William F. Nolan (1928-2021)

 

William F. Nolan

We are deeply saddened to learn of the passing of writer, editor, collector, and cultural historian William F. Nolan. He leaves behind an enormous body of work in a career that spanned seven decades. He died Thursday, July 15, 2021. He was 93.

Nolan (far right) goofing around with (R to L) fellow

Group members Richard Matheson, 

Charles Beaumont, and Chad Oliver

(shared from the June, 1989 issue of 

Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone Magazine)

Nolan was the last living member of what Los Angeles Times literary critic Robert Kirsch labeled The Southern California School of Writers. Known simply as The Group, Nolan was a key member of a close-knit circle of writers living in the Los Angeles area during the 1950’s and 1960’s, a collective that included Ray Bradbury, Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, George Clayton Johnson, Chad Oliver, Jerry Sohl, and John Tomerlin, among others. These writers produced or contributed to many of the most celebrated works of fantasy, science fiction, mystery, and horror of the twentieth century, including The Twilight Zone. An enthusiastic and pioneering chronicler of popular culture, Nolan is largely responsible for preserving the legacy of many of the writers in his circle of friends, notably the works of Twilight Zone writer Charles Beaumont, who died in 1967 at the age of 38.

Nolan (right) on a trip to Paris with Charles Beaumont
(shared from the June, 1989 issue of
Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone Magazine)

Although Nolan never saw his work appear on The Twilight Zone, he is a part of the show’s legacy all the same. His friendship with Charles Beaumont and the rest of the show’s writers had a substantial creative impact on both their work and his own. Nolan was the inspiration for Beaumont’s season four episode “Miniature” and the episode's protagonist, Charley Parkes, is a direct characterization of Nolan. There are also several characters on The Twilight Zone that are deliberately named after Nolan, including a character in our most recently reviewed episode, Richard Matheson's "Steel." Around the same time that his friends were writing for The Twilight Zone, Nolan was collaborating on articles, short stories, and television scripts with Beaumont, Jerry Sohl, and John Tomerlin. He raced cars with Beaumont, Tomerlin, and OCee Ritch, and edited anthologies and magazines featuring stories and essays from The Group, as well as the works of other contemporary writers. Early in their careers, Nolan and Beaumont worked together at Whitman Publishing Company, writing children’s comics under pseudonyms. Later, as The Group coalesced, Nolan and his friends often stayed out all night, driving around Los Angeles, occupying booths at coffee houses, and talking about their craft. They took spontaneous trips across the country to hang out with Hugh Hefner or Ian Fleming. Nolan traveled with Beaumont and company to Missouri to appear in Roger Corman’s screen adaptation of Beaumont’s novel The Intruder (1962). Nolan was the first archivist of the works of his friend Ray Bradbury, producing an important body of work on the great American writer, including a pioneering journal (Ray Bradbury Review), book-length studies, and an anthology dedicated to Bradbury. In 1967, he and George Clayton Johnson published the landmark science fiction novel Logan’s Run, which firmly established him as an important voice in the fantasy community. Years earlier, the two collaborated on a teleplay for The Twilight Zone titled “Dreamflight” which they sold to producer Buck Houghton near the end of the show’s third season. Due to a lack of sponsorship, however, the show was briefly cancelled--the first of three near cancellations--and “Dreamflight” was never made. It was later published in the 2005 anthology Forgotten Gems from the Twilight Zone, volume 2, edited by Andrew Ramage. 

Back cover of Nolan's 1968 novel
Death is for Losers (Sherbourne Press)

Nolan's most well-known works include his Sam Space detective series, his Bart and Nick Challis series, and his Black Mask Murders series. His 1991 horror novel Helltracks is also highly regarded. Nolan established himself as a screenwriter specializing in the horror genre with frequent collaborator Dan Curtis. Nolan wrote screenplays for several of producer/director Curtis’s films including Trilogy of Terror (1975), an anthology film comprised of adaptations of stories by Richard Matheson (a sequel followed in 1996), and Curtis's adaptations of The Turn of the Screw (1974) and Burnt Offerings (1976).

Nolan was named a Grand Master by the World Horror Society, an Author Emeritus by the Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, and a Living Legend in Dark Fantasy by the International Horror Guild. He also received a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Horror Writers Association, a World Fantasy Convention Award, and the Edgar Allan Poe Award from the Mystery Writers of America.  

Illustration by Rick Shelton for Nolan's story,

"The Strange Case of Mr. Pruyn,"

from Alfred Hitchcock's Mystery Magazine

(December, 1956).

One of the greatest pleasures afforded us since we began this blog was the opportunity to interview Mr. Nolan, where he spoke about The Group, his memories of that heady time when The Twilight Zone was being produced, and his approach to the craft of writing. To read that interview click here.

