Episode Spotlight: "Queen of the Nile" (3/06/1964)

Season 5, Episode 23 (143 overall)

Originally aired 3/06/1964

Cayuga Production # 2626

Fifty years ago tonight, a curious cat fell victim to the attractive wiles of an alluring femme fatale. He really should’ve seen it coming, but he was clearly in de Nile.

Newspaper columnist Jordan Herrick arrives at the estate of actress Pamela Morris for an interview. After a bit of flirtatious banter, he gets down to brass tacks and asks her how old she is. She coyly avoids the questions, at which point her mother, Viola Draper, joins them for coffee. Ms. Draper is strangely sullen and resentful of her daughter and, on her way out, says a pointed “goodbye” to Herrick.

Pamela states that she’s 38 years old, contradicting Herrick’s research, which suggests she’s much older. She assuages his suspicions by more or less throwing herself at him, which he more than willingly laps up. They share a kiss, after which she agrees to have dinner with him that evening.  On his way out, Viola accosts him and insists that he never see her again. She then imparts a shocking and impossible piece of information to him: Pamela is not her daughter…. she’s her mother.

That night, Pamela dismisses Viola’s claim, stating that her mother is “disturbed.” After he leaves her, Herrick calls his editor and has him do some research on Pamela’s early film career. It turns out there was an identical actress, Constance Taylor (whose career pre-dates Pamela’s), who disappeared under mysterious circumstances right before Pamela appeared on the Hollywood scene.

Herrick brings his research materials to Viola, who confirms all of it. Viola states that she has no idea how old Pamela is, but she believes that her agelessness has something to do with the Egyptian scarab beetle, a symbol of renewal and regeneration. Pamela arrives and curtly dismisses her.

Herrick demands the truth, unaware that Pamela has slipped something into his coffee. She agrees to tell him everything, producing a small glass box, inside which is a live scarab beetle. As he becomes increasingly impaired, she reveals that, thanks to the scarab’s power, she has endured since the time of the Pharaohs. Jordan falls to the floor, unconscious, and Pamela places the beetle onto his chest.

Herrick rapidly ages, turning first to a skeleton, then finally to dust as the beetle saps the life force from him. Her immortality replenished, Pamela orders Viola to clean up the evidence.... just as another reporter arrives to interview her.

“Queen of the Nile” is the final Twilight Zone episode attributed to writer Charles Beaumont; however, like his other season five credits, he didn’t actually write it. Rapidly deteriorating from either Alzheimer’s or Pick’s Disease (it wasn’t easy to diagnose or differentiate them at that time; it’s a bit of a toss-up at this late date), Beaumont utilized a number of ghost writers; in this case he and Jerry Sohl blocked out the plot, and Sohl wrote the script. In this light, it’s easy to forgive the fact that the end result is quite similar to Beaumont’s earlier “Long Live Walter Jameson” from season one, particularly in the depiction of Herrick’s rapid aging and disintegration (the same color filter trick is used to achieve the first stage of both transformations). We do get a cool skull-crumbling bit this time around (see above); ultimately, both turn into an empty suit stuffed with dust.

The series has been borrowing from itself since the middle of the third season and, while “Queen of the Nile” is certainly guilty of that, it doesn’t bother me the way other guilty episodes do. For me, it serves at a decent bookend to “Long Live Walter Jameson” or, at the very least, an interesting variation on it. I’m comfortable acquitting it on the grounds that it’s entertaining, the acting is fine, there’s a nice sense of mystery that gradually changes to palpable dread, and it’s the only episode in the entire series with an Egyptian vibe. 

THE MUSIC

“Queen of the Nile” features an original musical score by Lucien Moraweck; however, we also hear a few selections from Bernard Herrmann’s “The Moat Farm Murders” during the climax (a suite of CBS library cues that originated from his radio days). The suite was first released by Cerberus Records as part of their 1986 vinyl album Bernard Herrmann: Music for Radio and Television and, more recently, on CD as part of Prometheus Records’ Bernard Herrmann: The CBS Years Volume 2: American Gothic. 

The Moraweck score, which is quite lovely and mysterious, has unfortunately never been released on any format, and is disappointingly not accessible as an isolated music track on the DVD and Blu-ray sets (as most TZ scores are).

