Rod Serling discusses "The Silence"

Rod Serling: Does Espousing a Cause Lose Character Credibility?

Rod Serling on Writing to Please an Audience

Great series of engaging interviews with Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling.

Salvador Dali and Walt Disney – Destino

From Artinthepicture.com:

Destino is a short animated cartoon released in 2003 by The Walt Disney Company. Destino is unique in that its production originally began in 1945, 58 years before its eventual completion. The project was a collaboration between American animator Walt Disney and Spanish painter Salvador Dalí, and features music written by Mexican songwriter Armando Dominguez. It seems an unlikely cooperation and/or friendship, but it happened nonetheless.

Destino from only one on Vimeo.

Rod Serling on Where Ideas Come From

On YouTube there's a great series of interview clips with Twilight Zone creator Rod Serling. I first saw these on Scott Myers' blog Go Into The Story where he's been posting one video a day. I shall try to do the same.

LOST: The Disappearing Distinction Between TV and Cinema

My all-time favorite television show, albeit only slightly above Ronald D. Moore’s brilliant Battlestar Galactica update, is LOST. I love it for the mystery, the ensemble cast, the emphasis on visual storytelling, the seamless blending of science fiction, the paranormal, and mundane human drama. This re-imagining of the common tale of castaways on an uninhabited island mixed, coupled with supernatural and sci-fi undertones reflects my favorite theme in fiction—the mundane versus the fantastic.

Although LOST, with its very high production value, feels very much like a movie to me. However, unlike Battlestar Galactica, which is filmed on digital, LOST is one of the most expensive shows on television—the two-part pilot being the most expensive ABC had ever produced. It was created when ABC wanted to make a television series that was a cross between William Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies, Robert Zemeckis’s Cast Away, Gilligan’s Island, while capitalizing on the success of the reality television program Survivor. Other inspirations were the work of Rod Serling, particularly the paranormal and suspense aspects of The Twilight Zone—another all-time favorite of mine, and the video game Myst. Jeffrey Lieber, who went on to write many episodes, initially wrote the pilot, title “Nowhere,” based on his pitch for the show. ABC was not satisfied with his teleplay so they contacted J.J. Abrams, essentially as a “fixer.” Abrams had been a revered icon within the television industry for creating and producing hit shows like Felicity and Alias. He began collaborating with fellow geek writer Damon Lindelof from Crossing Jordan. Abrams had one demand—that the show have a supernatural angle to it. The rest came together as the cast came together. Many of the characters were scrapped altogether to accommodate actors who may have been perfect for the show, despite not having a character in the initial draft that suited them.

The show is my favorite for infinite reasons. As a unapologetic fan of M. Night Shyamalan, I love the supernatural backdrop and emphasis on characters and their relationships to one another. I love the non-linear structure of episodes. In the first three seasons, every episode would take the point of view of one of the principle characters and intercut between their story on the island, and their story before the plane crash that marooned them there. Then, in a stroke of genius, they changed things up in the season three finale in an episode titled “Through the Looking Glass.” We assume we’re watching flashbacks of one of our lead characters (and would-be leader of the survivors), Jack Sheppard (Matthew Fox). However, his character is a drunk, scruffy, and suicidal, contradicting all of his previous flashbacks and what we know of his character at that point. Then, in the last minute of the show, he meets up with a fellow survivor, and we realize that what we’re watching is not a flashback, but a flash-forward! In the middle of its planned six seasons, it is revealed that many of them actually get off the island. The show’s title can then be thought of as a clear double meaning. The show is not about survivors lost on an untraceable island. It’s about people who are lost in their own lives.

My favorite episode is the season 4 episode, “The Constant.” It focuses on my favorite character, Desmond Hume (Henry Ian Cusick), a Scottish man who was stranded on the island before the survivors of the plane crash were. He, in a nod to Homer’s The Odyssey, is trying to get back to his love Penelope. In the episode, Desmond’s consciousness keeps going between the present (on the island) and the past (before the island). He is essentially being jolted back and forth through time, although nothing in his body is being physically moved. It is merely his consciousness going back, in a highly original take on a classic sci-fi trope, time travel. This was the beginning of the show’s delving into cerebral science fiction. The jolting back and forth in time will eventually cause a short circuiting in the brain that will kill Desmond if he doesn’t find his “constant. The constant that the title refers to is revealed to be Penelope, as she is the only figure present both in his past and present. By hanging on to her, his life is saved. As a reward, he makes contact with Penelope and her team of rescuers at the end of the episode in a very heartfelt moment. It is the juxtaposition of these elements, science fiction and humanity, that make this transcend typical television fare.

