Rod Serling's TWILIGHT ZONE - Individual Base Card from the series issued by Rittenhouse in 1999
Henry Earl Holliman (born September 11, 1928) is an American actor, animal rights activist and singer known for his many character roles in films, mostly westerns and dramas, in the 1950s and 1960s. He won a Golden Globe Award for the film The Rainmaker (1956) and portrayed Sergeant Bill Crowley on the television police drama Police Woman throughout its 1974–1978 run.
Earl Holliman was born on September 11, 1928, in Delhi in Richland Parish, located within northeastern Louisiana. Holliman's biological father, William A. Frost (born 1870), a farmer, died seven months prior to his birth, and his biological mother, Mary Frost Smith (1898-1973), living in poverty with several other children, gave him up for adoption at birth. Earl was the seventh out of ten children all together, all of whom, like himself, were sent to various orphanages, and in later years he was able to reconnect and establish relationships with them. He was adopted a week after his birth by Henry Holliman (1897-1941), an oil-field worker, and his wife, Velma (1898-1985), a waitress, who then gave him the name of Henry Earl Holliman. Although the Holliman's living conditions and family history have strong ties to Louisiana during Earl's teenage years, he and his family lived in Kerrville, Texas for a period of time as well as some parts of Arkansas (a fact, in which he was once noted later on as being a "red-blooded Ark-La-Texan").
Holliman's early years were normal until his adoptive father died when he was 13. Despite the fact that Henry and Velma were Earl's adoptive parents, he always referred to them as being his true parents and credited them for providing him with so much love and encouragement growing up as their only child and helping him look within himself to discover his self-confidence in converting his dreams into realism. In addition, when Earl began his career in films, Velma was so supportive of him she once even went to a theatre in their home state of Louisiana an hour before it opened just so she could be the first attendee present there to not only see her son in his first major role appearance but to also work with the theatre manager, show columnist, and a friend of the family who knew Earl from his schoolboy days, to go through a vast set of stills for that particular film so she could begin the composition of an album for him reflecting the start of his professional career as an actor.
He saved money from his position ushering at the Strand Theatre, as well as from also being a newsboy for the Shreveport Times and a magician's assistant, and then left Louisiana hitchhiking to Hollywood. After an unsuccessful first attempt finding work in the film industry, he soon returned to Louisiana after being out in California for only one week. Meanwhile, his adoptive mother had remarried, and Earl disliked his new stepfather, Guy Bellotte (1891-1957). He lied about his age and enlisted in the United States Navy during World War II. Assigned to a Navy communications school in Los Angeles, he spent his free time at the Hollywood Canteen, talking to stars who dropped by to support the servicemen and women. A year after his enlistment, the Navy discovered his real age and he was immediately discharged.
Holliman returned home, worked in the oil fields in his spare time, was a dishwasher at various restaurants, and, after some attendance at Louisiana Avenue, Fair Park, and Byrd High School in Shreveport, completed his public education at Oil City High School in Oil City, Louisiana graduating with high honors in 1946; while a student there he also played right tackle on the school football team and served as Senior Class President. After rejecting a scholarship to Louisiana State University, he re-enlisted in the Navy and was stationed in Norfolk, Virginia. Interested in acting, he was cast as the lead in several Norfolk Navy Theatre productions. When he left the Navy for good, Holliman studied acting at the Pasadena Playhouse. He also graduated from the University of California, Los Angeles. During the time he studied acting at both the Playhouse and UCLA, Holliman supplemented his income working as a file clerk for Blue Cross (later known as Blue Cross Blue Shield Association) and with North American Aviation constructing airplanes.
Holliman first appeared, uncredited, in the 1952 Western Pony Soldier. After he gained popularity in his image following a change in haircutting, he than followed with five films released in 1953. His credits include: The Bridges at Toko-Ri (1954), The Big Combo (1955), I Died a Thousand Times (1955), Forbidden Planet (1956), Giant (1956), Gunfight at the O.K. Corral (1957), Last Train from Gun Hill (1959), Visit to a Small Planet (1960), The Sons of Katie Elder (1965), Anzio (1968) and Sharky's Machine (1981).
