You're traveling through another dimension.
A dimension not only of sight and sound, but of mind.
A journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination.
Your next stop, the twilight zone.
Ladies and gentlemen, we're certainly glad to be here tonight.
Speak for yourself, turkey.
That's Jerry.
Every dummy to his own taste.
Now, cut that out.
All right. Let go of the suit. I'm getting out of here.
Now, wait a minute, willy. Just stay right here.
I mean it.
Uh-huh.
I'm sorry. If I said anything, I, uh, I didn't mean it.
Oh, no?
Just tell me this, wise guy. You did admit that you were superstitious, didn't you?
Well, on occasion, yes.
But you don't throw salt over your shoulders or cross your fingers.
No, I knock on wood.
You did it again.
Wait a minute.
I resign. From now on, I'm a single!
As for you, you can turn in your lap.
Uh, why, willy, uh, in the first place, what would you do without me?
Well, for one thing, I could be a better ventriloquist.
Oh, yeah?
Yeah. Watch this.
A funny thing happened to me on my way over to the club tonight.
Is that a fact? What happened, blockhead?
I was out in front of the Ritz-savoy.
That's where I live. Out in front of the Ritz-savoy.
They put formaldehyde in those jokes? Something must preserve them.
You're watching a ventriloquist named Jerry etherson, a voice-thrower par excellence. His alter ego, sitting atop his lap, is a brash stick of kindling with the sobriquet "willy."
In a moment, Mr. Etherson and his knotty-pine partner will be booked into one of the out-of-the-way bistros.
That small dark, intimate place known as the twilight zone.
We play places like, uh, Miami, los Angeles, Utah.
Hey, Jerry. How about san Quentin?
Play there, but not for a very long time.
Anyway, you've been a wonderful audience, and we wanna thank you.
Willy, I think it would be very nice if you'd say goodnight and thank you to all these wonderful people.
You can do anything I can do better? All right, wise guy. Can you do this?
Come around tomorrow night, folks. I'll be alone. Just you and me.
Willy, I think, little pal, we better cut out, huh?
Let me tell you something, folks.
As soon as I shake this pusher and get me a real act, you're gonna see some class!
Thank you again, ladies and gentlemen.
Help, I'm being kidnapped! Call a lawyer! Call a doctor!
Never mind. Just get me to the nurse on time!
Ow!
What do you say, maestro?
How did it go?
Not bad. It's a small house, but a happy one.
There weren't any complaints. Well, booby...
Frank!
Don't do that. I told you that.
Still on the bit, huh?
You still on that stuff, huh?
You gave me your solemn promise you were gonna do your drinking out of soda pop bottles and coffee jugs. What does it take, Jerry, to get you wise?
I'm tired. Will you clear the area?
First I'd like to clear the air.
I don't know where you manufacture all your illusions, Jerry.
But instead of being on top, where you ought to be, at present, you're a second-rate nightclub entertainer.
If you stay on that bottle...
All right, I'll put away the bottle. Now, will you pull out?
I don't know why I waste my time.
Ten percent of you is grief, and it's always been that way.
Maybe it's because I've got a soft spot in my heart for people who like to commit su1c1de eight hours a day.
Now, listen, Jerry.
It doesn't have to be this way.
You give in to some bad hooch and then you have bad nightmares.
It's as simple as that. Take away the hooch, and you take away the nightmares.
You got the chronology wrong, frank. First the nightmares and then the hooch.
I drink 'cause I have to, and I have to because of him.
I've gotta get rid of him, frank.
This stick of wood? This fugitive from a fireplace?
Jerry, how many psychiatrists do you have to see?
How many hours on the couch does it require? How many 20-buck-an-hour visits?
I can't help it.
You can help it. You know what it is, you've been told.
Often, endlessly, up to my craw in overflowing schizophrenia. I know it.
Patient feel helpless and manipulated by forces outside of his control.
I can give it to you frontwards, backwards, in three different languages.
It's like a well-rehearsed off-color gag. Patient goes from himself to a dummy and then is unable to separate himself from the dummy. That's very psychiatric and erudite and worth about 2 1/2 bucks a word, but it's not right. It's not right!
