Twilight Zone Companion (36 page)

Written by George Clayton Johnson

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: Buzz Kulik

Director of Photography: Jack Swain

Music: stock

Cast: Jesse Cardiff: Jack Klugman Jonathan Winters and Jack Klugman Fats Brown: Jonathan Winters

Jesse Cardiff, pool shark, the best on Randolph Street, who will soon learn that trying to be the best at anything carries its own special risks in or out of the Twilight Zone

Alone in Clancys pool hall, Jesse voices his dearest wish: that he be allowed to play the late Fats Brown and prove that he, not Fats, is really the worlds greatest pool player. Fats appears and challenges Jesse to a game with Jesses life as the stakes. A game of skill, nerve and bluff commences, with Fats seeming to hold the upper hand. But at last, Jesse has only one easy ball to sink to win the game. Fats warns him that he might win more

than he bargains for, but Jesse disregards this and sinks the ball. After he dies, however, he realizes the meaning of Fatss words: it is now he who must wearily rise to every challenge from ambitious players on Earth.

Mr. Jesse Cardiff, who became a legend by beating one, but who has found out after his funeral that being the best of anything carries with it a special obligation to keep on proving it. Mr. Fats Brown, on the other hand, having relinquished the champions mantle, has gone fishing. These are the ground rules in the Twilight Zone .

Jack Klugmans second appearance on The Twilight Zone was in George Clayton Johnsons A Game of Pool, a tautly written piece dealing with the ramifications of winning and losingand being the best. This episode should be shown to anyone who thinks that in order to have dramatic tension one needs car chases, explosions and guns, for it packs more drama than any ten cop shows combined.

For this one show, Johnson abandoned his usual sentimentality and wrote with a realism and hardness that makes his dialogue crackle. Reprinting the entire script would be impractical, but we can provide a sniff of the cork, as it were. Here, Fats has just materialized in the poolroom:

jesse (.Incredulous): Its impossible!

fats: Nothings impossible. Some things are less likely than others, thats all.

jesse: It isnt a rib. Its you. Youre

fats: James Howard Brown. Known to my friends as Fats. I know its a shock, but then you called meI didnt call you.

jesse: Well, I didnt mean anything. You see, it was just I was trying to

fats: Oh sure, sure, I understand. It was just big talk, is that it? You like to play with fire but you dont like to cook. Youre not as good as you claim and you know it. Deep down, you know that youre second rate.

jesse: Now wait a minute!

fats: Are you afraid? Look, Ive come a long way, boy, and not to be fooled with. Ive seen your kind beforea little skill, a knack, a style, but when the heats on, you fold.

jesse: That isnt fair. Youve never seen me play. Maybe I can beat you. Its possible, isnt it?

fats: Its possible. Things change. Records get higher.

But youll never get the job done with your mouth.

jesse: All right, fat boy, dead or alive, let me tell you something. Maybe you are some kind of a legenda tin god. You know what you are to me?

Youre a big balloon waiting for someone to stick a needle in it. (.Indicating his pool cue) Well, Im the someone and heres the needle.

As Jesse, Klugman is intense, thoughtful, and complex. More than that, he is real. As for Winters, well, first of all he is not the ponderous man with a neat fringe of beard described in Johnsons script.

Director Buzz Kulik explains the reasoning behind the casting of Winters. With a guy like Jack Klugman, you go out and get Jack Warden or somebody like that. However, we determined that here was this guy who was such a brilliant talent, who would bring a kind of freshness, because this was his first time as a dramatic actor. Hed never even been on film before.

For Winters, appearing in A Game of Pool was anything but a lark. He was very anxious to do this well, says Kulik, and yet he was kind of embarrassed because he felt, My God, here are all these professional people, this crew and cast, and here I am. And not only did he have to work his dialogue but he had to play pool! So, whenever hed blow a line or make a mistake, in order to cover his embarrassment he would go on for like ten, fifteen minutes, in the character, doing some of the wildest, funniest, most marvelous things youd ever seen.

Curiously, the conclusion of the show was not the original ending. We had a heck of a time with the ending on that, says Buck Houghton. I dont know that it ever was satisfactory. It seems to me we reshot that about three different times. We never could wrap that up to our satisfaction.

