George Clayton Johnson: Master Storyteller SDCC panel, 23 July 2023.
In 2012, I had the honor of being in the audience for a memorial tribute to one of Comic-Con’s founders, Richard Alf. And when I heard the introduction for one of the speakers, it immediately got my attention. The next person up to the lectern was this older elfin man with long gray hair and a full length beard. He had on a vest and Panama hat and, when he spoke, he seemed more wizard than elf. He had just been introduced with the longest list of credits I’d ever heard at Comic-Con. George Clayton Johnson had written for many of the leading television shows of the 1950s into the 1970s, including the biggest of pop culture icons, The Twilight Zone and Star Trek. George began his career by co-writing the story that was the basis of the Rat Pack classic, Ocean’s Eleven. And here he was, essentially the last man standing of a certain group of writers who would launch into the world the modern horror and dark fantasy genres we take for granted today. Fast forward a few more years, and here I am at Comic-Con leading a panel discussion of my graphic novel, George’s Run and honoring the man I was so fortunate to get to know and build a book around.
The gang’s all here: David Weiner, Wendy All, Mark Habegger, Henry Chamberlain, Phil Yeh, Martin Olson, and Marc Zicree.
The panelists all came through with flying colors. It felt like the gang was all here. That’s because they were, coming from various locales, all assembled to speak about George and basically help me launch my book.
This is the book for any fan of comics, pop culture, and great stories!
Heck, it’s a little awkward, I suppose, being my own marketing person but I sincerely believe there is nothing quite like this book outside of, say, Tim Scioli’s own unique graphic novel tribute to another legend, Jack Kirby: King of Comics. I’m very pleased with the journey I’m on as I go about promoting the book. It is a labor of love I would have created one way or another, which I did. It was first self-published and then it got published by Rutgers University Press. It’s a process that requires grit and dedication. That’s exactly the fighting spirit that kept George going.
Me and Marc Zicree, the man who gave us The Twilight Zone Companion.
Persistence, my friends, pays off. So, when your time comes, and you’ve put in the work, you’ll be ready. For anyone out there who enjoys a good story, would like to learn from George Clayton Johnson, a true master storyteller, then read on. This is Comic-Con history! This is storytelling history! Here is the transcript to the panel as well as the video at the end.
This panel took place at San Diego Comic-Con, in Room 29CD, 12:30-1:30 pm, on Sunday, 23 July 2023. It was a pleasure to organize and I look forward to the chance to organize more panels in the future. George’s Run: A Writer’s Journey Through The Twilight Zone is published by Rutgers University Press. I am very grateful to Rutgers and to Comic-Con for supporting my vision and helping me spread the word about my book. The panel begins with an introduction where I present some context and images from the book. I then pass it on to our moderator, David Weiner.
Henry Chamberlain: This is a story about ideas and about storytelling. George and I went on an adventure together where he shared with me his secrets to great writing and the meaning of life. I got to know George pretty well and finally worked up the courage to ask for his blessing on a graphic novel about him and the unique group of writers he worked with. George approved and wished me well, encouraged my creative license. Who was George? Well, many of you pop culture fans will instantly recognize some of his best known work, like the iconic episode, “Kick the Can,” from the original Twilight Zone. George was blessed to work with some of the greatest writers of the era who essentially invented the modern horror and dark fantasy genres we take for granted today. Richard Matheson single-handedly invented the zombie genre with his novel, I Am Legend. Robert Bloch set the tone for many a personal horror novel with Psycho. George was drawn to this dark fantasy world and gave it his own more whimsical twist. In public, he always talked about his love for Ray Bradbury–which is true. I private, he also talked about something with a darker tinge. At the end of the day, George held Theodore Sturgeon in the highest esteem. I will stop there and hand over the ceremonies to our moderator, David Weiner.
At the end of the day, George held Theodore Sturgeon in the highest esteem.
“A Penny For Your Thoughts,” one of George’s landmark works, is explored in GEORGE’S RUN.
