Culture – Page 35 – PowerPop… An Eclectic Collection of Pop Culture

Twilight Zone – Printer’s Devil

★★★★★ Febraury 28, 1963 Season 4 Episode 9

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

I’ve always liked sell your soul to the devil stories. This one has Burgess Meredith and that means chances are it’s a great one. Three out of four Twilight Zones he is in are classics. Time Enough At Last, The Obsolete Man, and this one are remembered episodes of the Twilight Zone. His eyebrows were pointing slightly upward, a twisted cigar in his mouth, he certainly looks the part. He is a grinning, leering Devil, full of subtleties. His interpretation goes well beyond the lines. Meredith is also listed as one of the writers.

Robert Sterling plays Douglas Winter, a down on his luck newspaper owner who is about to get pushed out by a larger paper. Pat Crowley plays Jackie Benson who is Douglas’s much more acute girlfriend. The hour format doesn’t hurt this one at all…in fact it helps a bit. The fourth season is not full of classic episodes but I have always considered this one…one of the best.

Ralph Senensky directed this episode. I want to use this opportunity to tell everyone who is interested that he has a blog and talks about all the shows he directed. The Waltons, Night Gallery, Twilight Zone, and much more. His memories are insightful about those old shows. He still posts and he is around 98 years old.

Ralph Senensky: Actors like Burgess Meredith fascinated me with the preparation they brought to their roles. They didn’t just memorize their lines. As Beulah Bondi once said to me, “After the lines are learned, that’s when the work begins.” I’m sure Burgess took his cue for how to work at the linotype machine from one of Jackie’s lines: “If he doesn’t play Chopin’s Polonaise, I’m going to be disappointed.”

This show was written by Robert Sterling, Pat Crowley, and Burgess Meredith

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Take away a man’s dream, fill him with whiskey and despair, send him to a lonely bridge, let him stand there all by himself looking down at the black water, and try to imagine the thoughts that are in his mind. You can’t, I can’t. But there’s someone who can—and that someone is seated next to Douglas Winter right now. The car is headed back toward town, but its real destination is the Twilight Zone.

Summary

Douglas Winter, the editor of The Courier, a failing newspaper, feels there is nothing to live for after a number of employees quit, including the Linotype operator. On a bridge while drunk, he looks down into the inviting water below. When he is going to commit suicide, he is approached by one “Mr. Smith”, who comments that it’s a short fall and probably wouldn’t do a very good job. He then asks Doug for a light, and, if he wasn’t quite ready, a ride into town. Amused and forgetting about suicide, Winter gives him a lift to a café, where Mr. Smith agrees to provide the editor with money to pay off debts and continue the operation of the newspaper. Mr. Smith also signs up to replace the linotype operator and be the sole reporter. With nothing to lose, Doug agrees to the proposition.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Exit the infernal machine, and with it his satanic majesty, Lucifer, prince of darkness—otherwise known as Mr. Smith. He’s gone, but not for good; that wouldn’t be like him—he’s gone for bad. And he might be back, with another ticket….to The Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling…Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Burgess Meredith…Mr. Smith
Robert Sterling…Douglas Winter
Pat Crowley…Jackie Benson
Ray Teal…Mr. Franklin
Charles P. Thompson…Andy Praskins
Doris Kemper…Landlady
Camille Franklin…Molly

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer

Merry Christmas Eve everyone! We always have our Christmas on Christmas Eve night. Some of the family comes over and we all celebrate. My nephew has three children and one is only 3 years old so we will have a good time. This year my son is in Germany visiting his girlfriend so it’s our first Christmas without him…that part is hard but we will enjoy this Christmas Eve.

Watching Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer every year is the same as setting up the tree. Every year I would look forward to seeing this along with the others but what a fantastic durable show this has been. When I hear Burl Ives in anything…I think of him as the narrator Sam the Snowman of this program.

I’ve marked out some time to watch this tonight during our Christmas Eve party.

The characters are wonderful. Well except those other young reindeer who really come down on Rudolph when his nose lights up.

Hermey the elf who wants to be a dentist
Clarice – The reindeer who likes Rudolph just as he is red nose and all.
Yukon Cornelius the prospector who loves silver and gold and has a tongue that can find his silver and gold.
Abominable Snowman – The bad guy of the show who only needs a dentist to make him a good guy.
Head Elf – He leans on Hermey to get his elf self-act together and discourages him from being a dentist…I never liked him too much.

Throughout the special, Yukon Cornelius is seen throwing his pickaxe into the ground, taking it out and licking it. It turns out that he is checking for neither gold nor silver; Yukon was actually searching for an elusive peppermint mine. In a scene right at the end of the special’s original broadcast, deleted the next year to make room for the Misfit Toys’ new scene, Cornelius pulled his pick from the ground, licked it and said, “Peppermint! What I’ve been searching for all my life! I’ve struck it rich! I’ve got me a peppermint mine! Wahoo!” The scene was restored in 1998 and has been reinstated in all the subsequent home video release except for the 2004 DVD release. However, this scene is still cut from recent televised airings.

The Island of Misplaced Toys got to me when I was a kid. I really felt sorry for these lonely toys. King Moonracer was over the island and tried to convinced Rudolph to tell Santa about them so he could pick them up and find kids who would play with them.

The original 1964 airing did not include the closing scene where Santa picks up the misfit toys. That scene was added in 1965, in response to complaints that Santa was not shown fulfilling his promise to include them in his annual delivery.

The stop animation in this works really well.

The songs are really good. Silver and Gold, Holly Jolly Christmas, Jingle Jingle Jingle, We Are Santa’s Elves, There’s Always Tomorrow, We’re a Couple of Misfits and The Most Wonderful Day of the Year.

https://christmas-specials.fandom.com/wiki/Rudolph_the_Red-Nosed_Reindeer_(Rankin/Bass)

Slade – Merry Xmas Everybody

Merry Christmas Everybody… for all of the UK readers…I know I know…you are so tired of it. I’ve only heard it for the past three years or so. There are a few Christmas songs along with Alices Restaurant that I reblog every year…and this is one of them. I have this on our music list at Christmas and we love it.

