A Kind of a Stopwatch

"A Kind of a Stopwatch"^[1] is an episode of the American television anthology series The Twilight Zone. Star Pulse ranks this as the best episode of the series.^[2]

Plot

Patrick McNulty is a self-important boor in his 40s who has accomplished very little. One day, he is summoned by his boss. He is delighted, believing that his suggestions have earned him the recognition he feels he deserves. His boss, however, says that all of McNulty's suggestions deal with fields of enterprise in which the company is not involved. The boss fires McNulty for wasting his time.

McNulty goes to a bar, where he drives away the other patrons with his opinions about a sporting event. The bar owner requests that McNulty patronize another establishment. McNulty ignores him and buys a drink for the sole remaining patron, a drunk. The drunk gives McNulty his stopwatch. Thinking it an odd gift, McNulty quickly discovers that it can stop the passage of time.

McNulty tries to show his former boss the power of the stopwatch. McNulty says it can be used to make their company the largest in the world. His boss immediately dismisses him. Before leaving, McNulty uses the stopwatch mischievously to rearrange random things in the office. Returning to the bar, he tries to demonstrate the power of the watch to the customers, but eventually realizes that only he is affected by the watch. No one else is aware that time has stopped for him alone.

McNulty attempts to rob a bank, but he drops the watch. It breaks, freezing time permanently. Unaware of a way to repair it, McNulty runs around in a panic, ultimately begging the frozen people to talk or move, vainly promising to change his ways if only they will recognize him.

Adaptation

The television episode was later adapted as an episode of The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas series—under the title "A Kind of Stopwatch"—featuring Lou Diamond Phillips in the lead role.^[3]

Parodies, pastiches, and allusions

A nearly identical premise appears in the novel The Girl, the Gold Watch & Everything. It was published in 1962 (a year before the writing of this episode) and also features a stopwatch that can freeze time.

Ideas from this episode were used in "A Little Peace and Quiet", an episode in the 1985 revival of The Twilight Zone. "The Day the Earth Didn't Move Around Very Much", a 1997 episode of the Cartoon Network series Johnny Bravo written by Seth MacFarlane, is a loose parody of "A Kind of a Stopwatch" and also mentions The Twilight Zone by name.

The Simpsons 2003 Halloween episode "Treehouse of Horror XIV" features a segment called "Stop the World, I Want to Goof Off", in which Bart and Milhouse buy a stopwatch that stops time. They use it to pull pranks on Springfield's residents.

The Fermata (ISBN 9780679415862) is a 1994 novel by Nicholson Baker. It is about a man named Arno Strine who can stop time, and uses this ability to embark on a series of sexual adventures.

References and further reading

^ "A Kind of Stopwatch" is the title on the script, two versions of which were published in As Timeless as Infinity: The Complete Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling, Volume 3, edited by Tony Albarella (Gauntlet Press, 2007). The original scripts (both versions) are part of The Rod Serling Archives at Ithaca College.
^ "Top Ten 'Twilight Zone' Episodes". Starpulse.com. 2008-07-03. Retrieved 2013-07-02.
^ "The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas: A Kind of Stopwatch". Twilightzoneradio.com. Retrieved 2013-07-02.

DeVoe, Bill. (2008). Trivia from The Twilight Zone. Albany, GA: Bear Manor Media. ISBN 978-1-59393-136-0
Grams, Martin. (2008). The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic. Churchville, MD: OTR Publishing. ISBN 978-0-9703310-9-0
Zicree, Marc Scott: The Twilight Zone Companion. Sillman-James Press, 1982 (second edition)

External links

The Rod Serling Archives at Ithaca College, The Twilight Zone, Season 5, Script 124, "A Kind of Stopwatch"
"A Kind of a Stopwatch" at IMDb

[1] "A Kind of Stopwatch" is the title on the script, two versions of which were published in As Timeless as Infinity: The Complete Twilight Zone Scripts of Rod Serling, Volume 3, edited by Tony Albarella (Gauntlet Press, 2007). The original scripts (both versions) are part of The Rod Serling Archives at Ithaca College.

[2] "Top Ten 'Twilight Zone' Episodes". Starpulse.com. 2008-07-03. Retrieved 2013-07-02.

[3] "The Twilight Zone Radio Dramas: A Kind of Stopwatch". Twilightzoneradio.com. Retrieved 2013-07-02.

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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"

Plot

Adaptation

Parodies, pastiches, and allusions

See also

References and further reading

External links