The Masks

"**The Masks**"
"The Masks"
The Twilight Zone episode
Episode no.	Season 5; Episode 25
Directed by	Ida Lupino
Written by	Rod Serling
Featured music	Stock from A Thing About Machines
Production code	2601
Original air date	March 20, 1964
Guest appearances
	Robert Keith; Milton Selzer; Virginia Gregg; Brooke Hayward; Alan Sues; Willis Bouchey; Bill Walker; Maidie Norman;
Episode chronology
← Previous; "What's in the Box"	Next →; "I Am the Night—Color Me Black"
	The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series) (season 5)
	List of episodes

"The Masks" is episode 145 of the American television series The Twilight Zone. It originally aired on March 20, 1964 on CBS. In this episode, set on Mardi Gras, a dying man coerces his relatives into wearing grotesque masks that reflect their true personalities.

Plot

Mr. Jason Foster, a tired ancient who on this particular Mardi Gras evening will leave the Earth. But before departing, he has some things to do, some services to perform, some debts to pay—and some justice to mete out. This is New Orleans, Mardi Gras time. It is also the Twilight Zone.
— Opening narration by Rod Serling

On the night of Mardi Gras, a wealthy old man named Jason Foster is attended by his physician, Dr. Sam Thorne, who warns him that his death is imminent. Cranky and candid, Jason is not cheered by the arrival of his daughter Emily Harper and her family: husband Wilfred, son Wilfred Jr., and daughter Paula. All four have terrible traits: Emily is a cowardly hypochondriac who whines about her perceived ailments; Wilfred, a successful businessman, is greedy, thinking of everything in monetary terms; Paula is vain, constantly checking her appearance in the mirror; and Wilfred Jr. is an oafish, sadistic bully who enjoys causing pain and suffering.

Jason is not shy about his opinions and openly insults each of them. He says he has a special Mardi Gras party planned for the group that night. After dinner, the family gathers in Jason's study where he instructs them to put on special one-of-a-kind masks, which he says are "crafted by an old Cajun". Explaining that an old Mardi Gras custom involves wearing a mask that is the opposite of one's true personality, Jason sarcastically gives one to each person: a sniveling coward for Emily, a miserable miser to Wilfred, a twisted buffoon to Wilfred Jr., and a self-obsessed narcissist to Paula. He dons a skull mask, saying that it represents death as opposed to his life. The others refuse to participate at first, but Jason rightfully accuses them of only being there to claim his fortune upon his death. He informs them that his will is drawn up so that they inherit everything, but only if they wear their masks until midnight. They reluctantly concede and put on their masks.

As the hours tick by, all four beg to be allowed to take off the masks, saying that they are unbearable. Their pleas are wasted on Jason, who delivers a final tirade to his family as the clock strikes midnight. "Without your masks, you're caricatures!" he says as he dies. The four rejoice in their newly inherited wealth and unmask, but discover to their horror that their faces now conform to the hideous features of the masks. Jason's face, on the other hand, proves to be superficially unchanged. Dr. Thorne observes, "This must be death. No horror, no fear, nothing but peace."

Mardi Gras incident, the dramatis personae being four people who came to celebrate and in a sense let themselves go. This they did with a vengeance. They now wear the faces of all that was inside them—and they'll wear them for the rest of their lives, said lives now to be spent in the shadow. Tonight's tale of men, the macabre and masks, on the Twilight Zone.
— Closing narration by Rod Serling

Cast

Robert Keith as Jason Foster
Milton Selzer as Wilfred Harper
Virginia Gregg as Emily Harper
Brooke Hayward as Paula Harper
Alan Sues as Wilfred Harper Jr.
Willis Bouchey as Dr. Samuel Thorne
Bill Walker as Jeffrey The Butler
Maidie Norman as Maid
Rod Serling as Host / Narrator – Himself

Episode notes

"The Masks" was directed by Ida Lupino, who had starred in the first-season episode "The Sixteen-Millimeter Shrine".

References

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

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"