Holliman played a doomed helicopter crewman in the William Holden war drama The Bridges at Toko-Ri and a gangster's double-crossed thug in The Big Combo. He co-starred with Jack Palance in the crime drama I Died a Thousand Times (1955), a remake of High Sierra. He starred in The Rainmaker (1956), opposite Katharine Hepburn and Burt Lancaster, playing a rancher's timid son who finally must defy his father to gain self-respect, for which he won the Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture; he was cast in the role instead of Elvis Presley. His role in Rainmaker brought him such praise that columnist Louella Parsons cited him being "as dedicated as though he were Marlon Brando and Anthony Perkins combined".
He was the soft-spoken son-in-law of a rancher (Rock Hudson) in the epic western saga Giant. Holliman would play many roles set in the American west. He was Wyatt Earp's deputy in Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, co-starring Lancaster and Douglas, and a sniveling coward guilty of murdering and raping the wife of a lawman (Kirk Douglas) in Last Train from Gun Hill. He played a drunken deputy sheriff whose brother Richard Widmark returns to town in a modern-day western, The Trap (1959), and the brother of John Wayne and Dean Martin, out to avenge their murdered father, in a traditional western, The Sons of Katie Elder. He portrayed a corrupt Atlanta politician in the crime drama, Sharky's Machine, directed by, and starring, Burt Reynolds.
Holliman became known to television audiences through his portrayal as Sundance in CBS's Hotel de Paree, with costar Jeanette Nolan, from 1959 to 1960, and in the title role of Mitch Guthrie with Andrew Prine in NBC's Wide Country, a drama about modern rodeo performers that aired for 28 episodes between 1962 and 1963. He also had the distinction of appearing in the debut episode of CBS's The Twilight Zone, titled "Where Is Everybody?" which aired on October 2, 1959, the same night as the premiere of Hotel de Paree.
In 1962, he and Claude Akins guest-starred as a pair of feuding brothers in "The Stubborn Stumbos" episode of Marilyn Maxwell's ABC drama series Bus Stop. In 1965, he guest starred on 12 O'Clock High as Lt. Steiger as a pilot who learns to appreciate life after being assigned a dangerous mission and winning the lottery. In 1967, Holliman guest-starred on Wayne Maunder's short-lived ABC military–western series Custer. In 1970, Holliman starred in the TV movie Tribes as the antagonist Master Sergeant Frank DePayster, co-starring with Darren McGavin and Jan-Michael Vincent. In 1970 and 1971, Holliman made two appearances in the western comedy series Alias Smith and Jones starring Pete Duel (né Deuel) and Ben Murphy.
From 1974 to 1978, he portrayed Sergeant Bill Crowley opposite Angie Dickinson in the Police Woman series. He co-starred in all 91 episodes of the hit series (which he later remarked changed his life), playing the police department superior of undercover officer Pepper Anderson. He later took part in The Dean Martin Celebrity Roast comedy roast of co-star Dickinson on August 2, 1977.
Holliman continued to appear in television guest roles throughout the 1970s and 1990s. He shared a starring role in the CBS movie Country Gold (a made for television remake of All About Eve), filmed on location in Nashville, Tennessee, which also featured Loni Anderson, Linda Hamilton and Cooper Huckabee. He was also a regular celebrity panelist on The Hollywood Squares, where he was recognized for his ability to trick the contestants with believable bluff answers. His most notable role during this period was in the hit miniseries The Thorn Birds with Richard Chamberlain and Rachel Ward. He also took part in the Gunsmoke reunion movie Gunsmoke: Return to Dodge in 1987 as Jake Flagg, having guest-starred on the Gunsmoke TV series with James Arness three times between 1969 and 1973.
He was an occasional celebrity on the $25,000 and $100,000 Pyramid game shows between 1983 and 1991. In 1991 and 1994, Holliman had two guest-star roles on Murder, She Wrote, in the Season 7 episode "Who Killed JB Fletcher?" and the Season 10 episode, "Roadkill". From September 15, 1991 to January 4, 1992, he appeared in the lead role of Detective Matthew Durning on the CBS sitcom P.S. I Luv U (a role which he got due to his prominence in Police Woman two decades prior) and after the series ended he was than featured as a special guest in the Season 6, Episode 8, edition of In the Heat of the Night entitled "Last Rights" portraying Dr. Lambert, a man who had been a prime suspect in a string of mercy killings. In 1996, he was the guest voice of the character Milton in the Season 6 Captain Planet and the Planeteers episode, "Never the Twain Shall Meet". Later in his career, Holliman had a recurring role as Fred Duffy, the father of the title character Caroline Duffy, on Caroline in the City, appearing in 3 episodes, and he additionally starred in the 1997–99 television series Night Man as Frank Dominus; a disgraced former police officer and the protagonist character's father.