As for George Clayton Johnson, he greatly prefers the ending he wrote in the script, in which Jesse loses the game. Here it is, in its entirety:

With a final look at Fats he bends to the table. He carefully sights. It is absolutely silent as he takes two tentative passes at the cue ball and shoots. The cue ball hits the 15 ball. It rolls toward the pocket, hooks the corner and bounds back. He has missed.

FATS STEPS INTO F.G.
Bends, sights, shoots and sinks the ball. He turns slowly to face Jesse. Jesse stands frozen. He is struck dumb with terror. It is time to pay off the bet.

jesse: (Hysteria) What are you waiting for?

Get it over with!

Fats continues to look at him without moving.

jesse (contd): You said life or death

fats: Do you really expect me to kill you?

Confused. He had expected sudden horrible death. Not this.

jesse: You said if I won Id live. If I lost Id

die!

fats: And you will as all second-raters die youll be buried and forgotten without me touching you. If youd beaten me youd have lived forever.

Reacting. At first with sudden relief as he realizes that Fats has no intention of taking his life, and then with anger because he has been tricked.

jesse: You tricked me!

fats: You had to prove yourself under pressure. Any man can be a marksman if the target doesnt shoot back.

Jesse looks at him in bewilderment as Fats packs his cueback into its case. Fats turns and walks into the shadows at the rear of the poolroom. He turns, nods and vanishes.

Jesse shakes himself, blinks. With a cry he runs to the spot where Fats disappeared.

jesse: Wait!

He looks wildly around.

jesse: Wait! It isnt over! Do you hear? I havent given up! Ill practiceday and night if necessary! Im still alive! I can get better! I will get better!

He cocks his head listening … Silence. And then, slowly, he turns.

As he walks back to the table, picks up his stick and begins to practice combination shots.

jesse: (Under his breath) Youll hear from me

again, Fats Brown!

serlings voice: Lives of great men all remind us:

We can make our lives sublime And, departing, leave behind us Footprints on the sands of time.

On the Earth as we know it,

And in The Twilight Zone.

Whichever ending one prefers, A Game of Pool is top-flight in every regard. Who wins the game is not as important as the game itself. In one guise or another, it is a game most of us have played at least once in our lives.

The Passersby,

Written by Rod Serling

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: Elliot Silverstein

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Music: Fred Steiner

Cast: Lavinia: Joanne Linville The Sergeant: James Gregory Abraham Lincoln: Austin Green Charlie: Rex Holman The Lieutenant: David Garcia Jud: Warren Kemmerling

This road is the afterwards of the Civil War. It began at Fort Sumter; South Carolina, and ended at a place called Appomattox. Its littered with the residue of broken battles and shattered dreams. … In just a moment, you will enter a strange province that knows neither North nor South, a place we call the Twilight Zone

A Confederate sergeant with a wooden leg stops to rest in front of the burnt-out mansion of Lavinia Godwin. He strikes up a conversation with Lavinia, who feels certain her beloved husband Jud, a Confederate officer, is dead. Loneliness and sense of loss have bred hatred in her, and when a blinded Union lieutenant pauses for a drink of water she shoots him point-blank with a rifle to no effect. The lieutenant departs, and the sergeant begins to draw a frightening conclusion: that everyone on the road, including himself and Lavinia, are dead. Suddenly, Jud arrives and confirms this fact. Lavinia cannot accept the revelation. She begs Jud to stay with her, but he is compelled to continue, promising to meet her at the end of the road. As he walks away, a figure draws near who is the last man on the road and the last casualty of the Civil War Abraham Lincoln. Gently, he consoles Lavinia. Finally accepting the truth, she runs off to join her husband.

Incident on a dirt road during the month of April, the year 1865. As weve already pointed out, ifs a road that wont be found on a map, but its one of many that lead in and out of the Twilight Zone.

The Passersby, is one of the weakest shows of the first three seasons. The direction by Elliot Silverstein is competent and the acting is fine, although James Gregory (later of Barney Miller) seems too old for the role of a sad balladeer who went off to war to become a man. The episode also has a very pretty score by Fred Steiner. What makes this an embarrassing episode is Serlings script. Turgid, verbose, posturing, it takes a long time for the widow and the sergeant to realize what is obvious almost from the beginning.