Batman: The Animated Series and Patronizing Children

The earliest favorite show I can remember is easily Batman: The Animated Series. It debuted in September of 1992, when I was four years old, and before Warner Bros. had its own television network devoted to younger programming. Today, the show is seen as an animation landmark. Following its debut, other shows began emulating its animation quality. The creators incorporated an Art Deco and 1940’s film noir atmosphere, even painting backgrounds on black paper. They were inspired by the Max Fleischer Superman cartoons of the 1940s, as well as the timeless stylization of Tim Burton’s films in which cars and fashion of the ‘40s blended with a modern world.

Although it aired on Saturday mornings, in which I first watched them, my fondest memories come from when it was on weekday afternoons. I remember watching it daily during my Summer vacations, and during the school year shortly after getting home from school. By this time, 1997, I was 9 years old. Batman: TAS was added to an anthology hour titled The New Batman/Superman Adventures, which included an update of Superman: The Animated Series, which had debuted in 1996 by the same creators of Batman: TAS, Bruce Timm and Eric Radomski. As a child, I also enjoyed Superman: The Animated Series, and as an adult (and avid comic fan) I revere the character of Superman slightly more than Batman. However, nothing from my childhood surpasses the thrills, the level of danger and suspense, the concepts,—many of the stories were adapted directly from classic mythos in comics—the humor and sheer of quality of Batman: The Animated Series.

It’s clear today, and I never would have perceived it as a child, that the commercials were being directly geared toward me and my demographic—boys. Commercials during this time were of fast food restaurants, action figures, play sets, family films, candy and video games. In retrospect, it amazes me how effective that television works as a commercial machine. Despite always being aggravated by commercials, and as much as passively watched them, most of my Christmas and birthday presents were comprised of things I asked for. I knew what I wanted because I had seen it on TV. It’s almost subliminal. It’s like brainwashing. For example, young children will want McDonald’s for dinner, because the TV tells them they want it for dinner—they even give you a toy!

Looking back on the programming of my childhood, and the advertising etched into my brain alongside Batman, it makes me all the more grateful to be living in the information age. It’s an age where I can download a show, such as Batman or any number of childhood favorites, and watch it without being asked to buy things. Although I certainly didn’t care about this when I was a child, I would rather enjoy a show on its own merits, without having to endure the advertisement. I can safely say, however, that I’ve never been captivated by commercials. Instead, they always impeded upon the show I was enjoying.

This is not to say that Batman: The Animated Series was some sort of punk rock show with an anti-capitalist message that I appreciated for its artistic merits. No, while viewing Batman and Robin squaring off with The Joker (played by Mark Hamill, who made a new career for himself), I was being sold to still. That show had me hooked. Therefore, I was going to want the merchandise. I had Batman bed sheets, an electric toothbrush, and several boxes full of Batman action figures. I had Batman video games and birthday party themes. And that was with the animated series alone! If you counted, all the movies, comics and merchandise from both, I’ve invested a lot into Warner Bros.’s franchise.

Although part of me wants to instantly object to the simple notion of advertising to kids due to how manipulative it is, I suppose I shouldn’t complain too much if their product satisfies, and Batman: The Animated Series certainly did.

In Defense of Television...

The advent of television was one of the greatest gifts to cinema. It diversified the medium, allowed for dense story arcs, larger casts of characters, live audiences, and TV challenged filmmakers to come up with smaller-scale storylines with creative restrictions. Television has grown into something much more than a commercial machine, but a form of cinema in its own right, particularly in the last ten years.

As a Lost fan, the greatest thing television provides is dense narratives. There’s a reason many thick novels, especially those by Stephen King, are adapted into television mini-series. They can cover more characters, more subplots, and more narrative arcs. Each season of Lost layers meaning and significance to events and characters in previous seasons, sometimes brilliantly so. Shows like Lost, Battlestar Galactica, Avatar: the Last Airbender, and The Sopranos, among others—all shows that aren’t just episodic, but each episode contains a piece to the whole, grander story. Shows like these are nearly impossible to adapt to film simply because there is too much integral information that would have to be chopped for the sake of a realistic runtime. These shows have drama, emotion, poignancy, relevance, and high entertainment value—everything and more we could hope from a great movie.

Not only did TV contribute to the storytelling meaning, but it made directors of both TV and feature films to adapt and grow as showmen. Cecil B. DeMille wrote epics filmed in scope to provide a cinema experience worth going out to the theaters for. Basically it’s about giving the audience its money’s worth. I would argue that without television, William Wyler might not have bothered to make a movie as ambitious as his Ben Hur remake in 1959. Perhaps David Lean would not have aspired as high in terms of the scale of his movies had TV not have been a competitor for the theater-going public.

In addition it taught filmmakers to pull the reins in. Stories had to be told with creative restrictions, of which many would actually criticize the nature of television for. But limitations and guidelines are from what creativity is born. For example, when George Lucas and Steven Spielberg (who, incidentally, started out directing television) began prepping Raiders of the Lost Ark, Lucas, with his producer hat on, noticed that Spielberg had been storyboarding the movie as if it were a David Lean epic. Lucas, who had only gotten a modest budget from Paramount, urged him to scale back. What he said to Spielberg was, “do it like a TV show”—as in down and dirty, cheap, real, and like an old fashioned serial. The minimalism paid off. One can see a huge difference between Raiders of the Lost Ark, and the most recent Indiana Jones movies, which had a considerably higher, “movie-sized” budget. Minimalist filmmaking has become an art thanks to television, one can point to Steven Spielberg’s first film as well, Duel. Duel was a movie made for television, and shot in twelve days. It was so good, it received a limited theatrical release, and a cult following. It is one of the most elemental stories ever—a giant fucking semi-truck tries to exact revenge on the tight-ass who cut him off. It’s brilliant, Hitchcockian, and completely small-scale and all the better for it. All thanks to the restrictions of filmmaking for television.

It’s clear that TV, while perhaps hard for Hollywood to adjust to and exploit its full potential, has over time become a great competitor for cinema-going. This will not change. Shows are already getting better in terms of production value and its ability to use the medium to its advantage in telling a large story. Teleplays have inspired the art of dialogue, and further linked cinema with the stage. Anthology shows have given ideas for filmmakers to flesh out for feature films (M. Night Shyamalan has professed his desire to make “feature length Twilight Zone episodes”).

Some of my favorite storytellers...

M. Night Shyamalan - I love the thematic links between his screenplays. His concepts couldn't be further apart from one another but they all bare his signature. He hasn't compromised his style or storytelling methods despite recent critical backlash. He defiantly chooses to write his own screenplays, turning down offers to direct other people's material. His screenplays also don't conform to traditional structure. His first three acts are typically half an hour long each, with a ten minute fourth act at the end serving as a falling action. By doing this, Shyamalan seems to be part art house/indie auteur, and part mainstream filmmaker. I aspire to that.

Agatha Christie - I love how she structures her mystery stories. Its very cinematic in how she withholds information, like Shyamalan, only to reveal it at the very end. It makes her novels really suspenseful, and satisfying reads.


Richard Matheson - First off, I love his Twilight Zone episodes and adaptations of his own short stories and novellas (Nightmare at 20,000 Feet, The Shrinking Man, etc.). But I love him mostly for the BIG IDEAS presented in his stories. For example, I Am Legend is a reversal of Dracula. Instead of the world being populated by humans with one vampire among us, the world is now populated by vampires with one human among us. He's the Dracula of the human race.

Jack Finney - Author of Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Time and Again, From Time to Time, and numerous short stories. For anyone who loves The Twilight Zone, this guy does Rod Serling one better. His shorts often set in San Francisco, deal with time travel and they tend to incorporate a twist.
Stephen King - I think with Stephen King's It, he managed to do what no filmmaker has done in making something so overwhelmingly visceral and frightening, and yet very warm and emotional. I loved the empowering of children in it. The juxtaposition of the monster with the 1950s Norman Rockwell setting makes the horror that much more horrifying. It's kind of how Pan's Labyrinth functions. Stephen King has other books that do this too-The Shining and Bag of Bones, in my opinion.

Brian K. Vaughn - I love him for his work on Lost, but even more so for his comic series Y: The Last Man, about an aspiring escape artist and his pet monkey as they survive through a plague that instantly wipes out every living creature with a Y chromosome. So women have inherited the Earth. It's both funny and surprisingly believable.