The Bard (The Twilight Zone)

"**The Bard**"
"The Bard"
The Twilight Zone episode
	Burt Reynolds and John Williams in a scene from "The Bard"
Episode no.	Season 4; Episode 18
Directed by	David Butler
Written by	Rod Serling
Featured music	Fred Steiner
Production code	4852
Original air date	May 23, 1963
Guest appearances
	Jack Weston ; John Williams ; Burt Reynolds ; Henry Lascoe ; John McGiver ; Howard McNear ; Judy Strangis ; Marge Redmond ; Doro Merande ; William Lanteau ; Clegg Hoyt ; John Newton; John Bose; Rudy Bowman ;
Episode chronology
← Previous; "Passage on the Lady Anne"	Next →; "In Praise of Pip"
	The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series) (season 4)
	List of episodes

Last updated March 10, 2025

"The Bard" is an episode of the American anthology television series The Twilight Zone . It first aired on CBS on May 23, 1963, and was the final episode of the hour-long fourth season. A direct satire of the American television industry, the episode features a parody of Marlon Brando by Burt Reynolds, and concerns an inept screenwriter, who through the use of black magic, employs William Shakespeare as his ghostwriter.

Opening narration

You've just witnessed opportunity, if not knocking, at least scratching plaintively on a closed door. Mr. Julius Moomer, a would-be writer, who if talent came 25 cents a pound, would be worth less than car fare. But, in a moment, Mr. Moomer, through the offices of some black magic, is about to embark on a brand-new career. And although he may never get a writing credit on the Twilight Zone, he's to become an integral character in it.

Plot

A bumbling screenwriter, Julius K. Moomer, is becoming desperate for a sale after years of working on unproduced scripts. When his agent mentions that he is submitting another writer's pitch for a television series about black magic, Julius pleads to be allowed to be given first crack at the series. Knowing nothing about the subject, he attempts some research, but turns up only an actual book of black magic. While experimenting with the book, he accidentally conjures William Shakespeare, who says he is at the service of the conjurer. Deciding not to waste Shakespeare's talent on a television pilot, Julius directs him to write a film.

The producers decide that Shakespeare's script, The Tragic Cycle, though archaic to the point of being almost incomprehensible, has potential. His task finished, Shakespeare proposes to leave. Julius argues that if he stops writing now, Shakespeare will lose his chance at Hollywood fame and become forgotten. Shakespeare at last says he will attend a rehearsal for the film and stay on if it does justice to his script. At the rehearsal, he is so horrified at the revisions by the sponsor that he assaults the leading man and storms out. Julius's next assignment, a TV special on American history, seems doomed to failure until he remembers his book on black magic, and uses it to conjure up Robert E. Lee, Ulysses S. Grant, Abraham Lincoln, George Washington, Pocahontas, Daniel Boone, Benjamin Franklin, and Theodore Roosevelt to act as consultants.

Closing narration

Mr. Julius Moomer, a streetcar conductor with delusions of authorship, and if the tale just told seems a little tall, remember a thing called poetic license, and another thing called the Twilight Zone.

Cast

Jack Weston as Julius Moomer
John Williams as William Shakespeare
Burt Reynolds as Rocky Rhodes
Henry Lascoe as Gerald Hugo
John McGiver as Mr. Shannon
Howard McNear as Bramhoff
Judy Strangis as Cora
Marge Redmond as Secretary
Doro Merande as Sadie
William Lanteau as Dolan
Clegg Hoyt as Bus driver
John Newton as TV interviewer
John Bose as Daniel Boone (uncredited)
Rudy Bowman as Robert E. Lee (uncredited)

Production

CBS extended the length of The Twilight Zone 's episodes for the fourth season from 30 minutes to 1 hour.^[1] Rod Serling criticized this decision as it led to episodes being "too padded" and that On Thursday We Leave for Home was the only "effective show this season".^[2]

The Bard was produced by Herbert Hirschman, directed by David Butler, and scored by Fred Steiner.^[3] George T. Clemens was the director of photography,^[3] art direction was done by George Davis and Edward Carfagno, and Edward Curtiss was the editor.^[4] Sterling's script for The Bard was a satire of television writing^[5] and it was one of six episodes with a major appearance of a historical figure (alongside The Man in the Bottle , Back There , The Passersby , Showdown with Rance McGrew , and He's Alive ).^[6]

