Original Air Date: June 17, 1960
Writer: Rod Serling
Director: Robert Parrish and Alvin Ganzer
“This locker and liniment emporium houses a major league baseball team known as the Hoboken Zephyrs, all of which by way of introduction to next week’s show, a wild and wooly yarn about the great American pastime. It’s called ‘The Mighty Casey’ and it’s all about a left-hander who pitches like nothing human simply because he isn’t. Mr. Jack Warden takes us into the stadium next week for nine fast innings on The Twilight Zone…. What you’re looking at is a ghost, once alive but now deceased. Once upon a time, it was a baseball stadium that housed a major league ball club known as the Hoboken Zephyrs. Now it houses nothing but memories and a wind that stirs in the high grass of what was once an outfield, a wind that sometimes bears a faint, ghostly resemblance to the roar of a crowd that once sat here. We’re back in time now, when the Hoboken Zephyrs were still a part of the National League, and this mausoleum of memories was an honest-to-Pete stadium. But since this is strictly a story of make believe, it has to start this way: once upon a time, in Hoboken, New Jersey, it was tryout day. And though he’s not yet on the field, you’re about to meet a most unusual fella, a left-handed pitcher named Casey.”
-Rod Serling
“The Mighty Casey” is a whimsical, delightful episode in The Twilight Zone series that explores a now-familiar theme: cheating in major league sports. Cheating occurs when the drive to win overcomes the fear of breaking the rules. However, this episode’s silly tone is overshadowed by a darker backstory. “The Mighty Casey” was marred by logistical problems from the outset –it had to be filmed twice when the original lead actor (Paul Douglas) suddenly died during production. Previously, Douglas had famously played a baseball team manager in the 1951 film Angels in the Outfield, among other classic performances. He was initially not crazy about the script for “The Mighty Casey” but he accepted the role nonetheless at the personal invitation of Rod Serling. When Douglas came on board The Twilight Zone, crew had to be reassured that Douglas was actually dependable –he was known to be a heavy drinker. Unbeknownst to anybody at the time, he was also suffering from near-cardiac failure. During filming Douglas could barely remember his lines, he lost a great deal of weight, and he was constantly out of breath. His condition was later revealed, and within days he suddenly died immediately after shooting “The Mighty Casey.” Rod Serling later morbidly stated: “we were watching him literally die in front of us.” Devastated, Serling put up $27,000 of his own money to re-cast, re-shoot, and re-edit this whole episode for CBS with Jack Warden in the lead role (Warden had previously appeared in “The Lonely“). Almost none of the original footage featuring Paul Douglas is known to have survived.
In the episode, Mr. “Mouth” McGarry (played by Jack Warden) is the manager of the Hoboken Zephyrs, a struggling American baseball team thinly based on the Brooklyn Dodgers. One day he is approached by a scientist named Dr. Stillman (played by Abraham Sofaer) who has invented a robot named Casey (played by Robert Sorrells –see his biographical details further below for details on his tragic end of life). Casey appears to play baseball like a man but his flawless mechanical pitching impresses everyone. McGarry and Stillman strike up a deal and Casey becomes the new secret weapon of the Zephyrs, pitching shut-out after shut-out.
However, in a routine medical exam the league discovers that Casey actually has no heartbeat. At the risk of losing Casey, Dr. Stillman promises the league that he will provide Casey with a heart so that he may continue to play. At the end, Casey is given a heart transplant by Dr. Stillman but in exchange he has now traded in his cold, machine-like skills for sentimental compassion. Like the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz, he has a heart. Casey now sympathizes with the opposing team he had previously been crushing, and he simply cannot bring himself to continue dominating them. In the end, Dr. Stillman gives Casey’s blueprints to McGarry who then has an epiphany –perhaps he will create a whole team of robotic baseball players for himself.
“Once upon a time, there was a major league baseball team called the Hoboken Zephyrs, who, during the last year of their existence, wound up in last place and shortly thereafter wound up in oblivion. There’s a rumor, unsubstantiated, of course, that a manager named McGarry took them to the West Coast and wound up with several pennants and a couple of world championships. This team had a pitching staff that made history. Of course, none of them smiled very much, but it happens to be a fact that they pitched like nothing human. And if you’re interested as to where these gentlemen came from, you might check under ‘B’ for Baseball – in The Twilight Zone.”
-Rod Serling
My Thoughts on “The Mighty Casey”
This goofy science fiction spoof is something of a fairy tale episode. Rod Serling’s narration, apparently taking place long after the fact, gives it the feel of a tall-tale or age-old baseball legend. The idea of introducing an artificially being into modern society has long been the subject of fascination in science fiction lore, however this episode goes a bit off the rails with its quirky comedy culminating in the farcical conclusion in which Casey receives a heart transplant and suddenly starts developing empathy. It’s certainly one of the lesser episodes of Season One, but somehow “The Mighty Casey” still manages to pull me in each time I watch it.
Credits:
- Directors: Robert Parrish, Alvin Ganzer
- Written by: Rod Serling
- Music: Stock Music
- Director of Photography: George T. Clemens
- Production Manager: Ralph W. Nelson
- Art Directors: George W. Davis and Merrill Pye
- Film Editor: Joseph Gluck
- Assistant Director: Don Klune
- Set Decorations: Henry Grace and Keogh Gleason
- Sound: Franklin Milton and Philip Mitchell
- Starring:
- Jack Warden…..Mouth McGarry
- Jack Warden (1920 – 2006) worked as a boxer, bouncer, tugboat deckhand, and lifeguard before joining the United States Navy in 1938 where he was stationed in China. He served in the 501st Parachute Infantry Regiment, but on the eve of D-Day, he shattered his leg in a practice jump in England after crash-landing in a tree. He spent almost eight months of his hospital recovery reading the Clifford Odets plays and decided to become an actor. He studied acting in New York City on the G.I. Bill and appeared in several anthology television shows and uncredited roles in films like Sunset Boulevard (1950) before his big breaks came in From Here to Eternity (1953) and especially 12 Angry Men (1957). He was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor for Shampoo (1975) and Heaven Can Wait (1978). He received a BAFTA nomination for Shampoo (1975), and won a Primetime Emmy Award for his performance in Brian’s Song (1971). He appeared in two episodes of The Twilight Zone, both of them in the first season (“The Lonely” and “The Mighty Casey”). Warden married French actress Vanda Dupre in 1958, they had one son together, but separated in the 1970s (though never legally divorced). He retired from acting in 2000 and lived with his girlfriend in Manhattan until his death in 2006.
- Robert Sorrells…..Casey
- Robert Sorrells (1930-2019) was an American television actor known for appearing in episodes of Ensign O’Toole, Gunsmoke, Rawhide, and Bonanza. In 2019, he died in prison while serving an indeterminate life sentence for murder. In his later years he was described as a sad alcoholic in emotional decline, particularly after the death of his mother and poodle. Back in 2004 (when Sorrells was 74 and living in a senior facility), he was drinking in a bar to the point of argumentative belligerence. When the bartender escorted him out, Sorrells later returned with a semiautomatic pistol and shot the bartender in the back at point-blank range, killing him. he shot the man again in the back as he lay dead on the barroom floor. He then shot another bystander in the face and back (who miraculously survived) and then fled the scene, but not before shouting to the rest of the patrons in the bar, “Does anybody else want to fuck with the cowboy?” He was arrested a few blocks away by the Simi Valley police. In 2005, he was sentenced to 32 years to life, despite attempting to plead not guilty by reason of insanity. Sorrells died in a Vacaville prison in 2019 at the age of 88.
- Abraham Sofaer…..Dr. Stillman
- Abraham Isaac Sofaer (1896-1988) was a British actor who appeared in shows like in Wagon Train, Gunsmoke, The Investigators, Daniel Boone, The Time Tunnel, Lost in Space, The Outer Limits, The Monkees, and I Dream of Jeannie. He died of congestive heart failure in 1988 at the age of 91.
- Alan Dexter…..Beasley
- Don O’Kelly…..Monk
- Jonathan Hole…..the Team Doctor
- Rusty Lane…..the Baseball Commissioner
- Dom Deluise…..locker room teammate (uncredited)
- Jack Warden…..Mouth McGarry
The Twilight Zone Trivia:
- The title of this episode is in reference to the 1888 Ernst Thayer baseball poem “Casey at the Bat.”
- This was one of four Twilight Zone episodes to include the “eye” opening, the other three being “Mr. Bevis,” “The After Hours,” and “A World of His Own.”
- Episodes employing comedic elements (like “The Mighty Casey”) were often dismissed as campy by reviewers, much to Rod Serling’s dismay.
- “The Mighty Casey” suffered from the fact that the episode had to be filmed twice due to the original actor’s death (Paul Douglas, as detailed above). Douglas described his big hit movie Angels in the Outfield (1951) “a real crummy movie” –even though President Eisenhower reportedly watched it numerous times. Douglas had also appeared on episodes of Playhouse 90 and Studio One.
- The baseball scenes were filmed at the Los Angeles Wrigley Field, an often-used venue for Hollywood films featuring baseball action scenes and home of the minor league Los Angeles Angels. Permission to film at the stadium was granted by Lefty Phillips and Dick Walsh of the Los Angeles Dodgers. It included a $750 fee for use, $35 per day paid to groundskeeper Jim Williams, $15 per day paid to Arnold Tashin to operate the scoreboard for filming, and $3.15 per hour paid to the LAPD for one officer to watch over the set and equipment.
- According to Anne Serling in her introduction to Stories From The Twilight Zone, Rod Serling was a great fan of baseball. He often used phrases like “Hello, sports fan!”
- The Hoboken Zephyrs are loosely based on the Brooklyn Dodgers whose last season before moving to Los Angeles in 1958 saw them go 71-83. Indeed, in Serling’s original teleplay he mentions several Dodgers pitchers, such as Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale (this dialogue does not remain in the final episode). Serling later wrote to a fan confessing that he is a fan of the Brooklyn/Los Angeles Dodgers as well as the Washington Red Skins for football.
- The Zephyrs’ uniforms bear a National League 75th anniversary patch on the left sleeve, which would likely place the setting of this episode in 1951.
- In this episode, the Zephyrs are playing the New York Giants (who had moved to San Francisco at the start of the 1958 season). One of the only Giant players with a visible number on his uniform is #24. Notably, the best player on the NY/SF Giants of the ’50s and ’60s was Hall of Famer, Willie Mays, who wore #24.
- In the second scene in the hospital (while the commissioner is reading the rule book), there is an oil can on the headboard of Casey’s bed. No reason is given for this to be present but it may be an obvious nod to the Tin Man in The Wizard of Oz (1939).
- Rod Serling said: “This idea stemmed from a general love for the great American sport and a feeling that the series could do with some tongue-in-cheek humor. I thought to myself, how incredible would it be if a baseball mired in the cellar could derive the services of a robot – somebody whose arm never went lame, legs never went rubbery, and to whom age would have no deleterious effects. hence – Casey the robot, left-hander!”
- Even though this episode takes place in New Jersey, palm trees can be clearly seen in the background.
- Mouth McGarry mentions two baseball players “DiMaggio” and “Durocher” –references to Leo Durocher and Joe DiMaggio.
- Note: The first officially recorded game of baseball took place in Hoboken, New Jersey in 1846 between the “Knickerbocker Club” and “New York Nine” at Elysian Fields.
- Rod Serling wrote a prior baseball script synopsis entitled “Dependable” which was plater fleshed out into a radio script, but the exact title and program remain unknown.
Click here to return to my survey of The Twilight Zone series.
Click here to read my reflections on Rod Serling’s short story “The Mighty Casey.”