The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street
- Episode aired Mar 4, 1960
- TV-PG
- 25m
On a peaceful suburban street, strange occurrences and mysterious people stoke the residents' paranoia to a disastrous intensity.On a peaceful suburban street, strange occurrences and mysterious people stoke the residents' paranoia to a disastrous intensity.On a peaceful suburban street, strange occurrences and mysterious people stoke the residents' paranoia to a disastrous intensity.
- Narrator
- (voice)
- Mrs. Goodman
- (as Lea Waggner)
- Alien
- (as William Walsh)
- Townswoman
- (uncredited)
- Ice-Cream Vendor
- (uncredited)
- Director
- Writer
- Rod Serling(uncredited)
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Storyline
Did you know
- TriviaThe location used for Maple Street was later reused as the abandoned town in Stopover in a Quiet Town (1964).
- GoofsWhen the neighbors go over to talk to Les Goodman about his car starting, as he walks onto his porch, you can see his address is 321, and there is a porch light. When he starts to explain his insomnia, you can see there are just holes on the front of the house where the address and light were. Then, as night falls and his wife brings his a glass of milk on the porch, the address and light are there again.
- Quotes
Narrator: [Closing Narration] The tools of conquest do not necessarily come with bombs and explosions and fallout. There are weapons that are simply thoughts, attitudes, prejudices to be found only in the minds of men. For the record, prejudices can kill, and suspicion can destroy, and a thoughtless frightened search for a scapegoat has a fallout all of its own for the children, and the children yet unborn. And the pity of it is that these things cannot be confined to the Twilight Zone.
- ConnectionsEdited from Forbidden Planet (1956)
Serling takes on mob psychology in this cautionary tale about an ordinary American neighborhood with average looking people (a well-chosen cast for that effect), going about normal activities. An unusual noise followed by mysterious electrical stoppage soon has these same normal families in the street looking for those among them who may be disguised space monsters. Premise plays pretty well, considering production crew only has twenty-plus minutes to unravel a whole community, which they do, especially with a series of montage close-ups to convey the mounting hysteria. First one neighbor falls under suspicion, then another, as the most innocent daily activities suddenly become suspicious in the climate of fear, which is probably the most unnerving part of the story. The script does a good job of showing how the most ordinary pursuits can be reinterpreted as sinister undertakings once mob psychology takes over. No doubt, those familiar with the 50's will see a subtext paraphrasing the anti-communist hysteria of the time. However you take it, the theme remains an important and timely one.
- dougdoepke
- Jul 22, 2006
Details
- Runtime25 minutes
- Color
- Aspect ratio
- 1.33 : 1