William F. Nolan at imdb

William F. Nolan at isfdb

                     

            

                  

               

                 

                  

Lost in the Fifth Dimension: Jerry Sohl's Legacy in the Twilight Zone

Jerry Sohl
Writer

In 1982 writer Marc Scott Zicree published the first edition of The Twilight Zone Companion, his exhaustively researched retrospective of Rod Serling’s celebrated fantasy series. The first book-length study of the show and its influence on the culture, The Companion shed a light on many aspects of the show that had gone largely unknown for nearly two decades. One of the more significant revelations was that science fiction writer Jerry Sohl had ghost-written three episodes of the show which, at the time of their original broadcasts, were all credited to frequent Twilight Zone writer Charles Beaumont. One episode in particular, season five’s “Living Doll,” had since become one of the most recognizable episodes of the series. He had also sold two additional scripts to the show during its fifth season that were never produced. Why then had his involvement with the show been all but erased from its history? The most significant reason is that he wrote them as a favor to his friend Charles Beaumont, who had begun experiencing symptoms of an undiagnosed neurological disorder that would eventually claim his life, in an agreement that they split the profit and that Beaumont receive the onscreen credit. Unfortunately, this violates guidelines set in place by the Writer’s Guild of America so even after the Twilight Zone went off the air, Sohl was hesitant to speak publicly about his involvement with the show. After the publication of Zicree’s book Sohl was finally able to take credit for his contribution to the show. But Jerry Sohl’s career as a professional writer was a prolific one, both on the page and the screen, and his place in the history of speculative fiction is worth exploring.

Gerald Allan Sohl was born on December 2, 1913 and was raised in Chicago, Illinois. Sohl became an avid reader at a young age, spending hours at the local library soaking in the early science fiction periodicals of the time. He eventually became a writer for The Chicago Daily News and several other local papers until he was drafted into the Army Air Corps where he served three years in the Airways Communications division. While serving he met and married his wife Jean with whom he would have three children. After returning from service he and Jean settled in Bloomington, Illinois where he became the music and literature critic for The Daily Pantagraph, a job he would keep until 1958 when he left Illinois for Los Angeles to try his luck at writing for television.

But Sohl began his career as a prose writer years earlier when his story “The 7^th Order” appeared in the March, 1952 issue of Galaxy Science Fiction. The story was later adapted into a radio play for the NBC series X Minus One in 1956. Sohl was inspired to begin writing science fiction after interviewing Hugo Award-winning author Wilson Bob Tucker for the Pantagraph in 1950. As a lifelong admirer of the genre, Sohl dove headfirst into writing science fiction and by 1952 he had sold his first novel, The Haploids, to Rinehart & Company. Over the next decade he would average around a novel a year—The Transcendent Man and Costigan’s Needle in 1953, The Altered Ego in 1954, Point Ultimate in 1955, The Mars Monopoly in 1956, The Time Dissolver and Prelude to Peril—a mystery novel—in 1957, One Against Herculum and The Odious Ones in 1959. He was also publishing numerous short stories during this time in science fiction magazines like Galaxy, If, and Infinity.

In 1958, at the age of forty-five, Sohl quit his job at The Pantagraph and moved to Los Angeles to become a screenwriter. He had already established himself as a novelist in the science fiction community and he hoped that this small bit of notoriety would get him a foot in the door in Hollywood. After arriving in Los Angeles, Sohl attended the World Science Fiction Convention where he first met Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, and George Clayton Johnson. Sohl would eventually form close friendships with each of them and would become a prominent figure in their extended circle of creative friends often referred to as the Southern California School of Writers, or simply the Group. Although significantly older than his new friends, Sohl’s work ethic and laid back personality seemed an immediate fit and their encouragement and influence was a prominent factor in his success.

Sohl sold his first teleplay to the NBC detective series M Squad in 1959. “The Upset” aired in December of the show’s third season. That same year he was hired as a staff writer for Alfred Hitchcock Presents polishing scripts and adapting short stories by Henry Slesar and others into fully formed teleplays. According to Sohl, many of his scripts for the show went unproduced but he did eventually see four of his teleplays make it to air. He wrote three episodes of the ABC series The New Breed and contributed two stories to the iconic anthology series The Outer Limits, adapting his short stories “The Invisible Enemy” and “Counterweight” for the show's second season. He also wrote two episodes of the Larry Cohen-created ABC series The Invaders. His first episode for the series, “The Watchers,” was a reworking of a script by fellow Twilight Zone alumni Earl Hamner.

Aside from his work on The Twilight Zone, Sohl is probably best remembered today for the three teleplays he wrote for the original Star Trek series. His first teleplay for the show, “The Corbomite Maneuver” was nominated for a Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation and is considered an important episode in the show’s chronology as it was originally intended to be the first episode broadcast and introduces key elements of the show. Sohl wrote two more teleplays for the show, “This Side of Paradise” for the show’s first season—for which he received story credit under the pseudonym Nathan Butler after he removed his name from the project due to changes made to his script by Gene Rodenberry and writer D.C. Fontana—and “Whom Gods Destroy” for the show’s third season.

In the late 1960s, Sohl, Matheson, Clayton Johnson, and science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon formed The Green Hand, a legal corporation designed to pitch quality fantasy and science fiction projects to television networks and production companies. They were hired by Herbert F. Solow, then Vice President in charge of television production at MGM, and they set up an office on the MGM lot. George Clayton Johnston served as president and the four of them spent several years trying to get a wide variety of shows on the air including a series called Hunter, about a police detective with ESP, E.T, about an extraterrestrial's difficulty adapting to humanoid culture on Earth, and a Twilight Zone-like anthology series called A Touch of the Strange. Ultimately though, none of their ideas managed to catch the attention of network executives and they eventually dissolved the corporation.

