Perchance to Dream (Twilight Zone episode)

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The Twilight Zone original series Season one (1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5) Fall 1959 – Summer 1960 List of The Twilight Zone episodes

Episodes: Where Is Everybody? One for the Angels Mr. Denton on Doomsday The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine Walking Distance Escape Clause The Lonely Time Enough at Last Perchance to Dream Judgment Night And When the Sky Was Opened What You Need The Four of Us Are Dying Third from the Sun I Shot an Arrow Into the Air The Hitch-Hiker The Fever The Last Flight The Purple Testament Elegy Mirror Image The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street A World of Difference Long Live Walter Jameson People Are Alike All Over Execution The Big Tall Wish A Nice Place to Visit Nightmare as a Child A Stop at Willoughby The Chaser A Passage for Trumpet Mr. Bevis The After Hours The Mighty Casey A World of His Own

“Perchance to Dream” is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.

[edit] Details

• Episode number: 9
• Season: 1
• Production code: 173-3616
• Original air date: November 27, 1959
• Writer: Charles Beaumont based on his story of the same name, published in the November 1958 issue of Playboy
• Director: Robert Florey

[edit] Cast

• Edward Hall: Richard Conte
• Dr. Rathmann: John Larch
• Maya: Suzanne Lloyd

[edit] Synopsis

Edward Hall, a man with a heart condition, believes that if he falls asleep, he'll die. On the other hand, keeping himself awake will put too much of a strain on his heart. He seeks out the aid of psychiatrist Rathmann and explains that he has been dreaming in chapters, as if in a movie serial. In his dreams, Maya, a carnival dancer, lures him onto a roller coster in a funhouse in an attempt to scare him to death. Realizing that Rathmann cannot help him, Hall starts to go, but stops when he realizes that Rathmann's receptionist looks exactly like Maya. Terrified, he runs back into Rathmann's office and jumps out of the window. In reality, this was all a dream: Hall actually came in to Rathmann's office, lay down, immediately fell asleep—and then a few minutes later, screamed and died.

[edit] Trivia

• This was the first episode aired that was written by Charles Beaumont (and also the first that was not written by Rod Serling).
• The title of the episode, and the Beaumont-written short story that inspired it, is taken from Hamlet's "to be or not to be" speech.

[edit] Critical response

"Throughout the TV filming, [Florey] strove for quality. It might have been the most expensive MGM feature. He rooted out the meanings of certain lines, frequently surprising me with symbols and shadings I'd neither planned nor suspected. The set was truly impressionistic, recalling the days of Caligari and Liliom. The costumes were generally perfect. And in the starring role, Richard Conte gave a performance which displays both intensity and subtlety." —Charles Beaumont writing in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science-Fiction, December 1959

[edit] External link

• TV Tome episode page

[edit] References

• Zicree, Marc Scott: The Twilight Zone Companion. Sillman-James Press, 1982 (second edition)

[edit] Twilight Zone links

• The Twilight Zone
• Episode List
• Season 1