Jack Weston previously appeared on the show in The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street .^[7]^[8] John Williams was known for his work in Alfred Hitchcock's films.^[4] Burt Reynolds was selected to play a stand-in for Marlon Brando due to how closely he looked like Brando and his impersonation.^[9]

William Bibbiani, writing for /Film in 2023, noted that one of the script ideas proposed by Moomer was similar to Love, American Style .^[10]

Reception

The episode aired on May 23, 1963,^[3] the last one of the season.^[4] Percy Shain, writing for The Boston Globe , gave the episode 3 out of 5 stars.^[11] Francis Murphy, writing for The Oregonian , stated that the show drifted into "the worst TV show of the season" with The Bard due to Weston's poor acting and the "great idea" of the script falling "miserably flat".^[12]The Bard was listed as the second worst episode of The Twilight Zone by Paste in 2023,^[13] and /Film in 2024, only behind The Incredible World of Horace Ford in /Film's ranking^[14] and I Dream of Genie in Paste's ranking.^[13]

Emily St. James, writing for The A.V. Club , gave it a rating of A- due to Weston and Williams' acting and the humor.^[15] David Chase stated that it was one of his favorite episodes and it was included in The Sopranos episode Made in America .^[16] Marc Scott Zicree, writing in The Twilight Zone Companion , stated that the episode was "both entertaining and accurate".^[9]

References

Works cited

Books

Presnell, Don; McGee, Marty (1998). A Critical History of Television's The Twilight Zone, 1959–1964. McFarland & Company. ISBN 978-0-7864-3886-0.
Zicree, Marc (1982). The Twilight Zone Companion. Bantam Books. ISBN 0553014161.

News

Baldwin, Kristen (July 21, 2020). "The Sopranos: David Chase reveals his favorite moments in the series finale". Entertainment Weekly . Archived from the original on March 9, 2025.
Bibbiani, William (November 4, 2023). "The Twilight Zone Parodied Studio Notes By Having Shakespeare Punch Burt Reynolds". /Film . Archived from the original on March 9, 2025.
Bria, Bill (September 21, 2024). "The 5 Worst Episodes Of The Twilight Zone, Ranked". /Film . Archived from the original on March 9, 2025.
Kozak, Oktay (September 29, 2023). "Every Episode of The Twilight Zone, Ranked from Worst to Best". Paste . Archived from the original on December 7, 2024.
Murphy, Francis (May 27, 1963). "Behind The Mike". The Oregonian . p. 15 – via Newspapers.com.
Shain, Percy (May 24, 1963). "Would He Bury It TV - Or Praise It?". The Boston Globe . p. 19 – via Newspapers.com.
St. James, Emily (September 7, 2013). "The Twilight Zone: "Passage On The Lady Anne"/"The Bard"". The A.V. Club . Archived from the original on April 11, 2021.

External links

"The Bard" at IMDb

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[FOOTNOTEZicree1982296-1] Zicree 1982, p. 296.

[FOOTNOTEZicree1982360-2] Zicree 1982, p. 360.

[FOOTNOTEZicree1982339-3] 1 2 3 Zicree 1982, p. 339.

[FOOTNOTEPresnellMcGee1998158-4] 1 2 3 Presnell & McGee 1998, p. 158.

[FOOTNOTEZicree1982340,_343-5] Zicree 1982, pp. 340, 343.

[FOOTNOTEPresnellMcGee1998246-6] Presnell & McGee 1998, p. 246.

[FOOTNOTEZicree1982342-7] Zicree 1982, p. 342.

[FOOTNOTEPresnellMcGee1998230-8] Presnell & McGee 1998, p. 230.

[FOOTNOTEZicree1982343-9] 1 2 Zicree 1982, p. 343.

[FOOTNOTEBibbiani2023-10] Bibbiani 2023.

[FOOTNOTEShain1963-11] Shain 1963.

[FOOTNOTEMurphy1963-12] Murphy 1963.

[FOOTNOTEKozak2023-13] 1 2 Kozak 2023.

