"Controlled Experiment"

Production Order #6 and Broadcast Order #16 Shooting Days: 27 June-2 July 1963 First Air Date: January 13, 1964

Production Credits: Writer: Leslie Stevens Director: Leslie Stevens Assistant Director: Robert H. Justman Director of Photography: John Nickolaus, Jr. Composer: Dominic Frontiere (original score with one bit from "Stoney Burke") Cast of Characters: Barry Morse as Inspector Phobos One Carroll O'Connor as Earth Caretaker Diemos Grace Lee Whitney as Carla Duveen Robert Fortier as Bert Hamil Linda Hutchins as Arleen Schnabel

Opening Narration:

"Who has not seen the dark corners of great cities, whose small and shabby creatures wander without purpose in the secret corners of the night? Without purpose? There are those whose purpose reaches far beyond our wildest dreams..."

Plotline:

Two human-like aliens study the very nature of a crime passionnel with the help of a time machine in order to save human kind from final destruction.

Closing Narration:

"Who knows? Perhaps the alteration of one small event may someday bring the end of the world. But that someday is a long way off, and until then there is a good life to be lived in the here and now."

Quote:

"This process of Earth creatures, destroying each other. This, ahh, what does it call, ahh?(...) That includes animals, ahh. (...) Oh, mu-murder, yes, of course. It's, so extraordinary, I can never remember it. Yes, deliberate obliteration. It's so fantastic. Happens only here on this weird little planet... nowhere else in the entire galaxy."

—Inspector Phobos One (Barry Morse)

Comments:

Barry Morse ("The Fugitive/Space: 1999") is timorous, flegmatic and rationalist Inspector Phobos One (in ancient Greek, "phobos" means fear what may explain its reactions) who analyzes human behaviour patterns—he handles a statue of a German WW II soldier in the pawnshop's outpost—and discovers Earthman way of life (coffee & cigarettes). Pre-"Point Blank" Carroll O'Connor plays Diemos: a retired person-like Earth Caretaker who gives up all hopes concerning the human species ("Well, there's nothing to make... It's their way of life: bang, you're dead!"). Pre-"Star Trek" Grace Lee Whitney plays high-heels killing beauty Carla Duveen (a kind of angry Marilyn Monroe or when Eros turns into Thanatos, if you like) who guns her husband down with grace ("two-faced, no good, black-hearted two-timer"). Pre-"Incubus" Robert Fortier plays skirt-chasing Burt Hamil (aka Mr. Motion because he can act and mime in many speeds). The cheapest episode (a hundred thousand dollars) that is filmed in four and a half days and much better than the most expensive turkey of the season: "Tourist Attraction". Watch this one with "The Marriage-Go-Around" to witness Stevens' knack for comedy. It's tongue-in-cheek all the way but it's still amusing. This is an old fashion unpretendious actor episode which tackles the time travelling in a light way with effective optical effects (a series of time backwards with negative reverse and garish strobing flashlight style and a magical use of the editing: slow motion shots and freeze frames). One of the rare one that steps into satire and critizes the capitalist system, especially when Inspector Phobos One describes a dollar bill in a puzzled way and concludes by saying: "What does it all mean?". The template of the leading characters is based on "Lettres persanes", a 1721 satiristic novel by French philosopher Montesquieu, that deals with the detached viewpoint of two foreigner travelers who study and criticize the morals and customs of the French society. As in the pilot "The Galaxy Being" and also "The Guests", Earthmen are considered as dangerous by aliens owing to their atomic weaponry. There's a slight plot analogy with "The Man Who Was Never Born", when the Martian authority explains that Burt Hamil must die because his son will become a dictator and devastate the Earth as Bertram Cabot, Jr. with the bacteria. And as in "The Human Factor" or "O.B.I.T.", a machine is manipulated by a scientist (Phobos One) to probe the brain of a subject (Carla Duveen) and, here, for identification but in a comic way (Phobos One: "State your name!" - Carla Duveen: "Yes, sir, buddy boy... What, What's my name got to do with it? I must loose my marbles. What is my name?"). Notice the pawnshop's set where you can observe the suspended instruments from "The Galaxy Being". Parts of the music from this episode has been recycled for Leslie Stevens' film: Incubus. One electric bass jazzy cue is already present in a "Stoney Burke" episode ("Point of Honor"). TV Analogy: In the episode from "The Twilight Zone", "Will The Real Martian Please Stand Up?", the main character, played by John Hoyt as Martian Ross, also makes reference to the delight of coffeine and nicotine. Notes: Leslie Stevens is the Martian computer control "Probability voice". Robert Fortier also plays in "Production and Decay of Strange Particles" and "Demon With a Glass Hand".