From 1958 to 1963, Holliman found a brief, yet successful, career as a singer and had a record deal with such notable recording studios as Capitol Records, Prep, and HiFi. His songs included: "A Teenager Sings The Blues", "Nobody Knows How I Feel", "Don't Get Around Much Anymore", "Sittin' And A Gabbin'", "If I Could See The World Through The Eyes Of A Child", "La La La Lovable", "Wanna Kiss You To-Night", "I'm In The Mood For Love", "We Found Love", "Willingly", "There'll Be No Teardrops Tonight", and "Road To Nowhere". In May 1976, he guest starred on The John Davidson Show singing a vaudeville style version of "(Hey Won't You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song" with Davidson, as well as performing his own solo version of The Carpenters track, "Rainy Days and Mondays".
After Wide Country ended its run in April 1963, Holliman spent the next two months traveling the country in the acclaimed musical Oklahoma! appearing in the lead role of Curly McLain. Later that same year, he appeared in the role of Mike Mitchell in the Philadelphia, Pennsylvania summer tour of Sunday in New York and at the Avondale Playhouse in Indianapolis, Indiana in The Country Girl in the role of Bernie Dodd opposite Lee Bowman and Julie Wilson. Between September 4 and September 9, 1963, he starred in a production of The Tender Trap, opposite Anthony George, in the role of Charlie Y. Reader at the Westchester County Playhouse in Dobbs Ferry, New York. In 1968, he starred in the Los Angeles Mark Taper Forum production of Tennessee Williams Camino Real in the role of Kilroy; his performance was well received by critics and Williams himself not only came too see Earl's performance an approximate 11 times but he also sent him a correspondence praising his work in both Real and Streetcar as being "the best" interpretations of the characters "Kilroy" and "Mitch" he had even seen.
From September 15 to October 14, 1981, he starred in a stage production of Mister Roberts at the Fiesta Dinner Playhouse in San Antonio, Texas, of which he was owner. He occasionally performed at his theater when he was not working in Hollywood; other productions that he appeared in there included Arsenic and Old Lace as Mortimer Brewster from April 1 to May 4, 1980, and Same Time, Next Year with Julie Sommars in 1983. The facility closed after 1987. He also appeared in stage productions of the 1973 revival of A Streetcar Named Desire as Mitch and the 1977 Santa Monica Civic production of A Chorus Line as Zach the Choreographer.
During the late 1970s, he served as the National Honorary Chairman for the Marine Toys for Tots Foundation. In 1976, he was the grand marshal of the Annual Fourth of July Parade in Huntington Beach, California.
He is also a vegetarian[43] and is against the exploitation of animals by using their furs for clothing.[44]
He is also one of many in the entertainment industry who have been cited in the short saying "There are Five Stages in the Life of an Actor" by Hollywood columnist Mike Connolly (e.g. "Who's Earl Holliman? Get me Earl Holliman. Get me an Earl Holliman Type. Get me a young Earl Holliman. Who's Earl Holliman?").
Holliman, a Republican, supported the re-election of Dwight Eisenhower in the 1956 presidential election.[45]
He is of the Baptist faith.[46]
Holliman is also known for his work as an animal-rights activist, including more than 25 years as president of Actors and Others for Animals.[47] He also was well known for nursing animals even on his own property, at one point feeding roughly 500 pigeons in a day as well as even healing a wounded dove and blind possum inside his own home.
For many years, during the Christmas season he was one of the many gracious elite of the film community to help organize various luncheons and dinners for the less fortunate at the Los Angeles Mission.[48]
He currently resides in Studio City, California. Holliman has never been married and has no children.[49]
In addition to his Golden Globe Award for Best Supporting Actor – Motion Picture for The Rainmaker, he also earned a nomination for a Golden Globe Award for "Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role in a Television Series" for his performance alongside Delta Burke in the short-lived 1992 sitcom Delta.
For his contributions to the television industry, Holliman has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame located at 6901 Hollywood Blvd.
"Where Is Everybody?" is the first episode of the American anthology television series The Twilight Zone. It was originally broadcast on October 2, 1959 on CBS.
