Static (The Twilight Zone)

Plot

Ed Lindsay, an embittered bachelor in his late fifties, living in a boarding house, is dismayed over the mindless programs and commercials emanating from the television set watched by the other residents. He retrieves from the basement an old radio which, in his younger and happier days, he enjoyed as a source of relaxation and entertainment. Installing it in his room, he is pleased to hear the radio receiving 1930s/1940s music and programs, including live performances by Edward Bowes, Fred Allen and Tommy Dorsey, all of whom are dead. He tells the others about the broadcasts but, when they come into his room, they hear only static. What's more, when he tries to contact the station ("WPDA", in fictional Cedarburg, New Jersey) broadcasting those programs, he discovers the station went off the air (and out of business) 13 years earlier.

Ed has a confrontation with Vinnie Broun (Carmen Mathews), who has lived in the same boarding house with him for two decades. In an earlier era, they had intended to marry, but he kept letting other things interfere, and too much time passed. She tells him that the past cannot be recovered and he should let it go, and that the phenomenon by which he can listen to defunct programs is nothing more than a delusion. Ed is furious and he throws Vinnie out of his room. His obsession with his radio continues to grow.

Worried about Ed's mental state, Vinnie and the other residents have the radio hauled away by a junk dealer. After Ed notices the radio missing and demands an explanation, he rushes out and buys the radio back from the junk dealer for $10. Ed takes the radio back to his room and, to his great relief, finds it still operational. He loses himself in an old Tommy Dorsey love song, the one he would share with Vinnie. The door to his room swings open, and Vinnie enters. Both Ed and Vinnie are young again—or rather, Ed has retreated 20 years into his past.

Cast

Opening narration

As Ed Lindsay retrieves his old radio from the boarding house basement, he says to a boy watching him, "Don't you know what a radio is?" "Sure," says the kid, "but I've never seen one like that before!" The camera then moves to show Rod Serling standing at the top of the basement steps.

"No one ever saw one quite like that, because that's a very special sort of radio. In its day, circa 1935, its type was one of the most elegant consoles on the market. Now with its fabric-covered speakers, its peculiar yellow dials, its serrated knobs, it looks quaint and a little strange. Mr. Ed Lindsay is going to find out how strange very soon when he tunes into the Twilight Zone."

Closing narration

Rod Serling's closing narration, "Around and around she goes, and where she stops nobody knows. All Ed Lindsay knows is that he desperately wanted a second chance and he finally got it, through a strange and wonderful time machine called a radio, in the Twilight Zone."