After the Green Hand, Sohl begrudgingly continued to write for television for several more years but after a bad experience submitting a teleplay to the NBC series Man from Atlantis in 1977 he decided to call it quits and concentrate exclusively on writing novels and short fiction. His last script to ever be produced was a teleplay for The Next Step Beyond the following year called “Portrait of the Mind.”

Although Sohl concentrated his efforts mostly on writing for series television he did see several feature-length scripts make it to the big screen. In 1960 he adapted Richard Stern’s story “Set Up for Murder” into a feature length film directed by Edward L. Cahn called Twelve Hours to Kill. He also scripted two films for American International Pictures, both of which starred Boris Karloff and were adaptations of stories by H.P. Lovecraft. Monster of Terror (aka Die, Monster, Die, 1965) was an adaptation of Lovecraft’s “The Colour Out of Space” and The Crimson Cult (1968) was an uncredited adaptation of Lovecraft’s story “The Dreams in the Witch House.” Sohl stated in several interviews that he admired Lovecraft’s work a great deal. A few years before either of these films he co-wrote a feature-length adaptation of Lovecraft’s story “The Dunwich Horror” with Charles Beaumont that was, unfortunately, never produced. Aside from his own scripts he also wrote the plot synopsis to the 1965 Japanese film Frankenstein Conquers the World and he saw his novel Night Slaves (1965) adapted into an NBC Movie of the Week in 1970 which was directed by Twilight Zone veteran Ted Post.

Sohl was also indirectly involved in the inspiration for another television classic. An avid golfer, Sohl was golfing with Richard Matheson the day President Kennedy was assassinated. After hearing the news, the two packed up their clubs and decided to call it a day. On the drive home, they encountered a large eighteen-wheeler driving dangerously close behind them. Even after increasing their speed in an attempt to put some distance between themselves and the driver the truck remained just as close as before. They were now driving at a dangerously fast speed through steep hills with nowhere to pull over. Finally, they came upon an area wide enough to pull off onto and let the gigantic truck pass them by. This encounter stayed with Matheson for many years and he eventually turned it into the novella “Duel” which he adapted into the screenplay for the famous made-for-television film directed by Stephen Spielberg in 1971.

Collaboration was common within the Group and Sohl spent the first few years of his career as a screenwriter co-writing scripts and other projects with various members of the Group’s inner circle. Second to Richard Matheson, Sohl would become Charles Beaumont’s most frequent collaborator, although for most of the projects he worked on with Beaumont he was less of a collaborator than a ghostwriter as Beaumont would often receive sole credit for the assignment. In addition to the aforementioned script for "The Dunwich Horror" Sohl and Beaumont collaborated on a handful of projects. He co-wrote an episode of The Naked City with Beaumont and William F. Nolan called “Down the Long Night” and he co-wrote an episode of Route 66 called “The Quick and the Dead” with Beaumont and John Tomerlin. He and Beaumont also collaborated on two articles for Playboy, “Requiem for the Holidays” (June, 1963) and “Lament for the High Iron” (October, 1963). Beaumont received sole credit for these. Both articles later appeared in Beaumont’s nonfiction collection Remember, Remember (1963) which he dedicated to Sohl and fellow collaborator OCee Ritch.

The majority of these collaborations were written in early 1963 when Charles Beaumont’s health first began to deteriorate. These experiences working with Sohl are likely the reason the busy writer trusted him with his material for The Twilight Zone when he found it difficult to reach production deadlines during the show's fourth and fifth seasons. Sohl wrote a total of five scripts for the show, three under Beaumont's byline: “The New Exhibit” for season four and “Living Doll” and “Queen of the Nile” for season five. He also wrote two additional scripts,* “Pattern for Doomsday” and “Who Am I?” which were originally bought by producer Bert Granet at the beginning of the fifth season but were later cut from the production schedule by Granet’s replacement William Froug who also axed another Beaumont script, “Gentlemen, Be Seated” and Richard Matheson’s “The Doll” among others. Beaumont had varying degrees of participation in the writing of these scripts ranging from fully thought out story treatments to virtually no involvement at all. But all of the finalized scripts that were handed to the show's producers were written by Sohl.

In the early 1960’s Sohl took an extended hiatus from writing novels and short stories to concentrate on his new career as a screenwriter. By the end of the decade, however, he had returned to the format and was now writing far outside the genre of science fiction. Starting with the publication of his novel The Lemon Eaters by Simon and Schuster in 1967 Sohl’s fiction began to take on more of a mainstream dramatic aesthetic aimed at a wider audience. He published several novels through the prominent publishing house including The Spun Sugar Hole (1971) and The Resurrection of Frank Borchard (1973). Sohl put a tremendous amount of creative effort into these novels and it earned him a great deal of critical acclaim. Unfortunately, the sales were moderate at best and by the 1980s Sohl had more or less abandoned the mainstream market. Throughout the late 70s and 80s Sohl published novels in a variety of different genres including several horror novels, two historical romances under the name Roberta Jean Mountjoy, a series of romantic suspense novels under the name Nathan Butler, and a novelization of the Japanese film SuperManChu: Master of Kung Fu under the name Sean Mei Sullivan in 1974. A renaissance man of many talents, Sohl also released two semi-satirical instructional books on Bridge, Underahanded Bridge, and chess, Underhanded Chess, both published by Penguin Books in 1973.

