The Twilight Zone in Four Colors

The first Twilight Zone comic book

Four Color #1173 (1960)

Cover artist unknown

A Look at The Twilight Zone Comic Books

   

        From the inception of the original television series through today, The Twilight Zone has been featured in books, radio, film, theater, magazines, a theme park ride, board games, soundtrack albums, toys, and novelty items ranging from T-shirts to posters. It has inspired documentary films and been released numerous times on home video packages from VHS tapes to Blu-ray discs. It has been imitated and parodied and has been the subject of numerous books, articles, and online resources. It should come as no surprise that The Twilight Zone has also been adapted multiple times for the comic book format, as three ongoing series of traditional comic books, a little-known literacy education book, and a line of graphic novels from an American college of art and design. The Twilight Zone in comic book form displayed its own trends and illustrated the versatility with which the show lent itself to an alternative visual format.

 

The first Gold Key issue (Nov, 1962)

Cover art: George Wilson

            By the early 1960s, science fiction had moved from the pulps and paperbacks into an established genre on television, evolving from early programs aimed primarily at children (Buck Rogers, Space Patrol) to pioneering anthology series (Tales of Tomorrow, Science Fiction Theatre). Comic book publishers began to consider science fiction television programs for their line of titles, particularly in the wake of the fear created around the crime and horror comics of the 1950s. Science fiction and fantasy material was seen as less-controversial subjects which could perhaps reach the same audience. There was reasoning that if it was broadcast on American television then it was okay for comic books. As a result, the 1960s saw a sharp rise in science fiction and fantasy television series adapted for comic books, ranging from The Twilight Zone to Boris Karloff’s Thriller to The Outer Limits, Star Trek, and many more too numerous to list here.

            In 1960, around the time of production on the second season of The Twilight Zone, Western Publishing licensed the rights to create a Twilight Zone comic book. The title was published by Dell (Western and Dell had worked closely together as packager and distributor, respectively, since the 1930s) for its Four Color series, a rotating anthology frequently used to gauge a title’s potential as an ongoing series. The comic would not directly adapt episodes of the television series but instead presented new tales of mystery and imagination, although there were inevitably instances of the comic book covering the same ground as original series. Portions of Rod Serling's introductions from episodes of the show were also occasionally used. Most stories featured an illustrated Rod Serling delivering his typically pithy opening and closing narrations.

A typical Rod Serling hosting panel from issue #18

Art: Nevio Zeccara

          In 1962, four issues after The Twilight Zone comic began its irregular run under the Dell imprint (two for Four Color, two as a regular title), Dell and Western Publishing dissolved their partnership. Western partnered with a new distributor and continued to issue many of their licensed titles under a newly created comics imprint, Gold Key. It is under the Gold Key imprint that The Twilight Zone remained for the bulk of its run. Gold Key Comics became a haven in the 1960's and into the 1980's for fantasy, science fiction, and horror properties with titles including Boris Karloff's Tales of Mystery, Grimm's Ghost Stories, and The Occult Files of Dr. Spektor. Later in its run, The Twilight Zone comic also began to appear under Western's imprint of Whitman during a time when Western battled the shifting dynamics of newsstand distribution. Whitman publications were typically found in markets such as grocery stores, pharmacies, and department stores. Certain later issues of The Twilight Zone were released under both the Gold Key and Whitman imprints in differing distribution patterns.  

Issue #73 (Whitman)

Cover art: George Wilson, reprinted from issue #40

             The initial Dell comic was incorporated into an existing series (continuing from the Dell Four Color series) and therefore numbered in a preexisting pattern. The Dell comic lasted two additional issues before the move to Gold Key, in which the series began with new numbering, from issue #1 (1962) to issue #91 (1979). An all-reprint issue #92 was released nearly three years later, in 1982, with a cover by Frank Bolle recreating George Wilson's cover for the first issue. 

