Shatterday
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| “Shatterday” | |||||||
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| The Twilight Zone episode | |||||||
 Bruce Willis as Peter Jay Novins |
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| Episode no. | Season 1 Episode 1, Segment 1 |
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| Written by | Alan Brennert (Based on the short story by Harlan Ellison) |
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| Directed by | Wes Craven | ||||||
| Guest stars | Bruce Willis : Peter Jay Novins Seth Isler : Alter Ego John Carlyle : Clerk Dan Gilvezan : Bartender |
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| Original airdate | September 27, 1985 | ||||||
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| List of Twilight Zone episodes | |||||||
"Shatterday" is the first segment of the first episode of the television series The Twilight Zone. This episode is based on the short story "Shatterday" by Harlan Ellison which was first published in September 1975 in Gallery.
[edit] Opening Narration
| “ | Some push for what they need; some push for what they want. Some people, like Peter Jay Novins, just push. If they do it hard enough and long enough, something might just push back... from the Twilight Zone. | ” |
[edit] Synopsis
Day 1: Someday
Peter Jay Novins sits in a bar. Intending to call someone else, he accidentally dials his own home phone number, and the phone is answered by Peter Jay Novins. Peter speaks to the man on the other end of the line, initially thinking that it is a joke, but eventually hanging up the phone in shock. Flustered, he heads out of the bar, goes to a phone booth on the street, calls his house and gets Novins again. Stunned, he begins to believe that the man he is speaking to is his own alter ego. He thinks about heading over to his apartment, but the man on the phone warns him against it. Peter asks if the two of them could just lead normal lives; the man on the other end tells him that Peter's life is terrible, and that he is going to change it. Peter threatens the man on the phone.
Day 2: Duesday
The next day, Peter cashes out his bank account, calls the grocery store and insults them to ensure that his alter ego can't get any food delivered, and then calls his apartment again to gloat. The man on the other end tells him that Peter is too late because the man used the $200 that was stashed away to buy enough groceries to hold him for a long time. The man also tells Peter his estranged mother phoned to try to patch things up, and that the man has invited her to live with him. Angry at the prospect of his alter ego stealing his mother, Peter hangs up.
Day 3: Woundsday
During a storm, a sick Peter stares into his apartment from the street. From a pay phone, he calls his alter ego and says he wants to work things out. The man in his apartment says that the more deserving of them should take over the entire life, and that he turned down an unethical advertising job that Peter had previously accepted.
Day 5: Freeday
Peter sits in a hotel room, growing sicker. He receives a phone call from the man in the apartment, who tells him that he is trying to make amends with the people that Peter has neglected, and that he isn't going to live his life like Peter has.
Day 6: Shatterday
Peter is lying in the hotel room when his alter ego arrives. His alter ego tells him that it is time to come to terms with the fact that he is being replaced, and that he is becoming a mere memory. Peter goes to the window and stares out. His alter ego reveals that things are going well with him, and that he has put his life in order. He asks Peter if there is anything he would have done if things had been different; Peter says no. As the alter ego leaves, Peter wishes him well, shakes hands with him, then disappears.
[edit] Closing Narration
| “ | Peter Jay Novins, both victor and victim, of a brief struggle for custody of a man's soul. A man who lost himself... and found himself... on a lonely battlefield, somewhere in the Twilight Zone. | ” |