This is fast becoming my favorite rock Christmas song second only to John Lennon’s Happy Xmas (War Is Over)

This is a great Christmas song that was released in 1973 and ever since it re-enters the charts every December in the UK. The song never hit in America but it went to #1 in the UK Charts. I first heard it on a Doctor Who episode in the mid-2000s and have liked it ever since.

This was based on a psychedelic song, “My Rocking Chair,” which Noddy Holder wrote in 1967. In 1973 the Slade vocalist decided to convert it into a Christmas song after a night out drinking at a local pub.

He and the band’s bass player and co-writer Jimmy Lea camped out at Noddy’s mother’s house and got down to changing the lyrics to make them more Christmassy. Jimmy Lea incorporated into the verse parts of another song which he was then writing and Noddy re-wrote the words incorporating different aspects of the Christmas holiday season as they came to mind.

This went straight in at #1 in the UK, selling over 300,000 copies on the day of its release, making it at the time the fastest ever selling record in Britain. It eventually became Slade’s best-ever selling single in the UK, selling over a million copies.

In the UK this has become a standard, and it is usually reissued in its original form each Christmas. On several occasions, the song has re-entered the Top 40.

UK copyright collection society and performance rights organization PRS For Music estimated in 2009 that 42 percent of the earth’s population has heard this tune.

The song was written by Noddy Holder and Jim Lea of Slade. It was produced by Chas Chandler formerly of the Animals.

Noddy Holder: “I wrote the original verse with the lyrics, ‘Buy me a rocking chair, I’ll watch the world go by. Bring me a mirror, I’ll look you in the eye,’ in 1967 in the aftermath of The Beatles’ Sgt Pepper,” I was being psychedelic. Dave (Hill) wrote another part to the song but it didn’t work so we put it away. Then in 1973 he remembered my verse one day when we were trying to write a Christmas single. We changed the words to, ‘Are you hanging up your stocking on the wall?’ and the rest fell into place.”

From Songfacts.

When Noddy Holder wrote the line “Look to the future now, it’s only just begun,” he had in mind the strikes that were blighting Britain at the time. He told the Daily Mail On Sunday November 10, 2007: “We’d decided to write a Christmas song and I wanted to make it reflect a British family Christmas. Economically, the country was up the creek. The miners had been on strike, along with the gravediggers, the bakers and almost everybody else. I think people wanted something to cheer them up – and so did I. That’s why I came up with the line.”

The harmonium used on this is the same one that John Lennon used on his Mind Games album, which was being recorded at the studio next door.

This was recorded at the Record Plant studios in New York while the band were on a tour of the States in the summer of 1973. When they recorded the vocals, they sang the chorus on the stairs in order to achieve the echo that they required. Guitarist Jimmy Lea recalled to Uncut magazine in 2012: “All these Americans were walking past in their suits thinking we were off our rockers singing about Christmas in the summer.”

Producer Chas Chandler opened the song with a howl recorded during some of Noddy Holder’s vocal exercises.

A few months before Slade recorded this song, drummer Don Powell was badly injured in a car crash. Though his physical recovery was quick, the mental scars took longer to heal. Noddy Holder explained to The Daily Mail December 18, 2009: “The doctors told us to get him playing drums again as soon as possible to boost his confidence. But he was suffering from short-term memory loss – he could remember our old songs, but not the new ones. So, instead of recording live, we built up Merry Xmas Everybody layer by layer. That gave it a more poignant, restrained sound. It was something new for us. But the fates were with us and it became our biggest hit.”

Noddy Holder’s earliest childhood memory served as inspiration for one of the song’s lines. He recalled to the Mail On Sunday’s Live magazine: “As a lad we used to knock sleds with old orange boxes and go tobogganing down this big old quarry in the snow at Christmas. It was the inspiration for the line ‘are you hoping that the snow will start to fall.’”

I want that hat he starts off with… in this video…very subtle.

Merry Christmas Everybody

Are you hanging up a stocking on your wall?
It’s the time that every Santa has a ball
Does he ride a red nosed reindeer?
Does a ‘ton up’ on his sleigh
Do the fairies keep him sober for a day?

Chorus:
So here it is merry Christmas
Everybody’s having fun
Look to the future now
It’s only just begun

Are you waiting for the family to arrive?
Are you sure you got the room to spare inside?
Does your granny always tell ya that the old are the best?
Then she’s up and rock ‘n’ rollin’ with the rest

Chorus:
So here it is merry Christmas
Everybody’s having fun
Look to the future now
It’s only just begun

What will your daddy do
When he sees your Mama kissin’ Santa Claus?
Ah ah

Are you hanging up a stocking on your wall?
Are you hoping that the snow will start to fall?
Do you ride on down the hillside in a buggy you have made?
When you land upon your head then you’ve been slayed

Chorus (4x)
So here it is merry Christmas
Everybody’s having fun
Look to the future now
It’s only just begun

…

Twilight Zone – Miniature

★★★★1/2 Febraury 21, 1963 Season 4 Episode 8

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

***Since we have two Holiday Weekends coming up,This will be the last Twilight Zone until January 5, 2022…thank you***

The first thing you notice is a young Robert Duvall that stars in this episode. He gives a sensitive portrayal of Charley Parkes who suffers from some sort of social anxiety. Parkes has a hard time interacting with humans but finds a doll house with a doll that he feels comfortable with. He seems to be retreating into a world of fantasy… but is he? Duvall plays it brilliantly with sensitivity.

Barbara Barrie plays Myra Russell and she would later play Barney Miller’s wife in the 1970s. Charles Beaumont’s script is thoughtful and sensitive and flows well for the most part…Duvall is a big reason.

Of all the hour-long Twilight Zone episodes, Miniature is the only one never put into syndication. The reason is that when the series was originally syndicated, Miniature was involved in a lawsuit. A script entitled The Thirteenth Mannequin had been submitted to Cayuga Productions prior to Miniature. The script concerned an old man who preferred the company of store mannequinsmannequins who ultimately come to life. The suit claimed that since both works dealt with main characters becoming involved inanimate human figures who come to life, Miniature had stolen the idea.

