Static (The Twilight Zone)
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| “Static” | |||||||
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| The Twilight Zone episode | |||||||
.jpg/250px-Static_(The_Twilight_Zone).jpg) Scene from "Static" |
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| Episode no. | Season 2 Episode 56 |
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| Written by | Charles Beaumont | ||||||
| Directed by | Buzz Kulik | ||||||
| Guest stars | Dean Jagger : Ed Lindsay Carmen Mathews : Vinnie Robert Emhardt : Professor Ackerman Arch W. Johnson : Roscoe Bragg Alice Pearce : Mrs. Nielson Clegg Hoyt : Shopkeeper (the "junk dealer") Stephen Talbot : Boy Lillian O'Malley : Miss Meredith Pat O'Malley : Mr. Llewellyn Roy Rowan : (Voice of radio and television announcer) (uncredited) Diane Strom : (Blonde in TV cigarette commercial) (uncredited) Jerry Fuller : (Rock 'n' roll singer on TV) (uncredited) Eddie Marr : (Hard-sell real estate pitchman on TV) (uncredited) Bob Crane : (Voice of radio disc jockey) (uncredited) Bob Duggan : Extra (uncredited) Jay Overholts : Extra (uncredited) |
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| Production no. | 173-3665 | ||||||
| Original airdate | March 10, 1961 | ||||||
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| List of Twilight Zone episodes | |||||||
"Static" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.
Contents |
[edit] Opening narration
As Ed Lindsay retrieves his old radio from the boarding house basement, the camera moves to show Rod Serling standing at the top of the basement steps:
| “ | No one ever saw one quite like that, because that's a very special sort of radio. In its day, circa 1935, its type was one of the most elegant consoles on the market. Now, with its fabric-covered speakers, its peculiar yellow dial, its serrated knobs, it looks quaint and a little strange. Mr. Ed Lindsay is going to find out how strange very soon, when he tunes in to the Twilight Zone. | ” |
[edit] Synopsis
Ed Lindsay, an embittered, irritable bachelor in his late fifties, living in a boarding house, is dismayed over the mindless and worthless programs and commercials emanating from the television set watched by the other residents. He retrieves from the basement the old radio which, in his younger and happier days, he enjoyed as a source of relaxation and entertainment. Installing it in his joyless room, he is astonished to hear the radio transmit 1930s and 40s music and programs, including those of Major Bowes, Fred Allen and Tommy Dorsey, all of whom were no longer alive. He tries to tell the others about the miraculous broadcasts, but they can hear only static. Worried about Ed's mental state, they have the radio taken away by a junk dealer in his absence, but when they tell Ed, he rushes out and manages to buy it back for ten dollars.
Subsequently Ed has a heartfelt confrontation with Vinnie, who has lived in the same boarding house with him for twenty years, enabling us to learn that in an earlier era, they listened together to the same shows and had intended to marry, but he kept letting other things interfere and too much time passed. She tells him that the past cannot be recovered and he should let it go. As she returns to her room, he turns on the radio. Both Ed and Vinnie are young again, or rather, Ed has retreated 20 years into his own past to relive his life and set things right.
[edit] Closing narration
| “ | Around and around she goes, and where she stops nobody knows. All Ed Lindsay knows is that he desperately wanted a second chance and he finally got it, through a strange and wonderful time machine called a radio.... in the Twilight Zone. | ” |
[edit] Episode notes
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Trivia sections are discouraged under Wikipedia guidelines. The article could be improved by integrating relevant items and removing inappropriate ones. |
As The Twilight Zone's second season began, the production was informed by CBS that at about $65,000 per episode, the show was exceeding its budget. By November 1960, 16 episodes, more than half of the projected 29, were already filmed, and five of those had been broadcast. It was decided that six consecutive episodes would be videotaped at CBS Television City in the manner of a live drama and then transferred to 16-millimeter film for TV transmission. Eventual savings amounted to only about $30,000 for all six entries, which was judged to be insufficient to offset the loss of depth of visual perspective that at the time only film could offer. The shows wound up looking little better than set-bound soap operas and as a result the experiment was deemed a failure and never tried again.
