Running Head: THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 1 The Atomic Bomb and The Twilight Zone Donald Lambert Shepherd University THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 2 Abstract This paper will explore how The Twilight Zone would reflect the feelings and fears of the atomic bomb in 1960’s society. I want to show that Rod Serling captured the fear and mentality of the people living at a time where the atomic bomb was just the push of button away. The different sources used in this paper will range from internet articles to books written about the show. I will also reference a number of episodes from The Twilight Zone that deal with the subject or the atomic bomb or atomic war in general. Each episode will reflect on something related to the bomb and how society would react. I ultimately concluded that The Twilight Zone indeed reflected 60’s society’s fears of the atomic bomb. THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 3 The Atomic Bomb and The Twilight Zone After World War II, two things were on the minds of the citizens of the United States: the Cold War and television. Even though TV had been popular since the 1940’s, an argument can be made that television didn’t really get it’s feet planted into the ground until the 1950’s. At this time, Russia and the United States were locked in a deadly game of who would be the first to push the button to start a nuclear holocaust. At the same time, television was picking up steam. With shows like I Love Lucy dominating the airwaves, there was a bright future ahead for television. The 50’s also saw the rise of Rod Serling, a writer who gained fame by writing for the TV series, Playhouse 90. Serling, who had previously had trouble dealing with censorship over some of his scripts in the early years of his career, wanted to make a series that would deal with such issues like racism and, the topic of this research paper, the atomic bomb, which were considered taboo in the early years of television. He took taboo subjects and mixed them with the anthology format to create The Twilight Zone. This paper will take a look at the show and how Serling would inject views (sometimes his, but most times, societies’ in general) into The Twilight Zone. This paper will specially look at how Serling would add the Cold War element into his show and would reflect how people were feeling about the possibility of nuclear war. This paper will include a look at the production history of selected episodes from the series, commentary (both expert and my own) on those episodes that dealt with the topic at hand and see if Serling was able to capture the thoughts and fears of a society, a nation and a world on the brink of nuclear war. THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 4 As the 1950’s drew to a close, The Twilight Zone began to air on CBS. One after another, the episodes of the series would take on one taboo subject after another. It wasn’t until the episode, “Time Enough At Last,” that The Twilight Zone would touch on the subject of the atomic bomb. The episode, based on the short story by Lynn Venable tells of Henry Bemis (played by Burgess Meredith), a bank teller who has a strong love for books. Bemis loves to read so much that people in his life, notably his wife and boss, bash him for reading. One day, while eating lunch in a bank vault, a bomb goes off and Bemis is the only one alive. He begins to survey the hellish wasteland. After a few days, Bemis decides that living alone was not worth it and decides to end his own life (a thing that was not on TV much during the time this episode aired). Bemis then notices the library had survived the atomic bomb. As he prepares to read the books that had survived, Bemis’ glasses slip off and break, leaving Bemis sightless and unable to read his books. This episode is considered a classic Twilight Zone for its story (that Serling had to flesh out since the original work was a short story), its writing and, most notably, the aftermath of the bomb. David Cochran, author of the book, In America Noir : Underground Writers and Filmmakers of the Postwar Era, calls how Serling made the urban setting of the episode post-bomb “unsettling.” (p. 9) Cochran cites Bemis walking around the rubble calmly. Marc Scott Zicree talks about the making of the after-the-bomb sets in his book The Twilight Zone Companion. Zicree (1992) wrote the following on the making of the landscape post-bomb: One [set] was a seemingly huge Bomb-wrecked landscape, complete with storm cloud-filled skies. In reality, this set was built on a soundstage, with a sky THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 5 originally painted for a motion picture. (p. 69) After the episode aired on November 20, 1959, it was met with mixed reactions, mostly positive. As Martin Grams shows in his book, The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to A Television Classic, the episode was brought up in editorial written in The Stamford Advocate in 1960. Grams (2008) focuses on a comment by the writer, Vilius Brazenas, about the episode: [Brazenas] claimed part of the problem was that juveniles, fostered by shows like this, lacked an understand of “the enemy,” faltered by shows like this. “By atom horror shows and movies we are being gradually scared into surrender without being told or shown what that surrender would mean. Why couldn’t those brilliant scriptwriters and producers make a movie about American victims in Korea?” (p. 200) I understand where Brazenas was coming from with that comment, but I disagree. I don’t think it was Serling’s intention to scare people into surrendering with this episode. “Time Enough at Last” was unique in how it was one of the first mediums to display the aftermath of an atomic bomb going off. If anything, this episode displayed how someone would be if they somehow survived an atomic blast. Serling was able to hone in on the concept of survival and loneliness, much like he did in the very first episode of the series, “Where is Everybody?” “Time Enough at Last” was able to entertain the audience and show them a world after the bomb went off. Almost 2 months after “Time Enough at Last” aired, “Third From the Sun” premiered on January 8, 1960. This episode took the threat of atomic war and put it in the THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 6 forefront unlike “Time Enough at Last,” which foreshadowed the bomb before it went off, but never made it the focus of the episode. This episode tells of a scientist who learns of the threat of atomic war. Along with a co-worker, the scientist, William Sturka (played by Fritz Weaver), plans to take an experimental aircraft and escape the planet. The two men and their families outrun their pursuers and escape the planet before the war broke out. The twist of the episode in the form of the destination the aircraft is heading in. The final destination is revealed as Earth. As mentioned above, this episode dealt with the topic of atomic war a bit more than “Time Enough at Last.” The episode starts off with the talk of two nations (who we are led to believe are the United States and the Soviet Union) readying to launch weapons at each other. This was a pretty forceful way to start an episode, but I guess after “Time Enough at Last” and the reaction it got, the producers didn’t think it would be a big deal to dive right into the topic of the atomic bomb or atomic war. Meredith Brenner, author of the article, “Thirty Minute Reality Check: How the Twilight Zone Reflected American Society in the 1950’s” (2004), talks about the episode: Serling uses this seemingly innocuous episode to reinforce the fact that the bomb has the power to destroy the world if not used correctly, because the families' home planet faces that destruction. However, it also forces the viewer to question whether or not the earth is really that different from the warring planet in the episode -- is it so peaceful and safe that it could really be considered a refuge, or is it in just as much danger as the home planet in this episode? (p. 1) THE ATOMIC BOMB AND THE TWILIGHT ZONE 7 Brenner brings up a good point in that the viewer is forced to question how much different a fictional world is from the world they currently live in. Throughout the entire episode, the audience is led to believe that this is indeed Earth the men and their families are trying to escape. Everything, from the signs and language to Struka’s home, are replicated like a home in the United States. Not until the end is it revealed that the ship is GOING to Earth. Brenner also brings up another point that would become a staple in the “Atomic War” story of the series from here out, the social reaction of the bomb: The families in this episode feel so threatened by the impending war that they are willing to steal and, when it comes down to it, harm others in order to get away. If we were threatened in a similar way, what would we be willing to do to ensure our own safety? (p.