Twilight Zone "A game of pool"

Gerry

Gerry

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
The SciFi channel is having a new year twilight zone-athon today and at 3:30 EST our favorite episode is on....."a game of pool"

Happy new year everyone!

G.
 
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Gerry said:
The SciFi channel is having a new year twilight zone-athon today and at 3:30 EST our favorite episode is on....."a game of pool"

Happy new year everyone!

G.
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is that the one with johnathan winters and jack klugman aka oscar?
 
Gerry said:
yup, thats the one!............set the tivo!
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i had twilight zone on last nite,
already watching it again this morning
tv was a helluva lot better in the 1960's :)
i get a big kick out of seeing a lot of the "unknown" actors then
there's one with jack nicholson, looks like he was still in high school
 
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thanks for the heads up --- somebody on AZ had a great quote/sig line from that episode...maybe watching it will jog my middle-aged memory :confused:
 
There was another pool related episode of Twilight Zone featuring Cliff Robertson, I believe, as a retired pool player who attempts to hustle a gangster-type for the $5,000 he needs for his wife's hospital bills. Does anyone remember the name of the episode? My cable co. has just generic descriptions for today's episodes in their directory, so I'm unable to see if it's included in today's broadcast schedule.
Bill
 
I may be mistaken but I believe that Cliff Robinson starred in Goodbye Johnny. This was the film that was given to Playboy in 1959 and was the beginning of the movie the Hustler. I don't think that this is what you were referring to.:)
 
billyjack...Cliff Robertson starred in only two episodes of Twilight Zone, and neither of them was about pool. Check it out on IMDB.com.

Scott Lee
www.poolknowledge.com

billyjack said:
There was another pool related episode of Twilight Zone featuring Cliff Robertson, I believe, as a retired pool player who attempts to hustle a gangster-type for the $5,000 he needs for his wife's hospital bills. Does anyone remember the name of the episode? My cable co. has just generic descriptions for today's episodes in their directory, so I'm unable to see if it's included in today's broadcast schedule.
Bill
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Maybe it was "Alcoa Theater", another half-hour drama from the late 50's-early 60's. I remember seeing it on one of those New Years Day retro broadcasts a few years ago. Coulda possibly been Rod Taylor. I remember the episode ending with the broken cue and case lying on the curb as the Hustler character is driven away in the mobster's car. "Goodbye Johnny" sure sounds familiar. I also remember that a newsboy delivering the paper spoiled the hustler's masquerade.

Bill
 
billyjack said:
Maybe it was "Alcoa Theater", another half-hour drama from the late 50's-early 60's. I remember seeing it on one of those New Years Day retro broadcasts a few years ago. Coulda possibly been Rod Taylor. I remember the episode ending with the broken cue and case lying on the curb as the Hustler character is driven away in the mobster's car. "Goodbye Johnny" sure sounds familiar. I also remember that a newsboy delivering the paper spoiled the hustler's masquerade.

Bill
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It was Alcoa Theater and Cliff Robertson. Here's the IMDB link. Being driven away in the gangster's car sounds like the short story written by Walter Tevis, but he's given no writing credit.
 
billyjack said:
Maybe it was "Alcoa Theater", another half-hour drama from the late 50's-early 60's. I remember seeing it on one of those New Years Day retro broadcasts a few years ago. Coulda possibly been Rod Taylor. I remember the episode ending with the broken cue and case lying on the curb as the Hustler character is driven away in the mobster's car. "Goodbye Johnny" sure sounds familiar. I also remember that a newsboy delivering the paper spoiled the hustler's masquerade.

Bill
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"Goodbye Johnny" is correct, here's a link to the video http://www.guba.com/watch/3000090299
 
daphish1 said:
"Goodbye Johnny" is correct, here's a link to the video http://www.guba.com/watch/3000090299
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I watched it - thanks a lot for the link. It was the first version of The Hustler that Walter Tevis' wrote for Playboy. The short story is reprinted in Robert Byrne's book of pool stories. Some slight changes - he hadn't been away in prison, has a wife that needs an operation, the young boy has become "Pop". Otherwise the same.

I thought I recognized Willie Mosconi's hands doing the shots for Cliff Robertson. It was clear that neither Cliff nor Harold Stone could play on their own.
 
ok, who caught the rule bending in the twilight zone episode?? jack klugman didn't really win that game did he?
 
larrynj1 said:
ok, who caught the rule bending in the twilight zone episode?? jack klugman didn't really win that game did he?
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It is a TV show son. TCOM was a movie.:cool:

LOL

Ken
 
larrynj1 said:
ok, who caught the rule bending in the twilight zone episode?? jack klugman didn't really win that game did he?
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One thing I noticed was that the game was clearly 14.1, as evidenced by the opening safety shot, but when they each needed one, they both shot at the final ball of the rack without reracking.
 
sjm said:
One thing I noticed was that the game was clearly 14.1, as evidenced by the opening safety shot, but when they each needed one, they both shot at the final ball of the rack without reracking.
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Except the one time they showed Winters shoot the 1 ball into the corner off the pack to break them. I liked the one where Klugman has a completely open table and chooses to bank a ball 3 rails into the side pocket!

Also, I got a chuckle whenever either player had to describe to the other player what was happening on the table. "The opening break is a disadvantage for the shooter, so I'm going to skim the pack and leave you without anything at all to shoot."

I hadn't seen this episode in awhile and have to admit it was pretty lame. We can all be nostalgic because it was actually about pool, but couldn't they have done just a little better? I mean, even the last shot was a completely different length shot than what it appeared to be originally. There is a person who is supposed to maintain "continuity" from one edit to another, and didn't bother with details like that.
 
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