A Short Drink From a Certain Fountain

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

“A Short Drink From a Certain Fountain”

The Twilight Zone episode

Harmon Gordon after regressing to a child

Episode no.

Season 5
Episode 131

Written by

Rod Serling
(From an idea by Lou Holz.)

Directed by

Bernard Girard

Guest stars

Patrick O'Neal : Harmon Gordon
Ruta Lee : Flora Gordon
Walter Brooke : Dr. Raymond Gordon

Featured music

Stock

Production no.

2614

Original airdate

December 13, 1963

Episode chronology
← Previous	Next →
"The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms"	"Ninety Years Without Slumbering"

List of Twilight Zone episodes

"A Short Drink From a Certain Fountain" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.

1 Opening narration
2 Synopsis
3 Closing narration
4 Production
5 References
6 External links

[edit] Opening narration

“

Picture of an aging man who leads his life as, Thoreau said, ‘in quiet desperation.' Because Harmon Gordon is enslaved by a love affair with a wife forty years his junior. Because of this, he runs when he should walk. He surrenders when simple pride dictates a stand. He pines away for the lost morning of his life when he should be enjoying the evening. In short, Mr. Harmon Gordon seeks a fountain of youth, and who's to say he won't find it? This happens to be the Twilight Zone.

”

[edit] Synopsis

Please help improve this article or section by expanding it.
Further information might be found on the talk page or at requests for expansion. (January 2008)

A wealthy old man married to a younger woman is exhausted by his wife’s youthful lifestyle. Seeking to keep up the pace, he has his scientist brother inject him with an experimental youth serum. The experiment is a success at first, but side effects begin to set in, and he regresses to a child. His brother forces his wife to stay and raise him or else she will be cut off from his fortune.

[edit] Closing narration

“

It happens to be a fact: as one gets older, one does get wiser. If you don't believe it, ask Flora. Ask her any day of the ensuing weeks of her life, as she takes note during the coming years and realizes that the worm has turned: youth has taken over. It's simply the way the calendar crumbles...in the Twilight Zone.

”

[edit] Production

Initially, Raymond Gordon was a typical family physician. Disturbed by the character's willingness to experiment on a fellow human (Harmon's brother), CBS asked that his occupation be changed to that of a research scientist. Serling complied.^[1]

This episode was not included in the Twilight Zone syndication package until 1984. When this and other long-unseen episodes became available, a series of short introductions were shot featuring commentary from the cast and crew of the original episodes. In the segment with Patrick O'Neal for this episode, O'Neal remarked on how accurately the show's makeup effects artists had aged him, as he now very closely resembled his older appearance in this episode.