James Gregory recalls a humorous incident from the shooting. On The Passersby, I put my belt buckle on upside down, a big C.S.A. The director saw it and remarked about it, and I told him, But dont you see, Elliot, these people are dead, and the buckle upside down indicates that status? Well, he gave me a funny look and then, Ah, yes, Jim, I see what you mean. Good touch. I dont think either of us truly understood, but it was good for a laugh.

THE MIDNIGHT SUN (11/17/61)

Written by Rod Serling

Producer: Buck Houghton

Director: Anton Leader

Director of Photography:George T. Clemens

Music: Van Cleave

Cast: Norma: Lois Nettleton Mrs. Bronson: Betty Garde Intruder: Tom Reese Neighbor: Jason Wingreen Neighbors Wife: June Ellis Refrigerator Repairman: Ned Glass Policeman: John McLiam Doctor: William Keene Announcer: Robert J. Stevenson

The word that Mrs. Bronson is unable to put into the hot, still, sodden air is doomed, because the people youve just seen have been handed a death sentence. One month ago, the Earth suddenly changed its elliptical orbit and in doing so began to follow a path which gradually, moment by moment, day by day, took it closer to the sun. And all of mans little devices to stir up the air are now no longer luxuries they happen to be pitiful and panicky keys to survival. The time is five minutes to twelve, midnight. There is no more darkness. The place is New York City and this is the eve of the end, because even at midnight its high noon, the hottest day in history, and youre about to spend it in the Twilight Zone.

While most people have left New York in a desperate attempt to reach cooler climates, Norma and her neighbor Mrs. Bronson remain in their apartment building, trying as best they can to cope with irregular electricity and the ever-increasing heat. A thirst-crazed man breaks into Normas apartment and gulps down her water, then regains his senses, begs her forgiveness and departs. A little later, Mrs. Bronson becomes delirious and then dies. As the temperature rises, Normas paintings melt and run off the canvas and the thermometer bursts. Norma screams and collapses. When she revives, it is cool, dark and snowing outside. It was all a feverish delusion; the Earth is not heading toward the sunits heading away from it!

The poles of fear\ the extremes of how the Earth might conceivably be doomed. Minor exercise in the care and feeding of a nightmare, respectfully submitted by all the thermometer-watchers in the Twilight Zone.

During the first season, Serling had explored the end of the world in Time Enough at Last. In The Midnight Sun he returned to that theme, but the catalyst is no longer nuclear war. Instead, the world he depicts is one in which the Earths orbit has changed, bringing it daily closer to the sun. Coincidentally, the plot is remarkably similar to a film shot that same year in Great Britain, The Day the Earth Caught Fire. Both depict the utter breakdown of society, scarcity of water, people trying to get to cooler regions of the planet, deserted cities, and the hysteria that sets in when the death of a world seems inevitable. But The Day the Earth Caught Fire had the budget and shooting schedule of a feature film, while The Midnight Sun had only three shooting days and $52,577 to portray the total destruction of the Earth. Remarkably, a pretty convincing picture is presented.

With a very limited budget and facilities, we had to do a lot of improvising, recalls director Tony Leader, who had done so very well on Long Live Walter Jameson. We had to use every means available to us to project the fear of this developing heat and this cataclysmic ending to the world. I think we did a pretty good job.

Many visual effects lend credence to the feeling of terrible heat: the sweaty-looking makeup on the actors, their matted hairdos, mercury boiling and breaking the glass in a thermometer, a painting melting and running down the canvas (which was accomplished by painting a picture in wax on the surface of a hotplate and then turning the hotplate on). The actors are also very skilled at presenting the illusion of a doomed world, particularly Lois Nettleton in the lead as Norma and Betty Garde as her landlady, Mrs. Bronson.

Tony Leader recalls an additional factor that helped put the actors into the spirit of the thing. In those days, they had no air conditioning on the set and we shot in summer, so it was hot enough to give you the initial feeling. I remember that there were a couple of scenes in which I asked the electrical grip to add heat, not so much heat that it would show on the film, but heat that we would feel on the set. It made us distinctly uncomfortable, but I think it helped us develop the feeling that we had of heat. I didnt do that throughout, because its effect would have been lost eventually. We would have just been plain simply miserable and angry with each other for being involved in this thing.