Although Sohl published several dozen short stories during his career, he never saw a collection of his short fiction published during his lifetime. He attempted to publish a collection of stories in 1959 under the title Filet of Sohl but it never materialized. In 2003 BearManor Media finally published Filet of Sohl as a career retrospective of Sohl’s work featuring his original introduction to the 1959 edition, new and old works of short fiction, and his two unproduced Twilight Zone teleplays. In 2004 they published The Twilight Zone Scripts of Jerry Sohl featuring his three scripts that were made into episodes of the show (“The New Exhibit” “Living Doll” and “Queen of the Nile”). Both volumes were edited by frequent Southern California School of Writers biographer Christopher Conlon and feature tributes to Sohl from George Clayton Johnson, William F. Nolan, and Richard Matheson, as well as Sohl’s children.

Sohl passed away on November 4, 2002 in Thousand Oaks, California. He was 88.

Jerry Sohl
(1913-2002)

Grateful acknowledgement is made to the following publications:

Filet of Sohl edited by Christopher Conlon (BearManor Media, 2003)

The Twilight Zone Scripts of Jerry Sohl edited by Christopher Conlon (BearManor Media, 2004)

“Jerry Sohl” interview with Sohl by Edward Gross in Starlog (October and November issues, 1988)

"Sohl Man: From the Twilight Zone to the Outer Limits and Beyond" interview with Sohl by Mathew R. Bradley Filmfax #75/76 (October, 1999)

California Sorcery edited by William F. Nolan and William Schafer (Cemetery Dance, 1999)

The Work of Charles Beaumont: An Annotated Bibliography and Guide compiled by William F. Nolan (Bibliographies of Modern Authors series, Borgo Press, 1986)

The Twilight Zone Companion, 2nd edition by Marc Scott Zicree (Silman-James Press, 1992)

Jerry Sohl at imdb.com

Jerry Sohl at isfdb.org

Jerry Sohl at wga.org

*Both scripts were eventually adapted into episodes of The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas by author Dennis Etchison. "Pattern for Doomsday" features a full cast including Henry Rollins and Mike Starr and "Who Am I?" features Sean Astin. The scripts can also be found in Filet of Sohl (2003) edited by Christopher Conlon.


--Brian

From the jacket of The Spun Sugar Hole (1971)

Happy Birthday to William F. Nolan

William F. Nolan

Join us in wishing a happy birthday to the legendary William F. Nolan who turns 89 today!

Born in 1928, Nolan is a renowned writer, editor, artist, and historian whose career spans over half a century. During the 1950’s and 60’s he was part of a close community of writers in the Los Angeles area collectively known as the Southern California School of Writers—or simply the Group—which also included prominent Twilight Zone writers Charles Beaumont, George Clayton Johnson, Richard Matheson, Ray Bradbury, John Tomerlin, and Jerry Sohl. Although he never wrote an episode of show, Nolan’s presence can be felt in almost every chapter of its history. He was close friends with many of the show's writers and features prominently in their recollections of the time. He was particularly close to Beaumont, Johnson, and Tomerlin and the quartet would spend hours driving around Los Angeles, eating at all-night diners, talking about books and writing, critiquing each other’s work, and often taking impulsive jaunts halfway around the world to meet Ian Fleming or revel in Monte Carlo or the Bahamas. In 1962 Nolan, Johnson, and Beaumont all had roles in Roger Corman's The Intruder based on Beaumont's novel. In interviews Johnson often recalled that he wrote part of "Kick the Can" while he and Nolan drove back to California from shooting in Missouri. Nolan and Johnson also collaborated on an unproduced teleplay for The Twilight Zone called “Dreamflight” about a woman whose recurrent nightmare of dying in a plane crash begins to manifest itself into reality. It was likely abandoned due to scheduling reasons. Nolan was also the inspiration for Charley Parkes (Robert Duvall's character) in Beaumont's fourth season episode "Miniature." In an interview with Marc Scott Zicree, Nolan explains that Beaumont confessed to him that he created the shy, soft-spoken Parkes using Nolan as a muse.