This narration was used for the original pilot of "Where is Everybody", where it was narrated by Westbrook Van Voorhis, as it is written in the original script for the episode.
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There is a sixth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space, and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow -- between man's grasp and his reach; between science and superstition; between the pit of his fears and the sunlight of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area that might be called the Twilight Zone. |
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The following narration was used in the later-released versions of the episode which had been dubbed over by Rod Serling as narrator, where the phrase "the sixth dimension" is replaced with "the fifth dimension" to fall in line with later episodes of The Twilight Zone.
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There is a fifth dimension beyond that which is known to man. It is a dimension as vast as space, and as timeless as infinity. It is the middle ground between light and shadow, and it lies between the pit of man's fears, and the summit of his knowledge. This is the dimension of imagination. It is an area that we call, The Twilight Zone. |
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The place is here. The time is now, and the journey into the shadows that we are about to watch, could be our journey. |
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A man dressed in a U.S. Air Force flight suit finds himself alone on a dirt road, with no memory of who he is or how he got there. He finds a diner and walks in to find a jukebox playing loudly; he lowers the volume and continues to call out. Eventually, he heads into the kitchen where he finds a hot pot of coffee on the stove and freshly made pies, but there are no other people besides himself. He accidentally knocks over and breaks a clock, at which point the jukebox stops playing.
The man leaves the diner and walks to a nearby town; he sees a parked truck with an apparent female passenger, but 'she' turns out to be a mannequin. Like the diner, the rest of the town seems deserted, but the man feels he is being watched and that there is someone around. The phone rings in a telephone booth and he dashes to answer it. There is nobody on the line and he can only raise a recorded message when he tried to call the operator. He grows unsettled as he wanders through the empty town, increasingly anxious to find someone to talk to.
Inside the police station, he uses the radio ("Calling all cars, calling all cars, unknown man walking around police station..."); then he notices a lit cigar in an ashtray. This prods him to check the jail cells in back. In one cell, there is evidence that someone had recently been there shaving. He declares that he wants to "wake up now". The man makes his way to the soda shop where, as he makes himself a sundae, he considers this dream he must be having and marvels at how detailed it is. He sees an entire rack of paperback books titled The Last Man on Earth, Feb. 1959. This spooks him and he quickly leaves.
As night falls, lights turn on and the man is drawn to the illuminated movie theater marquee. The advertised film is Battle Hymn and this causes him to remember that he is in the Air Force. He runs inside shouting, "I'm in the Air Force." Inside the theater he sits down to ponder this discovery and what could have happened that resulted in him being in this situation.
When the film suddenly begins onscreen, he sprints to the projection booth and finds nobody there, then becomes even more paranoid that he is being watched. Panicked, he runs downstairs and headfirst into a wall-length mirror. When he recovers from this shock, he gives in to terror and races through the streets, stumbling, falling and startled by everything. He comes upon a pedestrian call button and desperately pushes it over and over, begging for help. The call button is revealed to be a panic button: the man, whose name is given as Sgt. Mike Ferris, is actually in an isolation booth being observed by a group of uniformed servicemen. He has been undergoing tests to determine his fitness as an astronaut and whether he can handle a prolonged trip to the Moon alone; the town was a hallucination caused by sensory deprivation.
The officiating general warns Ferris that while his basic needs will be provided for in space travel, he will not have companionship: "next time [he will] really be alone". As Ferris is carried from the hangar on a stretcher, he looks into the sky and tells the Moon, "don't go away up there" and, "we'll be up there in a little while".
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The barrier of loneliness: The palpable, desperate need of the human animal to be with his fellow man. Up there, up there in the vastness of space, in the void that is sky, up there is an enemy known as isolation. It sits there in the stars waiting, waiting with the patience of eons, forever waiting... in The Twilight Zone. |
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Earl Holliman as Mike Ferris
James Gregory as General
Garry Walberg as Colonel
Serling's original pilot for The Twilight Zone was "The Happy Place", which revolved around a society in which people were executed upon reaching the age of 60, being considered no longer useful. CBS executive William Self rejected the story, feeling it was too dark; Serling eventually relented and wrote "Where is Everybody?" as a more acceptable substitute. Unlike other episodes, which were filmed at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, "Where is Everybody?" was filmed at Universal Studios, using Courthouse Square as the episode's Oakwood town.