Ultimately, the case was dismissed, both by the initial judge and on appeal. The Thirteenth Mannequin was no ancestor of Miniature. The curious thing about this whole affair is that if any Twilight Zone episode was similar to The Thirteenth Mannequin, it was Serlings The After Hoursand that was written long before anyone at Cayuga ever heard of The Thirteenth Mannequin. Even when it was submitted, The Thirteenth Mannequin was not unique; The Twilight Zone had already explored its central idea.

Still, the damage was done. Because of the suit, Miniature was aired only once until… It was re-aired in 1984 as part of The Twilight Zone Silver Anniversary Special. For this showing, the dollhouse scenes were colorized in an early public demonstration of the then-innovative colorization process.

This show was written by Rod Serling and Charles Beaumont

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

To the average person, a museum is a place of knowledge, a place of beauty and truth and wonder. Some people come to study, others to contemplate, others to look for the sheer joy of looking. Charley Parkes has his own reasons. He comes to the museum to get away from the world. It isn’t really the sixty-cent cafeteria meal that has drawn him here every day, it’s the fact that here in these strange, cool halls he can be alone for a little while, really and truly alone. Anyway, that’s how it was before he got lost and wandered into the Twilight Zone.

Summary

Mousey misfit Charley Parkes finds the world unfolding before him in a museum doll house to be more real than his boring job and overbearing mother.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

They never found Charley Parkes because the guard didn’t tell them what he saw in the glass case. He knew what they’d say and he knew they’d be right too because seeing is not always believing, especially if what you see happens to be an odd corner of the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Robert Duvall … Charley Parkes
Pert Kelton … Mrs. Parkes
Barbara Barrie … Myra Russell
William Windom … Dr. Wallman
Lennie Weinrib … Buddy Russell
John McLiam … Guard
Barney Phillips … Diemel
Joan Chambers … Harriet
Chet Stratton … Guide
Richard Angarola Richard Angarola … The Suitor
Nina Roman … The Maid
Claire Griswold … The Doll
Norman Burton … Office Worker (uncredited)
Sally Kellerman … Office Worker (uncredited)
Joseph V. Perry … Office Worker (uncredited)

A Charlie Brown Christmas

I watched this last night…gearing up for Christmas…it’s not Christmas without The Peanuts and watching them all dance to “Linus and Lucy.”

The Peanuts were my favorite cartoon growing up and I would never miss their Thanksgiving, Halloween, and Christmas specials. Everyone can relate to Charlie Brown because we all lose more than we win in life. He doesn’t get to kick that football, his dog has more things than he does, and he is forever trying to get the elusive little redhead girl to notice him.

The Peanuts inhabit a kids world where grownups are felt but not heard. At least not in English. I’ve said this before but… Charlie Brown, one day when you grow up… I hope you end up with the little red head girl that you like so much and win just for once…for all of us.

This 1965 special has everything good about them in one show.

The gang is skating and Charlie Brown is telling Linus that despite Christmas being a happy time he is depressed. Linus tells Charlie that is normal and Lucy pipes in with “Of all the Charlie Browns in the world, you’re the Charlie Browniest.” That sums it all up.

Charlie gets to direct the Christmas play and his main job was to get a spectacular Christmas tree under Lucy’s orders. …He picks the only real tree there…more like a branch but he is sure it will do the job. Most of the gang do not agree when he comes back with the tree but Charlie persists. Linus gets up and reads from the Bible and the inflection he lends to the reading is great.

After that, you will need to watch because it will be worth it.

Aluminum Christmas trees were marketed beginning in 1958 and enjoyed fairly strong sales by eliminating pesky needles and tree sap. But the annual airings of A Charlie Brown Christmas swayed public thinking: In the special, Charlie Brown refuses to get a fake tree. Viewers began to do the same, and the product was virtually phased out by 1969. The leftovers are now collector’s items.

Actors and Actresses The early Peanuts specials made use of both untrained kids and professional actors: Peter Robbins (Charlie Brown) and Christopher Shea (Linus) were working child performers, while the rest of the cast consisted of “regular” kids coached by Melendez in the studio. When Schulz told Melendez that Snoopy couldn’t have any lines in the show—he’s a dog, and Schulz’s dogs didn’t talk—the animator decided to bark and chuff into a microphone himself, then speed up the recording to give it a more emotive quality.

Love the Christmas Dance.

…

Vince Guaraldi Trio – Linus and Lucy

It’s hard to resist this song. It automatically makes me happy when I hear it. I see the Peanuts gang doing their thing.

This song I can hear anytime of the year and be happy. It’s associated with Christmas also…whichever… I never get tired of it.

I was reminded of this song this year in Hanspostcard’s song draft when run-sew-read’s pick was this song.

Ironically, just about everyone would call this “the Charlie Brown song” even though it’s actually titled after Linus and Lucy Van Pelt, brother and sister in Charles Schulz’s Peanuts comic strip universe.

The song is most famous for its use in the yearly favorite A Charlie Brown Christmas, which first aired in 1965, but it was written two years earlier for a documentary about Schulz and the Peanuts gang called A Boy Named Charlie Brown, which never aired.

Producer Lee Mendelson was in charge of the documentary and asked Vince Guaraldi to compose music for it

Guaraldi was huge in the jazz world and won the 1962 Grammy for Best Original Jazz Composition for “Cast Your Fate To The Wind” for his group, the Vince Guaraldi Trio. Mendelson was searching for what kind of music to play for the documentary when he took a taxi cab and “Cast Your Fate To The Wind” was playing as he crossed the Golden Gate bridge. He loved it and his decision was made.

Guaraldi wrote a series of songs for the project, including “Linus and Lucy,” that he recorded with his group, the Vince Guaraldi Trio. Even though A Boy Named Charlie Brown was shelved, the soundtrack was released in 1964, which is where “Linus and Lucy” first appeared.

In 1965, Mendelson put together the first Peanuts TV special, A Charlie Brown Christmas, using many of the same people who worked on the documentary. “Linus and Lucy” formed the score, and a song he wrote with Guaraldi called “Christmas Time Is Here” was included in a key scene.