A prolific writer of both fiction and nonfiction Nolan is the co-author, with Johnson, of the landmark science fiction novel Logan’s Run (1967), and author of its sequels and various graphic adaptations. In 2001 his short fiction was collected in the career retrospective Dark Universe: Stories 1951 – 2001 from Stealth Press. An auto-racing enthusiast, he and Beaumont edited two volumes of stories and essays about motorsports, Omnibus of Speed: An Introduction to the World of Motor Sport (1958) and When Engines Roar (1964). In 1991 he co-edited The Bradbury Chronicles: Stories in Honor of Ray Bradbury with Martin H. Greenberg and in 1999 he co-edited California Sorcery with William Schafer, an anthology of short stories celebrating the Group. In 1975 he adapted Matheson’s stories “The Likeness of Julie” and “Therese” (aka “Needle in the Heart”) for Dan Curtis’s anthology film Trilogy of Terror which aired on ABC. The following year he and Curtis co-wrote a screenplay based on Robert Marasco’s novel Burnt Offerings for United Artist which starred Karen Black, Oliver Reed, Bette Davis, and Burgess Meredith. In 1975 he published The Ray Bradbury Companion: A Life and Career History and in 1986 he published The Work of Charles Beaumont: An Annotated Bibliography. He is the recipient of two Edgar Allan Poe Special Awards, a World Fantasy Award, a Bram Stoker Lifetime Achievement Award from the Horror Writers Association, and the Author Emeritus Award from the Science Fiction Writers of America. He is a World Horror Society Grand Master and was voted a Living Legend by the International Horror Guild. In 1991 Newsweek chose his story "The Party" (1967) as one of the seven most effective horror stories of the twentieth century.

At 89, Nolan is still active in the speculative fiction world and attends conventions and grants interviews regularly. He co-edited two anthologies from Cycatrix Press with Jason V. Brock, The Bleeding Edge: Dark Barriers, Dark Frontiers (2009) and The Devil’s Coattails: More Dispatches from the Dark Frontier (2011). In 2013 Dark Regions Press published a new collection of his short fiction entitled Like a Dead Man Walking and Other Shadow Tales. And in 2014 he received a Bram Stoker Award for his memoir Nolan on Bradbury: Sixty Years of Writing about the Master of Science Fiction.

Cheers to you, Mr. Nolan.

William F. Nolan Official Website

Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Internet Movie Database

Forgotten Gems from the Twilight Zone, Volume 2 edited by Andrew Ramage
--contains Nolan and George Clayton Johnson's unproduced teleplay "Dreamflight."

"Kick the Can"

Mr. Charles Whitley (Ernest Truex) remembering a life forgotten.

“Kick the Can”

Season Three, Episode 86

Original Air Date: February 9, 1962

Cast:

Charles Whitley: Ernest Truex

Ben Conroy: Russell Collins

Mr. Cox: John Marley

Frietag: Hank Patterson

Mr. Agee: Earl Hodges

Mrs. Summers: Marjorie Bennett

Mrs. Densley: Lenore Shanewise

Mrs. Wister: Anne O’Neal

Mr. Carlson: Burt Mustin

David Whitley: Barry Truex

Nurse: Eve McVeagh

Boy #1: Gregory McCabe

Boy #2: Marc Stevens

Crew:

Writer: George Clayton Johnson (original teleplay)

Director: Lamont Johnson

Producer: Buck Houghton

Production Manager: Ralph W. Nelson

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens

Art Direction: George W. Davis and Phil Barber

Set Decoration: George R. Nelson

Assistant Director: E. Darrell Hallenbeck

Casting: Stalmaster-Lister

Editor: Bill Mosher

Story Consultant: Richard McDonagh

Sound: Franklin Milton and Bill Edmondson

Music: stock

And Now, Mr. Serling:

“For all of us, even the most young at heart, I suppose there’s a little kernel of want having to do with reliving childhood, that grand and glorious moment in time when the biggest guy around is the patrol boy. Next week on the Twilight Zone this moment is recaptured in George Clayton Johnson’s exceptionally sensitive story called ‘Kick the Can.’ It co-stars Mr. Ernest Truex and Mr. Russell Collins.

“If the tobaccos in a cigarette are good enough, they alone will give mellow richness and satisfactory mildness. Try Chesterfields and you’ll discover twenty-one great tobaccos make twenty wonderful smokes.”

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration:

“Sunnyvale Rest: a home for the aged. A dying place. And a common children’s game called kick the can that will shortly become a refuge for a man who knows he will die in this world if he doesn’t escape…into the Twilight Zone.”

Summary:
            Charles Whitley is an elderly man who resides at a small retirement home called Sunnyvale Rest. He and the other residents spend their days knitting or watching television, talking about things that do not matter, and looking for anything that may remind them that their life is not yet over. Whitley announces one afternoon that he is leaving Sunnyvale and going to live with his son. His announcement is met with skepticism. His son arrives and tells him that he will not be able to house him and that he must stay at the rest home. Whitley walks through the vacant lot next to the facility. He sees a group of boys playing a game of kick the can and sits beneath a tree and watches for a while.

            Later, in his room, Whitley tells one of the other residents, Ben, that he misses his youth. He misses playing games like kick the can. He wonders if there is a secret to staying young. Ben dismisses this as wishful thinking and tells Whitley that he should accept his age and be thankful that he has lived a long life.

           That night, Whitley wakes up all of the residents and asks them if they want to play kick the can. Perhaps youth is only an idea, he says, and maybe acting youthful will somehow keep them young. He convinces them to sneak past the night nurse and venture outside.