Even though the six shows were taped in a row, through November and into mid-December, their broadcast dates were out of order and varied widely, with this, the second one, shown on March 10, 1961 as episode 20. The first, "The Lateness of the Hour" was seen on December 2, 1960 as episode 8; the third, "The Whole Truth" appeared on January 20, 1961 as episode 14; the fourth was the Christmas show "Night of the Meek" shown as the 11th episode on December 23, 1960; the fifth, "Twenty-Two" was seen on February 10, 1961 as episode 17; and the last one, "Long Distance Call" was transmitted on March 3, 1961 as episode 22.
- Arch (W.) Johnson (1922-1997), one of the most familiar TV faces from the 1950s, 60s and 70s, was a regular on three short-lived series between 1960 and 1966, the sitcoms Peter Loves Mary (1960-61) and Camp Runamuck (1965-66) as well as the hour-long crime drama The Asphalt Jungle (April-September 1961). Here, he's an unsympathetic boarding house resident and in his other TZ appearance he was Jesse James himself, who returns from the 19th Century frontier to ensure the authenticity of TV westerns, in the third season spoof "Showdown with Rance McGrew".
- Minor player Clegg Hoyt (1910-1967) has numerous movie and TV credits, all in the final 11 years of his life. One of his last acting assignments was an uncredited bit as "Transporter Chief Pitcairn" in the Star Trek pilot episode "The Cage"/"The Menagerie". Here he is the shopkeeper-"junk dealer" who quotes Ed Lindsay a price of ten dollars for the return of Ed's old radio, and in the fourth season's final episode, "The Bard", he's a bus driver.
- Stephen Talbot, now a prominent PBS producer, is the son of movie and TV character face Lyle Talbot (1902-1996). Stephen was an appealing child actor who had a minor career playing minors between 1959 and 1963. A semi-regular role during those years as Beaver's friend "Gilbert" is his only claim to audience familiarity. His other TZ appearance was as one of the neighborhood kids in J. Pat O'Malley's starring episode, third season's "The Fugitive".
- J. Pat O'Malley (1904-1985) is listed by one reference book as having prominent roles in a record eight TZ episodes. In actuality, he is in "only" four, still a high number for any featured actor. Three of the other episodes, including this one, have former silent film star-turned-character-actor Pat O'Malley (1891-1966). Like J. Pat, Pat acted in hundreds of movies and TV shows. J. Pat, however, specialized in playing smiling, twinkly, elderly Irishmen, while Pat's elderly men were generally serious and sedate. He was once a handsome leading man in silents, but by the arrival of sound he had aged beyond his years and could only command continually diminishing character roles. Ultimately he ended his career playing countless bit parts. All three of Pat's TZ roles are typically small, with hardly any dialogue. In first season's "Walking Distance", he's a shopkeeper, and in second season's "Back There", he's a men's club attendant. In this, his final episode, he is one of the boarding house residents. Billed directly above him in the closing credits, playing another one of the residents, is Lillian O'Malley, his wife of many years, herself a small-part character actress.
- Eddie Marr (1900-1987), another small-part player, portrayed numerous minor characters between 1937 and 1969. He initially appeared on TZ as the dream carnival barker in first season's "Perchance to Dream", and here, in an unbilled bit, he's the epitome of the obnoxious TV pitchman that Ed Lindsay so dislikes.
- Bit player Bob Duggan was unbilled in two TZ episodes shot months apart in the second season, but shown consecutively: "Mr. Dingle, the Strong", where he's a photographer, and this one, where he is difficult to spot as an extra.
- Another bit player, Jay Overholts (1922-1966), whose entire acting career only extends over the three-year period from 1959 to 1962, managed eight appearances, a TZ record. All were very brief, some were unbilled, and the first two were, appropriately enough, in the show's first two episodes, "Where Is Everybody?" (one of the reporters) and "One for the Angels" (a physician). During the second season, in addition to this one, the remaining three were in "A Thing About Machines" (an intern), "Twenty-Two" (public address system announcer) and "The Odyssey of Flight 33" (an airplane passenger). Overholts' final two appearances came in the third season—"The Jungle" (a taxi driver) and, again with Arch Johnson, "Showdown with Rance McGrew" (a cowboy).