I told them that, I tell you that. It's no more schizophrenia-paranoia than it is athlete's foot or a head cold! Willy's alive!
He's a dummy! He's a block of wood.
Look at it. Does this thing look alive to you?
Well, does he?
Twenty-four inches of timber and you're shoveling yourself into a grave over it.
Now, you listen, Jerry. I've gone along with you.
I've held your hand, I've sung you lullabies, I patted you on the shoulder.
I've also covered for you the 110 performances you've run out on.
I've thought of excuses that haven't even been invented, yet.
I've gone without commission, without sleep.
And why? Because I thought I had a talented article here that eventually was gonna crawl out from under a bottle and hit it big.
Well, I don't think you're such a talented article anymore, Jerry.
Let's put it this way. Maybe I think you could be, but you're never going to.
I think you're a self-indulgent sot with an overactive imagination, and the only thing you like better than scotch is sympathy.
I'm gonna give you just 24 hours to straighten out.
Get rid of that bottle and get rid of the crazy obsession that you're battling a dummy.
Frank... he's alive.
Willy's not a dummy.
That's a dummy.
And that's the answer.
Go on.
Gotta get rid of willy, make a whole new routine.
A whole new routine takes time.
You've got another show in half an hour.
Tell them I can't make the late show. Tell them I'm sick or something.
I've already told them. The trouble is, they know it's "something."
And they know something is bottled in bond.
Jerry, you pull yourself together. And when you hear your music you be out on that stage. I don't care which dummy you bring, but you be out there.
This is one I don't cover for, Jerry.
Say, goofy goggles, why don't you have your glasses fixed?
I don't have to. My eyes are much better now.
Goofy, you're looking at the band leader. I'm over here.
Keep talking, I'll find you. Say, etherson, I've been meaning to tell you you put too much starch in my collar.
Too much starch in your collar? I'm not your laundry man.
Yeah. Yeah, we're gonna make it, you and me.
Just you and me.
Jerry. Marsha, listen to this. Make me talk, Jerry, come on.
Look, Noreen, I'm on in a couple of minutes.
Makes you sound just like willy. Come on.
Knock it off, babe, that tickles.
Willy, shut up!
Is that wild? Is that wild?
Goofy. Goofy, I think it's time you had your glasses fixed.
I really do.
My eyes are much better now.
Goofy, you're talking to the band leader. I'm over here.
Keep talking, I'll find you.
Goofy, I think you need your eyes tested.
Eyes tested?
That's right. Eyes tested.
Well, I'm ready.
All right, here.
Now, tell me what that says.
Where?
Oh. That thing. How about a hint?
Goofy, it's-it's clear as day. It's right in front of you.
Just give me a hint.
Well, it's a letter, and it's between "d" and "fef."
I've got it. It's "e."
I don't know how you do it, goofy.
I cannot tell a lie. I memorized it.
Oh, for goodness' sake. Sing your song, will you?
Are the stars out tonight?
I don't know if it's cloudy or bright
'cause I only have eyes cute act, isn't it, Georgie?
What's cute about it?
Besides, I liked the old dummy better. Why did he change it?
You know, brightens it up a little. Gives it some novelty.
Novelty? With a ventriloquist?
Frankie, you've seen one, you've seen them all.
Every dummy looks the same. And if just once they changed the jokes, I'd have a coronary.
What's with etherson, anyway?
What do you mean?
Usually the acts mix with the trade, you know, walk down on the floor, do a little drinking with the customers.
This guy plays it like Greta Garbo.
Locks himself up in his room like a prima Donna.
Well, he's nervous tonight.
Why?
You know, he hasn't been well. It's his first night out in a month or so.
Give him a chance, Georgie. He'll warm up for you.
Well, you tell him to. Tell him to bring the dummy out and walk around the tables after the show.
It's, uh, psychological, Frankie.
Makes people thirsty.
Sweet dreams, willy.
Your next booking is in the fireplace.
You leaving?
What's it look like, frank?
It looks like you're leaving.
I waited for you after the last show.
Georgie was hoping you'd mix with the customers.
You tell Georgie I'm a ventriloquist, not a shill.
Why don't you tell him?
What does that mean?
That means I'm resigning from the club.
You keep your ten percent, and I'll keep my self-respect.