            Alarmed that his friend may be suffering a mental breakdown, Ben wakes the head caregiver and informs him that Whitley and the others have broken curfew by going outside. When they arrive outside, however, they find only children. Ben spots a boy playing tag and realizes that it is Whitley. He begs Whitley to take him with them, to make him young again. But the boy only stares back at him silently and then runs off into the woods with the others. The old man picks up the can and walks quietly back into the empty rest home.

Rod Serling’s Closing Narration:

“Sunnyvale Rest. A dying place for ancient people who have forgotten the fragile magic of youth. A dying place for those who have forgotten that childhood, maturity, and old age are curiously intertwined and not separate. A dying place for those who have grown too stiff in their thinking to visit…the Twilight Zone.”

Commentary:
            “Kick the Can” is the fourth original teleplay from writer George Clayton Johnson. Unfortunately, it would also be his last. Before coming to write for The Twilight Zone Johnson had little experience writing professionally and had never written for television. Still, he hit a creative stride on the show that was unprecedented for even a seasoned veteran. His scripts were thoughtful and mature and they drew the audience in and convinced them to care about the characters, even ones like Jesse Cardiff and Ben Conroy. But his time with the show was more or less over. His work would appear on the program one last time during the fifth season but the experience would be a bitter one.

           At the end of the fourth season Johnson submitted a story to producer Bert Granet called “The Grandfather Clock” about an elderly man who is emotionally dependent upon a wind-up grandfather clock. He believes that if the clock stops ticking he will die. His loved ones watch helplessly as he sinks further and further into his obsession. At the end of the story he dies after the clock falls on top of him and stops ticking. The moment the clock is repaired and begins to tick again the old man’s granddaughter gives birth. Granet liked the idea and told him to flesh it out into a teleplay. By the time he submitted it to the show, however, William Froug had taken over as producer. Convinced it wouldn’t work as an episode, Froug gave it to writer Richard DeRoy to adapt. DeRoy kept Johnson’s concept but changed the ending so that the old man realizes that he no longer needs the clock and is permitted to live. Johnson was so dissatisfied with the episode that he removed his name from it—the only person to ever do so during the show’s five year run—and used the pseudonym “Johnson Smith” instead. The episode remains enjoyable, thanks largely to a great cast and a very moving musical score from Bernard Herman, but it lacks the emotional resonance found in his earlier episodes. After four teleplays of his own and four adaptations of his work, this was how George Clayton Johnson departed The Twilight Zone.

            Before we go any further let’s talk about “Dreamflight.” At some point between selling “Kick the Can” in 1962 and the show’s cancellation in 1964, Johnson co-wrote an original teleplay with friend and frequent collaborator William F. Nolan called “Dreamflight," about a woman living with a recurring nightmare in which she is a passenger on an airplane that gradually begins to shut down before falling out of the sky. Several days later she boards a real airplane and notices the exact same sequence of events from her dream starting to unfold there. She begins to panic. The man sitting next to her does his best to distract her from her thoughts and they develop a connection. By the end of the flight she has forgotten the nightmare and is finally ready to move forward with her life. The plane lands safely and the story ends. The fantasy element here is ambiguous much like the supernatural abilities of the Mystic Seer in “Nick of Time.” The protagonist chooses not to fall victim to her own mind and is willing to take steps to prevent this from happening much like William Shatner in the earlier episode.

            There appears to be some confusion as to when “Dreamflight” was sold to the show. The dates given by past researchers vary considerably, as do the reasons for why it was never made into an episode. Many, including Nolan, say that it was submitted to the show near the end of season three. This meant that Buck Houghton would have been the one to decide its fate. No definitive reason as to why this one never made it past the writing phase has ever really been given although many believe that the script was not completed in time to be included in the third season and was abandoned altogether once the show went off the air at the end of the season. However, when asked about this project in interviews Johnson recalled selling it to producer William Froug during the fifth season. Like the first scenario, the timing was not in their favor and the show went off the air for good before the script could be filmed. Another reason the producers may have been reluctant to jump into production on the script was the show’s ever-growing catalog of episodes dealing with airplanes or air travel, particularly Serling’s “Twenty-Two” and Matheson’s “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” both of which bear a resemblance to “Dreamflight.” On an interesting side note, Johnson said that he wrote the first draft of "Kick the Can" while he and Nolan were driving back to Los Angeles from Missouri where the filming of Roger Corman's The Intruder (1962) had just wrapped. The film was adapted by Beaumont from his novel and featured Nolan and Johnson in bit roles. Read more about "Dreamflight" in our interview with William F. Nolan here.

