Original Air Date: July 1, 1960
Writer: Richard Matheson
Director: Ralph Nelson
“The home of Mr. Gregory West, one of America’s most noted playwrights. The office of Mr. Gregory West. Mr. Gregory West—shy, quiet, and at the moment, very happy. Mary—warm, affectionate…And the final ingredient: Mrs. Gregory West.”
-Rod Serling
The conclusion of Season One of The Twilight Zone ends on a comedic high note. “A World of His Own” is a wonderful meta-episode that contemplates the art of writing –in this episode, fictional characters are suddenly brought to life! I found this triumphant conclusion to the first season to be both hilarious and yet subtle. We are introduced to America’s most renowned playwright, Gregory West (played by Keenan Wynn) who is seated in his study with a woman named Mary (played by Mary LaRoche). However, lurking outside the window is Gregory’s wife Victoria (played by Phyllis Kirk). When she spots Gregory alone with a young blonde woman, she sneers and quickly enters the house. In a frenzy, Gregory tries to hide Mary before his wife enters his office.
When Victoria storms in, she searches around the room but she cannot find the other woman. Eventually she traps Gregory into admitting the truth. He tries to explain an extraordinary new development in his writing –when he dictates stories into a dictaphone, the characters miraculously come to life. He demonstrates the creation of Mary when she is suddenly imagined into life. She appears with a knock at the door. Victoria, however, remains unconvinced. Gregory takes his scissors, cuts off a piece of the recording from the dictaphone, and casts it into the fire which then makes a despondent Mary disappear. He also dictates for an elephant to appear in the hallway as proof for Victoria. When she threatens to alert the authorities about Gregory, he calmly pulls a box off his shelf. As it turns out, Victoria is merely just another creation of Gregory’s writing. When he casts her own recording section into the fire, she too suddenly disappears and Gregory decides to reanimate Mary instead.
At the end of the episode, Rod Serling appears before the audience and he starts saying, “We hope you enjoyed tonight’s romantic story on The Twilight Zone. At the same time, we want you to realize that it was, of course, purely fictional. In real life, such ridiculous nonsense could never—” But Gregory suddenly interrupts him: “Rod, you shouldn’t!” and he pulls a box off his shelf that reads “Rod Serling.” Gregory then casts its contents into the fire and Serling cheekily shrugs and remarks, “Well, that’s the way it goes,” as he fades away. Like Gregory’s wife and lover, Rod Serling has been a mere figment of Gregory’s imagination. This wonderful ending elicited more than a few laughs from me. What a delightful, witty way to end one of the greatest seasons of network television!
“Leaving Mr. Gregory West—still shy, quiet, very happy… and apparently in complete control of The Twilight Zone.”
-Rod Serling
My Thoughts on “A World Of His Own”
“A World Of His Own” offers a glimpse at a writers’ fantasy, the dream of seeing his characters come to life. It is a delightfully fitting ending to a show which celebrates great writing (even as Rod Serling himself is uncharacteristically written out of the story!) Richard Matheson later identified this episode as one of his favorites, crediting the subtle touch of director Ralph Nelson, and in many respects, I have to agree.
Credits:
- Director: Ralph Nelson (not to be confused with Twilight Zone production manager Ralph W. Nelson)
- Written by: Richard Matheson (based on his then-unpublished story “And Now I’m Waiting” which Matheson later adapted and published from this teleplay)
- 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:
- Keenan Wynn…..Gregory West
- Born Francis Xavier Aloysius James Jeremiah Keenan Wynn (1916-1986) Keenan Wynn was an American character actor and son of Ed Wynn (who previously appeared in the second Twilight Zone episode “One For The Angels“). Both he and his father appeared in the original 1956 Playhouse 90 television production of Rod Serling’s “Requiem for a Heavyweight.” Keenan Wynn was an MGM contract player throughout the 1940s and 1950s, appearing in films like The Hucksters (1947), The Three Musketeers (1948), Annie Get Your Gun (1950), Royal Wedding (1951), Kiss Me, Kate (1953), The Man in the Gray Flannel Suit (1956), The Absent-Minded Professor (1961), The Americanization of Emily (1964), and Dr. Strangelove (1964). He later appeared in films ranging from Disney productions (The Absent-Minded Professor, Son of Flubber, and Herbie Rides Again) to Sergio Leone’s Once Upon a Time in the West. He was married three times and had five children. He died of pancreatic cancer in 1986 at the age of 70.
- Phyllis Kirk…..Victoria West
- Born born Phyllis Kirkgaard or Kirkegaard, Phyllis Kirk (1927-2006) began her career on Broadway and appeared in television shows like The Thin Man, Studio One, The United States Steel Hour, and Playhouse 90, in addition to The Twilight Zone. She contracted polio as a child which caused health issues throughout her life, and she later became a noted political activist, in opposition to the death penalty and in support of the ACLU and preschool programs for underprivileged families in South Los Angeles. She was married to television producer and writer Warren Bush until his death 1995. Phyllis Kirk died in 2006 of a cerebral aneurysm at age 79 in Woodland Hills, California.
- Mary LaRoche…..Mary
- Mary LaRoche (1920-1999) was best known for her roles in the feature films Gidget (1959) and Bye Bye Birdie (1963), as well as television shows like The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Perry Mason, Wagon Train, and Gunsmoke. She appeared in two episodes of The Twilight Zone (“A World of his Own” and “Living Doll.” She was married twice, first to actor John Hudson. She died in 1999 at the age of 78.
- Keenan Wynn…..Gregory West
The Twilight Zone Trivia:
- This was one of four Twilight Zone episodes to include the “eye” opening, the other three being “Mr. Bevis,” “The After Hours,” and “The Mighty Casey.”
- Although Rod Serling appears on-screen at the end of most first season Twilight Zone episodes to plug the following week’s show, this is the only episode in the first season in which Rod Serling appears on-screen within the episode itself. From the second season onward Serling appears in most every episode.
- This marked a reunion of Rod Serling with Ralph Nelson and Keenan Wynn, both of whom also appeared in Serling’s Playhouse 90 classic “Requiem for a Heavyweight.”
- Richard Matheson’s original script was much darker in tone than the final cut of this episode. His original short story had narrator David who confronts his brother-in-law Richard over unfaithfulness to his wife, Mary. The characters in his writings start coming to life and he has wild raucous orgies with them. The twist at the end is that the narrator David realizes he is also one of Richard’s creations.
- Mary is intended to be 30 years old, though actress Mary LaRoche was actually 39 at the time this episode was filmed.
- Like the protagonist in this episode, Rod Serling often dictated Twilight Zone scripts into a recorder/dictaphone beside his Olympic sized pool in Pacific Palisades, California.
- The fireplace set where most of this episode takes place was previously used in “A Stop At Willoughby.”
- The character names of Virginia West and Gregory West were an inside joke; Producer Buck Houghton’s secretary was named Virginia Gregory.
Click here to return to my survey of The Twilight Zone series.