The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas

Well, this week I got the rough mixes in from Cerny American Creative on “Night Call” which airs the week of May 5th. Aside from some sound effects tweaks, which are being adjusted, the show is one of my favorites to date. It stars Mariette Hartley who did an amazing job of playing a character much older than she is, the character of Elva Keene. Elva is an 80 year old invalid who lives alone in her house in Maine and one stormy night she starts to receive phone calls from - wait a minute, I’m not going to spoil it for you, tune in and find out! When I directed Mariette in this episode I was so taken by the way she wanted to record her performance. Usually the star of the show records in Los Angeles and the supporting cast records all-together in our studios here in Chicago at a later date (sorry if that spoils it for some of you : ). Then the two sound files are fused together by the geniuses at Cerny American Creative. Anyway, most stars in LA will read his or her line one by one and give me several “slightly” different takes of each line. Not Mariette -- she wanted to go through the entire script in one take only stopping to redo a line if she made a mistake (which wasn’t often). At first it kind of threw me but once she got going - wow - it was amazing! I didn’t want to throw her off from her flow so I just let her do her thing and I’m glad I did! I followed along with my script and
circled any dialog that I wanted her to give me a safety on later but overall, she performed the entire script in one take! I was really blown away by what she did and how she did it. She’s such a tremendous actress and she totally nailed the complex character of Elva Keen – I can’t wait for you to hear it. If you haven’t guessed already, I enjoy casting stars of the original TV show in these new radio versions. Past stars include: H.M. Wynant, Shelley Berman, Peter Mark Richman, Beverly Garland, Orson Bean, Morgan Brittany and Bill Erwin. I never cast them in the roles they appeared in on the original TV episodes -- I cast them in completely different roles in completely different episodes. Fans of the original TZ show know that Mariette Hartley co-starred with Robert Lansing in The Twilight Zone TV episode “The Long Morrow” written by Rod Serling, originally televised January 10th, 1964. Our radio version of “The Long Morrow” starred Kathy Garver in the role Mariette originated.

Well that’s all for now, check back with me next week for more NEWS FROM THE ZONE!