David Weiner: That was Henry Chamberlain, the author and artist of George’s Run, this delightful book we’re going to discuss along with speaking about George. I’m David Weiner, former executive editor of Famous Monsters and director of the In Search of Darkness documentaries. Let’s go down the row here and have everyone introduce themselves and how you are connected to George Clayton Johnson.
Wendy All: Hi, I’m Wendy All. I’m an artist. I first met George around 1975. It was for a meeting, at the home of magician Patrick Culliton, to discuss the direction that Comic-Con was heading in. This was still in the very early days of Comic-Con. I didn’t know George. I saw a man with long hair wearing a bright orange vest. George was sitting playing the second movement of Rachmaninoff’s piano concerto on his harmonica. That fascinated me.
Later, at the El Cortez, a bunch of us were going to lunch, and I remember that George stopped to pick up a penny he spotted on the sidewalk. He was jingling it in his pocket. This is something he would do, all the way to the very end. I recall meeting him one last time, before his death, and he was still jingling those pennies in his pocket. It was his way of recalling that very famous episode he wrote for The Twilight Zone, “A Penny For Your Thoughts.”
Marc Zicree: Hi, I’m Marc Zicree, the author of The Twilight Zone Companion, among other things. I met George when I was 16-years-0ld, around 1971-72 at a convention. This was before he had a beard, but he already had long hair. There was a wall-sized poster for the novel for Logan’s Run with his name in big letters. I had written my first book, while in college, Three Interviews on Media and Society, which featured Ron Cobb, Ted Sturgeon, and George Clayton Johnson. George was the impetus for The Twilight Zone Companion. I think back to how we have a changing of the guard. But it seems to me that the older generation is more interesting. I think of Ray Bradbury, and George, and we won’t see their like again.
Original page from George’s Run.
Martin Olson: Hi, I’m Martin Olson. I’m a comedy writer and author. I met Henry going back to an interview he did with me. Later on, we met in person and he had just come from talking with George. When Henry told me that, I nearly fell over. George was an idol of mine. Going back to as a child, I’ve always diligently looked at the credits after a show. George Clayton Johnson had written some of my favorites ever. I was so intrigued by him and read up on him. After Henry told me about George, we never got around to talking about my shows as I was so thrilled to just chat about George, as we’re doing today.
Phil Yeh: Hi, I’m Phil Yeh. I created a magazine, with Mark Eliot, called Uncle Jam, and we have the issue available today which features an interview with did George for anyone who is interested. I was at the first Comic-Con and somewhere along the way, maybe at the El Cortez hotel, I became friends with George. He would speak to anyone. And, when you’re young, it’s nice to have someone older who will listen to you. George told me about a convention he wanted to do featuring him, called Clayton-Con, and I did the graphics for it. Over the years, George would come to our booth. And I always loved his enthusiasm.
Mark Habegger: Hi, I’m Mark Habegger, a writer and filmmaker. I probably have the shortest association with George. I became involved with Comics Fest, beginning with the first one in 2012, which was Mike Towry’s brainchild, a way to bring back the original Comic-Con vibe. George was part of that. Wendy did a recreation of George’s Cafe Frankenstein. The following year, I interviewed George for about an hour in order to help archive memories of the history of Comic-Con. It was just me and George in a white room. Once we started, he completely lit up. He was a storyteller who needed an audience. It didn’t matter if it was an audience of one or a thousand, he was going to tell his stories. You can find my interview at Comic-Con Kids.
David Weiner: Henry, you wrote George’s Run because George had a profound impact upon you. Please speak to the origins of your project and why it is so personal for you.
