Creator of the Twilight Zone

  Born in New York  Second born into family of grocers  Very imaginative child, put on plays for his family on the stage his father built him  Practical joker / class clown  Seventh grade teacher inspired him to pursue a life of entertainment

 Rather than going to college, Serling enlisted in the army to participate in WWII  Serling contemplated dropping out of high school to enlist, but his Government teacher told him that “War is temporary. Education is a lifetime.”  Took up boxing to relieve stress while enlisted  Being a Jewish man, he wanted to fight Hitler  Witnessed many unexpected deaths, and inspired future stories  Awarded the Purple Heart, Bronze Star, and Philippine Liberation Medal  Suffered from PTSD

 Worked at a rehabilitation center for veterans, as he was rehabilitating from a GSW to the knee  He fell down many flights of stairs, because his knee never really healed  Graduated from college with a bachelors in Literature; while in college, participated in the campus radio station  While in college, he met Carolyn Louise Kramer, and wanted to date her, but she continually turned him down, because he was known as a “ladies’ man”

 Serling finally convinced Kramer to give him a chance, and they finally ended up getting married in 1948  He converted from Judaism to Unitarianism so he could marry Kramer  They had two daughters, Jodi and Anne  Spent a majority of his summers in New York  Worked as a parachute tester to provide income for his family

 Worked for and wrote for many radio stations  Won several prizes for his work on the radio  In the early years of his career, he tried to get into television and received 40 rejection slips  Finally got a break in 1955 when his 70-second script aired  He grew tired of stations “tearing apart” his scripts, and decided to make his own show  He proposed a science-fiction show that CBS aired under DesiLu’s studio

 Due to the popularity of his episode on “Desilu Playhouse”, CBS let him have his own show that he entitled, “The Twilight Zone”  “The Twilight Zone” was a show that aired science-fiction stories that usually had unexpected endings  Twilight Zone means “gray area” or the time in between night and day

 “The Twilight Zone” premiered in 1959, and ran 156 episodes, with Serling writing 92 of them  Many episodes of “The Twilight Zone” were controversial (i.e. “I Am The Night – Color Me Black”  “The Twilight Zone” was cancelled TWICE, but was renewed both times  When “The Twilight Zone” was finally cancelled for the third time, Serling tried to create more TV shows, but none ever gained the popularity of “The Twilight Zone”  He also wrote many prose works and did appearances on many school campuses  “The Twilight Zone” came back to television twice after Serling death in the 1980s and early 2000s

 Anti-War Activism  “The Rack” – soldier conspiring with Koreans  “No Christmas This Year” – Santa being shot at  “24 Men to a Plane” – soldiers jump too early  Supported McCarthy while running for President  Misanthropy  "The Fever", "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street", "Mr. Dingle, the Strong" and "The Shelter"  Racial Equity  “A Town Has Turned to Dust” – lynching

 Serling died at the age of 50, of a fifth heart attack during open heart surgery  The public thought that he died of lung cancer, as he was a lifelong smoker  Truth: Serling died of heart failure in his 50s, like both his father and grandfather  By his death, Serling had won more than twenty awards for “The Twilight Zone”

 Disney’s Tower of Terror is centered around “TTZ”  When in the Tower of Terror, you actually see a hologram of Serling and the very famous introduction to each episode