            At the same time that he was penning episodes of The Twilight Zone, Johnson’s work was also appearing on shows like Alfred Hitchcock Presents ("I'll Take Care of You," also featuring Russell Collins), Route 66, The Law and Mr. Jones, and several others. In 1960 the original Ocean's 11 film starring Frank Sinatra finally premiered in theaters. Johnson co-wrote the initial draft of the

Logan's Run, 1967

screenplay with Jack Golden Russell five years earlier. The film was a huge success and Johnson and Russell—along with Harry Brown and Charles Lederer who were brought in for screenplay revisions—were nominated for a Writer’s Guild of America Award. In 1962 he collaborated with friend and mentor Ray Bradbury on an animated short film based on Bradbury’s story “Icarus Montgolfier Wright” which was nominated for an Academy Award. He also saw several of his short stories appear in magazines like Rogue and Gamma. In 1966 he wrote the premiere episode of Star Trek called “The Man Trap.” In 1967 Johnson collaborated with William F. Nolan once again on the landmark science fiction novel Logan's Run (Dial Press) about a dystopian society where people are euthanized at the age of twenty-one. The book was a huge success which spawned two sequels written by Nolan, a 1976 feature film directed by Michael Anderson, a short-lived television series in 1977, and several graphic adaptations.

            Johnson found himself roaming the fifth dimension throughout much of the 1980’s starting with the publication of a small collection of stories and essays called Writing for the Twilight Zone in 1980. In 1981 Rod Serling’s The Twilight Zone Magazine began an impressive eight year run with author T.E.D. Klein as its first editor. The magazine published several of Johnson’s essays and short stories during its reign including his story “Sea Change,” in which the protagonist loses his hand only to have another one grow back in its place. Serling bought the story for the original series in 1960 but had to sell it back to Johnson amid concerns that the sponsors would find it too violent. The 1980’s revival series remade “A Game of Pool” using Johnson’s original ending during its final season.

            Most notable, of course, is the remake of “Kick the Can” for Twilight Zone: The Movie in 1983. In 1982 Warner Brothers contacted Johnson wanting to purchase the screen rights to the story. Johnson was hesitant at first but after learning of Carol Serling’s involvement and that Richard Matheson would write the screenplay he agreed to let them adapt his story. But before he did so he met with Frank Marshall and Kathleen Kennedy of Amblin Entertainment and gave them a short, three page outline which contained a new ending to his story. Johnson felt that his original teleplay was a bit irresponsible in that it failed to portray the reality of the situation. These kids were now on their own with no one to take care of them. The outline featured an additional sequence which began where the original story ended, with the kids running off into the woods. It follows the kids on their adventure through the woods, laughing and playing, lost in the exhilaration of youth. As the excitement fades they grow tired and hungry and scared. The consequences of their actions become a reality. They stumble upon the rest home, unfamiliar to them now, and climb into the warm beds where they are transformed back into their older selves. Matheson kept Johnson’s idea but condensed it for time, eliminating the scenes of the children in the woods. This earned Johnson screen credit as well as story credit for his original teleplay. After Matheson submitted his final script to Warner Brothers, however, director/producer Steven Spielberg gave it to screenwriter Mellissa Mathison for revision. Spielberg had just worked with Mathison on E.T. earlier that year and felt that she could give the story a softer, whimsical quality. The result is a syrupy-sweet disaster with unnecessary special effects which bears little resemblance to the original episode.

"Kick the Can" segment in
Twilight Zone: The Movie (1983)
directed by Steven Spielberg

           In Spielberg’s version the residents don’t discover the magic of playing kick the can for themselves. Instead a traveling gypsy-like character named Mr. Bloom, played by Scatman Crothers, provides the magic for them. This places all of the importance on Bloom instead of on the residents and their spiritual enlightenment which is the foundation of the story. It also removes the relationship between Whitley and Conroy which is another important element of the original episode. Aside from this the segment is filled with formulaic characters, atrocious dialogue, a badly miscast leading man, and a significant emotional scene that depends almost exclusively on the performances of small children, a risky choice that proved to be a bad one. Despite a talented director and three very talented writers this version is almost unwatchable and is generally considered the worst segment of the film.

Robert Bloch’s official novelization of the film is quite different from Spielberg’s version. As we mentioned in our review of the book, Bloch was given an early draft of the screenplay. His version features a humorous opening scene in which Bloom is checking into Sunnyvale and a dream montage which occurs before all of the residents go outside to play kick the can. It is also void of the overbearing visual effects, hideous set designs, and awkward dialogue that saturate the film. Those who were disappointed with the movie may find Bloch’s laid-back approach more enjoyable.

When George Clayton Johnson wrote this teleplay he was 32 years old. Three of his Twilight Zone episodes, “Nothing in the Dark,”  “Ninety Years Without Slumbering,” and “Kick the Can” all concern growing old, facing death, and losing one’s self to fear and time. It is interesting that a young writer would be able to create accurate and compelling characters that are significantly older than he is. Johnson does not judge or exploit his characters and gives them sympathetic personalities that are easily approachable. In fact, most of the show’s regular writers were in their thirties at the time yet most wrote about the aging process frequently. Matheson wrote “Night Call” and “Spur of the Moment,” both rather bleak episodes about aging. Beaumont wrote “Static” and “Long Live Walter Jameson,” both stories about escaping old age. He also wrote “Passage on the Lady Anne” to the opposite effect. Serling wrote a handful of episodes about aging most notably “The Changing of the Guard,” “The Sixteen Millimeter Shrine,” and “The Trade Ins.” He also adapted “Of Late I think of Cliffordville” from a Malcolm Jameson short story and “A Short Drink from a Certain Fountain” from a story by Lou Holtz.