             Each issue typically featured between 2-4 illustrated stories as well as a short text story (required to maintain access to second class postage). The first eight issues of the Gold Key comic featured a pin-up reproduction of the front cover illustration on the back cover, sans logo and text. George Wilson contributed many of the eye-catching covers. Other notable artists who worked on the book during its long run include Reed Crandall, George Evans, Al Williamson, Joe Orlando, Alex Toth, Jerry Robinson, Mike Roy, Angelo Torres, Frank Miller (in his professional debut), Russ Jones, Bob Jenny, Mike Vosburg, Walter Simonson, and Alex Niño. Several stories in issues from the early 1970's were written by Len Wein, creator of Wolverine and (with artist Bernie Wrightson) Swamp Thing. The first incarnation of The Twilight Zone comic folded in June of 1979, 15 years of (almost) uninterrupted publication beyond the end of the show upon which it was based. The first series of Twilight Zone comic books have not, as of this writing, been collected in a permanent format, despite being part of a line of comics which have seen a resurgence of interest in recent years. Several other Gold Key titles have been restored and reprinted in archive editions. It is long past time for The Twilight Zone to receive the same treatment. 

            1979 saw the appearance of a little-known volume titled Stories from the Twilight Zone: A Skylark Illustrated Book. Published by Bantam Books and designed for reading education, this volume featured comic style adaptations of the contents from Rod Serling's 1960 Bantam book, Stories from the Twilight Zone. The stories, “The Mighty Casey,” “Escape Clause,” “Walking Distance,” “The Fever,” “Where Is Everybody?” and “The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street,” were adapted by Horace J. Elias and illustrated by Carl Pfeufer.

            The Twilight Zone returned to comics a little more than a decade later when the first issue of a second incarnation was released by NOW Comics, issue-dated November of 1990. The new book was decidedly different from its predecessor. The second series of Twilight Zone comic books were a natural off-shoot of another boom in science fiction and fantasy films and television programs adapted for comics. 

 

NOW series issue #1 (1990)

Cover art: Bill Sienkiewicz

NOW Comics was founded in late 1985 by Anthony Caputo during a rise in the industry wide trend toward independent publishing. Though NOW began as a sole proprietorship, Caputo was soon bought out and the company began growing at an increasing rate, becoming one of the top five producers of comic books in America by 1990. Much of NOW's success came from their line of licensed properties, including titles such as The Real Ghostbusters, Fright Night, The Green Hornet, Married. . . with Children, The Original Astro Boy, Speed Racer, Mr. T and the T Force, Terminator: The Burning Earth, and The Twilight Zone. 

        Rod Serling was noticeably absent from the NOW comic book series, which capitalized on the demand for more mature fantasy and horror content. Variant covers and special issues were common and included a double-sized "science fiction" issue, a 3-D issue, an "all computer" issue, and a double-sized annual issue. The most notable issue is the series debut featuring Harlan Ellison's "Crazy as a Soup Sandwich," illustrated by Neal Adams. Ellison, who served for a time as Creative Consultant on the revival The Twilight Zone television series, provided an essay preceding the story detailing his experiences working on the show. "Crazy as a Soup Sandwich" was produced as an episode for the third season of the revival Twilight Zone television series, directed by Paul Lynch from Ellison's script, broadcast April 1, 1989. The prose version of the story was published in the Spring, 1989 issue of Pulphouse magazine and collected in Ellison's Slippage (1997). Interestingly, that first issue comprised the entirety of the first volume of the series. Due to a change in ownership of NOW Comics, the series was placed on hold for a year. When it returned, the first issue was reprinted with slightly different contents. It originally contained a back-up story, "Wish Book," written by Don Glut and illustrated by John Stangeland. When the issue was reprinted, it dropped "Wish Book" and added a prose story by Ellison, "Darkness Upon the Face of the Deep," along with a new cover by Neal Adams.

        The NOW series ceased publication in August of 1993. Like many of the NOW titles, The Twilight Zone series has not been reissued in a collected edition.

Cover art: Rich Ellis

        Rod Serling's scripts for The Twilight Zone were adapted into a series of graphic novels in 2008 and 2009 by Walker & Company in conjunction with the Rod Serling Trust overseen by Carol Serling. Serling's scripts were adapted by art instructor Marc Kneece and art duties were handled by the student artists from the Savannah College of Art and Design, including Dove McHargue, Rebekah Isaacs, Robert Grabe, Rich Ellis, Anthony Spay, and Chris Lie. Each volume included an introductory essay and a biographical essay on Rod Serling.

Dynamite series issue #1
Cover art: Francesco Francavilla

        The third and most recent incarnation of The Twilight Zone in comic book form arrived in December of 2013 with The Twilight Zone #1 from Dynamite Entertainment. The format this time was a long-form series written by J. Michael Straczynski, who'd previously contributed significantly to the 1985 revival Twilight Zone television series, out of which he produced the 1989 book Tales from the New Twilight Zone. The main series continued for twelve issues until February of 2015. A second limited series, The Twilight Zone: Shadow and Substance, appeared in 2015 and another, The Twilight Zone: The Shadow (a crossover series with the pulp hero) appeared in 2016. Like the NOW series, Dynamite released a number of single issue specials, including a 2014 Annual and the one-shots The Twilight Zone: Lost Tales and The Twilight Zone: 1959. The series concluded with the publication of the latter in 2016. The Dynamite series has been collected in a series of trade editions.

         A final publication of interest is the 2019 graphic novel biography The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television by writer and artist Koren Shadmi, published by Life Drawn. This excellent illustrated biography follows Rod Serling from his days as a paratrooper to his early success in television through The Twilight Zone and Night Gallery and on to his untimely death. Serling's life is presented in a refreshingly direct manner, blemishes and all, as well as in a highly engaging visual style that manages to slot a great amount of information into a relatively small space. It comes recommended.

Cover art: Koren Shadmi

         It is unlikely that we have seen the end of The Twilight Zone in comic book form. It is a tribute to Rod Serling and the original series that each new generation rediscovers the show and re-imagines it in an interesting and unique way.

For a sampling of the Gold Key Twilight Zone comics, go here. 

The Twilight Zone comic books:

1.) Dell Four Color Comics #1173, #1288

2.) The Twilight Zone (Dell Comics), 2 issues (1962)

3.) The Twilight Zone (Gold Key/Whitman) 92 issues (#1-92), November, 1962-June, 1979; 1982. 

4.) Mystery Comics Digest (Gold Key reprint series) #3,6,9,12,15,18,21,24

5.) Dan Curtis Giveaway Comics #3 (Gold Key, 1974; mini-comics used as bubble gum premiums).

6.) The Twilight Zone (Gold Key, 1976; mini-comic, sold in packs)

7.) Stories from The Twilight Zone: A Skylark Illustrated Book by Rod Serling, stories adapted by Horace J. Elias and illustrated by Carl Pfeufer (Bantam Books, 1979)

8.) The Twilight Zone (NOW Comics) Series 1: Nov, 1990 (1 issue; reprinted Oct, 1991), Series 2: 11 issues (Nov, 1991-Sept, 1992), Series 3: 4 issues (May-August, 1993). One shots (all 1993): Annual, Science Fiction Special, 3-D special.

9.) The Twilight Zone graphic novels (Walker & Co.); 1. “Walking Distance” 2. "The After Hours" 3. “The Odyssey of Flight 33” 4. “The Monsters are Due on Maple Street” 5. “The Midnight Sun” 6. “Deaths-head Revisited” 7. “Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?” 8. “The Big, Tall Wish”

10.) The Twilight Zone (Dynamite Entertainment) Series 1: 12 issues (Dec, 2013-Feb, 2015; collected in 3 volumes as The Way Out (#1-5), The Way In (#4-8), The Way Back (#9-12)), Series 2: Shadow and Sustance, 4 issues (2015), Series 3: The Twilight Zone: The Shadow, 4 issues (2016). One-shots: 2014 Annual, The Twilight Zone: Lost Tales (2004), The Twilight Zone: 1959 (2016)

11.) The Twilight Man: Rod Serling and the Birth of Television by Koren Shadmi (Life Drawn, 2019).

Grateful acknowledgement to The Grand Comics Database (comics.org) and Sequential Ellison (sequentialellison.com) for information used in the text.

-JP

"A Thing About Machines"

Richard Haydn as the bitter Barlett Finchley.

"A Thing About Machines"

Season Two, Episode 40

Original Air Date: October 28, 1960

Cast:

Bartlett Finchley: Richard Haydn

Edith (the secretary): Barbara Stuart

TV Repairman: Barney Phillips

Intern: Jay Overholts

Policeman: Henry Beckman

Girl on TV: Margarita Cordova

Crew:

Writer: Rod Serling (original teleplay)

Director: David Orrick McDearmon

Producer: Buck Houghton
Associate Producer: Del Reisman
Production Manager: Sidney S. Van Keuren

Director of Photography: George T. Clemens
Art Direction: George W. Davis and Phil Barber
Set Decoration: Henry Grace and H. Web Arrowsmith
Assistant Direction: Darrell Hallenbeck
Casting: Ethel Winant
Editor: Leon Barsha
Sound: Franklin Milton and Charles Scheid

Music: Stock

And Now, Mr. Serling:

"These are familiar items, I'm sure. Television set, electric razor, clock, typewriter, the normal, everyday accouterment that are part and parcel of twentieth century progress. But next week you'll see them under different circumstances and in a totally dissimilar guise. They'll be machines, but they'll also be monsters. Our story is called 'A Thing About Machines' and it'll be here waiting for you in The Twilight Zone."

Rod Serling's Opening Narration:

"This is Mr. Bartlett Finchley, age forty-eight, a practicing sophisticate who writes very special and very precious things for gourmet magazines and the like. He's a bachelor and a recluse with few friends, only devotees and adherents to the cause of tart sophistry. He has no interests save whatever current annoyances he can put his mind to. He has no purpose to his life except the formulation of day-to-day opportunities to vent his wrath on mechanical contrivances of an age he abhors. In short, Mr. Bartlett Finchley is a malcontent, born either too late or too early in the century and who in just a moment will enter a realm where muscles and the will to fight back are not limited to human beings. Next stop for Mr. Bartlett Finchley. . . The Twilight Zone."

Summary:

            The opening scene immediately establishes what the remainder of the episode repeatedly hammers home: Bartlett Finchley, a wealthy, reclusive bachelor whose occupation involves regular commentary on culture, is an unrepentant snob prone to sudden bursts of violent anger. Finchley exchanges barbed witticisms with the television repairman, a familiar figure in the large, solitary home as Finchley repeatedly assaults his television when it does not work according to the standards he has set for the electrical and mechanical appliances in his home. After the television repairman has left, Finchley smashes a tolling clock with a fireplace poker to drive the point home.

            Finchley's next human encounter, this time with his personal secretary (who promptly quits on him after suffering one too many of his insults), reveals Finchley's true dilemma. Not only has Finchley possessed a lifelong inability to effectively use machines, he now believes the machines have gained sentient life and are conspiring not only to malfunction but to cause him bodily harm. 

            Finchley's typewriter writes on its own: GET OUT OF HERE FINCHLEY. His television displays a dancing woman alone on a stage who looks straight at him and utters the same threatening message. In a panic Finchley attempts to call old friends from his little black book. None, however, have time for the curmudgeon. Blaming the telephone itself for this embarrassment, Finchley tears it from the wall. That does not, however, stop the phone from working. A voice on the other end screams at him to get out. The sound of police sirens outside calls Finchley to the end of his driveway where a policeman and a crowd have gathered because Finchley's car has rolled itself out into the street, almost hitting passersby. It seems Finchley's car, too, has been causing trouble as only a few days before the car's steering wheel turned itself in Finchley's hands as he was pulling the vehicle into the driveway and a headlight was broken as a result. It hit Finchley where it hurts most, his wallet. After resolving the issue of the car, all-the-while spewing insults and threats to the people gathered near his home, Finchley decides the only logical thing to do is to drink himself to sleep.

            He awakens hours later. Rising groggily and going upstairs to his bedroom, Finchley is greeted with a frightening adversary, his electric razor has gained life of its own and begins attacking him. The razor chases Finchley downstairs and out of the house where the car takes its turn tormenting the man, chasing him up the street and through backyards where it eventually knocks Finchley into a swimming pool and drowns him. When the ambulance and the police arrive to retrieve the dead man, they wonder why Finchley's body stayed on the bottom of the pool instead of floating up. It seems as though something were holding him down.

Rod Serling's Closing Narration:

"Yes, it could be. It could just be that Mr. Bartlett Finchley succumbed from a heart attack and a set of delusions. It could just be that he was tormented by an imagination as sharp as his wit and as pointed as his dislikes. But as perceived by those attending, this is one explanation that has left the premises with the deceased. Look for it filed under M for machines, in the Twilight Zone."

Commentary:

"In that one brief, fragmentary moment that lay between life and death he saw the headlights of the car blinking down at him through the water and he heard the engine let out a deep roar like some triumphant shout."
           -"A Thing About Machines" by Rod Serling, More Stories from the Twilight Zone (1961)

            Author Marc Scott Zicree, in The Twilight Zone Companion, was short and sharp in his review of "A Thing About Machines": "Although the concept of 'A Thing About Machines' is a clever one and some of the effects are fun (who couldn't help but love the image of an electric shaver slithering down a flight of stairs?), neither the writing, direction, nor performances are able to give the show any real vitality." 
            Zicree is right on the money.

            The problems with the episode are many but fortunately for series creator Rod Serling, this one appears to be an anomaly among his work for the series, particularly during the early seasons. If fault can be made of Rod Serling's style of drama, it is that his scripts can be overly "talky," as exemplified by "A Thing About Machines." The problem is that the incessant talking, after the first scene, does little to move the plot forward other than to pad out the time limit required for a half-hour show. For a show like The Twilight Zone, a show that thrived on the fable-like quality of its scripts, the script for "A Thing About Machines" is especially threadbare and struggles to remain interesting for more than ten minutes. As Zicree states, the main interest in the episode after the first few minutes are the effects of the machines coming to life to attack Finchley, and these are reasonably well done. Unfortunately, on the higher resolution of today's home videos, the fish line attached to the electric razor can clearly be seen holding the razor upright and pulling it down the stairs.

            Also, the characters are one-dimensional and the viewer doesn't like Finchley. Unlike some of Serling's other so-called "hopeful loser" characters, Finchley starts unlikable and doesn’t change or transform from his trip into the Twilight Zone other than to go from living to dead. It renders the episode not only thin on plot but also thin on character and asks the viewer to remain tuned in to this drama for the sole reason of seeing what everyone knows is coming all along: the machines kill Finchley. Few if any viewers can relate to Finchley nor is there any semblance of humanity about the man to elicit viewer sympathy. If anything, we want to see Finchley hurt and punished. Unlike other episodes which generate a similar response in the viewer, think "Death's-head Revisited" or "What You Need,"the effect simply doesn't come off and the viewer is left feeling bored with the whole thing.

            Serling didn't even feel it necessary to tack on one of his twist endings, which even by this point in the show’s history had become a defining characteristic of the series. The one truly unnerving effect in the episode is Margarita Cordova dancing on the television and stopping to look straight out at Finchley and tell him to "get out of here." It is an effectively bizarre choice and the one truly imaginative spot in an otherwise predictable episode.

            It is interesting to note that this episode resembles a story written by another of the show's contributing writers, Richard Matheson. Matheson published a story titled "Mad House" about an aspiring writer/college professor who is victimized by steadily progressing and nearly uncontrollable bouts of rage that not only cost him his job and destroy his marriage but imbue the everyday objects in his home with a malevolence aimed at destroying him. In Matheson's story, not only do machines attempt to inflict pain (instead of a typewriter typing out a threatening message, there is a grisly scene of a typewriter shredding the character's fingers with its metal keys), but so do simple, inanimate objects, including a pencil that breaks and stabs and a deadly straight razor (similar to the electric one in Serling's script) that ends the character's life in a gut-wrenching moment of pain, regret, and helplessness. Matheson's story had seen three printings before Serling brought his vision of killer household machines to the show. "Mad House" was originally published in the January/February, 1953 issue of Fantastic. It was reprinted twice, in Matheson's first hardcover book, Born of Man and Woman (Chamberlain Press, March, 1954) and the abridged paperback reprint of the same collection, Third from the Sun (Bantam, February, 1955). Though Serling certainly took his vision in a different direction for the show it is reasonable to assume that Serling had at least read the Matheson story if not consciously borrowed the germ of the story altogether. The genius and horror of the Matheson story is that the malevolent objects are not the scorned avengers of Serling's version but are products of the character's own rage and negative energy. The resulting death is that of being consumed by one's own hatred for oneself.

            The only other interesting aspect of the episode is an ending which confused some viewers upon initial telecast. As written, Finchley is knocked into the swimming pool and the car enters the pool on top of Finchley to hold him down until he is drowned. As filmed, it is a tad confusing as the viewer never sees the car enter the pool after knocking Finchley in. It simply stops on the edge. A subtle hint is given when Finchley's body is found and the water is shown to be pouring out of the car as though it had recently been submerged. Perhaps it was a bit too subtle and probably a bit too clever on top of the already predictable drama beforehand.