The episode originally featured Westbrook Van Voorhis as narrator. When Voorhis was unavailable for later episodes, Serling re-recorded the narration himself for consistency. Serling notably changed the opening narration to place the Twilight Zone within the fifth dimension, among other alterations.
Serling later adapted "Where is Everybody?" for a novelization titled Stories From the Twilight Zone. Serling allegedly[where?] grew dissatisfied with the lack of science fiction content and changed the story to include Ferris discovering a movie ticket in his pocket while on the stretcher. A variation on this plotline was used in the episode "King Nine Will Not Return".
The New York Times praised the episode, saying that Serling proved "that science cannot foretell what may be the effect of total isolation on a human being", though "[the episode's] resolution... seemed trite and anticlimactic. In the desultory field of filmed half-hour drama, however, Mr. Serling should not have much trouble in making his mark. At least his series promises to be different.
Charles Beaumont praised the episode in The Magazine of Fantasy and Science-Fiction, writing that he "read Serling's first script... Old stuff? Of course. I thought so at the time... but there was one element in the story which kept me from my customary bitterness. The element was quality. Quality shone on every page. It shone in the dialogue and in the scene set-ups. And because of this, the story seemed fresh and new and powerful. There was one compromise, but it was made for the purpose of selling the series."
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
The Twilight Zone is an American media franchise based on the anthology television series created by Rod Serling. The episodes are in various genres, including fantasy, science fiction, suspense, horror, and psychological thriller, often concluding with a macabre or unexpected twist, and usually with a moral. A popular and critical success, it introduced many Americans to common science fiction and fantasy tropes. The original series, shot entirely in black and white, ran on CBS for five seasons from 1959 to 1964.
The Twilight Zone followed in the tradition of earlier television shows such as Tales of Tomorrow (1951–53) and Science Fiction Theatre (1955–57); radio programs such as The Weird Circle (1943–45), Dimension X (1950–51) and X Minus One (1955–58); and the radio work of one of Serling's inspirations, Norman Corwin. The success of the series led to a feature film (1983), a TV film (1994), a radio series (2002–12), literature including a comic book, novels and a magazine and a theme park attraction and various other spin-offs that spanned five decades, including three revival television series. The first revival (1985–89) ran on CBS and in syndication in the 1980s, while the second revival ran on UPN (2002–2003). In December 2017, CBS All Access officially ordered the third Twilight Zone revival to series, helmed by Jordan Peele. The series premiered on April 1, 2019.
TV Guide ranked the original TV series #5 in their 2013 list of the 60 greatest shows of all time and #4 in their list of the 60 greatest dramas.
As a boy, Rod Serling was a fan of pulp fiction stories. As an adult, he sought topics with themes such as racism, government, war, society, and human nature in general. Serling decided to combine these two interests as a way to broach these subjects on television at a time when such issues were not commonly addressed.
Throughout the 1950s, Serling established himself as one of the most popular names in television. He was as famous for writing televised drama as he was for criticizing the medium's limitations. His most vocal complaints concerned censorship, which was frequently practiced by sponsors and networks. "I was not permitted to have my senators discuss any current or pressing problem," he said of his 1957 Studio One production "The Arena", intended to be an involving look into contemporary politics. "To talk of tariff was to align oneself with the Republicans; to talk of labor was to suggest control by the Democrats. To say a single thing germane to the current political scene was absolutely prohibited."
CBS purchased a teleplay in 1958 that writer Rod Serling hoped to produce as the pilot of a weekly anthology series. "The Time Element" marked Serling's first entry in the field of science fiction.
Several years after the end of World War II, a man named Peter Jenson (William Bendix) visits a psychoanalyst, Dr. Gillespie (Martin Balsam). Jenson tells him about a recurring dream in which he tries to warn people about the "sneak attack" on Pearl Harbor before it happens, but the warnings are disregarded. Jenson believes the events of the dream are real, and each night he travels back to 1941. Dr. Gillespie insists that time travel is impossible given the nature of temporal paradoxes. While on the couch, Jenson falls asleep once again but this time dreams that the Japanese planes shoot and kill him. In Dr. Gillespie's office, the couch Jenson was lying on is now empty. Dr. Gillespie goes to a bar where he finds Jenson's picture on the wall. The bartender tells him that Jenson had tended bar there, but he was killed during the Pearl Harbor attack.