When A Charlie Brown Christmas debuted in 1965, it quickly turned the Peanuts franchise into a television institution. That first special also shot Guaraldi to greater fame, and he became connected to all subsequent Peanuts shows.

Guaraldi would continue to work on Peanuts films until his death in 1976.

No words…just enjoy

…

Twilight Zone – Jess-Belle

★★★★ Febraury 14, 1963 Season 4 Episode 7

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

I like this episode….it has a backwoods eerie feel to it. The show reminded me of the 1940s and 1950s horror movies like the Wolfman but set in a rural enviroment. There is some padding but that doesn’t stop this from being a good episode. Each character portrays superstitious beliefs and they play off of that for the story. A story of how love can sometimes blind people to the consequences of their actions. This was written by Waltons creator Earl Hamner Jr.

If you noticed the date…This haunting love story originally aired on Valentine’s Day in 1963.

The stand out in this episode was Jeanette Nolan as the creepy Granny Hart. A woman not to be messed with. She has an authentic backwoods dialect that she used in a previous episode…The Hunt. She was a marvelous character actress. James Best plays Billy Ben Turner in this one. Before he was in The Dukes of Hazzard he guest starred in the Andy Griffith Show among many shows. The two leading ladies Anne Francis and Laura Devon were on the mark. Anne Francis was in another Twilight Zone….the classic “After Hours” where she played a mannequin.

From IMDB: Jeanette Nolan played Granny Hart, from whom Jess-Belle Stone obtains a love potion to win over Billy-Ben Turner. In The Twilight Zone: The Chaser (1960), Nolan’s husband John McIntire played Professor A. Daemon, from whom Roger Shackleforth obtains a love potion to win over Leila.

This show was written by Rod Serling and Earl Hamner, Jr.

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

The Twilight Zone has existed in many lands in many times. It has its roots in history, in something that happened long, long ago and got told about and handed down from one generation of folk to the other. In the telling the story gets added to and embroidered on, so that what might have happened in the time of the Druids is told as if it took place yesterday in the Blue Ridge Mountains. Such stories are best told by an elderly grandfather on a cold winter’s night by the fireside in the southern hills of the Twilight Zone.

Summary

After the love of her life, Billy Ben Turner, gets engaged to Ellwyn, the daughter of a rich farmer, a jealous Jess-Belle turns to a local witch to help her get him back. Granny Hart is known in the area as the person to go to for any potion you might want. Jess-Belle has no money, however, and all Granny Hart can give her is a potion that carries a high price. Jess-Belle is prepared to pay any price, and the potion she takes seems to work: as soon as Billy Ben sets eyes on her, he falls madly in love with her. When the clock strikes midnight, however, Jess-Belle is transformed and later realizes that she, too, is now a witch.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

The episode did not feature a closing narration from Rod Serling. Instead, it ends with the folk song heard at the beginning:

Fair was Elly Glover,
Dark was Jess-Belle.
Both they loved the same man
And both they loved him well.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Anne Francis … Jess-Belle Stone
James Best … Billy Ben Turner
Laura Devon … Ellwyn Glover
Jeanette Nolan … Granny Hart
Virginia Gregg … Ossie Stone
George Mitchell … Luther Glover
Helen Kleeb … Mattie Glover
Jim Boles … Obed Miller
Jon Lormer … Minister

Twilight Zone – Death Ship

★★★★★ Febraury 7, 1963 Season 4 Episode 6

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

This is one of my favorite episodes of the 4th season. All three main actors bring something to the table. This one shows denial from the three main characters and the will to go on. They see a spaceship (their spaceship) has crashed and they see themselves dead. How is this possible? Are they really dead or is it just an hallucination? They spend the episode investigating different reasons as Captain Ross pushes the other two to the brink.

Jack Klugman plays Captain Ross and he is great as always and he would appear in 4 Twilight Zones. Ross Martin appears as Lt. Ted Mason and Martin would have 130 tv credits in the 60s and 70s. He was turned down in starring roles because of a heart condition and studios were afraid to take a chance on him in starring roles. He had mostly had guest appearances and was a great character actor. Fred Beir as Lt. Mike Carter had over 100 screen credits to his name.

This episode is quite creepy and the twist at the end is good…even if you guess it before hand. The hour long format works well in this episode. You get background information on each character.

The special effects were really good for this one. Included in Death Ship are a number of futuristic props, including the spaceship itself (a leftover from the movie Forbidden Planet) and an on-bridge device that scans the planets surface. Realistic paintings show the wrecked spaceship and the exterior of a house back on Earth. Also worth noting are the day and night shots of the spaceship landing and taking off.

Russ Martin who was separted from his wife and daughter: I had found that certain personal things with regard to my own daughter motivate me or drive me or move me. Years ago, I was in a class taught by Marty Ritt, who is now a brilliant director, and one of the exercises we had was to move a distance of something like eighteen feet in three steps and sit in a chair. I mean, just move, three steps and youre sitting in the chair. And I said, Tt just cant be done. He said, You give yourself something thatll make you do that.

So I pictured my daughter under certain circumstances. Now, its horrible to me even now, as I mention it but the truth is that I pictured her at a window, inside a burning building, calling to me in near panic, Daddy! Daddy! And I took those steps! It was effortless to stride the length of a mans body. It was almost as though I had been shot out of a cannon, but that was because that was meaningful to me. And I used similar circumstances involving my own daughter, in my mind, in preparation for that scene, so that when I turned and saw her my heart just broke. The joy, the joy at seeing her!

Special effects supervisor Herbert Hirschman : I supervised the construction and told them what I wanted. We built a miniature to show the ship landing and taking off. It was on a table with sand and little plants. The ship was suspended from invisible wires. And as the ship was slowing in the descent, I wanted to see the sand billowing up. It was very expensive, but I felt that it was essential to the credibility of the show. The attention to detail was well worth the effort; its a beautiful effect. It was an awful lot of fun, says Hirschman, I kept asking for more and they kept doing it.

