Robert Culp Rocks "The Outer Limits"

The 1950s and 1960s television landscape featured many anthology series, and a number of those shows planted their feet firmly in the genre of the fantastic: The Twilight Zone, One Step Beyond, Thriller, and Science-Fiction Theatre, to name a few. There was one short-lived show that proved to be as groundbreaking and influential as its better-known counterparts: the original version of The Outer Limits. The series was the brainchild of writer-producer Leslie (Stoney Burke) Stevens. Along with Joseph (writer of the screenplay for Psycho) Stefano, and a talented crew of actors, writers and an amazing array behind the scenes talent, they produced some of the most creative, chilling and thoughtful hours of science-fiction (often laced with horror and fantasy) on television. There are a number of episodes I could write about, but for this week, I’d like to focus on a different kind of alien invasion tale, entitled Corpus Earthling, starring Robert Culp.

Culp plays Dr. Paul Cameron, a surgeon who has a steel plate in his head as a result of a previous injury. His wife Laurie (portrayed by Salome Jens) works with geologist and researcher Jonas Temple. While visiting them in their lab, Cameron thinks he hears voices coming from a couple of rock samples they’re studying. The voices are talking about a takeover of the planet Earth. When the aliens realize Cameron can hear them due to the metal plate in his head, they try to induce him to jump from a window, but the attempt fails. Cameron thinks he’s going crazy; and neither Jonas nor Laurie can hear the voices. But does that mean they aren't there?

Laurie (Salome Jens) and the alien invaders

After Laurie and Paul leave, one of the interstellar rocks takes over Dr. Temple’s body. Now possessed by the aliens, he is driven to search out Laurie and Paul, who’ve left town for a few days so Paul can rest. Temple (played by Barry Atwater, who later went on to portray vampire Janos Skorzeny in the classic telefilm The Night Stalker) follows the couple, and Laurie is taken over as well. The now transformed Temple and Laurie both cause Cameron to doubt himself, and his life becomes a living nightmare. Cameron must make some difficult choices, as he’s the only one standing between the aliens and their plan to conquer Earth. Alien rocks taking over the Earth may sound like a silly premise, but the straight-forward treatment of the idea and stark look of the episode bring the idea home. It's a nicely-crafted tale, written by Orin Bortsen, based on a story by Louis Charbonneau.

The Outer Limits was always noir-inspired, baroque and Gothic in its look and feel, due in no small part to the inspired work of cinematographer Conrad Hall (who later went on to win several Oscars) and director Gerd Oswald, who both contributed to a significant number of episodes. The dark atmosphere gives life to the hellish experience of Paul Cameron, who’s well played by Culp, especially in the creepy scene when he discovers the now-transformed Laurie, who both tempts and repels him in equal measure. Culp appeared in two other excellent episodes of the show, The Architects of Fear, and the Hugo award-winning Demon with a Glass Hand, which was penned by the late Harlan Ellison.

If you’re looking for something a little different in your classic science-fiction television diet, give The Outer Limits a try. There was no on-camera host for the show, just an eerie control voice proclaiming “There is nothing wrong with your television set…” The series lasted a season and a half, and boasts an unusually high number of quality episodes for such a short-lived run. Other stars that appeared on memorable episodes of the series include Martin Landau, Sally Kellerman, David McCallum and Robert Duvall. There’s an excellent website devoted to the series called We Are Controlling Transmission, which can be found here: http://wearecontrollingtransmission.blogspot.com. Episodes of the show can be found on Hulu, and the first season of the series was recently released on Blu-Ray by Kino Lorber.