Johnson said he got the idea for this episode while trying to remember the rules to kick the can, a game he played frequently as a kid, and discovering that he could not. This loss of memory caused Johnson to think that maybe he had lost his youth to time and old age. After realizing that old age is not as black and white as it is often depicted as being, Johnson came up with the idea for “Kick the Can.” Ironically, his decision to approach the movie version with a more mature philosophy directly contradicts the message of the original episode.

Director Lamont Johnson, who added an immeasurable depth to George Clayton Johnson’s previous episode “Nothing in the Dark,” lends his distinctive personality to “Kick the Can” as well. This was his fifth episode of the show, all of which were made within a few short months, and by this time Johnson had a definite understanding of the show’s personality. He knew, almost instinctively it seems, what type of direction was suitable for an episode simply based on the script. Many of his episodes, like “Five Characters in Search of an Exit,” “The Shelter,” and “Passage on the Lady Anne” are heavily stylized and feature unconventional lighting and camera angles which give them an immediately noticeable quality. His direction here is a bit more reserved but he still manages to use the camera to his benefit in several places.

“Kick the Can” is one of the best episodes The Twilight Zone produced during its five year run and has become a classic piece of American television. Writing about characters so far removed from himself could have been a risky decision for George Clayton Johnson. But he delivers a brilliant story that is equal parts sentimental and haunting. Even when the action appears to be taking a turn for the hokey he and director Lamont Johnson manage to keep it grounded in rationality. It is entertaining but still accomplishes what every piece of superior art strives for which is to show its audience a part of themselves that they were unaware of. With a great cast, two fantastic leading performances, amazing direction and a wonderful script “Kick the Can” can easily stand as an example of why The Twilight Zone remains one of the best television programs of all time.

George Clayton Johnson
1929 - 2015

Grade: A

Grateful acknowledgement to:

Archive of American Television:

--Interview with George ClaytonJohnson; conducted by Gary Rutkowski (September, 2003)

The Twilight Zone Definitive Edition DVD, Season Five (Image Entertainment, 2004)

--Video Interview with George Clayton Johnson

Twilight Zone Scripts and Stories by George Clayton Johnson (Streamline Pictures, 1996)

All of Us Are Dying and Other Stories by George Clayton Johnson (Subterranean Press, 1999)

Dimensions Behind the Twilight Zone by Stewart Stanyard (ECW Press, 2007)

Forgotten Gems from the Twilight Zone: Volume 2 edited by Andrew Ramage (BearManor Media, 2005)

More Giants of the Genre by Michael McCarty (Wildside Press, 2005)

Internet Speculative Fiction Database

Notes:

--Ernest Truex also appears in Serling’s adaptation of Henry Kuttner and C.L. Moore’s “What You Need” in the first season.

--John Marley also appears in Serling’s adaptation of Henry Slesar’s story “The Old Man” (as “The Old Man in the Cave”) during the fifth season.

--Marjorie Bennett also appears in season one’s “The Chaser” adapted by Robert Presnell, Jr. from the story by John Collier and in Serling’s season four episode “No Time Like the Past.” She also appeared in a season two segment of Night Gallery called “Deliveries in the Rear” which was written by Serling.

--Hank Peterson also appears in the fifth season episodes “Ring-a-Ding Girl” and “Come Wander with Me.” He also has a role in an episode of The Loner called “The Sherriff of Fetterman’s Crossing.”

--Burt Muslin also appears in “Night of the Meek” during the second season.

--The role of Charles Whitley’s son David Whitley is played by Ernest Truex’s son, actor Barry Truex, although he receives no screen credit.

-- Eve McVeagh also appears in the season five episode “I Am the Night—Color Me Black.”

--Lamont Johnson directed eight episodes of the show including “The Shelter,” “Five Characters in Search of an Exit,” “Nothing in the Dark” and “Four O’Clock” for season three and “A Passage on the Lady Anne” for season four.

--George Clayton Johnson wrote four original teleplays for the show: “A Penny for Your Thoughts” for season two and “A Game of Pool,” “Nothing in the Dark” and “Kick the Can” for season three. His stories “All of Us Are Dying” (“The Four of Us Are Dying”) and “Execution” were adapted by Serling for the first season and Charles Beaumont adapted his story “The Prime Mover” for the second season. As mentioned, his fifth season episode “Ninety Years Without Slumbering” was re-written by Richard DeRoy as per producer William Froug which prompted Johnson to use the pseudonym Johnson Smith as his by-line.

--“Kick the Can” was famously made into the second segment of Twilight Zone: The Movie by Steven Spielberg in 1983. Johnson received story credit and shared screenplay credit with Richard Matheson and Mellissa Mathison (writing as Josh Rogan). This segment was also adapted into prose form by Robert Bloch in his official novelization of the film, released by Warner Books.
--"Dreamflight" was finally published in Forgotten Gems from the Twilight Zone: Volume 2 edited by Andrew Ramage (BearManor Media, 2005).

--Listen to the Twilight Zone Radio Drama starring Shelley Berman and Stan Freberg.

--Brian