IMDB: The story proposes that 1997 is the year that spaceships are being sent from an overpopulated Earth to find planets suitable for colonization. A similar notion was later used as one of the main premises of Lost in Space (1965), a series which starred many Twilight Zone alumni.

Of the three main actors, Jack Klugman (Captain Ross) was the only one who lived to see the actual 1997.

The spaceship E-89, is the same miniature prop that was originally created as the saucer-shaped United Planets Cruiser C-57D for the 1956 MGM science fiction classic Forbidden Planet (1956). The external set of the ship and its staircase, and the crew uniforms, are also from the same film. “The Twilight Zone” was able to make extensive use of props and costumes created for “Forbidden Planet” (including Robby The Robot) thanks to the fact that it was regularly filmed at MGM Studios, which kept all these items in storage in its prop department for many years.

This show was written by Rod Serling and Richard Matheson

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Picture of the spaceship E-89, cruising above the 13th planet of star system 51, the year 1997. In a little while, supposedly, the ship will be landed and specimens taken: vegetable, mineral, and if any, animal. These will be brought back to overpopulated Earth, where technicians will evaluate them, and if everything is satisfactory, stamp their findings with the word ‘inhabitable’ and open up yet another planet for colonization. These are the things that are supposed to happen.

Picture of the crew of the spaceship E-89: Captain Ross, Lieutenant Mason, Lieutenant Carter. Three men who have just reached a place which is as far from home as they will ever be. Three men who in a matter of minutes will be plunged into the darkest nightmare reaches of the Twilight Zone.

Summary

In 1997, the spaceship E-89 arrives at the 13th planet in star system 51. Their mission is to collect plant samples to take back to an overpopulated Earth so it can be determined if the planet could be colonized. What they find however is a crashed spaceship of Earth design. Inside the ship they discover three dead crew members – but the dead are their duplicates and the crashed vessel is the E-89. The captain refuses to accept that they might be dead and explores several possibilities to explain what has happened including the theory that they may have time-traveled. The two crewmen hallucinate and come to believe they are already dead but the captain refuses to accept that and intends to prove that they are very much alive.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Picture of a man who will not see anything he does not choose to see, including his own death. A man of such indomitable will that even the two men beneath his command are not allowed to see the truth; which truth is, that they are no longer among the living, that the movements they make and the words they speak have all been made and spoken countless times before, and will be made and spoken countless times again, perhaps even unto eternity. Picture of a latter-day Flying Dutchman, sailing into the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Jack Klugman…Capt. Paul Ross
Ross Martin…Lt. Ted Mason
Fred Beir (as Fredrick Beir)…Lt. Mike Carter
Mary Webster…Ruth Mason
Ross Elliott…Kramer
Sara Taft…Mrs. Nolan
Tammy Marihugh…Jeannie Mason

A Christmas Carol (1951)

I watched this movie Monday night. It gets me in the mood for Christmas. Alastair Sim is such a pleasure to watch and he is the reason that this is my favorite interpretation of A Christmas Carol.

There have been many versions of this great story. This is the version that I like the most. The great Alastair Sim plays Ebenezer Scrooge and he is the reason I like this so much. When I think of the Scrooge… I think of him.

The movie is in black and white which turns some people off but it makes it that much better to me. They do have a color version but trust me…watch the black and white version. It gives the movie a darker feeling.

The effects they use are obviously not CGI but they get the point across well and serve the story. I like the scene where the ghost of Jacob Marley is warning Ebenezer of being greedy…the two were not on the set at the same time…it looked really good for being 1951…or anytime for that matter.

So get some eggnog or hot butter rum and sit back and watch this great movie.

From IMDB…spoilers

Ebenezer Scrooge (Alastair Sim) is a greedy businessman who thinks only of making money. For him, Christmas is, in his own words, a humbug. It has been seven years since his friend and partner, Jacob Marley (Sir Michael Hordern), died and on Christmas Eve. Marley’s ghost tells him he is to be visited during the night by three spirits. The Ghost of Christmas Past (Michael Dolan) revisits some of the main events in Scrooge’s life to date, including his unhappy childhood, his happy apprenticeship to Mr. Fezziwig (Roddy Hughes), who cared for his employees, and the end of his engagement to a pretty young woman due to a growing love of money. The Ghost of Christmas Present (Francis De Wolff) shows him how joyously is nephew Fred (Brian Worth) and his clerk, Bob Cratchit (Mervyn Johns), celebrate Christmas with those they love. The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come (Czeslaw Konarski) shows him what he will leave behind after he is gone. Scrooge awakens on Christmas morning, a new man intent on doing good and celebrating the season with all of those around him.

Cast

Alastair Sim (Ebenezer Scrooge)
Kathleen Harrison (Mrs. Dilber)
Mervyn Johns (Bob Cratchit)
Hermione Baddeley (Mrs. Cratchit)
Michael Hordern (Jacob Marley)
Glyn Dearman (Tiny Tim)

…

Twilight Zone – Mute

★★★★ January 31, 1963 Season 4 Episode 5

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

I really like this one. It’s not among the best but again a really good sci-fi episode. The show has some very good character actors like Frank Overton and Barbara Baxley. A girl who loses her parents in a fire manages to escape their burning house. A couple named Harry and Cora take her in but cannot uderstand why Ilse doesn’t talk. It turns out that Ilse used telepathy with her parents…her parents were molding her to use that skill. When Harry and Cora took her to school for the first time Ilse was horrified and could not commuicate like other kids.

This episode has depth and there are a lot of moving parts. What I saw in this episode is parents who treat their children as objects to be molded rather than people with needs and rights. Its a good episode and moves quite well. It does give a back story on why Ilse’s parents were teaching her telepathic abilities.

The biggest surprise to me was who played Ilse…it was an 80s sitcom actress…Ann Jillian.

From IMDB: The main street that Ilsa runs across is the same one used in The Twilight Zone: I Sing the Body Electric (1962). Located on the MGM backlot in Culver City, it was known as the “New England Street”, and is same set that was featured in the Andy Hardy movies, starring Mickey Rooney., Elvis Presley’s “Jailhouse Rock”, Frank Sinatra’s “Some Came Running” and the 1970s musical fantasy “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Heart’s Club Band”, starring The Bee Gees, which was the last major film shot there. Much of the MGM backlot had been demolished in 1974, and the remainder, including the New England Street, was pulled down in 1978, soon after filming wrapped on “Sgt Pepper’s”.