DRAMATIS PERSONAE

In the director’s chair this week is John Brahm, who holds the distinction of directing more Twilight Zones than anyone else (including classics like “Time enough at Last,” “Mirror Image” and “Shadow Play”). “Queen of the Nile” is his twelfth and final contribution to the series.

Lee Philips (Jordan Herrick) returns for his second TZ appearance (he headlined last season’s “Passage on the Lady Anne”). He also co-starred in “The Galaxy Being,” the pilot episode of The Outer Limits, and he enjoyed multiple roles on both of Alfred Hitchcock’s TV series (“Alibi Me,” “The Deadly” and “Deathmate” on Alfred Hitchcock Presents and, later, “The Black Curtain” on The Alfred Hitchcock Hour).

The beautiful Ann Blyth is radiant as Pamela Morris in her sole Twilight Zone appearance, which is also the only sci-fi/fantasy/horror credit on her resume. She did show up in a couple of notable film noirs in the 40’s, however (1945’s Mildred Pierce and 1947’s Brute Force). And yes, in case you were wondering, she qualifies as a TZ Babe.

Ann Blyth (right) with Joan Crawford.

Celia Lovsky is quite good as Viola Draper, Pamela Morris’s mother daughter, but of course genre fans will immediately recognize her as the Vulcan High Priestess T’Pau from the classic “Amok Time” episode of Star Trek. It’s also worth noting that she'd already crossed paths with Lee Philips, in the aforementioned Alfred Hitchcock Hour episode “The Black Curtain” in 1962.

After a fairly prolific film career in the 40’s and 50’s (including a few choice film noirs, among them 1942’s This Gun for Hire and 1952’s On Dangerous Ground, the latter of which, incidentally, was scored by frequent TZ music contributor Bernard Herrmann), Frank Ferguson (here playing Krueger, Herrick’s editor) enjoyed a fairly prolific TV career in the 60’s and 70’s; however, not much of it fell under the sci-fi/fantasy/horror genres. He did appear on one episode of The Alfred Hitchcock Hour (“Night of the Owl”), one Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea (“The Sky is Falling”) and one Land of the Giants (“The Marionettes”).

Frank Ferguson consoles TZ alum Ida Lupino.

“Queen of the Nile” is quite good by fifth season standards (if it had aired during the first season, I’d probably dismiss it as mediocre). The actors are engaging, the music is great, and it serves as a nice bookend to Beaumont’s earlier classic “Long Live Walter Jameson” (even though Beaumont didn’t actually write this one). 

That about wraps it up for this week, kids… as always, ankhs for stopping by.

Next week:

Yonkers! Yonkers! YONKERS!!!

Episode Spotlight: "Living Doll" (11/01/1963)

Season 5, Episode 6 (126 overall)

Originally aired 11/01/2013

Cayuga Production # 2621

Fifty years ago tonight, a mean ol’ sumbitch matched wits with a doll… and lost miserably. Jeez, wotta wuss.

Erich Streator is your average everyday wicked stepfather. Overbearing and cruel, he makes life miserable for his wife Annabelle and stepdaughter Christie on a daily basis. When Annabelle buys Christie a new Talky Tina doll, Erich is clearly perturbed because, well, nobody in his house should ever enjoy anything. Kinda reminds me of my stepdad when I was a kid.

Hi Daddy! Meet your adorable new nemesis!

“My name is Talky Tina, and I love you very much,” coos Tina whenever her string is pulled. But whenever she’s alone with Erich, she says other, more interesting phrases: they start with “I don’t think I like you” and quickly escalate to “I’m going to kill you.” The aforementioned battle of wits escalates from there and, to borrow a catchphrase from Highlander: there can be only one.

ZICREE RAPED MY CHILDHOOD!

I was pretty new to the series when I first read Marc Scott Zicree’s The Twilight Zone Companion in 1982, and there were many episodes that I hadn't seen yet, one of which was “Living Doll.” Zicree’s comments on the episodes are as follows:

“Erich Streator is trying desperately not to alienate his wife and her young daughter. When the child brings home a doll that makes clear its murderous intentions --- but only when it's alone with him --- Erich is in one hell of a bind. If he tries to tell his wife of it, he sounds like a lunatic, and if he tries to protect himself by attempting (unsuccessfully) to destroy the doll, his actions seem those of a twisted mind striking out resentfully to hurt a helpless little girl. Poor Erich; it is clear early on that he hasn't much of a chance against this ruthless doll.” 

