1960s – Page 41 – PowerPop… An Eclectic Collection of Pop Culture

Twilight Zone – I Am the Night – Color Me Black

★★★★★ March 27, 1964 Season 5 Episode 26

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

IMDB has this one rated with 7.4 out of 10. I think it should have been rated much higher. It is an excellent and powerful episode so I’m giving it 5 stars. A thought-provoking episode that is very original. Rod Serling wrote this and he lashed out at hatred in this episode. It was made only 4 months after JFK was assassinated. I rate this a 5 not because of the action or sci-fi…but it makes you think. The best Twilight Zones do that. Some might not like it because it is very dark.

Serling describes darkness covering various areas of the world simultaneously in reference to the evil happenings of the era. It’s a powerful message about a human sickness that all of us can learn and grow from. It was such a great concept to have the sunlight go away and to have total darkness brought on by hate. Maybe it is an act of God that’s being spurred on by men.

George Lindsey (Goober off of the Andy Griffith Show) plays a backwoods redneck policeman in this one. Michael Constantine plays the sheriff who feels guilty about what is going on and realizes the mistakes that he and everyone else has made. Ivan Dixon plays the Reverend Anderson and he and Constantine are the stars of this episode. The acting, writing, and lessons are great in this one.

IMDB Trivia: This episode takes place on May 25, 1964.

Ivan Dixon (Reverend) previously starred in The Twilight Zone: The Big Tall Wish (1960).

This show was written by Rod Serling

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Sheriff Charlie Koch on the morning of an execution. As a matter of fact, it’s seven-thirty in the morning. Logic and natural laws dictate that at this hour there should be daylight. It is a simple rule of physical science that the sun should rise at a certain moment and supersede the darkness. But at this given moment, Sheriff Charlie Koch, a deputy named Pierce, a condemned man named Jagger, and a small, inconsequential village will shortly find out that there are causes and effects that have no precedent. Such is usually the case—in the Twilight Zone.

Summary

In a small town, a man by the name of Jagger is about to be executed after being found guilty of murder. The local newspaperman, Colbey, is convinced that Jagger is innocent. He accuses Deputy Pierce of having perjured himself to get a conviction and accuses Sheriff Charlie Koch of just plain laziness in investigating the case. As the morning of his execution arrives, the townsfolk realize that the sun hasn’t risen that day. They soon begin to understand the cause of the darkness that surrounds them.

SPOILER WARNING WITH VIDEO

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

A sickness known as hate. Not a virus, not a microbe, not a germ—but a sickness nonetheless, highly contagious, deadly in its effects. Don’t look for it in the Twilight Zone—look for it in a mirror. Look for it before the light goes out altogether.

CAST

Rod Serling … Host / Narrator – Himself
Michael Constantine … Sheriff Charlie Koch
Paul Fix … Colbey
George Lindsey … Deputy Pierce
Ivan Dixon … the Reverend Anderson
Terry Becker … Jagger
Eve McVeagh … Ella
Douglas Bank … Man
Russell Custer … Townsman
Elizabeth Harrower … Woman
Michael Jeffers … Deputy
Robert McCord … Townsman
Ward Wood … Man

Janis Joplin – Ball and Chain

I always thought Janis had the voice of a songbird. A cigarette smoking and Southern Comfort drinking songbird…but a songbird all the same. Janis and Aretha Franklin are my two favorite female artists of all time. They put every ounce of themselves into their songs. They cheated no one.

I first heard this song on Janis Joplin’s Greatest Hits. I bought the album for the song Me and Bobby McGee and I found out I liked every song on the album. Unlike other singers I listened to at that time…Janis left everything on the field so to speak. That is the same quality I liked about Bruce Springsteen later.

Ball and Chain was written and originally recorded by a blues singer named Willie Mae “Big Mama” Thornton, who recorded the original version of “Hound Dog.” Thornton was introduced to church music at an early age. A skilled singer, songwriter, dancer, self-taught drummer, and harmonica player.

Janis’s big break came at the Monterey Pop Festival singing this song. She would go on to sing it at Woodstock also. It was on the album by Big Brother and the Holding Company called Cheap Thrills released in 1968. With the help of their appearance at Monterey, the album peaked at #1 in the Billboard Album charts for 8 consecutive weeks.

This was their breakthrough album. The album was supposed to be called Sex, Dope and Cheap Thrills; Columbia nixed it. The album ended up being the band’s last album with Joplin, who left by the end of the year to launch a solo career.

The cover was designed by legendary artist Robert Crumb. He didn’t care for Big Brother too much but liked Janis.

Robert Crumb: “She was a swell gal and a very talented singer. Ever heard any of this pre-Big Brother stuff she recorded? She was great. Then she got together with those idiots. The main problem with Big Brother was they were amateur musicians trying to play psychedelic rock and be heavy and you listen to it now and it’s bad… just embarrassing.”

“She wasn’t nationally known yet. I remember going to see her at the Avalon Ballroom and you could tell right away that she had an exceptional voice and she would go far. She started out singing old time blues like Bessie Smith. She was kind of a folknik originally.“

“Janis had played with earlier bands just playing country blues and it was much better. Way, way better. She’s singing well, not screaming, not playing to the audience that wanted to watch her sweat blood. In the beginning she was just an authentic, genuine Texas country-girl shouter.”

Ball and Chain

Sitting down by my window
Honey, looking out at the rain
Sitting down by my window, looking out at the rain
All around that I felt it
All I can see was the rain
Something grabbed a hold of me
Feel to me, oh, like a ball and chain
Hey, you know what I mean that’s exactly what it felt like
But that’s way too heavy for you, you can’t hold them all

And I say, oh, whoa, whoa, oh, that cannot be
Just because I got oh, your love, please
Why does every
Oh, this can’t be just because I got to need you, daddy
Please don’t you knock it down now, please
Here you’ve gone today
What I wanted to love you and I wanted to hold you, yeah, till the day I die
Yes, I did, yes, I did, yeah, hey, hey, alright

Say, whoa, whoa, whoa, honey
This can’t be anything I’ve ever wanted from your daddy tell me now
Oh, tell me, baby
Oh, say, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, honey
This can’t be, no, no, no, no, no
Yeah, yeah
I hope there’s someone out there who could tell me
Tell me why just because I got to want your love
Honey, just because I got to need, need, need, need your love
I said I understand
Honey, what I’m wanna trying to say hi
Trying, try, try, try, try, try, try
Honey, everybody in the world, also same, baby
When everybody in the world what needs, seem lonely
What I wanted work for your love, daddy
What I wanted trust your love, daddy
I din’t understand how come you’re gone
I don’t understand why half the world is still crying, man
And the other half of the world is still crying too, man
I can’t get it together
I mean if you go to ? Oneday, man
I mean, so baby, you want ? Three and sixty five days, right
You ain’t gonna within sixty five days, you gonna for one day, man
I tell you, that one day, man, better be your life, man
Because you know, you can stay oh man, you can cry about the other three and sixty four, man I said whoa, whoa, whoa
But you gonna lose that one day, man
That’s all you got, you got to call it love, man
That’s what it is, man
If you got today, you don’t worry about tomorrow, man
Because you don’t need it
Because the matter of the fact, as we discovered tat’s rain, tomorrow never happens, man
It’s all the same fucking day, man

So you gotta when you want to hold someone
You gotta hold them like it’s the last minutes of your life
You gotta hold, hold, hold and I say, oh, whoa, whoa, now babe, tell me why
Hold, baby, ’cause some come on your shoulder, baby
It’s gonna feel too heavy, it’s gonna weigh on you why does every thing, every thing
It’s gonna feel just like a ball
Oh, daddy and a chain

Twilight Zone – The Masks

★★★★★ March 20, 1964 Season 5 Episode 25

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

Rod Serling wrote this episode and it is a bonafide classic. This is one of the episodes I point out to people who have never seen The Twilight Zone. I love some great Twilight Zone justice and this has it. A dying wealthy older man invites his awful family (his daughter Emily, her husband Wilfred, and children Paula & Wilfred Jr.) down to visit and for a party. He makes each of them wear a mask that reflects who they are until midnight. They do not want to wear the masks but he makes it clear, if they don’t wear the masks they will not get anything when he dies. “That is indeed the most touching thing you ever dredged up by way of conversation, Wilfred. But I must include this addendum, this small proviso: You shall wear your masks until midnight. If anyone of you should take them off, from my estate, you shall each receive train fare back to Boston, and that’s it!”

This is one of those perfect episodes. The narration, writing, and acting come together perfectly. The star of it was Robert Keith who played Jason Foster. He is dying and his lines to his family in this episode are cutting but well deserved. This was the only episode of the series to be directed by a woman, Ida Lupino. She previously played Barbara Jean Trenton in the episode The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine. The famous actress Lupino would end up with 42 director credits to go along with her 105 acting ones.

Here are a few of his quotes

You’ve been at death’s door so often it’s a wonder you haven’t worn a hole in the mat.

You know, Wilfred, I think the only book you ever read was a ledger. I think if someone cut you open, they would find a cash register.

Well, that’s friendly of you to tell me that, considering that you haven’t seen me yet. All you’ve seen is your mirror image.

This show was written by Rod Serling

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Mr. Jason Foster, a tired ancient who on this particular Mardi Gras evening will leave the Earth. But before departing, he has some things to do, some services to perform, some debts to pay—and some justice to mete out. This is New Orleans, Mardi Gras time. It is also the Twilight Zone.

Summary

When his doctor tells him that he could die at any moment, the wealthy Jason Foster gathers his heirs including his daughter Emily Harper, her husband Wilfred and their children Paula and Wilfred Jr. Jason doesn’t think much of any of them and it’s clear they can’t wait to get their hands on his fortune. It’s Mardi Gras time in New Orleans and he has one last request – for each of them to wear a carnival mask. Each of the masks is meant to reflect some aspect of their personality – and leave a lasting impression on them.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Mardi Gras incident, the dramatis personae being four people who came to celebrate and in a sense let themselves go. This they did with a vengeance. They now wear the faces of all that was inside them—and they’ll wear them for the rest of their lives, said lives now to be spent in shadow. Tonight’s tale of men, the macabre and masks, on the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Robert Keith…Jason Foster
Milton Selzer…Wilfred Harper
Virginia Gregg…Emily Harper
Brooke Hayward…Paula Harper
Alan Sues…Wilfred Harper Jr.
Willis Bouchey…Dr. Samuel Thorne
Bill Walker…Jeffrey The Butler
Maidie Norman…Maid

Lovin’ Spoonful – You Didn’t Have to Be So Nice

The Lovin’ Spoonful’s songs seem so effortlessly written and performed. They were popular for a short while in the mid-sixties. They influenced many bands including The Beatles who released Good Day Sunshine as a nod to The Lovin’ Spoonful’s song Daydream.

In the 1980s I really got into this band. I purchased one of their many greatest hits. I first heard of John Sebastian in the 70s when he wrote and sang the theme song of TV show Welcome Back Cotter called “Welcome Back” which went to #1.

They were considered by TV producers to be in a television show but they were dropped over a conflict of song publishing rights. After an audition process, the producers figured it was more trouble than they expected. For one thing, the Spoonful were writing their own music at this point, and the show was not interested in giving up the publishing rights to the songs written for the show, so it really did not make sense for either party, and the producers instead turned to open auditions for the show. The Monkees were found soon after that.

Brian Wilson said this song influenced one of the Beach Boys’ best songs…God Only Knows. The group was only active from 1965 to 1968, which John Sebastian described as “two glorious years and a tedious one.” John Sebastian wrote the majority of their songs. He had a #1 hit as a solo artist in 1976 with “Welcome Back,” the theme song to the TV series Welcome Back, Kotter.

This song was written by John Sebastian and bassist Steve Boone.

Lovin’ Spoonful played what they called “jug band” music and like the Rascals, they were more of a singles band than an album band. In 1967 Zal Yanovsky left the band citing musical differences. In 1968 Sebastian left for a solo career and the band carried on until 1969 without a significant hit.

The song peaked at #10 in the Billboard 100 and #4 in Canada in 1965.

John Sebastian: “We started off in a world of 45 singles, so our only game still was three minutes of heaven every time out. That was all. We thought of it as four-man Phil Spector music. We wanted it to have that big quality, but we didn’t want to hire the Wrecking Crew.”

“Our producer Eric Jacobsen understood something about this funny hybrid that we were working on,” “Things like the chimes on ‘You Didn’t Have to Be So Nice’ were our attempts at creating that kind of vibe: harmonica, slide whistles and penny whistles. I hate calling it folk-rock. They called The Byrds folk-rock and then they were too lazy to come up with something else for our band, but we weren’t really drawing from the Pete Seeger, Bob Dylan catalog. It was a time of a lot of seriousness, and a lot of fake seriousness and people talking about Important Things. And Loving Spoonful didn’t really go for that. We were just trying to entertain.”

You Didn’t Have To Be So Nice

You didn’t have to be so nice
I would have liked you anyway
If you had just looked once or twice
And gone upon your quiet way

Today I said the time was right for me to follow you
I knew I’d find you in a day or two
And it’s true

You came upon a quiet day (ooh)
You simply seemed to take your place (ooh)
I knew that it would be that way (ooh)
The minute that I saw your face (ooh)

And when we’ve had a few more days (when we’ve had a few more days)
I wonder if I’ll get to say (wonder if I’ll get to say)
You didn’t have to be so nice (be so nice)
I would have liked you anyway (would have liked)

Today I said the time was right for me to follow you
I knew I’d find you in a day or two
And it’s true

You didn’t have to be so nice (didn’t have to be so nice)
I would have liked you anyway (would have liked you anyway)
If you had just looked once or twice (once or twice)
And gone upon your quiet way (quiet way)

Ventures – Walk Don’t Run

Walk Don’t Run is one of my favorite instrumentals right along Sleep Walk, Green Onions, and a few others. When I learned to play this on guitar, I was on cloud nine. Johnny Smith wrote this song and was the first one to record it. Chet Atkins along with many artists covered this but the song is best remembered by The Ventures.

This song got a push in The Ventures native Seattle when a local radio DJ used it to lead into every newscast. The Ventures first released this song in 1960 and it peaked at #11 in the Billboard 100. After this song, it kicked their career in high gear. The band had 14 singles in the Billboard Hot 100. With over 100 million records sold, the Ventures are the best-selling instrumental band of all time.

Numerous musicians credit the Ventures with helping them learn their instrument, including Anthrax, the B-52s, Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, Dire Straits, Dave Edmunds, Adam Ant, Mick Fleetwood, Aerosmith’s Joe Perry, Johnny Ramone, Jello Biafra, Keith Moon, Gene Simmons, Jimmy Page, Toulouse Engelhardt, Jim Diamond, Chris Spedding, Insect Surfers, Black Train, Gary Pig Gold, Al Di Meola, and Max Weinberg.

In 1964, The Ventures released an updated version called “Walk Don’t Run ’64, which also made the Top 10 in the US. In addition to their 1960 and 1964 versions. They recorded completely new versions in 1968, 1977, 1986, and 2000. “Walk-Don’t Run 77 is a disco track. The 1986 one was sort of a heavy metal version, and the one in 2000 has a sax in it.

They were founded by Bob Bogle and Don Wilson in the 1950s. John Fogerty inducted the Ventures in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008.

Johnny Smith Version

Walk Don’t Run 77

Walk Don’t Run 64

The Original

Walk Don’t Run

Not one lyric…Just dig on the guitar riff.

Twilight Zone – What’s in the Box

★★★1/2 March 13, 1964 Season 5 Episode 24

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

Two bickering and unlikable characters star in this episode. Do you want to see the dark side of marriage? Watch this episode. It reminds me of the episode A Most Unusual Camera. It’s almost too close to that episode. Both take place in a high-rise apartment building that features a window. This time it’s a TV, not a camera that after a “repair” shows the near feature in wonderful black and white.

William Demarest and Joan Blondell are effective in portraying their characters here, even if neither one is very likable. There is no need for a back story of these two, it’s clear why they fight. Sterling Holloway plays the TV repairman, and you might recognize his voice as Winnie The Pooh. Again, not in the top episodes but certainly not too bad. The next episode coming Wednesday…a classic.

From IMDB Trivia: Joe Britt is surprised at getting Channel 10. When television began, it was broadcast over the very high frequency (VHF) band of the radio spectrum. The VHF channels were 2-13, but, to avoid interference, a city could not have channels with consecutive numbers, except for 4 and 5 or 5 and 6. Britt lives in New York, which had channels 2, 4, 5, 7, 9, 11, and 13.

While the TV repairman is fixing the television in the first scene, numerous voices can be heard. One of them is Rod Serling saying, “Next time on The Twilight Zone (1959)…”

According to The Twilight Zone Companion, Martin M. Goldsmith was brought in to write an episode of The Twilight Zone, due to his previous collaboration with William Froug on Playhouse 90. And according to William Froug, Martin Goldsmith came up with a notion of a guy looking at his own extramarital activities on TV, and trying to it off before his wife could see it. Martin Goldsmith would disown the episode, saying “I didn’t like it, it lacked all subtlety the way it was done. I think Joan Blondell and William Demarest overplayed it. It was just too broad.”

This show was written by Martin Goldsmith and Rod Serling

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Portrait of a TV fan. Name: Joe Britt. Occupation: cab driver. Tonight, Mr. Britt is going to watch “a really big show,” something special for the cabbie who’s seen everything. Joe Britt doesn’t know it, but his flag is down and his meter’s running and he’s in high gear—on his way to the Twilight Zone.

Summary

Taxi driver Joe Britt usually makes his way home to his wife Phyllis but theirs is not a happy marriage as they constantly bicker and she accuses him of having a girlfriend. The obnoxious Joe is having his TV fixed but after the repairman leaves, Joe sees himself with his girlfriend in scenes from the recent past. Soon after, he has a glimpse of what will happen in the near future.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

The next time your TV set is on the blink, when you’re in the need of a first-rate repairman, may we suggest our own specialist? Factory-trained, prompt, honest, twenty-four hour service. You won’t find him in the phone book, but his office is conveniently located—in the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Joan Blondell…Phyllis Britt
William Demarest…Joe Britt
Sterling Holloway…TV Repairman
Herbert Lytton…Dr. Saltman
Sandra Gould…Woman On T.V.
Howard Wright…Judge
Douglas Bank…Prosecutor
Ted Christy…The Wild Panther
Robert McCord…Electric Chair Guard
Tony Miller…Announcer
Mitchell Rhein…Neighbour
Ron Stokes…Car Salesman
John L. Sullivan…The Russian Duke

Procol Harum – A Whiter Shade of Pale

I don’t remember the sixties, but this song makes me feel like I do. In my humble opinion, it’s one of the best songs of the sixties. It perfectly captured its time. John Lennon was a huge fan of the song and would play it repeatedly in his psychedelic Rolls Royce.

It is one of those songs like Itchycoo Park that automatically transports me to the sixties… I never get tired of listening to this. A Whiter Shade of Pale was released in 1967. It peaked at #1 in Canada, The UK, New Zealand, and #5 in the Billboard 100. It sold over 10 million copies. It was re-released in 1972 and went to #13 in the UK charts.

Gary Brooker and Keith Reid were credited with writing the song but Matthew Fisher the former keyboard player in the band sued for partial writing credit and won on July 24, 2008. Now the song’s writing credit is Reid-Brooker-Fisher. Gary Brooker and Fisher wrote the music and Reid wrote the lyrics. This was the first song Procol Harum recorded. After it became a hit, they fired their original drummer and guitarist, replacing them with Barry Wilson and Robin Trower… more experienced musicians who could handle touring.

The Illinois Crime Commission included the song in a list of ‘drug-oriented records’ along with “White Rabbit” by Jefferson Airplane and The Beatle’s “Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds.” When any ban would happen, the records would fly off the shelves.

In 2004, the UK performing rights group Phonographic Performance Limited named this the most-played record on British TV and radio of the past 70 years. In 2009 it was announced that this song is still Britain’s most played record.

Gary Brooker: “I’d been listening to a lot of classical music, and jazz. Having played rock and R&B for years, my vistas had opened up. When I met Keith, seeing his words, I thought, ‘I’d like to write something to that.’ They weren’t obvious, but that doesn’t matter. You don’t have to know what he means, as long as you communicate an atmosphere. ‘A Whiter Shade Of Pale’ seemed to be about two people, a relationship even. It’s a memory. There was a leaving, and a sadness about it. To get the soul of those lyrics across vocally, to make people feel that, was quite an accomplishment.

I remember the day it arrived: four very long stanzas, I thought, ‘Here’s something.’ I happened to be at the piano when I read them, already playing a musical idea. It fitted the lyrics within a couple of hours. Things can be gifted. If you trace the chordal element, it does a bar or two of Bach’s ‘Air on a G String’ before it veers off. That spark was all it took. I wasn’t consciously combining rock with classical, it’s just that Bach’s music was in me.”

Keith Reid: “I was trying to conjure a mood as much as tell a straightforward, girl-leaves-boy story. With the ceiling flying away and room humming harder, I wanted to paint an image of a scene. I wasn’t trying to be mysterious with those images, I was trying to be evocative. I suppose it seems like a decadent scene I’m describing. But I was too young to have experienced any decadence, then. I might have been smoking when I conceived it, but not when I wrote. It was influenced by books, not drugs.”

A Whiter Shade of Pale

We skipped the light fandango
Turned cartwheels ‘cross the floor
I was feeling kinda seasick
But the crowd called out for more
The room was humming harder
As the ceiling flew away
When we called out for another drink
And the waiter brought a tray

And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale

She said, “There is no reason
And the truth is plain to see. “
But I wandered through my playing cards
And they would not let her be
One of sixteen vestal virgins
Who were leaving for the coast
And although my eyes were open wide
They might have just as well been closed

And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale

She said, “I’m here on a shore leave,”
Though we were miles at sea.
I pointed out this detail
And forced her to agree,
Saying, “You must be the mermaid
Who took King Neptune for a ride. “
And she smiled at me so sweetly
That my anger straightway died.

And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale

If music be the food of love
Then laughter is it’s queen
And likewise if behind is in front
Then dirt in truth is clean
My mouth by then like cardboard
Seemed to slip straight through my head
So we crash-dived straightway quickly
And attacked the ocean bed

And so it was that later
As the miller told his tale
That her face, at first just ghostly,
Turned a whiter shade of pale

Twilight Zone – Queen of the Nile

★★★1/2 March 6, 1964 Season 5 Episode 23

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

The show begins with a reporter coming to the home of a pretty film star that looks amazing for her age. At first, the show seems friendly and innocent and then starts getting dark. It’s a good episode but not spectacular and has twists and turns that will keep viewers interested.

Ann Blyth plays ageless film star Pamela Morris, who is adored and envied by her fans, she has a mysterious past that a syndicated journalist Jordan Herrick (played by Lee Philips) hopes to uncover. This episode was very reminiscent of “Long Live Walter Jameson” from season 1 except Miss Morris will go to any length to keep her youth. Charles Beaumont wrote that one… and he was credited with Queen of the Nile but it was ghostwritten by Jerry Sohl. Beaumont’s health was in bad shape at the time.

This one is has a blend of drama, science fiction, and mystery. How does she stay young? How old is she really? The universe has rules and Miss Morris is breaking the biggest one.

From IMDB Trivia: When Jordan is on the phone with his Chicago-based editor Krueger, Krueger states that Constance Taylor had been “reigning beauty in the days of the Florodora Girls.” This is a reference to the chorus girls of the play “Florodora,” a popular musical comedy that opened on Broadway in 1900 and ran for over 550 performances. Much of the show’s success was attributed to the beauty of its sextet of chorines, whom the public dubbed “The Florodora Girls.”

Pamela Morris claimed to have been born in 1925.

This show was written by Charles Beaumont, Rod Serling, and Jerry Sohl (uncredited)

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Jordan Herrick, syndicated columnist, whose work appears in more than a hundred newspapers. By nature a cynic, a disbeliever, caught for the moment by a lovely vision. He knows the vision he’s seen is no dream; she is Pamela Morris, renowned movie star, whose name is a household word and whose face is known to millions. What Mr. Herrick does not know is that he has also just looked into the face—of the Twilight Zone.

Summary

A syndicated columnist, Jordan Herrick, gets an interview with the famous and beautiful actress Pamela Morris. She claims to be 38 years old but according to Jordan’s information, that would have made her first film as an adult when she was only 10. He takes her word for it but her elderly mother, Viola Draper, has news for him: she’s not Pamela’s mother, she is her daughter. The more he looks into her background, the more convinced he becomes that Pamela hasn’t aged for decades. Faced with the facts, Pamela shows the lengths she will go to in order to protect her great secret.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Everyone knows Pamela Morris, the beautiful and eternally young movie star. Or does she have another name, even more famous, an Egyptian name from centuries past? It’s best not to be too curious, lest you wind up like Jordan Herrick, a pile of dust and old clothing discarded in the endless eternity of the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Ann Blyth…Pamela Morris/Constance Taylor
Lee Philips…Jordan Herrick
Celia Lovsky…Viola Draper
Ruth Phillips…Charlotte
Frank Ferguson…Krueger
James Tyler…Mr. Jackson

Twilight Zone – An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

★★★★★ Feburary 28, 1964 Season 5 Episode 22

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

This one is a totally different animal in the Twilight Zone catalog. It was not written or adapted for the show. The producer William Froug had seen An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge, a French film that had won first prize for short subjects at the 1962 Cannes Film Festival. Based on the story by Ambrose Bierce, it told the story of a condemned Confederate spy who, during the instant that he’s falling before the rope breaks his neck, imagines an involved and successful escape.

The Twilight Zone was running over budget for the year so they paid 10,000 dollars for a one year viewing and it balanced their budget. The film was shortened by several minutes and an introduction by Serling was added and voilà… it was a Twilight Zone.

The first time I watched this, I didn’t like it as much because I wasn’t expecting it. Now when watching it I realize what a brilliant short film it is. It was almost entirely silent…there were maybe a half-dozen lines in film. It fits the Twilight Zone on one hand…but on another it works independently of it because it was made that way.

A good watch and I reccomend it. It has a little different look and feel but it fits.

I found a discrepancy on who saw the film at a film festival. Rod Serling or the producer William Froug. I’ve read conflicting info at different places. I stated above William Froug because of Marc Scott Zicree’s book on the Twilight Zone. Below this you will see IMDB Trivia saying Mr. Serling…Until confirmed otherwise I will stick to the book. Who knows? Maybe they went together.

IMDB Trivia: Rod Serling was getting ready to take his end-of-season break, with all but one of the shows for the fifth season already filmed or in production, when he decided to leave early and go to a French film festival. There he saw Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (1961) and immediately hunted down the producers with an offer to buy it for a one-time showing for American TV. Serling reportedly picked it up for $10,000 and flew straight back to Los Angeles, filming a new intro the moment he got to the studio and plugging the show into that same week’s time slot. Not only did Serling get what was considered a classic, he also saved nearly $100,000 in production costs and brought the season’s worth of shows in on budget. This prompted ABC-TV to offer to pick up The Twilight Zone (1959) for another season. Serling said no to the deal when his discussions over the content of the new season made it appear he would be “going to the graveyard” for each show, doing Gothic horror shows. (ABC did want that, and eventually would pick up Dark Shadows: The Vampire Curse (1966), which fit the bill, in daytime.) ironically, Serling would return to television in 1970 for three seasons of Night Gallery (1970) on NBC, consisting of the exact format that ABC had asked for.

The 1962 French version of Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge (1961) won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject.

The French title of this film -“La riviere du hibou” – translates into English as “The River of the Owl.”

This show was written by Ambrose Bierce and Robert Enrico

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Tonight a presentation so special and unique that, for the first time in the five years we’ve been presenting The Twilight Zone, we’re offering a film shot in France by others. Winner of the Cannes Film Festival of 1962, as well as other international awards, here is a haunting study of the incredible, from the past master of the incredible, Ambrose Bierce. Here is the French production of ‘An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.

Summary

A Southern planter is about to be hanged for sabotage during the Civil War; when he is dropped off the bridge the rope breaks and he flees for his safety amid bullets and shots from a cannon. In this wonderful adaptation of Ambrose Bierce’s short story, the depths of a condemned man’s mind are probed. What does go through one’s mind moments before death?

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

An occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge – in two forms, as it was dreamed, and as it was lived and died. This is the stuff of fantasy, the thread of imagination… the ingredients of the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
Roger Jacquet … Peyton Farquhar
Anne Cornaly … Mrs. Farquhar
Anker Larsen … Union Officer
Stéphane Fey … Union Officer
Jean-François Zeller … Union Sergeant
Pierre Danny … Union Soldier
Louis Adelin … Union Soldier

Twilight Zone – Spur of the Moment

★★★★ Feburary 21, 1964 Season 5 Episode 21

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

An eerie opening makes this one very promising. There are things you dream about happening and there is reality that actually happens. Diana Hyland plays Anne Henderson who gets a frightening visitor while riding a horse …or is it a warning? This episode makes you think about the choices you make and how those choices make you who you are…good or bad. Sometimes we all have red flags…not necessarily someone screaming on a horse but things that we know we shouldn’t ignore.

Richard Mathesons final four Twilight Zone scripts run the gamut from mildly disturbing to outright horrific. In Spur of the Moment, the romantic situation is a familiar one…Annes family wants her to marry the proper-but-dull stockbroker, but she is in love with the romantic, headstrong young fellow of whom they disapprove. We just know what she picks. The characters show Serling’s usual level of humanism but with a disturbing realistic edge.

This episode takes place on June 13, 1939, and in 1964.

This show was written by Rod Serling and Richard Matheson

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

This is the face of terror. Anne Marie Henderson, 18 years of age, her young existence suddenly marred by a savage and wholly unanticipated pursuit by a strange, nightmarish figure of a woman in black, who has appeared as if from nowhere and now, at driving gallop, chases the terrified girl across the countryside, as if she means to ride her down and kill her, and then suddenly and inexplicably stops to watch in malignant silence as her prey takes flight. Miss Henderson has no idea whatever as to the motive for this pursuit. Worse, not the vaguest notion regarding the identity of her pursuer. Soon enough, she will be given the solution to this twofold mystery, but in a manner far beyond her present capacity to understand, a manner enigmatically bizarre in terms of time and space – which is to say, an answer from… the Twilight Zone.

Summary

While out horseback riding on June 13, 1939, 18 year-old Anne Henderson comes across another rider, a middle-aged woman dressed in black, who chases after her. She’s terrified and races home. It’s the day of her engagement party. She’s supposed to marry Robert Blake but childhood friend David Mitchell wants her to break it off and marry him instead. As for the woman in black, she is someone who knows Anne quite well.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

This is the face of terror. Anne Marie Mitchell, 43 years of age, her desolate existence once more afflicted by the hope of altering her past mistake – a hope which is unfortunately doomed to disappointment. For warnings from the future to the past must be taken in the past. Today may change tomorrow but once today is gone, tomorrow can only look back in sorrow that the warning was ignored. Said warning as of now stamped ‘Not Accepted’- and stored away in the dead file, in the recording office… of the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
Diana Hyland … Anne Henderson
Robert J. Hogan … Robert Blake
Philip Ober … Mr. Henderson
Marsha Hunt … Mrs. Henderson
Roger Davis … David Mitchell
Jack Raine … Reynolds

Cream – Badge

During my senior year in high school in 1985, I had their greatest hits. I wore it out and became a huge Cream fan. I went to an old music store a couple of years ago and they had an original 60s Leslie Cabinet. Why am I bringing that up? That is what Clapton is playing through on this song. A Leslie Cabinet (I have video at the bottom of the post) contains a rotating horn and was designed for organs, but many tried it with guitars. It gives an organ guitar a swirling sound. The Beatles used it a lot.

One of my favorite Cream songs. Badge was written by Eric Clapton and George Harrison. In George’s handwritten lyrics he wrote the word “Bridge” as in bridge of a song and Clapton thought it read “Badge” so they named the song that. In 1969 Badge peaked at #60 on the Billboard 100 Charts, #18 on the UK Charts, and #49 in Canada.

It appeared on Cream’s final album Goodbye. This song is one of only 3 studio tracks on Goodbye…the rest are live cuts. Badge would be the only Cream song to include 5 people…in addition to Clapton, Bruce, Baker and Harrison, Felix Pappalardi played the piano and Mellotron. Pappalardi produced Disreali Gears, Wheels Of Fire, and Goodbye. Robert Stigwood produced their debut album Fresh Cream.

Cream were broke up when this album was released. Clapton was already working with Blind Faith. The did reunite for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction in 1993 and played 3 songs. In 2005 the band reunited at the Royal Albert Hall…the location of their last concert in 1969 and later in the year at Madison Square Gardens.

I will say…it’s hard for me to listen to the 2005 reunion. Clapton chose to play his Fender guitar and it just didn’t have the bite his Gibson SG had in the Cream days. I didn’t expect the long jams but I do wish he would have been a bit dirtier in his sound. The musicianship though was great.

Don’t study the lyrics too much. They don’t make much sense. Supposedly many of them came from drunk conversations with George and Ringo.

George Harrison: I helped Eric write “Badge” you know. Each of them had to come up with a song for that Goodbye Cream album and Eric didn’t have his written. We were working across from each other and I was writing the lyrics down and we came to the middle part, so I wrote ‘Bridge.’ Eric read it upside down and cracked up laughing – ‘What’s BADGE?’ he said. After that, Ringo walked in drunk and gave us that line about the swans living in the park

Hope I didn’t bore you all with the Leslie Cabinet information, but I really like them. In this video you will see how it works and why an organ gets that swirling sound. A sixties model costs around $3000 and up.

Back to our song of the day!

Badge

Thinkin’ ’bout the times you drove in my car.
Thinkin’ that I might have drove you too far.
And I’m thinkin’ ’bout the love that you laid on my table.

I told you not to wander ’round in the dark.
I told you ’bout the swans, that they live in the park.
Then I told you ’bout our kid: now he’s married to Mabel.

Yes, I told you that the light goes up and down.
Don’t you notice how the wheel goes ’round?
And you better pick yourself up from the ground
Before they bring the curtain down.
Yes, before they bring the curtain down.

Ah Ah Ah, yeh yeh yeh
Ah Ah Ah, yeh yeh yeh

Talkin’ ’bout a girl that looks quite like you.
She didn’t have the time to wait in the queue.
She cried away her life since she fell off the cradle.

Twilight Zone – From Agnes – With Love

★★★ Feburary 14, 1964 Season 5 Episode 20

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

This episode is a light Twilight Zone and it was appropriately released on Valentine’s Day. Wally Cox plays James Elwood a computer programmer in the early 60s. Wally Cox’s voice is distinctive. If you are a cartoon fan, he was the voice of Underdog. He was also Marlon Brando’s best friend throughout their lives. The computer he is programming is acting strange…that is because “Agnes” the computer is in love with James.

The problem with From Agnes With Love lies with the main character. James Elwood is enormously brilliant in his position but positively inept and naive in life. Sue Randall appears in this episode and she is probably best known as Miss Landers in Leave It To Beaver. All in all, it’s a fun episode but not as memorable as some of the other lighter episodes. As I’ve said before, the 5th season is not as consistent as the first 3. You do have some great episodes mixed in with good and a couple that are below the Twilight Zone’s high standards.

From IMDB Trivia: When Agnes opens the doors to communicate, there are a few phrases that apparently make no sense. AUT AMAT AUT ODIT FEMINA is Latin for “a woman either loves or hates”. Also T’MA ZHILI BYLI and V TUMANE are stories by Russian author Leonid Andreyev. They translate to “Once There Lived”, and “In the Fog”, both controversial stories about women’s sexuality.

While they are in Walter’s apartment he mentions he wanted to drive a “Mustang 500” sports car. This episode was broadcast on February 14, 1964. The 1964-1/2 Ford Mustang was first introduced to the public on April 17, 1964 at the New York World’s Fair, although there had been Mustang concept cars in 1962 and 1963. The Shelby GT500 Mustang was first produced for the 1967 model year.

The music heard early in the episode and in different variations throughout the episodes, is titled “The Cuckoo Song”. Also known as “Dance Of The Cuckoos”, it is perhaps best known as the theme music from the Laurel and Hardy comedy films of the early to mid 1900s.

This show was written by Rod Serling and Bernard C. Schoenfeld

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

James Elwood: master programmer. In charge of Mark 502-741, commonly known as Agnes, the world’s most advanced electronic computer. Machines are made by men for man’s benefit and progress, but when man ceases to control the products of his ingenuity and imagination he not only risks losing the benefit, but he takes a long and unpredictable step into… the Twilight Zone.

Summary

When their computer, known as Agnes, breaks down the company supervisor calls in a master programmer James Elwood to see if he can figure out what has gone wrong. He solves the problem quickly and soon finds himself in charge of the machine. Agnes and Elwood quickly develop a rapport and the machine takes to giving him advice about Millie, Jim’s co-worker who has finally agreed to go out on a date with. The date doesn’t go well and Agnes has more and more advice for him. It turns out that Agnes has her own agenda.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Advice to all future male scientists: be sure you understand the opposite sex, especially if you intend being a computer expert. Otherwise, you may find yourself like poor Elwood, defeated by a jealous machine, a most dangerous sort of female, whose victims are forever banished… to the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
Wally Cox … James Elwood
Sue Randall … Millie
Raymond Bailey … Supervisor
Ralph Taeger … Walter Holmes
Don Keefer … Fred Danziger
Byron Kane … Assistant
Nan Peterson … Secretary

Dave having A Sound Day

Thanks to Max, aka “Badfinger” for giving me the chance to write something for his site today! He’s likewise written something cool about the band from which he took his screen-name, for my site, A Sound Day, (http://soundday.wordpress.com today) One of the best things about writing a blog, for about four years now, has been getting to know other bloggers with similar interests and read their posts. Of those, Badfinger has been a favorite of mine almost since I came to WordPress. I’m amazed that he and I are similar in age and have very similar tastes in music, and in baseball as well. So, needless to say he’s a pretty cool guy!

What I do at A Sound Day is post daily articles generally involving things which have happened on that calendar day in the world of music – album releases, records hitting #1, musicians having birthdays, that sort of thing. A simple enough idea, and one which I must admit wasn’t entirely original. A decade or so back, ex-Sex Pistol John Lydon (aka Johnny Rotten) ran a short syndicated radio bit called “A Rotten Day” which did the same basically, but in headline form delivered in his characteristically snarky persona. So, it’s not a unique idea, but I try to go beyond the headlines and tell a story. Make it interesting. For example, we pretty much all know the song “Midnight Train to Georgia”, but how many knew it was indirectly inspired by a Mississippi songwriter talking to Farrah Fawcett? Lots of us like London Calling, but do we know that the big hit single on it, “Train in Vain” wasn’t included on the track listing printed on the record because it wasn’t supposed to be on the album? How about an avant garde new wave rocker who has a successful second career writing books about archaeology? It’s the details that make the stories interesting and I try to find them… and remind people of some great music that they might have forgotten. Or introduce them to music I love that they might not have even heard. Grudgingly, I sometimes even cover music that, well, didn’t really get my motor running but was important in its own way, and try to listen to it with a fresh ear. If it was rock, or pop, or maybe even occasionally country, and it was from the ’60s to the end of the century, I’ve probably given it a look. That’s kind of an overview of what I do there, but let me tell you a bit about why.

Music has always been important to me. A big part of my memories… so much so that it can be an almost Rainman-like, frustrating ability. I can barely remember the names of my teachers or classmates from 1974, for example, but I can probably name two-thirds of the #1 songs of that year without ever looking to Google or Wiki. I couldn’t tell you the name of a girl I might have danced with at a junior high dance, but I can still recall the song was “Car Wash” by Rose Royce.

Mind you, there weren’t a lot of dances for young me. I was rather ill a lot of the time, and had by 1970s standards, a very over-protective mother…although by today’s standards, she was pretty lax. At least I walked or cycled to school myself instead of being driven to the door. But if it was raining, or cold, I probably wouldn’t be going out with friends to hang out on the weekend – “you’d get sick.” So I was home (with chain-smoking adults) and prone to lots of asthma attacks and bouts of pneumonia. Things like reading, looking outside at the birds coming to the feeder and music took on an import to me that many wouldn’t be able to relate to. Music especially.

Both my parents liked music, and every vague memory I have of being very young seems to have included music somewhere in the background. One of my first memories was listening to Sgt.Pepper and marveling in the weird but delightful sounds coming from the big wooden-cabinet stereo in the living room, while being dazzled by the funny-looking cover of the record. I can’t say whether it was my Mom or my brother who had the album… my Mom loved the Beatles and my older brother was a rocker as long as I can remember. One time just after he was old enough to drive, my Dad let him drive the car home most of the way from a family Florida vacation. He played Wish You Were Here on 8-track for almost the entire ride. It took some years for me to be able to listen to that with happy ears, I can tell you! Pop, Beatles, Glen Campbell, some old-school country now and again… there always seemed to be music on in the house when I was little.

Around when I was five, I was given a little transistor radio. Might have been for my birthday, might have been for Christmas. I can’t remember. What I do remember is that little black plastic, mono radio with its’ rotating dial and tiny earbud let me listen to my own music…and life was never the same. And here, I feel very lucky because I grew up near Toronto, Canada… so I got to mature listening to two of the coolest radio stations on the continent…CHUM when I was a kid, and CFNY as I grew towards adulthood.

The first station I seemed to find on that little transistor was 1050 CHUM. A Toronto “hits” station that was by far the most-listened to station in the entire country at the time. It had been around since, well about since Noah went looking for two giraffes and two hornets ( did you really have to take them…but I digress!) but one which had switched to rock and pop before the curve, in 1957. “All Shook Up” was the first song they played apparently, and their first #1 song. Madonna’s “Live to Tell” was its final one, 29 years later before it changed formats (the station still exists but is now talk sports apparently) so it covered my early school and junior high years. My tuner rarely swayed back then, even though my radios got better and better through the ’70s, to a big transistor with a big built-in speaker to one of those only-in-the-70s white, plastic stereos with rounded corners and a turntable on top. And I put that to use; while other kids were spending their allowances on chocolate bars or comic books, I was saving my coins til we went to the mall and I could buy “Chevy Van” or “Don’t Call Us, We’ll Call You” as singles. I still remember the first LP I bought – Elton John’s Greatest Hits. Nearly 50 years later, that still seems like a pretty decent place to start.

CHUM was a pretty conventional “top 40” station, even though it actually had a “top 30”. And a cool thing about that was they actually published it weekly… I’d stop by the basement of Eatons and go to the records and pick up a little folder with the top 30 songs listed inside, as the picture shows. And take a look at that, a fairly typical example of one. Rock – how ’bout BTO or Rick Derringer? Country, dare you say? Umm, Tom T. Hall, John Denver. Cool pop? Elton John, Wings. Disco? It’s there. In fact, CHUM let us hear pretty much everything that was hot in the decade from Motown to Meco to McCartney. It was one of the great things about the decade, its music (which Max nicely reminded us last week with his 70s AM Radio series) and radio before it became too formulated and narrow in playlists. Plus, it mixed in a fair bit of Canadian content. That helped the homegrown artists and let us hear even more of a range of music. The world knew Anne Murray and BTO but we knew Wednesday (from my hometown, their biggest hit being a cover of “Last Kiss”) and Edward Bear too. Years before he was writing “Black Velvet” for his girlfriend Alannah Myles, we knew Christopher Ward as a decent singer of soft-rock ballads (www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E1VgsoS6i4 ) thanks to CHUM.

One thing Toronto was great for – many say best in North America – was being open to new sounds and “obscure” British music. By 1980, CHUM’s list of #1 songs included some classic rock mega-names – Led Zeppelin, John Lennon, Pink Floyd – but also things like “Turning Japanese” by the Vapors and “Making Plans for Nigel” by XTC. That might have been inspired a bit by the second great station that I lived with – CFNY.

CFNY-FM was a station started in the late-’70s in “the little yellow farmhouse” in the outer suburbs. It’s reach was only a few miles at first; it’s nickname “the Spirit of Radio”… yes the one and the same name Rush wrote a song about. It concentrated on finding and playing great music other stations ignored. If you were going to hear the Damned, solo Peter Gabriel or Depeche Mode years before other people would in Canada, it was going to be on CFNY. As time went by though the station relocated, bought more powerful transmistors and was broadcasting to half a million regular listeners from the CN Tower. And making bands like the Psychedelic Furs and The Smths huge, arena-selling artists in Toronto. Such was their sway in the area that soon other stations began copying them to some degree. Not many hard rock stations were playing A Flock of Seagulls or “music at work” stations The Stranglers, but in Toronto they were. They had to to compete. Now, don’t get me wrong. I actually liked Bruce Springsteen, John Mellencamp, even Madonna and I did hear them, once in awhile turning over to a hit station, or watching Much Music (our version of MTV) but by listening to so much CFNY I found incredible music by artists most elsewhere in North America never heard of – It’s Immaterial, Black (Liverpool singer Colin Vearncombe), (www.youtube.com/watch?v=koRT3HEmre4 )

Sinead O’Connor long before she flipped her wig and became a Saturday Night Live punchline. And as with CHUM, CFNY highlighted a lot of great Canadian acts. A couple of them went on to become national heroes with a lengthy string of platinum records at home… while remaining anonymous outside the Great White North. Blue Rodeo and Tragically Hip. The latter had very Canadian-oriented lyrics that made them so endeared the Prime Minister attended their final concert… which was televised nationwide on the national network! The former mixed country and rock seamlessly to create a great music that at the time defied labels – alt country? Country rock? Later it would probably be described as one of the early examples of “Americana” music (www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mqa4YzKPrFw ), following the traditions of The Band before them. Something we took to by the millions up there… but wouldn’t likely have ever heard were it not for that one station championing them in the early days. See an example of one of their year-end charts below.

When I was six or seven, and coughing and my parents were fighting, I could be in my room listening to Jim Gold or the Doobie Brothers on that transistor radio…and feel kind of happy. A decade or so later, I didn’t fit in that well in many places but when I went to the indie record store and picked up the latest import 12” Depeche Mode single, I was everyone else’s equal… the equivalent of a Sheldon in Stuart’s comic book shop on Big Bang Theory. Music was my friend.

It still is, and I feel priviledged to be able to help you discover some of it, and make some human friends all the while doing so. Thanks again Max, for giving me this space today.

…

Twilight Zone – Night Call

★★★★1/2 February 7, 1964 Season 5 Episode 19

If you want to see where we are…HERE is a list of the episodes.

I really like this one a lot. It has a feel of a horror movie because it is somewhat of a ghost story. It’s about an older lady who starts getting calls in the middle of the night. Gladys Cooper is brilliant as Elva Keene in this episode. Elva is confused and frightened by persistent phone calls from an eerie sounding caller.

Gladys also appeared in Nothing in the Dark opposite Robert Redford in the 3rd season. Who else but Rod Serling could take something as simple as an inanimate object, a telephone, and turn it into an element of fear and dread?Highly suspenseful episode with an ironical ending. So who is the caller interrupting elderly Elva’s rest? One typical Twilight Zone trait is here…loneliness. This one will make you hesitant to answer the phone at night.

From IMDB Trivia: The title of Richard Matheson’s original short story is “Long Distance Call”. However, as there was already an episode of The Twilight Zone (1959) with this title, The Twilight Zone: Long Distance Call (1961), the title of this episode had to be changed.

Originally scheduled to air on November 22, 1963, it was preempted by John F. Kennedy’s assassination. In the alternate timeline featured in The Twilight Zone: Profile in Silver/Button, Button (1986) in which JFK’s assassination was prevented, a CBS television announcement is heard: “We will now return to our regular programming” and the theme of The Twilight Zone (1959) is played, a reference to the intended broadcast date of this episode.

Elva’s phone number is KL-5-2368. The K and the L are both the number 5 on the phone dial. “555” is an exchange number commonly thought to be reserved by the phone companies for use by TV and movies in order to prevent prank phone calls to real people. In fact, only 555-0100 through 555-0199 are now specifically reserved for fictional use, and the other numbers have been released for actual assignment.

On the day that this episode was first aired (February 7, 1964), The Beatles arrived in the United States in preparation for their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show (1948): The Ed Sullivan Show: Meet The Beatles (1964).

This show was written by Rod Serling and Richard Matheson

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Miss Elva Keene lives alone on the outskirts of London Flats, a tiny rural community in Maine. Up until now, the pattern of Miss Keene’s existence has been that of lying in her bed or sitting in her wheelchair, reading books, listening to a radio, eating, napping, taking medication—and waiting for something different to happen. Miss Keene doesn’t know it yet, but her period of waiting has just ended, for something different is about to happen to her, has in fact already begun to happen, via two most unaccountable telephone calls in the middle of a stormy night, telephone calls routed directly through—the Twilight Zone.

Summary

The elderly Elva Keene is not too happy when she begins receiving phone calls in the middle of the night. At first the calls are little more than static and her complaints to the local telephone operator, Miss Finch, seem to go unheeded. Over time however, she begins to hear a man’s voice but out of fear, tells whoever it is to go away. When Miss Finch reports they’ve found the problem, Elva visits the site only to realize the identity of the caller, and that regardless of anything she’s said, desperately wants the calls to continue.

VIDEO SPOILERS

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

According to the Bible, God created the Heavens and the Earth. It is man’s prerogative—and woman’s—to create their own particular and private Hell. Case in point, Miss Elva Keene, who in every sense has made her own bed and now must lie in it, sadder, but wiser, by dint of a rather painful lesson in responsibility, transmitted from the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator (voice) (uncredited)
Gladys Cooper…Elva Keene
Nora Marlowe…Margaret Phillips
Martine Bartlett…Miss Finch

Flying Burrito Brothers – Hot Burrito #1

This song is my favorite of the Flying Burrito Brothers. It came off their great country album The Gilded Palace of Sin. It didn’t chart at the time. It probably would have helped if they would have given it a proper name but regardless… it’s a great song.

Parsons wrote this song with Burrito bass player Chris Ethridge while the band was living in their San Fernando Valley house that was dubbed “Burrito Manor.”

This song, like the album The Gilded Palace of Sin, barely made a dent on the music world of 1969. They did develop a cult following after this albums release that included Bob Dylan and The Rolling Stones. The band was more popular with other musicians than the public.

Gram joined the Flying Burrito Brothers after leaving the Byrds in 1968.

The Gilded Palace of Sin. One thing you notice are the “Nudie” suites on the front cover. Nudie Cohn was an American tailor who designed decorative rhinestone-covered suits. Parsons’ suit was hand-stitched by Manuel Cuevas, Nudie Cohen’s protégé, who has called the suit “a map for him to follow to his death.”

The green leaves featured in the design on the front of the jacket are a marijuana plant, and the red-petaled flowers above them are poppies, the natural source of morphine, opium, and heroin. Gram Parsons would die in 1973 and the cause of death was an overdose of morphine and alcohol

This album was a major influence on the Eagles, Travis Tritt, Vince Gill, Alan Jackson, Clint Black, and Randy Travis.

Hot Burrito #1

You may be sweet and nice
But that won’t keep you warm at night
‘Cause I’m the one who showed you how
To do the things you’re doing now
He may feel all your charms
He might hold you in his arms
But I’m the one who let you in
I was right beside you in the end
Once upon a time
You let me feel you deep inside
But nobody knew, nobody saw
Do you remember the way we cried?
I’m your toy
I’m your old boy
But I don’t want no one
But you to love me
No, I wouldn’t lie
You know I’m not that kind of guy
Once upon a time
You let me feel you deep inside
But nobody knew, nobody saw
Do you remember the way we cried?
I’m your toy
I’m your old boy
But I don’t want no one
But you to love me
No, I wouldn’t lie
You know I’m not that kind of guy