In Praise of Pip

"In Praise of Pip"
The Twilight Zone episode

Scene from "In Praise of Pip"
Episode no. Season 5
Episode 121
Directed by Joseph M. Newman
Written by Rod Serling
Featured music Rene Garriguenc, conducted by Lud Gluskin
Production code 2607
Original air date September 27, 1963
Guest stars

Jack Klugman: Max Phillips
Billy Mumy: Young Pip Phillips
Bobby Diamond: Private Pip Phillips
Connie Gilchrist: Mrs. Feeney

Episode chronology
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"The Bard"
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"Steel"
List of Twilight Zone episodes

"In Praise of Pip" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.

This was the first episode of The Twilight Zone to be 30 minutes long since The Changing of the Guard.

Contents

Synopsis

Max Phillips is a bookie who finds out via telegram that his son Pip, a soldier, has been seriously wounded fighting in Vietnam and will likely die. He feels he could have been a better father. With that in mind, he returns $300 to an unlucky bettor and gets into a fight with his boss and the boss' hitman. Max is shot by the hitman. Wounded, he stumbles into an amusement park and is surprised to see Pip, who is now a child again. After having some fun, reliving past enjoyable outings, Pip runs away into a house of mirrors. When Max finds him, Pip explains that he is dying and vanishes. Max offers to trade his own life to God in exchange for Pip's, then collapses and dies on the freeway. The next day, the full-grown Pip - walking with a cane due to his war injuries - visits the amusement park's shooting gallery and recalls some of Max's advice as he begins to play.

Episode notes

The episode was filmed on location at the Pacific Ocean Park in Santa Monica, California. It is often incorrectly cited as the first American television drama to mention the growing Vietnam War. (The previous March, actor Glenn Corbett had become a regular on the series Route 66, playing returned Vietnam soldier Lincoln Case.) However, the episode actually opens in Vietnam, with a wounded Pip being brought into a front-line mobile hospital—making it possibly the first American television drama to have a scene set in the midst of the Vietnam War.

Rod Serling originally wanted the episode to take place in Laos; it was CBS who asked for the change to Vietnam.

This was the first episode sponsored by American Tobacco (on alternate weeks), on behalf of Pall Mall cigarettes, who suggested that Rod and some of the guest stars and supporting players "light up" during the episodes. Unlike previous sponsor Liggett & Myers, American Tobacco did not have Rod plug their products at the end of the program.

References

External links