It's a Good Life (The Twilight Zone)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

“It's a Good Life”
The Twilight Zone episode

Billy Mumy as Anthony Fremont
Episode no. Season 3
Episode 73
Written by Rod Serling from the story “It's a Good Life” by Jerome Bixby. First published in the 1953 collection Star Science Fiction Stories No. 2.
Directed by James Sheldon
Guest stars Billy Mumy : Anthony Fremont
John Larch : Mr. Fremont
Cloris Leachman : Mrs. Fremont
Don Keefer : Dan Hollis
Casey Adams : Pat Riley
Jeanne Bates : Ethel Hollis
Featured music Stock
Production no. 4801
Original airdate November 3, 1961
Episode chronology
← Previous Next →
"The Grave" "Deaths-Head Revisited"
List of Twilight Zone episodes

"It’s a Good Life"is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. It is based on a short story of the same name by Jerome Bixby.

Contents

[edit] Opening narration

“ Tonight's story on The Twilight Zone is somewhat unique and calls for a different kind of introduction. This, as you may recognize, is a map of the United States, and there's a little town there called Peaksville. On a given morning not too long ago, the rest of the world disappeared and Peaksville was left all alone. Its inhabitants were never sure whether the world was destroyed and only Peaksville left untouched or whether the village had somehow been taken away. They were, on the other hand, sure of one thing: the cause. A monster had arrived in the village. Just by using his mind, he took away the automobiles, the electricity, the machines - because they displeased him - and he moved an entire community back into the dark ages - just by using his mind. Now I'd like to introduce you to some of the people in Peaksville, Ohio. This is Mr. Fremont. It's in his farmhouse that the monster resides. This is Mrs. Fremont. And this is Aunt Amy, who probably had more control over the monster in the beginning than almost anyone. But one day she forgot. She began to sing aloud. Now, the monster doesn't like singing, so his mind snapped at her, turned her into the smiling, vacant thing you're looking at now. She sings no more. And you'll note that the people in Peaksville, Ohio, have to smile. They have to think happy thoughts and say happy things because once displeased, the monster can wish them into a cornfield or change them into a grotesque, walking horror. This particular monster can read minds, you see. He knows every thought, he can feel every emotion. Oh yes, I did forget something, didn't I? I forgot to introduce you to the monster. This is the monster. His name is Anthony Fremont. He's six years old, with a cute little-boy face and blue, guileless eyes. But when those eyes look at you, you'd better start thinking happy thoughts, because the mind behind them is absolutely in charge. This is the Twilight Zone. ”

[edit] Synopsis

Six year-old Anthony Fremont looks like any other little boy, but looks are deceiving. He is a monster, a mutant with godlike mental powers. Early on, he isolated the small hamlet of Peaksville, Ohio. In fact, the handful of inhabitants do not even know if he destroyed the rest of the world or if it still exists. Anthony has also eliminated electricity, automobiles, and television signals. He controls the weather and what supplies can be found in the grocery store. Anthony creates and destroys as he pleases, and controls when the residents can watch the TV and what they cannot watch on it.

The adults tiptoe nervously around him, constantly telling him how everything he does is "good", since displeasing him can get them wished away "to the cornfield", where they are presumably met by a less-than-happy ending. Finally, at Dan Hollis' birthday party, Dan, slightly drunk, can no longer stand the strain and confronts the boy, calling him a monster and a murderer; while Anthony's anger grows, Dan begs the other adults to kill Anthony from behind -"Somebody end this, now!"- but everyone else is too afraid to act. Before he is killed, he is shown, indirectly by his shadow, transformed into a Jack-in-the-box.

His widow breaks down, but no matter what happens, the people of Peaksville make sure to think only good thoughts and repeat "That's a real good thing what Anthony did!" and "It's a good life."