Whatchoo talkin' 'bout, Zicree?

This was all I knew about “Living Doll” until I finally saw it a few years later. I was expecting to see a basically decent guy get decimated unfairly by an evil doll; imagine my surprise to discover that said “decent guy” was actually the villain of the piece! Did Zicree even watch the episode before writing about it? He couldn't have possibly sympathized with Erich Streator AT ALL if he had; however, the excessive praise he heaps on it would seem to imply that not only had he seen it, but had deemed it absolute top tier Zone: “Masterfully written and superbly directed, acted, photographed and scored, it is an episode that can stand with the best of any season.”  It was at this point, at the tender of age of 13, that I had the sobering realization that Zicree was perhaps not the be-all-end-all Twilight Zone expert that I’d assumed he was. I mean, he’d written a goddamned book about it; how the hell could he have been so incredibly wrong?

I think, in describing this dark event in my TZ-formative years, I've figured out why I’m so hostile toward Zicree. Serling was my new idol (after outgrowing such childhood heroes as Spiderman and Luke Skywalker), but he died before I ever heard his name, so Zicree, having chronicled Serling’s wonderful TV series, was the closest I could get to him. And the son of a bitch let me down by being so blatantly wrong about something so obvious. Erich Streator was a bad guy; he deserved what he got. This was the cosmic justice that lay at the very heart of The Twilight Zone, which even I understood at that early age. If Zicree didn't understand that, then who was he to write the book in the first place?

Ahem. I think I might just have exorcised a serious demon here. Maybe now I can move on with my life. Maybe I can even forgive Mr. Zicree his egregious trespasses against my inner child. Maybe.

Okay, therapy session over. Let’s move on.

“Living Doll” has a great concept (which is unfortunately pretty clichéd nowadays; I’m looking at you, Child’s Play franchise) which, coupled with Telly Savalas’s fantastic bad-guy-you-love-to-hate performance, makes for a highly entertaining half-hour (except for the last thirty seconds; see below). Unfortunately, it’s pretty flat on a visual level, the exception being when the action moves to Erich’s garage, where he attempts to dispose of Tina in a number of ways (she’s definitely more menacing in semi-darkness). Still, these scenes offer nothing on the level of, say, season three’s “The Dummy” (which features a menacing ventriloquist’s dummy framed by complex camera work with marvelous lighting).  And the final shot of the episode, in which slow-motion is abruptly employed for no apparent reason, does nothing to advance the mood (and was likely done to stretch out the ending to accommodate Serling’s closing narration, which suggests poor planning during filming).  

In fact, the ending is disappointing in general, since having Tina murder Erich is the easiest possible conclusion. Why not have Erich scared straight, so to speak, and forced to treat his family better under Tina’s ongoing supervision? Further, why the hell does Tina threaten Annabelle (Christie’s one and only champion) after Erich is dispatched? Up until this point, the episode was operating under the cosmic justice approach (discussed in detail last week) but, in the final moment, gears are abruptly switched over to something more akin to chaos theory. It seems Tina is just an all-around evil doll (yawn) instead of a protective shield for a mistreated child (infinitely more satisfying) after all.

One minor bid of weirdness. Annabelle says to Erich that “I know you got more than you bargained for when you married me; two for the price of one, wasn’t it?” Um… surely he was aware that she had a kid, right…? If he wasn’t, then I’m almost willing to cut him some slack for being such an asshole. On that note, surely she was aware that he was a profoundly mean bastard, so why the hell did she marry him in the first place? 

Jerry Sohl and Charles Beaumont

“Living Doll” is the first of three episodes credited to writer Charles Beaumont this season. Unfortunately, he didn't actually write any of them, as by this time his health was rapidly deteriorating (he passed away in 1967). In this particular case, Beaumont mapped out the plot with Jerry Sohl, who ghostwrote the script.

THE MUSIC

“Living Doll” features another great score from Bernard Herrmann. As a fan(atic) of his work, I find it fascinating to compare his Twilight Zone work with the film scores he composed around the same time (for example, his score for 1959’s Journey to the Center of the Earth shares similar instrumentation with TZ’s “The Lonely” from that same year). His sole film score in 1963 was Jason and the Argonauts which, now that I think about it, doesn’t really sound like “Living Doll” at all.  Here, Herrmann employs a very small ensemble (two harps, celesta and bass clarinet) to create moody, suspenseful cues that perfectly underline the escalating psychological warfare between Erich and Talky Tina. The original Herrmann recordings have never been properly released; however, they can be obtained via the isolated music tracks present on both the DVD and blu-ray sets of season five (from Image Entertainment).  