[FOOTNOTEBria2024-14] Bria 2024.

[FOOTNOTESt._James2013-15] St. James 2013.

[FOOTNOTEBaldwin2020-16] Baldwin 2020.

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v t e The Twilight Zone (1959) episodes
Season 1	"Where Is Everybody?" "One for the Angels" "Mr. Denton on Doomsday" "The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine" "Walking Distance" "Escape Clause" "The Lonely" "Time Enough at Last" "Perchance to Dream" "Judgment Night" "And When the Sky Was Opened" "What You Need" "The Four of Us Are Dying" "Third from the Sun" "I Shot an Arrow into the Air" "The Hitch-Hiker" "The Fever" "The Last Flight" "The Purple Testament" "Elegy" "Mirror Image" "The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street" "A World of Difference" "Long Live Walter Jameson" "People Are Alike All Over" "Execution" "The Big Tall Wish" "A Nice Place to Visit" "Nightmare as a Child" "A Stop at Willoughby" "The Chaser" "A Passage for Trumpet" "Mr. Bevis" "The After Hours" "The Mighty Casey" "A World of His Own"
Season 2	"King Nine Will Not Return" "The Man in the Bottle" "Nervous Man in a Four Dollar Room" "A Thing About Machines" "The Howling Man" "Eye of the Beholder" "Nick of Time" "The Lateness of the Hour" "The Trouble with Templeton" "A Most Unusual Camera" "The Night of the Meek" "Dust" "Back There" "The Whole Truth" "The Invaders" "A Penny for Your Thoughts" "Twenty Two" "The Odyssey of Flight 33" "Mr. Dingle, the Strong" "Static" "The Prime Mover" "Long Distance Call" "A Hundred Yards Over the Rim" "The Rip Van Winkle Caper" "The Silence" "Shadow Play" "The Mind and the Matter" "Will the Real Martian Please Stand Up?" "The Obsolete Man"
Season 3	"Two" "The Arrival" "The Shelter" "The Passersby" "A Game of Pool" "The Mirror" "The Grave" "It's a Good Life" "Deaths-Head Revisited" "The Midnight Sun" "Still Valley" "The Jungle" "Once Upon a Time" "Five Characters in Search of an Exit" "A Quality of Mercy" "Nothing in the Dark" "One More Pallbearer" "Dead Man's Shoes" "The Hunt" "Showdown with Rance McGrew" "Kick the Can" "A Piano in the House" "The Last Rites of Jeff Myrtlebank" "To Serve Man" "The Fugitive" "Little Girl Lost" "Person or Persons Unknown" "The Little People" "Four O'Clock" "Hocus-Pocus and Frisby" "The Trade-Ins" "The Gift" "The Dummy" "Young Man's Fancy" "I Sing the Body Electric" "Cavender Is Coming" "The Changing of the Guard"
Season 4	"In His Image" "The Thirty-Fathom Grave" "Valley of the Shadow" "He's Alive" "Mute" "Death Ship" "Jess-Belle" "Miniature" "Printer's Devil" "No Time Like the Past" "The Parallel" "I Dream of Genie" "The New Exhibit" "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville" "The Incredible World of Horace Ford" "On Thursday We Leave for Home" "Passage on the Lady Anne" "The Bard"
Season 5	"In Praise of Pip" "Steel" "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" "A Kind of a Stopwatch" "The Last Night of a Jockey" "Living Doll" "The Old Man in the Cave" "Uncle Simon" "Probe 7, Over and Out" "The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms" "A Short Drink from a Certain Fountain" "Ninety Years Without Slumbering" "Ring-a-Ding Girl" "You Drive" "The Long Morrow" "The Self-Improvement of Salvadore Ross" "Number 12 Looks Just Like You" "Black Leather Jackets" "Night Call" "From Agnes—With Love" "Spur of the Moment" "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge" "Queen of the Nile" "What's in the Box" "The Masks" "I Am the Night—Color Me Black" "Sounds and Silences" "Caesar and Me" "The Jeopardy Room" "Stopover in a Quiet Town" "The Encounter" "Mr. Garrity and the Graves" "The Brain Center at Whipple's" "Come Wander with Me" "The Fear" "The Bewitchin' Pool"