This show was written by Rod Serling and Richard Matheson

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

What you’re witnessing is the curtain-raiser to a most extraordinary play; to wit, the signing of a pact, the commencement of a project. The play itself will be performed almost entirely offstage. The final scenes are to be enacted a decade hence and with a different cast. The main character of these final scenes is Ilse, the daughter of Professor and Mrs. Nielsen, age two. At the moment she lies sleeping in her crib, unaware of the singular drama in which she is to be involved. Ten years from this moment, Ilse Nielsen is to know the desolating terror of living simultaneously in the world and in the Twilight Zone.

Summary

Sometime after World War II, a small group of people make a pact to develop their telepathic abilities as a means of communicating, foregoing any type of oral communication. One couple, the Nielsens, announce that they are migrating to a small town in the USA, German Corners, Pa. After a tragic fire at their house 10 years later, Sheriff Harry Wheeler and his wife Cora take in the only survivor, the now orphaned Ilsa Nielsen. The young girl has never learned to speak, always using telepathy to communicate with her parents. They don’t quite understand why Ilsa won’t speak to them and Cora sees her as a replacement for the daughter she lost in an accident some years ago. When they enroll Ilsa in school, her teacher is determined to make her act like all the other children.

THE ENTIRE EPISODE ON DAILY MOTION

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

It has been noted in a book of proven wisdom that perfect love casteth out fear. While it’s unlikely that this observation was meant to include that specific fear that follows the loss of extrasensory perception, the principle remains, as always, beautifully intact. Case in point, that of Ilse Nielsen, former resident of the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Barbara Baxley … Cora Wheeler
Frank Overton … Harry Wheeler
Irene Dailey … Miss Frank
Ann Jillian … Ilse (as Ann Jilliann)
Éva Szörényi … Frau Werner (as Eva Soreny)
Robert Boon … Holger Nielsen
Claudia Bryar … Frau Nielsen
Percy Helton … Tom Poulter
Oscar Beregi Jr. … Karl Werner (as Oscar Beregi)
Fred Aldrich … Pedestrian (uncredited)
William Challee … Rude man on porch (uncredited)
Bill Erwin Bill Erwin … Man in Flashback (uncredited)
Charles Morton … Bartender (uncredited)
Norbert Schiller … Committee member in prologue (uncredited)
Glen Walters … Pedestrian (uncredited

Twilight Zone – He’s Alive

★★★★★ January 24, 1963 Season 4 Episode 4

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

This episode is not subtle…there is no reading between the lines in this one. Serling lays it out on the table for everyone to see. Dennis Hopper plays Peter Vollmer who is a disenfranchised young man and a xenophobic would be Nazi trying to gain a following. The episode was not the best of the Twilight Zone but it packs a punch and as Serling said…it probably was the most important episode of the Twilight Zone.

Peter Vollmer is struggling to gain followers for his hate causes. He then starts getting advice from a shadowy figure who we cannot see…until later on. The advice he gets is all too familiar unfortnately…it reeks of hatred, bigotry, and ignornace. How to manipulate the situations around him to gain followers for his movement.The mystery man leads Peter along and when he is uncovered it is shocking. In 1963 WWII was still fresh in people’s minds

From IMDB….Rod Serling considered this episode, which he wrote and which examines the subject of Nazism (National Socialism), to be the most important of the series.

The episode’s director Stuart Rosenberg would later direct Dennis Hopper in the classic film Cool Hand Luke

This show was written by Rod Serling

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Portrait of a bush-league Führer named Peter Vollmer, a sparse little man who feeds off his self-delusions and finds himself perpetually hungry for want of greatness in his diet. And like some goose-stepping predecessors he searches for something to explain his hunger, and to rationalize why a world passes him by without saluting. That something he looks for and finds is in a sewer. In his own twisted and distorted lexicon he calls it faith, strength, truth. But in just a moment Peter Vollmer will ply his trade on another kind of corner, a strange intersection in a shadowland called the Twilight Zone.

Summary

Peter Vollmer is the leader of a small neo-Nazi movement in a large American city. He’s having trouble getting his message across and seems to alienate people every time he opens his mouth. After a particularly bad rally, he hears a voice and sees a man standing in the shadows. He begins to advise Peter on what to say and how he can structure his message to make it more appealing to his particular audience. Peter has success but his mentor begins pushing him to extremes. There is a limit however and there is a voice of reason in the mob that seemed so willing to follow him

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Where will he go next, this phantom from another time, this resurrected ghost of a previous nightmare – Chicago? Los Angeles? Miami, Florida? Vincennes, Indiana? Syracuse, New York? Anyplace, everyplace, where there’s hate, where there’s prejudice, where there’s bigotry. He’s alive. He’s alive so long as these evils exist. Remember that when he comes to your town. Remember it when you hear his voice speaking out through others. Remember it when you hear a name called, a minority attacked, any blind, unreasoning assault on a people or any human being. He’s alive because through these things we keep him alive.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Dennis Hopper … Peter Vollmer
Ludwig Donath … Ernst Ganz
Paul Mazursky … Frank
Howard Caine … Nick
Barnaby Hale … Stanley
Jay Adler … Gibbons
Wolfe Barzell … Proprietor
Bernard Fein … Heckler
Curt Conway … Adolf Hitler
Edward Astran … Audience Member (uncredited)
Sam Bagley … Audience Member (uncredited)
Chet Brandenburg … Audience Member (uncredited)
Paul Bryar … Cop (uncredited)
Bud Cokes … Audience Member (uncredited)
Joe Evans … Audience Member (uncredited)
Bobby Gilbert … Man With Cat (uncredited)
Buck Harrington … Audience Member (uncredited)
Ed Haskett … Audience Member (uncredited)
Robert McCord … Cop (uncredited)
William Meader … Brawling Townsman (uncredited)
Jim Michael … Guard (uncredited)
Sol Murgi … Audience Member (uncredited)
William H. O’Brien … Audience Member (uncredited)
Jose Portugal … Ice Cream Man (uncredited)
Paul Ravel … Audience Member (uncredited)
Bill Zuckert … Detective (uncredited)

Mike Nesmith (1942-2021) and the Monkees influence

I had something else planned to post but I found out that Mike Nesmith passed away. Nesmith was a big inspiration to me. There is no question…Nesmith would have made it without the Monkees…he was a talented writer, actor, producer, novelist and a very good Texas guitar player. He wrote some great country rock songs, Elephant Parts, and even a hit for Linda Ronstadt’s band The Stone Poneys…Different Drum.

While watching the reruns of the Monkees I bugged my mom to buy me a green wool hat with buttons but you can’t buy them off the shelf. She got me a green stocking cap…it wasn’t the same but I was happy. When the Monkees are mentioned some people cringe but they still have a place in my 5-year-old heart…plus how many bands can say that Jimi Hendrix opened up for them? Although that might be the worst pairing ever.

I’m not saying they deserve to be remembered with the best bands ever. Not at all but they do need to be recognized for their influence on a couple of generations. They influenced a lot of kids to form bands…mostly because of their weekly prime-time television show and ensuing hit singles. In the 80s they had a big comeback with a tour and massive airplay on MTV… I got to see them then…without Nesmith though.

They were a lot of fun. I thought WOW… I must be in a band one day. Little did I know that being in a band was not living in a cool place at the beach and having adventures at every turn…not to mention everyone getting along…it just doesn’t happen that way…but it is a special feeling being in a band with an us against them attitude and a great growing experience.

After I went through the Monkees faze I discovered the Beatles, The Who, Stones, Kinks…anything British but I still have a soft spot for some of the old Monkees songs.

The Monkees basically took A Hard Days Night movie humor and made a television show around a life of a mid-sixties rock band. Kids wanted to form bands after seeing them romp around the screen with girls…who wouldn’t want that gig? Michael Stipe from REM has said he was influenced by them.

They were not allowed to play on their first couple of albums…only sing…The Monkees were put together by Bob Rafelson and Bert Schneider for Screen Gems with two real musicians in the band…Michael Nesmith and Peter Tork… Micky Dolenz (he did sing in cover bands before The Monkees) and Davy Jones could sing and act…. and Mickey quickly learned drums.

When news came out that they didn’t play on their albums they were roundly criticized in the 1960s. They fought Don Kershner who controlled what they sang…. and won… The funny thing is many sixties pop bands didn’t play on their records and the Monkees actually started to play their own instruments on their third album (Headquarters) and writing some songs for every album afterward.

In the second season of their tv show they started to gain more control. Some of those last episodes are very pot influenced…especially the episode called “The Frodis Caper”… It is surreal and broke the fourth wall…the second season is worth a watch…all of them are fun but the 1st season is more formulaic.

I still like many songs by them…anything written by Michael Nesmith (famous also for Elephant Parts), Pleasant Valley Sunday, Randy Scouse Git, Steppin Stone and Saturday’s Child.

All in all, they ended up singing and playing on some of the best-known sixties pop-rock hits.

I’ll just add one more thing…he Monkees belong in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

….

Twilight Zone – Valley Of The Shadow

★★★★★ January 17, 1963 Season 4 Episode 3

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

One of the thought-provoking episodes of the 4th season. I like the story and the pace for the hour long format is brisk. They cover a lot of ground in this episode. Ed Nelson as Philip Redfield plays this role with passion. He is traveling through back roads and runs through a small nothing little town called Peaceful Valley.

He notices something different and the townspeople can do things that are impossible…make a dog disappear, bring that same dog back from the dead, and invisible force fields. He finds out the history of the town from the leaders and wants them to share this with the world.

If you had the technology to end poverty, sickness, and even death in cases…do you use it? If you do, you risk someone getting the technology and using it for evil things. Are humans outside of this peaceful town ready for that much power? Dorn doesn’t think so…and I don’t either.

. Al the actors do a great job. David Opatoshu as the “town” leader Dorn plays it with compassion and common sense. You will know James Doohan in a minor role…still a few years away from Scotty in Star Trek.

Watch this one…it could have been a great sci-fi movie.

The title comes from the King James Version of the 23rd Psalm in the Hebrew Bible. “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”

This show was written by Rod Serling and Charles Beaumont

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

You’ve seen them. Little towns, tucked away far from the main roads. You’ve seen them, but have you thought about them? What do the people in these places do? Why do they stay? Philip Redfield never thought about them. If his dog hadn’t gone after that cat, he would have driven through Peaceful Valley and put it out of his mind forever. But he can’t do that now, because whether he knows it or not his friend’s shortcut has led him right into the capital of the Twilight Zone.

Summary

On the back roads, trying to find his way back home, reporter Philip Redfield and his dog, Rollie, stop in the small town of Peaceful Valley, for gas and food, and directions. When Rollie runs off in pursuit of a cat, a young girl points a device at the dog, and he disappears. Though her father brings Rollie back, Philip finds it all very strange. When Phillip tries to leave town, his car crashes into an invisible barrier, preventing his departure. Shaken up, the town’s mayor, Dorn, reveals their secret, and gives Philip the choice; join them or die

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

You’ve seen them. Little towns, tucked away far from the main roads. You’ve seen them, but have you thought about them? Have you wondered what the people do in such places, why they stay? Philip Redfield thinks about them now and he wonders, but only very late at night, when he’s between wakefulness and sleep in the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
David Opatoshu … Dorn
Ed Nelson … Philip Redfield
Natalie Trundy … Ellen Marshall
Jacques Aubuchon … Connolly
Dabbs Greer … Evans
James Doohan … Father
Morgan Brittany … Girl (as Suzanne Cupito)
Henry Beckman … Townsman
Bart Burns Bart Burns … Townsman
King Calder … Townsman
Pat O’Hara Pat O’Hara … Townsman
Sandy Kenyon … The Attendant

December 8, 1980…Lennon

Damn this date. Every Dec 8th I can’t help but think of where I was at when I heard. Get Back only heightened the anger and confusion over what happened.