Also my sense of humor, my regular meals, my normal working hours.
You and I have had it, Jerry.
I have gone the route and then some.
You don't need an agent. You need medical help.
I think it's reached that now.
You never believed me, did you, frank?
Yeah, I believed you.
I believed you had obsessions. I believe those obsessions were eating you up alive but I also believe, Jerry, you're letting them.
He talks when I don't talk.
He tells jokes I never heard of before, gives me bum cues.
He's alive, frank. That's why I locked him in that trunk.
Goofy and I are gonna fly out of here, frank.
We'll fly to Miami, los Angeles, maybe that place in Kansas city.
The place in Kansas city is the same as Miami, which is the same as los Angeles which is the same as Sioux city, Iowa, which is the same as any town south, west, north of here.
They're all the same, Jerry. And you're not gonna leave willy by hopping a plane or a train, or a taxi or a one-horse shay.
This thing you lick right here.
This thing you lick at the source.
This thing you don't run away from.
We'll see.
Good night, mr. Etherson.
Good night, Ralph.
You're not gonna leave me in a stuffy old trunk, are you?
Was there something, mr. Etherson?
Did you say something?
Is said good night, that's all.
Good night.
Aw, come on, old sport. I wouldn't lock you in a trunk.
Willy?
Where are you, willy?
Jerry?
Good night, Jerry.
Good night.
Hey, Garibaldi!
Didn't you forget someone?
Didn't you forget willy?
Jerry?
Noreen. Oh.
Noreen, I was waiting for you.
Yeah, that's right.
I was waiting for you.
The line is, "this is so sudden."
And in this case, it happens to be sudden.
No, I-I was waiting for you because I-I want to have a drink with you, Noreen, or maybe a sandwich or something, you know?
Noreen, you're a good kid, and I've always thought you were a good kid, and I've always wanted to...
Easy, Jerry. Easy!
Honey, listen. Wait a minute, Noreen, look.
What's the matter with you, Jerry?
There's nothing the matter with me. No, I'm not sick.
I just wanna have a drink with you. I don't wanna be alone.
I keep hearing those voices and willy is bugging me.
No, wait a minute! Willy is bugging me wait a minute!
What do you say, stranger?
You slumming?
A funny thing happened to me on the way to the club tonight.
! Was out in front of the Ritz-savoy.
That's where I live. Out in front of the Ritz-savoy.
Come out, come out, wherever you are.
Hey, wise guy.
Hey! Wise guy!
The wrong one.
How could I get the wrong one?
Maybe you need glasses.
Why don't you take the eye test?
Now, what am I holding out in front of me? I'll give you a hint.
It's between "d" and "f." Don't peek. Don't peek.
What do you say, partner? What do you say?
What do you say we get down to business?
You're real.
How can you be real when you're made of wood?
You made me real. You poured words into my head.
You moved my mouth. You stuck out my tongue.
You jerk, don't you get it?
You made me what I am today.
I hope you're satisfied.
From the song, of the same name.
And now, direct from new york city, the funniest pair of cuckoos you'll ever see here in Kansas city or anyplace else, Jerry and willy. Let's bring them out big, folks.
How do you do, folks? How do you do?
A funny thing happened to me on the way over to the club tonight. I met this broad.
Now, Jerry, you don't mean "broad." You mean "lady."
Oh, look, chum, you just write the jokes and I'll tell them, okay?
Well, anyway, I met this broad coming down the street.
It was a broad street.
What's known in the parlance of the times as the old switcheroo. From boss to blockhead in a few, uneasy lessons.
And if you're given to nightclubbing on occasion, check this act.
It's called willy and Jerry, and they generally are booked into some of the clubs along the gray night way known as the twilight zone.
Rod serling, creator of the twilight zone, will tell you about next week's story after this message.
And now, Mr. Serling.
Next week through the good offices of mr. Richard Matheson we tell you a story of a young man's fancy, which is kind of a euphemistic description of a mortal combat between the living and the dead, between the present and the past, between Miss Phyllis thaxter and Mr. Alex nicol.
The battleground is this old house, and its front door will be opened to you next week on the twilight zone.
Hello, tree.
Trees are everybody's friends. Remember, only you can prevent forest fires.