With the "Time Element" script, Serling drafted the fundamental elements that defined the subsequent series: a science-fiction/fantasy theme, opening and closing narration, and an ending with a twist. "The Time Element" was purchased immediately, but shelved indefinitely.
This is where things stood when Bert Granet, the new producer for Westinghouse Desilu Playhouse, discovered "The Time Element" in CBS' vaults while searching for an original Serling script to add prestige to his show. "The Time Element" (introduced by Desi Arnaz) debuted on November 24, 1958, to an overwhelmingly delighted audience of television viewers and critics alike. "The humor and sincerity of Mr. Serling's dialogue made 'The Time Element' consistently entertaining," offered Jack Gould of The New York Times. Over 6,000 letters of praise flooded Granet's offices. Convinced that a series based on such stories could succeed, CBS again began talks with Serling about the possibilities of producing The Twilight Zone. "Where Is Everybody?" was accepted as the pilot episode and the project was officially announced to the public in early 1959. Other than reruns at the time "The Time Element" was not aired on television again until it was shown as part of a 1996 all-night sneak preview of the new cable channel TVLand. It is available in an Italian DVD boxed set titled Ai confini della realtà – I tesori perduti. The Twilight Zone Season 1 Blu-ray boxed set released on September 14, 2010, offers a remastered high-definition version of the original Desilu Playhouse production as a special feature.
The series was produced by Cayuga Productions, Inc., a production company owned and named by Serling. It reflects his background in Central New York State and is named after Cayuga Lake, on which he owned a home, and where Cornell University and Ithaca College are located.
Aside from Serling, who wrote or adapted nearly two-thirds of the series' total episodes, writers for The Twilight Zone included leading authors such as Charles Beaumont, Ray Bradbury, Earl Hamner, Jr., George Clayton Johnson, Richard Matheson, Reginald Rose, and Jerry Sohl. Many episodes also featured new adaptations of classic stories by such writers as Ambrose Bierce, Jerome Bixby, Damon Knight, John Collier, and Lewis Padgett.
Twilight Zone's writers frequently used science fiction as a vehicle for social comment, as networks and sponsors who censored controversial material from live dramas were less concerned with seemingly innocuous fantasy and sci-fi stories. Frequent themes on The Twilight Zone included nuclear war, McCarthyism, and mass hysteria, subjects that were avoided on less serious primetime television. Episodes such as "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" and "I Am the Night—Color Me Black" offered specific commentary on current events and social issues. Other stories, such as "The Masks", "I Dream of Genie", or "Mr. Denton on Doomsday" were allegories, parables, or fables that reflected the moral and philosophical choices of the characters.
Despite his esteem in the writing community, Serling found the series difficult to sell. Few critics felt that science fiction could transcend empty escapism and enter the realm of adult drama. In a September 22, 1959, interview with Serling, Mike Wallace asked a question illustrative of the times: "...[Y]ou're going to be, obviously, working so hard on The Twilight Zone that, in essence, for the time being and for the foreseeable future, you've given up on writing anything important for television, right?" While Serling's appearances on the show became one of its most distinctive features, with his clipped delivery still widely imitated today, he was reportedly nervous about it and had to be persuaded to appear on camera. Serling often steps into the middle of the action while the characters remain oblivious to him, but on one notable occasion, they are aware of his presence: In the episode "A World of His Own", a writer (Keenan Wynn) with the power to alter his reality objects to Serling's narration and promptly erases Serling from the show.
In season two, due to budgetary constraints, the network decided – against Serling's wishes – to cut costs by shooting some episodes on videotape rather than film. The requisite multicamera setup of the videotape format precluded location shooting, severely limiting the potential scope of the storylines, and the experiment was abandoned after just six episodes ("Twenty Two", "Static", "The Whole Truth", "The Lateness of the Hour", "The Night of the Meek", and "Long Distance Call").
The original series contains 156 episodes. The episodes in seasons one through three are 30 minutes long with commercials (24 or 25 minutes without commercials). Season four (1962–63) consists of one-hour episodes with commercials (51 minutes without commercials). Season five returned to the half-hour format.
It was Serling's decision to sell his share of the series back to the network that eventually allowed for a Twilight Zone revival. As an in-house production, CBS stood to earn more money producing The Twilight Zone than it could by purchasing a new series produced by an outside company. Even so, the network was slow to consider a revival, turning down offers from the original production team of Rod Serling and Buck Houghton and later from American filmmaker Francis Ford Coppola.