[edit] Closing narration

“ No comment here, no comment at all. We only wanted to introduce you to one of our very special citizens, little Anthony Fremont, age 6, who lives in a village called Peaksville in a place that used to be Ohio. And if by some strange chance you should run across him, you had best think only good thoughts. Anything less than that is handled at your own risk, because if you do meet Anthony you can be sure of one thing: you have entered the Twilight Zone. ”

[edit] Trivia

 Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines.
The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones.
  • On Serling’s never-realized plans to make a feature-length version of this episode:
“Back in 1974, one year before his death, Serling told an interviewer that he was working on a third draft of the screenplay for Alan Landsburg Productions, for whom he had narrated Chariots of the Gods? and other documentaries. The script was essentially an elaboration of the award-winning teleplay, according to Joe Dante, who has read it. Unlike Bixby’s story, however, “the screenplay starts with the child being born,” Dante recalled in Fangoria magazine. “He can talk right away. He’s very smart and dangerous...It falls upon the townspeople to get up enough courage to do something about Anthony. It’s a little like a more sophisticated version of what It’s Alive turned out to be.”
“It’s possible that the screenplay included scenes from the original story too grotesque for television: Anthony’s making a rat eat itself, from the tail up; his turning some of his neighbors into truly horrific creations; and the actual process of his “wishing someone into the cornfield,” i.e. executing someone—although Dante claims that the script contained no “exploitation.” —James H. Burns, excerpt from “It’s a Good Life: Rod Serling’s Forgotten Screenplay” published in the October 1984 edition of The Twilight Zone Magazine.
  • In the story it is implied that Anthony is very strange looking, so awful that his mother's physician tried to kill him at birth.
  • The opening lines and appearance of Sterling's introduction in this episode are directly lifted for the video introduction in Disney's The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror ride. The video begins with Sterling introducing
“ Tonight's story on The Twilight Zone is somewhat unique and calls for a different kind of introduction. This, as you may recognize-- ”

At this point he begins to describe the service elevator that is the focal point of the ride's story.

  • In the Sam and Max episode "The Trouble with Gary" in 1998, Sam and Max were called to help with the little boy Gary with powers similar to Anthony's, who was terrifying the scientists at a research center where he was kept.
  • In the cartoon series Johnny Bravo, a spoof was made as one of three episodes in which Johnny explores The Zone Where Normal Things Don't Happen Very Often. The title of the episode was "Johnny Real Good", and featured Bravo babysitting a small boy whose parents, much like the people of the town, are always overly happy and positive. As a reference to Anthony's wishing people into the cornfield, every time Johnny did something to annoy or displease him, the boy would teleport him into a thick cornpatch just outside the home (though for Johnny this is only a minor annoyance, as he simply has to walk back into the house). The episode concludes with Johnny waking up in bed, only to find himself once again in the middle of a dense cornfield, now situated on a small, deserted island.
  • In the episode "I Can't Stan You" of the FOX animated comedy American Dad, a reference to this episode is made when Stan becomes fed up with people criticizing him and evicts his neighbors to the Cornfield Motel, the name being a reference to the cornfield that Anthony Fremont sends his victims to in "It's a Good Life." His family must then act nice around him to avoid being sent there too.
  • In Disney's California Adventure, there is a small dedication to Anthony Fremont (and his orchestra) in a poster inside the The Tower of Terror themed after The Twilight Zone episode. Several other episodes have a dedication inside the attraction as well.
  • In Star Trek episode "Charlie X" the Enterprise crew confronts a mutant human boy with "The Power".
  • A similar episode of The Justice League featured a mutated child with similar powers, who recreated his favorite superheroes' adventures. However, in this episode, the Justice Leaguers sent to that world discover the boy's manipulation and domination and with the help of the Justice Guild, they defeat him and free that world.
  • In Second Life, at one stage if an attempt was made to log in with an avatar who was temporarily banned, the avatar would appear in an area called "the cornfield" where they were completely isolated.
  • In the pilot episode of Dead Like Me, George Lass narrates, while being forced to her displeasure to reap the soul of a young girl, her wonder that if she concentrates hard enough, she can wish her entire situation "into the cornfield, or something".

[edit] References

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

[edit] External links

[edit] Twilight Zone links

Languages