            Though author Marc Scott Zicree bemoans the direction of the episode, it must be said that David Orrick McDearmon was basically attempting to spin straw into gold with this assignment. The director turned in two other fine episodes for the show, the previous season’s "Execution" and the following season two episode "Back There." British born actor Richard Haydn plays it so that Finchley never seems to have a moment when he lets that high cultured, snobbish exterior down, even in moments when he is alone and in fear of his life. Hadyn’s fussy mannerisms found early success on radio and later became a fixture in anthology television, appearing in Playhouse 90, Lux Playhouse, and G.E. True Theater, as well as finding roles in popular television shows Burke's Law, The Dick Van Dyke Show, Man from U.N.C.L.E., Bewitched, and Bonanza. He found occasional supporting roles in impressive films ranging from Disney's Alice in Wonderland (1951), voicing the Caterpillar, to Mutiny on the Bounty (1962) and The Sound of Music (1965). He sat in the director's chair for three features in the late 1940s and early 1950s, including the Bing Crosby vehicle Mr. Music (1950). Hadyn died on April 25, 1985.

            Barbara Stuart is refreshing as the working woman who's finally had enough of Finchley's condescending remarks. The talented character actress amassed over a hundred television credits from the early 1950s until 2004. Her other genre credits include appearances on One Step Beyond and Batman. She died on May 15, 2011.

                 The one familiar face in the cast is that of Barney Phillips as the television repairman. Phillips appeared in four episodes of The Twilight Zone and "A Thing About Machines" is certainly the worst of the lot. He also appeared in the first season's "The Purple Testament,"season four's excellent "Miniature," and, most memorably, in the second season fan favorite "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" as an alien moonlighting as a short order cook in a remote diner and revealing himself by displaying a third eye on his forehead.

            In all, it seems that "A Thing About Machines" got the short end from the start. The stock music cues are uninspired and unremarkable except for the fact that they are used as predictably suits the episode. Like all of producer Buck Houghton's episodes, its looks great and the wonderful MGM backlot is in fine form. The episode, however, lacks complexity or the simple moral quality of Serling's best scripts. Serling's creative muscles were likely being stretched too thin by the enormous amount of material he was obligated to provide for the show. Fortunately, Serling amassed an extremely talented supporting crew of writers for the first season (Richard Matheson and Charles Beaumont) and would add another to the stable in George Clayton Johnson, soon to make his script writing debut in season two's "A Penny for Your Thoughts" after previously selling two short stories that Serling adapted into season one’s "The Four of Us Are Dying" and "Execution." Of course, Serling was far too talented a writer to produce disposable fodder for the show with any regularity and he would turn in one of his finest efforts with "Eye of the Beholder" just two episodes later.

Grade: D

Notes:

-Director David Orrick McDearmon also directed season one's "Execution" and season two's "Back There."

-Actor Barney Phillips also appeared in season one's "The Purple Testament," season two's "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" and season four's "Miniature."
-Henry Beckman appeared in Rod Serling's "They're Tearing Down Tim Riley's Bar" for Night Gallery.

-"A Thing about Machines" was adapted as a The Twilight Radio Drama starring Mike Starr.
-Rod Serling adapted his teleplay into a short story for More Stories from the Twilight Zone (Bantam Pathfinder, April, 1961).

-JP

"Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room"

Joe Mantell as nervous man Jackie Rhodes

“Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room”
Season Two, Episode 39
Original Air Date: October 14, 1960

Cast:

Jackie Rhodes: Joe Mantell
George: William D. Gordon

Crew:
Writer: Rod Serling (original teleplay)
Director: Douglas Heyes
Producer: Buck Houghton
Associate Producer: Del Reisman
Production Manager: Ralph W. Nelson
Director of Photography: George T. Clemens
Art Direction: George W. Davis and Phil Barber
Set Decoration: Henry Grace and H. Web Arrowsmith
Assistant Director: Darrell Hallenbeck
Casting: Ethel Winant
Editor: Bill Mosher
Sound: Franklin Milton and Charles Scheid
Music: Jerry Goldsmith

And Now, Mr. Serling:

“Next week we take you into this eight-by-eight hotel room and we watch a penny-ante crook make a decision.  You better ask the room clerk the number of this room and then come on up.  Mr. Joe Mantell is the ‘Nervous Man in the Four Dollar Room.’  That’s the Twilight Zone, next week, and we’ll be waiting for you.  Thank you and good night.”

Rod Serling’s Opening Narration: 

“This is Mr. Jackie Rhodes, age thirty-four.  And where some men leave a mark of their lives as a record of their fragmentary existence on Earth—this man leaves a blot.  A dirty, discolored blemish to document a cheap and undistinguished sojourn amongst his betters.  What you are about to watch in this room is a strange mortal combat between a man and himself.  For in just a moment Mr. Jackie Rhodes, whose life has been given over to fighting adversaries, will find his most formidable opponent in a cheap hotel room that is in reality the outskirts…of the Twilight Zone.”

Summary:

           Incessant nail-biter and would-be crook Jackie Rhodes sits in a squalid hotel room biding his time until his next big job. The night is long and smothered with heat. Finally, Rhodes receives a phone call from a man named George who has been giving him various jobs for quick cash. But this isn’t another small-time nickel and dime job George has in mind for Jackie Rhodes. Tonight George wants him to murder a bothersome bar owner whom George considers a liability. Rhodes knows he is no murderer and is bound to be caught if he goes through with it. He pleads with George but his gangster friend simply won’t hear it. Rhodes reluctantly hangs up the phone. 

           An hour or so later George stops by Rhodes’s hotel room. Rhodes again tries to persuade George into giving the job to someone else. An angry George explains to Rhodes that the reason he is going to do this job is because everyone knows he is not qualified to do it so no one will suspect him. He hands Rhodes a gun and tells him that the job better be finished the next time they speak.
                Panic sets in. He knows he can’t do the job but he also knows he has nowhere to run. And if he doesn’t kill this man then he will be the one who gets killed. Rhodes catches a glimpse of himself in the mirror. Remarkably, his mirror image begins to talk back to him. Frightened, and fearing that he might be losing his mind, Rhodes tries to escape his reflection. But he cannot escape himself for he finds his reflection in mirrors in the bathroom and in the closet.  His reflection tells him that he is tired of struggling and always listening to everyone else and never himself. He wants a better life for himself and he wants it to start now. The real Rhodes is dumbfounded and the two argue late into the night.

Early the next morning George drops by. He knows the bar owner is still alive. Rhodes looks up at George and instantly a change can be seen in his expression. He punches George in the face and throws him out of his room. Then he calls the front desk and tells them that Mr. John Rhodes is checking out.

 Rod Serling’s Closing Narration: 

“Exit Mr. John Rhodes, formerly a reflection in the mirror, a fragment of someone else’s conscience, a wishful thinker made out of glass, but now made out of flesh and on his way to join the company of men. Mr. John Rhodes, with one foot through the door and one foot out …of the Twilight Zone.”

 Commentary:

           Though clumsy at times, “Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room” is an archetypal Rod Serling story full of the compassion that runs throughout much of his work. Jackie Rhodes is a loser with a capital L, a character that would hang himself with every piece of rope given to him. But somewhere in his personality is something that makes him a likable and sympathetic character. He is the kind of character that Serling loved to grant a second chance. As many fans and critics have pointed out this episode bears a strong resemblance to the season five episode “The Last Night of a Jockey” also written by Serling.  In this later episode Mickey Rooney plays an aging horse jockey named Grady who has recently been banned from the sport due to horse doping allegations. Disgusted with himself and angry at the world he sits alone in a dirty hotel room drinking himself into a state of oblivion and self-denial. In the midst of his drunken state he hears a voice (Rooney’s voiceover). The voice informs him that it is there to grant him a single wish. Grady informs the voice that he wants to be big. When he wakes up later in the night he suddenly finds that he is a ten-foot tall giant of a man. Immediately after this he receives an offer to come back to race as a jockey again. He is overjoyed until he realizes that he can no longer race because of his size. He proceeds to rip his hotel room apart. Role credits.  Aside from their similarities the juxtaposition of these two episodes is an example of the main thematic element that runs through the majority of Serling’s episodes. The outcome of a character’s journey into the Twilight Zone depends entirely on the character’s view of humanity. While Jackie Rhodes may be a crook there is still something in him that makes him a basically decent person. And the audience recognizes this in his reluctance to murder the bar owner. So he walks away from the Twilight Zone unscathed and with a renewed outlook on life. But Grady cares exclusively for himself and the audience is given evidence of this in virtually everything he does. He takes no responsibility nor does he show any remorse for his crimes thus the Twilight Zone defeats him. Of course this theme can be found in episodes written by any of the show’s regular writers but it is most prominent in Serling’s work.

                The heroes of this episode are leading man Joe Mantell and director Douglas Heyes. This is the first of two appearances by Mantell who also has a role in Season Five’s “Steel.” He had a knack for playing nervous, fumbling characters and here he breathes life into an otherwise stale protagonist. Jackie Rhodes’s personality spills out onto the screen via the naturally spastic mannerisms of Mantell. His anxiety is genuine and the audience sees this in the inflection of his voice and his frantic, disheveled physical appearance. If there is a down side to his performance it’s his portrayal of the “other” Jackie Rhodes, the confident Jackie that wants to take control of his life again. He turns in a believable enough performance but in contrast to the nervous Jackie it comes off as slightly predictable, but this is a minor flaw and Mantell is still the most enjoyable thing about this episode. Mantell first garnered attention in Hollywood when he starred alongside Ernest Borgnine in Marty (1955) for which he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. Years later he would star alongside Jack Nicholson in Chinatown (1974). On the small screen he appeared in episodes of Inner Sanctum, Lights Out, One Step Beyond and Alfred Hitchcock Presents. 

                For his first episode of Season Two director Douglas

Heyes flexes his creative muscle for a script that would be an enormous challenge for most directors given that the entire episode takes place in one room. To emphasize Rhodes’s cramped living quarters there are several crane shots shown from directly above the room including the shot for Serling’s intro in which his image is superimposed over video footage. For the scenes which feature mirror images of Jackie Rhodes’s alter ego Heyes choose not to use split screen and instead used rear projections screens for Mantell to play off. To accomplish this Heyes shot all of the footage of Mantell’s mirror image first. So when it came time to shoot the footage of Mantell speaking directly to his alter-ego, all of the mirrors seen in the hotel room were actually rear projection screens with pre-recorded footage playing back on them. So when the viewer sees Mantell speaking to his other self in the mirror they are seeing exactly what was filmed and not footage spliced in later. This allowed both Heyes and Mantell more freedom to move about the set and is aesthetically more pleasing for the viewer. For the alter-ego footage an uncredited actor was brought in to play the meek Rhodes in order to give Mantell a sense of timing. The person assigned this thankless task was actor and director Brian Hutton who later went on to direct Where Eagles Dare (1968) and Kelley's Heroes (1970). Heyes went on to direct five episodes during the show’s second season including “The Howling Man,” “Eye of the Beholder” and “The Invaders,” all three of which are among the best known episodes of the program, particularly for their unusual direction and skillful camera work.

                While the theme here is classic Serling the story isn’t quite up to par with some of his other episodes. The idea is interesting but at times the story feels stagnant and the dialogue repetitive. It’s unique enough to grab the viewer’s attention but ultimately it feels as if it’s stretched too thin over a half-hour segment. 

Grade: C

Grateful acknowledgement is made to:

"Douglas Heyes: Behind the Scenes at The Twilight Zone" Interview with Heyes conducted by Ben Herndon. Rod Serling's The Twilight Zone Magazine (August, 1982) edited by T.E.D. Klein 

 Notes:

--Joe Mantell also appears in the season five episode “Steel.”
 --William D. Gordon appears as the Doctor in another season two episode directed by Douglas Heyes, “Eye of the Beholder.”
--Director Douglas Heyes was also at the helm for the classic episodes "The After Hours," "The Howling Man," "Eye of the Beholder," and "The Invaders." Heyes wrote and directed the first episode of Rod Serling's Night Gallery, "The Dead Man" (based on the story by Fritz Leiber), as well as scripting the second segment of that first episode, "The Housekeeper" under the pseudonym Matthew Howard. Under the Howard name, Heyes also scripted the episode "Brenda," based on the story Margaret St. Clair. 
--"Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room" was adapted as a Twilight Zone Radio Drama starring Adam Baldwin. 
 --There is a moment in this episode that is eerily similar to the famous scene in Taxi Driver (1976) when Rhodes first encounters his mirror image and utters the lines “Are you talkin’ to me?”

 --Brian