CBS gave the new Twilight Zone a greenlight in 1984 under the supervision of Carla Singer, then Vice President of Drama Development. While the show did not come close to matching the enduring popularity of the original, some episodes – particularly Alan Brennert's love story "Her Pilgrim Soul" and J. Neil Schulman's "Profile in Silver" – were critically acclaimed. In a tribute to the original series, the opening credits include a brief image of Rod Serling. Four episodes are remakes of those from the original series: "Night of the Meek", "Shadow Play", "The After Hours" and "A Game of Pool", while "Dead Woman's Shoes" is an adaptation of "Dead Man's Shoes". Unlike the original series and the second revival, this series does not include the opening monologue during the title sequence. As well, the narration is all strictly voice-over and the narrator never appears on-screen.
In the early 1990s, Richard Matheson and Carol Serling produced an outline for a two-hour made-for-TV movie which would feature Matheson adaptations of three yet-unfilmed Rod Serling short stories. Outlines for such a production were rejected by CBS until early 1994, when Serling's widow discovered a complete shooting script ("Where the Dead Are") authored by her late husband, while rummaging through their garage. She showed the forgotten script to producers Michael O'Hara and Laurence Horowitz, who were significantly impressed by it. "I had a pile of scripts, which I usually procrastinate about reading. But I read this one right away and, after 30 pages, called my partner and said, "I love it," recalled O'Hara. "This is pure imagination, a period piece, literate – some might say wordy. If Rod Serling's name weren't on it, it wouldn't have a chance at getting made."
Eager to capitalize on Serling's celebrity status as a writer, CBS packaged "Where the Dead Are" with Matheson's adaptation of "The Theatre", debuting as a two-hour feature on the night of May 19, 1994, under the name Twilight Zone: Rod Serling's Lost Classics. The title represents a misnomer, as both stories were conceived long after Twilight Zone's cancellation. Written just months before Serling's death, "Where the Dead Are" starred Patrick Bergin as a 19th-century doctor who stumbles upon a mad scientist's medical experiments with immortality. "The Theatre" starred Amy Irving and Gary Cole as a couple who visits a cineplex where they discover the feature presentation depicts their own lives. James Earl Jones provided opening and closing narrations.
Critical response was mixed. Gannett News Service described it as "taut and stylish, a reminder of what can happen when fine actors are given great words." USA Today was less impressed, even suggesting that Carol Serling "should have left these two unproduced mediocrities in the garage where she found them." Ultimately, ratings proved insufficient to justify a proposed sequel featuring three scripts adapted by Matheson.
A second revival was developed by UPN in 2002, it was hosted by Forest Whitaker. It was broadcast in a one-hour format composed of two half-hour stories, it was canceled after one season. "It's Still a Good Life" is a sequel to "It's a Good Life", "The Monsters Are on Maple Street" is an adaptation of "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" and "Eye of the Beholder" is a remake of an episode from the original series, with Serling still credited as writer.
In December 2012, it was reported that Bryan Singer was developing and executive producing a third revival television series for CBS Television Studios. A writer for the series was not chosen and the program was not pitched to any networks. CBS, which broadcast the original series and first revival, was reportedly interested. In February 2013, Singer told TG Daily that the project was still in development and that he hoped to direct the pilot and have A-list actors appear on the revival. The following month, he told IGN that a writer with whom he had previously worked was in negotiations to join the revival and that he felt "passionate" towards the original series and the planned revival.
In February 2016, it was reported that Ken Levine would write and direct the pilot episode of the revival series. It was also reported that the series would be interactive. In November 2017, it was reported that Jordan Peele was developing a reboot of the series for streaming service CBS All Access with Marco Ramirez serving as potential showrunner. In December 2017, CBS All Access ordered the third The Twilight Zone revival to series. It was announced that the series would be produced by CBS Television Studios in association with Monkeypaw Productions and Genre Films. Jordan Peele, Marco Ramirez, and Simon Kinberg will serve as executive producers for the series and collaborate on the premiere episode. Win Rosenfeld and Audrey Chon will also serve as executive producers. Peele was revealed to be the new host and narrator in September 2018, and the new opening sequence was released. The series premiered on April 1, 2019.
The second episode of the series, "Nightmare at 30,000 Feet", is based on "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet".