loses patience with Sturka’s chattiness. In the garage sequence when Sturka runs machinery to frustrate eavesdroppers, Sturka doesn’t see Carling look in the window, unlike the script where he spots him. During the scuffle with Carling and then with the guards near the end, the broadcast involves both Sturka and Riden in the action. Plus, in the short story, the characters escape in a rocket. In the broadcast, they use a flying saucer. (The show got to use the ship from the movie Forbidden Planet.)
The broadcast gives another example of the number 22 turning up in The Twilight Zone. There’s the episode “Twenty-Two” where a hospital patient has a reoccurring dream about a hospital room numbered 22. It’s the address of the magician/alchemist in “The Chaser.” Here it’s the number of the gate through which Sturka enters and leaves work.
“Third from the Sun” and Bradbury’s “The Million-Year Picnic” both feature two families using a space ship to escape a nuclear holocaust. Bradbury’s story concerns their arrival on their new world (Mars) while “Third From the Sun” is about their departure from the old world. In “Third” their goal is a world similar to their own in another solar system. “Third From the Sun’s” ending stays mostly the same from short story to script, but it does differ subtly. In Bradbury and Matheson’s stories, the families want their children to marry and regenerate humanity. Serling’s version foreshadows that the new planet already contains, “people like us.” There is no need to restart humanity. Bradbury’s story doesn’t show what the future holds. What matters is that his characters are the Martians now, and they are safe from Earth’s nuclear war. “Third from the Sun” reminds us that “the grass is always greener on the other side.” Matheson shows us how things will be. Serling shows us how things are.
Works Cited
Albarella, Tony “Earthbound” As Timeless as Infinity: The Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling Volume I ed. Tony Albarella, Colorado Springs, Gauntlet Publications, 2004, Pgs. 209-213
Bradbury, Ray “The Million Year Picnic” The Martian Chronicles, New York, Bantam, 1979, Pgs. 172-182
Matheson, Richard “Introduction” The Twilight Zone: The Original Stories ed. Greenberg, Matheson, and Waugh, New York, MJF Books, 1985, Pgs. 3-8
_ _ “Third From the Sun” The Twilight Zone: The Original Stories ed. Greenberg, Matheson, and Waugh, New York, MJF Books, 1985, Pgs. 79-87
Serling, Rod “Third From the Sun” As Timeless as Infinity: The Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling Volume I ed. Tony Albarella, Colorado Springs, Gauntlet Publications, 2004, (The script runs from pgs. 175-208, but I refer to the script’s own page numbers rather than the book’s.)
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?GALOCT1950
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?PLANETSUM1946
It's on DVD too. Otherwise, if you don’t mind risking a spoiler, read on. I’ll try not to give away the ending, but there will be clues and things that come close.)
Rod Serling adapted this episode’s script from Richard Matheson’s short story of the same name. Matheson already had published short stories and books including I Am Legend and even a filmed screenplay to his credit. Along with others in the Bradbury/Beaumont circle, he was urged to contribute to the fledgling Twilight Zone. He, Beaumont, and Serling became the top three Twilight Zone writers. While Matheson later contributed original screenplays and adapted his own prose stories including “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” (“There’s a man on the wing!”), Serling adapted this story.
Often fans want adaptations which adhere faithfully to the original. However, Serling altered Matheson’s work, expanding it and adding his own thematic elements to Matheson’s among other changes. The story needed expansion because it was very short, and the episode had to fill a half-hour time slot. Serling didn’t pad the script though. He made the additions count. Matheson’s story provides most of the characters, their problem, their solution, and the twist ending. Serling fleshed things out and added thematic elements mirroring some he used in his own stories. Ranking TZ adaptations of his short stories in order of preference, Matheson placed Serling’s two adaptations last, but adds, “Pure ego at work on these last two, although I certainly appreciate the problem Rod faced in expanding what is essentially a short-short story (“Third from the Sun”) into a full half-hour program; and, as matter of fact, “Disappearing Act” was not really adapted at all, only the smallest aspect of its premise being used.” (Matheson “Introduction” 6)
Even though a member of his circle wrote the original story, this episode could have fueled Bradbury’s frustration with The Twilight Zone. Some of Matheson’s plot elements echo Bradbury’s “The Million-Year Picnic.” If the destinations weren’t different, and Matheson altered his characters a tad, his story could be a prequel to Bradbury’s. Yet, the stories are different giving contrary messages and views. “The Million-Year Picnic” first appeared in Planet Stories’ Summer 1946 issue and later in 1950’s The Martian Chronicles. “Third From the Sun” first appeared in Galaxy Science Fiction’s October 1950 issue.
Serling changed the viewpoint character from the unnamed pilot to the pilot’s neighbor whom Serling names William Sturka. Serling called the pilot Jerry Riden and created a villain, a government agent named Carling. He added a confrontation, some fights, and a chase. Matheson’s characters use a scheduled test flight to cover their escape. Serling’s protagonists try sneaking aboard and escaping with help from a bribed guard and others. Plus, where Matheson’s characters flee a nuclear holocaust which may occur within few years, Serling sets a forty-eight hour deadline. Sturka, after months of planning the escape, learns his government intends a preemptive strike within forty-eight hours. Along with Carling, the deadline increases suspense. Besides his contributions to Serling’s themes, Carling reinforces Matheson’s picture of a world committing suicide. During the Cold War, there really were people like Carling who saw nuclear war as winnable and who gambled on “acceptable” losses. For Carling it’s the possibility of losing “only” 35 million lives instead of 50 million. During the Cold War, leaders with that attitude made nuclear war seem more likely. In “Third from the Sun” they make it imminent. Carling represents authority in Serling’s oft explored theme of authority and conformity against individualism. Carling evokes both the KGB and McCarthyism. His views echo the recent Bush Administration which through its mouth pieces questioned the patriotism of dissenters. “You a defeatist, Sturka? That’s dangerous thinking. You better mind what you say.” (Serling 4) His name also suggests Quisling, the Nazi collaborator. Strangely, Carling voices Sturka’s hopes and dreams with unnerving accuracy. Consider the conclusion of Carling’s unexpected visit.
47. TRACK SHOT WITH THEM
As they leave the living room and go to the foyer. They pause at the front door. Sturka opens the screen door for him. Carling takes a step out and stands there looking up.
CARLING
Pretty night. Clear as a bell. Nothing but stars.
(Pause)
Ever think, Sturka, that those stars may have people on them too? Maybe people like us?
STURKA
(quietly)
That thought’s crossed my mind.
CARLING
(whirls around toward him)
Ever think. . . maybe you’d be happier on one of those than you are here?
STURKA
That thought’s crossed my mind, too.
CARLING
(with a smile)
I have no doubt.
He turns and walks out into the night. Sturka closes the screen door and then slams the regular door behind it. He leans against it, his eyes closed, for a moment in relief. (From Serling 22-23)
Has Carling learned Sturka’s hopes through spying, or is he good at “reading” people? Although, Carling seems cynical and hostile toward such dreams, there’s something that suggests Carling shares or once shared such thoughts himself. In trying to stop Sturka, it’s as if Carling is trying to crush a part of himself. On the other hand, maybe Carling’s a realist when it comes to human nature.
Considering his outburst to his daughter Jody, Sturka misses the contradiction in reaching for a world with “people like us.” Sturka said, “People are afraid because they make themselves afraid. They are afraid because they subvert every great thing that’s ever discovered – every fine idea ever thought, every marvelous invention ever conceived. They subvert it, Jody. They dirty it up. They make it crooked and devious and too late… far too late they ask the question –“Why?” Sitting in their own rubble… in their own tears… they ask the question – why?” (Serling 8) Yet Carling was right. At the conclusion, Sturka sounds hopeful asking Riden about the new world having “people like us.”
Unlike some individualists, Serling doesn’t reject society altogether. He resists the most overbearing, most crushing aspects of conformity. Here Serling shows us authority (personified by Carling) forcing people to do absurd things for the “good” of a society when those things will actually destroy the society. During the Cold War when all-out nuclear war loomed, “Third From the Sun” like The Watchmen carried greater emotional freight. Reading a story about a doomed world is one thing. Watching characters live out your hopes and fears when your world really faces destruction is another. However, with Serling’s additions, the Sturkas and Ridens flee more than a nuclear holocaust. They also flee authoritarianism.
Serling changed the story’s physical and emotional atmosphere. Matheson’s story starts in a cold, chilly bedroom in the early morning. It ends that same morning. Serling’s story is hot, summery, stifling. We meet Sturka at work and follow him home through the afternoon, evening and night. Serling’s script date is July 16, 1959 with revisions on August 4th and 6th. (The first date coincides with the first successful atomic bomb detonation. The last, with the bombing of Hiroshima. Coincidence?) Maybe the weather in Serling’s script just matched his surroundings. However, the physical atmosphere also reflects the different emotional atmospheres in the short story and the script. Matheson’s characters show jitters and sadness about leaving home forever. They pause and reflect, grab a handful of dirt from the home planet. They take a last look after blast off and wave good-bye. In Serling’s story, oppressive heat compliments the oppressive dangers posed by the government and imminent Armageddon closing in on the characters. The fight or flight response rolls full speed ahead. The characters fear capture and not escaping in time. That overwhelms any jitters relating to their “move.” In the end, the protagonists’ narrow escape gives them little time for sentiment.
The episode, broadcast in January 1960 uses some weird camera work. In his essay, “Earthbound,” Tony Albarella quotes director Richard Bare on the reasons for his approach. It created a sense of subtle oddness which prepared viewers for the ending which, although cliché now, surprised viewers in 1960. Fritz Weaver, Edward Andrews, Joe Maross, and the lovely Denise Alexander are memorable in their roles as Sturka, Carling, Jerry Riden, and Jody Sturka. Lori March as Sturka’s wife Eve and Jeanne Evans as Ann Riden also performed well.
The broadcast contains slight differences from the published script. In the broadcast’s opening, Sturka lacks patience for the guard’s questions. In the script, the guard loses patience with Sturka’s chattiness. In the garage sequence when Sturka runs machinery to frustrate eavesdroppers, Sturka doesn’t see Carling look in the window, unlike the script where he spots him. During the scuffle with Carling and then with the guards near the end, the broadcast involves both Sturka and Riden in the action. Plus, in the short story, the characters escape in a rocket. In the broadcast, they use a flying saucer. (The show got to use the ship from the movie Forbidden Planet.)
The broadcast gives another example of the number 22 turning up in The Twilight Zone. There’s the episode “Twenty-Two” where a hospital patient has a reoccurring dream about a hospital room numbered 22. It’s the address of the magician/alchemist in “The Chaser.” Here it’s the number of the gate through which Sturka enters and leaves work.
“Third from the Sun” and Bradbury’s “The Million-Year Picnic” both feature two families using a space ship to escape a nuclear holocaust. Bradbury’s story concerns their arrival on their new world (Mars) while “Third From the Sun” is about their departure from the old world. In “Third” their goal is a world similar to their own in another solar system. “Third From the Sun’s” ending stays mostly the same from short story to script, but it does differ subtly. In Bradbury and Matheson’s stories, the families want their children to marry and regenerate humanity. Serling’s version foreshadows that the new planet already contains, “people like us.” There is no need to restart humanity. Bradbury’s story doesn’t show what the future holds. What matters is that his characters are the Martians now, and they are safe from Earth’s nuclear war. “Third from the Sun” reminds us that “the grass is always greener on the other side.” Matheson shows us how things will be. Serling shows us how things are.
Works Cited
Albarella, Tony “Earthbound” As Timeless as Infinity: The Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling Volume I ed. Tony Albarella, Colorado Springs, Gauntlet Publications, 2004, Pgs. 209-213
Bradbury, Ray “The Million Year Picnic” The Martian Chronicles, New York, Bantam, 1979, Pgs. 172-182
Matheson, Richard “Introduction” The Twilight Zone: The Original Stories ed. Greenberg, Matheson, and Waugh, New York, MJF Books, 1985, Pgs. 3-8
_ _ “Third From the Sun” The Twilight Zone: The Original Stories ed. Greenberg, Matheson, and Waugh, New York, MJF Books, 1985, Pgs. 79-87
Serling, Rod “Third From the Sun” As Timeless as Infinity: The Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling Volume I ed. Tony Albarella, Colorado Springs, Gauntlet Publications, 2004, (The script runs from pgs. 175-208, but I refer to the script’s own page numbers rather than the book’s.)
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?GALOCT1950
http://www.isfdb.org/cgi-bin/pl.cgi?PLANETSUM1946
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