Cavender Is Coming

"Cavender is Coming"
The Twilight Zone episode
Episode no.	Season 3 Episode 101
Directed by	Christian Nyby
Written by	Rod Serling
Featured music	Horst Jankowski's A Walk in the Black Forest
Production code	4827
Original air date	May 25, 1962
Guest actors
Jesse White: Harmon Cavender Carol Burnett: Agnes Grep Howard Smith: Polk Frank Behrens: Stout John Fiedler: Field Rep #3 Sandra Gould: Woman Donna Douglas: Woman #1 Albert Carrier: Frenchman Barbara Morrison: Matron Danny Kulick: Boy Jack Younger: Truck Driver Maurice Dallimore: Man Pitt Herbert: Field Rep #2 Stan Jones: Field Rep #4 Adrienne Marden: Woman #2 Robert McCord: Waiter Rory O'Brien: Little Boy William O'Connell: Field Rep #1 Norma Shattue: Little Girl Roy N. Sickner: Bus Driver

"Cavender is Coming" is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone.

Opening narration

“

Submitted for your approval, the case of one Miss Agnes Grep, put on Earth with two left feet, an overabundance of thumbs and a propensity for falling down manholes. In a moment she will be up to her jaw in miracles, wrought by apprentice angel Harmon Cavender, intent on winning his wings. And, though, it's a fact that both of them should have stayed in bed, they will tempt all the fates by moving into the cold, gray dawn of the Twilight Zone.

”

Plot

Agnes Grep is unemployed and behind on her rent. She is visited by Harmon Cavender, her guardian angel who has to make Agnes happier in 24 hours to "earn his wings" (in other words, become a fully vested angel).

At one point, Cavender tries to change the bus in which Agnes is riding into a convertible with a chauffeur. However, Cavender makes errors twice, so they decided to get back to the bus, causing the bus driver to resign. Cavender provides riches and friends, a luxurious apartment and an active social life, but while it is a dazzling run, Agnes realizes she is happier with her normal life, despite all its shortcomings. Cavender reluctantly restores everything to the way it was and returns to Heaven.

To his surprise, he earns Polk the Head Angel's approval upon seeing Agnes' happiness. However, the Head Angel determines that before Cavender can earn his wings, he must help "other deserving subjects down there" and "those" will be his assignments for future evaluation. Polk muses, "In a strange way, I feel sorry for them..."

Closing narration

“

A word to the wise now to any and all who might suddenly feel the presence of a cigar-smoking helpmate who takes bankbooks out of thin air. If you're suddenly aware of any such celestial aids, it means that you're under the beneficent care of one Harmon Cavender, guardian angel. And this message from the Twilight Zone: Lotsa luck!

”

Episode notes

This episode was originally broadcast with a laugh track — the only Twilight Zone episode to feature one — because this episode was intended as a backdoor pilot for a regular comedy series featuring the Cavender character. The version included in The Twilight Zone - The Complete Definitive Collection DVD set has the laugh track removed. Reruns airing in the US on Sci Fi Channel and ME-TV also have the laugh track removed.

The essential premise of this episode is exactly the same as the first-season Twilight Zone episode "Mr. Bevis". Both episodes are comedies about well-meaning guardian angels who try to help kind-hearted but hapless human beings by magically giving them everything they think they desire — only to discover the humans are happier with the way life had been previously. Both episodes were written by Rod Serling.

References

DeVoe, Bill. (2008). Trivia from The Twilight Zone. Albany, GA: Bear Manor Media. ISBN 978-1-59393-136-0
Grams, Martin. (2008). The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic. Churchville, MD: OTR Publishing. ISBN 978-0-9703310-9-0

External links

"Cavender Is Coming" at the Internet Movie Database

The Twilight Zone (1959) episodes

Season 1	"Where Is Everybody?" "One for the Angels" "Mr. Denton on Doomsday" "The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine" "Walking Distance" "Escape Clause" "The Lonely" "Time Enough at Last" "Perchance to Dream" "Judgment Night" "And When the Sky Was Opened" "What You Need" "The Four of Us Are Dying" "Third from the Sun" "I Shot an Arrow into the Air" "The Hitch-Hiker" "The Fever" "The Last Flight" "The Purple Testament" "Elegy" "Mirror Image" "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" "A World of Difference" "Long Live Walter Jameson" "People Are Alike All Over" "Execution" "The Big Tall Wish" "A Nice Place to Visit" "Nightmare as a Child" "A Stop at Willoughby" "The Chaser" "A Passage for Trumpet" "Mr. Bevis" "The After Hours" "The Mighty Casey" "A World of His Own"

Season 2	"King Nine Will Not Return" "The Man in the Bottle" "Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room" "A Thing About Machines" "The Howling Man" "The Eye of the Beholder" "Nick of Time" "The Lateness of the Hour" "The Trouble with Templeton" "A Most Unusual Camera" "The Night of the Meek" "Dust" "Back There" "The Whole Truth" "The Invaders" "A Penny for Your Thoughts" "Twenty Two" "The Odyssey of Flight 33" "Mr. Dingle, the Strong" "Static" "The Prime Mover" "Long Distance Call" "A Hundred Yards Over the Rim" "The Rip Van Winkle Caper" "The Silence" "Shadow Play" "The Mind and the Matter" "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" "The Obsolete Man"

Season 3	"Two" "The Arrival" "The Shelter" "The Passersby" "A Game of Pool" "The Mirror" "The Grave" "It's a Good Life" "Deaths-Head Revisited" "The Midnight Sun" "Still Valley" "The Jungle" "Once Upon a Time" "Five Characters in Search of an Exit" "A Quality of Mercy" "Nothing in the Dark" "One More Pallbearer" "Dead Man's Shoes" "The Hunt" "Showdown with Rance McGrew" "Kick the Can" "A Piano in the House" "The Last Rites of Jeff Myrtlebank" "To Serve Man" "The Fugitive" "Little Girl Lost" "Person or Persons Unknown" "The Little People" "Four O'Clock" "Hocus-Pocus and Frisby" "The Trade-Ins" "The Gift" "The Dummy" "Young Man's Fancy" "I Sing the Body Electric" "Cavender Is Coming" "The Changing of the Guard"

Season 4	"In His Image" "The Thirty-Fathom Grave" "Valley of the Shadow" "He's Alive" "Mute" "Death Ship" "Jess-Belle" "Miniature" "Printer's Devil" "No Time Like the Past" "The Parallel" "I Dream of Genie" "The New Exhibit" "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville" "The Incredible World of Horace Ford" "On Thursday We Leave for Home" "Passage on the Lady Anne" "The Bard"

Season 5	"In Praise of Pip" "Steel" "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" "A Kind of a Stopwatch" "The Last Night of a Jockey" "Living Doll" "The Old Man in the Cave" "Uncle Simon" "Probe 7, Over and Out" "The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms" "A Short Drink from a Certain Fountain" "Ninety Years Without Slumbering" "Ring-a-Ding Girl" "You Drive" "The Long Morrow" "The Self-Improvement of Salvadore Ross" "Number 12 Looks Just Like You" "Black Leather Jackets" "Night Call" "From Agnes—With Love" "Spur of the Moment" "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" "Queen of the Nile" "What's in the Box" "The Masks" "I Am the Night—Color Me Black" "Sounds and Silences" "Caesar and Me" "The Jeopardy Room" "Stopover in a Quiet Town" "The Encounter" "Mr. Garrity and the Graves" "The Brain Center at Whipple's" "Come Wander with Me" "The Fear" "The Bewitchin' Pool"