Additionally, Joel McNeely recorded all seven of Herrmann’s Twilight Zone scores in 1999 for a 2-CD set released by Varese Sarabande Records (which was the only game in town for 4/7ths of Herrmann’s TZ output before Image came along). I do have some issues with some of McNeely’s interpretations (some cues are too fast while others are too slow; further, much of “Where Is Everybody?” just sounds off to my ears); however, his take on “Living Doll” is quite good (though it’s no match for the original recording).

FAMILIAR FACES

Telly Savalas, who has a long history of imposing and often malevolent characters on his resume, is perfect as Erich Streator.  This is his only TZ appearance, but he does have another connection to the series: he appeared in 1962’s Cape Fear, which was scored by Bernard Herrmann (and co-starred TZ vets Martin Balsam, Edward Platt and Paul Comi). Savalas also played super villain Ernst Stavro Blofeld in 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, one of my favorite James Bond films.

Mary La Roche (Annabelle Streator) previously entered The Twilight Zone as Mary, Gregory West’s mistress, in season one’s “A World of His Own.” Here she plays an unhappy wife, so I guess she got to play both sides of the extramarital fence (though I guess Erich isn't depicted as an adulterer; but honestly, would we be surprised?).

Tracy Stratford is convincingly sad and under-loved as Christie (she was also Tina in season three’s “Little Girl Lost,” which was also scored by Bernard Herrmann. Wait, so first she played Tina, then she had a doll named Tina… is it possible that Talky Tina came from the fourth dimension?). Additionally, Stratford provided the voice of Lucy Van Pelt in the 1960s Charlie Brown TV specials. So when Annabelle tells Erich to see a psychiatrist, I wonder if she meant….

Good grief! Uh, I mean... who loves ya, baby???

And hey, Telly Savalas and Charlie Brown are both bald. Coincidence?  I dunno… maybe Charles Schulz was a Twilight Zone fan…?

June Foray, probably the hardest working voice actor in Hollywood, provides the unforgettable voice of Talky Tina. She’ll also do some (slightly controversial) dubbing later this season in “The Bewitchin’ Pool,” but she has another less-obvious TZ connection as well.  80’s kids like me will have no trouble remembering the 1985 film Weird Science, but do you remember the TV spin-off, which lasted five seasons (1994-1998) on the USA Network? In the episode “Sci-Fi Zoned,” the main characters are trapped inside black and white episodes of their favorite TV show (a thinly-veiled TZ knockoff called The Sci-Fi Zone), one of which involves a murderous doll named “Talking Tammy,” who is voiced by…. yup, you guessed it, June Foray (she also voices a sentient candy bar named “Baby Ruth” in the same episode).

An iconic episode like this is almost guaranteed to spawn a parody somewhere along the line. Like “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” a few weeks back, “Living Doll” got the Simpsons treatment in 1992’s “Treehouse of Horror III,” in which a Krusty the Klown doll menaces Homer Simpson (“Clown without Pity”). Also of interest to genre fans is the framing device employed in this episode, which is patterned after TV’s Alfred Hitchcock Presents and features the rotund Homer standing in for Hitch.

Good morn--- D'oh!

Bif Bang Pow! has immortalized Talky Tina in every conceivable form (a talking bobblehead, action figure, and a fully-functioning life-sized replica). The bobblehead seems to be sold out but, as of this writing, the action figure and life-size replica are still available through Entertainment Earth (but, as with any collectible, they won’t be around forever). I can’t comment on the life-sized replica since I don't own it (c'mon, how could I possibly justify buying a fucking doll? For over a hundred bucks, no less!), but I've reviewed the other two (see here and here).

Questionable ending aside, “Living Doll” is great fun and a definite highlight of The Twilight Zone’s fifth and final season. Other than the misfire “A Kind of a Stopwatch” two weeks ago, season five’s offerings have ranged from good to excellent… unfortunately, the quality is about to start dipping in a big way.  Stay tuned, but temper your expectations from here on out.

Next week: Hoo boy. Where’s Charles Bronson and Elizabeth Montgomery when you need ‘em?