It’s odd to think the Beatles had only been broken up for 10 years when this happened…to a 13 year old at the time…that was a lifetime but in reality it’s nothing.

Since second grade, I’d been listening to the Beatles. While a lot of kids I knew listened and talked about modern music …I just couldn’t relate as much. By the time I was ten I had read every book about The Beatles I could get my hands on. In a small middle TN town…it wasn’t too many. I was after their generation but I knew the importance of what they did…plus just great music. The more I got into them the more I learned about the Who, Stones, and the Kinks. I wanted to get my hands on every book about the music of the 1960s. Just listening to the music wasn’t enough…I wanted to know the history.

I spent that Monday night playing albums in my room. Monday night I didn’t turn the radio on…I’m glad I didn’t…The next morning I got up to go to school and the CBS morning news was on. The sound was turned down but the news was showing Beatle video clips. I was wondering why they were showing them but didn’t think much of it.

Curious, I walked over to the television and turned it up and found out that John Lennon had been shot and killed. I was very angry and shocked. The bus ride to school was quiet, at school, it was quiet as well. Some teachers were affected because John was their generation. Some of my friends were shocked but some really didn’t get the significance at the time and some didn’t care. A few but not many kids acted almost gleeful which pissed me off…It was obvious their parents were talking through them.

I went out and bought the White Album, Abbey Road and Double Fantasy in late December of 1980…I can’t believe I didn’t have the two Beatle albums already…now whenever I hear any song from those albums they remind me of the winter of 80-81. I remember the call-in shows on the radio then…pre-internet… people calling to share their feelings for John or hatred for the killer.

The next few weeks I saw footage of the Beatles on specials that I had never seen before. Famous and non-famous people pouring their heart out over the grief. Planned tributes from bands and everyone asking the same question…why?

My young mind could not process why a person would want to do this to a musician. A politician yea…I could see that…not that it’s right but this? A musician? Martin Luther King, Bobby Kennedy, and JFK were before my time. By the mid-1970s John had pretty much dropped out of sight…John and Yoko released Double Fantasy on November 17, 1980, and suddenly they were everywhere…Less than a month later John was murdered. The catchwords were Catcher in the Rye, Hawaii, handgun and insane. The next day we were duly informed on who killed John in the First, Middle, and Last name format they assign to murderers.

I didn’t want to know his name, his career, his wife’s name, his childhood…I just wanted to know why… he says now…”attention”

I noticed a change happened after that Monday night. John Lennon was instantly turned into a saint, something he would have said was preposterous. Paul suddenly became the square and the uncool one and George and Ringo turned into just mere sidemen. Death has a way of elevating you in life. After the Anthology came out in the 90s that started to change back a little.

I called my dad a few days after it happened and he said that people were more concerned that The Beatles would never play again than the fact a man, father, and husband was shot and killed. He was right and I was among those people until he said that. Dad was never a fan but he made his point.

Below is a video of James Taylor telling on how he met the killer a day before Lennon was murdered.

…

Twilight Zone – The Thirty-Five Fathom Grave

★★★1/2 January 10, 1963 Season 4 Episode 2

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

This is the second episode in the new hour long format. This story has some added padding…a direct consequence of the hour-long format of this episode. That doesn’t mean it isn’t good. The story is creepy but they visited this theme before in the second season opener King Nine Will Not Return.

The cast is excellent. Mike Kellin plays Chief Bell who is having survivors guilt that brings to mind PTSD. You find out later that it’s more than that. Simon Oakland is Captain Beecham and gives a very realistic performance as Oakland does in whatever he is in. The most famous actor in this one…at least to my generation is Bill Bixby. He only plays a supporting role and it’s interesting to see him as a younger actor.

Basically it’s a great story but too much padding but…very watchable.

This is from IMDB…it’s a piece of trivia that is very eerie: Mike Kellin portraying the main character, Chief Bell, died 26 August 1983, the ship used for exterior shots in the episode was decommissioned 11 August 1983. Simon Oakland, who portrayed the captain, died three days later on 29 August 1983.

Also this explains why this episode drags a bit: Season four of Twilight Zone is the only one of the five seasons that ran its episodes in hour long time slots rather then the conventional half-hour format. The Thirty-Fathom Grave was written by Rod Serling before the network and producers decided to try out the series in the new lengthier format. Since the episode had already been optioned for season four it was necessary for Rod Serling to re-write and expand the episode to fit the new hour slot. Therefore several new scenes had to be added or padded to fill up time. As a result, this episode received mostly negative feedback based on its slow pace and unnecessary dialogue.

This episode would have been so much better at the original 30 minutes.

This show was written by Rod Serling

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

Incident one hundred miles off the coast of Guadalcanal. Time: the present. The United States naval destroyer on what has been a most uneventful cruise. In a moment, they’re going to send a man down thirty fathoms and check on a noise maker – someone or something tapping on metal. You may or may not read the results in a naval report, because Captain Beecham and his crew have just set a course that will lead this ship and everyone on it into the Twilight Zone.

Summary

As a U.S. Navy destroyer cruises near Guadalcanal in the South Pacific, its sonar detects muted but constant hammering on metal undersea. The eerie sounds emanate from a submarine on the ocean floor, apparently there since World War II. The ship’s chief boatswain’s mate becomes very nervous, having served aboard that sub – and he was its sole survivor.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

Small naval engagement, the month of April, 1963. Not to be found in any historical annals. Look for this one filed under ‘H’ for haunting in the Twilight Zone.

CAST

Rod Serling … Narrator / Self – Host (uncredited)
Mike Kellin…Chief Bell
Simon Oakland…Captain Beecham
David Sheiner…Doc
John Considine…McClure
Bill Bixby…OOD
Conlan Carter…Ensign
Forrest Compton…ASW Officer
Henry Scott…Jr. OOD
Anthony D. Call…Lee Helmsman
Charles Kuenstle…Sonar Operator
Derrik Lewis…Helmsman
Vincent Baggetta…Crewman
Louie Elias…Crewman