Henry Chamberlain: I’m a cartoonist and I’m always looking for a project to sink my teeth into, preferably a full-length graphic novel. I used to do comic strips, going back to working on my college paper, but I always wanted to take things further. I had done some graphic novel work in the past. When I went to a memorial tribute to one of Comic-Con’s founders, Richard Alf, in 2012, I was so impressed with the introduction given to this one speaker, George Clayton Johnson. He’d written for all the leading television shows of the era: Alfred Hitchcock Presents, Route 66, Honey West, and then the biggest ones, The Twilight Zone, and Star Trek. He began by writing the story that was the basis for the Rat Pack classic, Ocean’s Eleven; and he capped his career as the co-author of the cult classic novel, Logan’s Run. I instantly imagined this being a graphic novel if handled in just the right way, paying attention to various connections.
I approached George that night and we instantly got to talking. We ended up doing some podcast interviews, chatted on the phone, and got to spend some time at his home. I imagine you could say that I had around 20 interactions with him, some long, some short. Spending time with George in his own home was very much a Forry Ackerman (founder of Famous Monsters) thing to do, inviting people into your home.
I think about George all the time, during the week, perhaps not every day, but he’s a guiding light. I want to honor him. I feel his presence here.
David Weiner: How is a graphic novel the ultimate platform for all the stories you’re telling here?
Henry Chamberlain: I hope that folks will pick up on what I’m doing. It’s like the world you create in a prose novel or a painting. I got into a zone and dug deep and, I believe the reader will sense the dedication. Even my harshest critic can’t say that my work seems to have been rushed. I put a lot of work into it, connecting the dots. The whole experience is at a reader’s pace, the sort of cerebral vibe you can get in a daydream. Which seems fitting considering that George loved calling himself a “professional daydreamer.”
David Weiner: The initial motivation for George’s work as a writer, and he struggled a bit, was to talk a big name. George was with a group of writers who ultimately dubbed themselves, “The Group,” who were spectacular names, on the page and screen. Henry, and we can open this up to the rest of the panel, talk a bit about The Group and their influence on writer’s today.
Henry Chamberlain: George held his own with the other writers because he was a voracious reader. It may be lost to history but I don’t believe that George ever wrote for the pulps while all the other writers in The Group had cut their teeth on pulp fiction. George had to prove himself and he relished that. He’d talk about how everyone in The Group would regularly lay it all out, size each other up, and spill their guts out to each other. I’m not sure about every detail but I do know that, from the start, George was fortunate to become friends with Charles Beaumont since Beaumont was the key to gain entry into the rest of The Group, as well as the smaller core group.
The Core of The Group!
Wendy All: I can share about George and The Group. George hitchhiked across the country and he knew he wanted to end up in L.A. and he knew he wanted to end up with Ray Bradbury. So, he got into that group of writers, centered around Ray Bradbury, which included Charles Beaumont, who happened to live upstairs from the apartment my husband was renting in North Hollywood. Playboy magazine was paying $200 per story and, in those days, that was a lot of money. Bradbury had figured out a formula to sell stories. So, yeah, the writers would gather and critique each others’ work.
Marc Zicree: I just want to jump in and say that science fiction is unique, in a certain way. The fans who go on to become professionals don’t shut the door on the fans attempting to move up. If you want to meet someone in the science fiction and fantasy genres, whether an actor or a writer, they are there for the fans.
Ray Bradbury grew up as a fan of Ray Harryhausen and Forry Ackerman. Later, Bradbury became a mentor to Richard Matheson, Charles Beaumont, and George Clayton Johnson, core writers, under Rod Serling, on The Twilight Zone. So, to have George in that circle, he was in the perfect fertile field for a writing career.
What I learned from George is that you can write one story on one show that is so well-written that it can have an impact on someone’s life that can last forever.
David Weiner: There’s that elusive ingredient you talk about in your book, Henry, that this group of writers strove for, that “touch of strange.” Can you tell us about it?
Henry Chamberlain: Rod Serling, under contract, wrote the majority of the episodes of The Twilight Zone, 80 percent for the first season alone; and around 70 percent of the episodes for the whole run of the series, which made sense considering his caliber of writing. And then there was that 30 percent to which Serling granted access to this select group of writers. Here’s the rub, it wasn’t easy to describe what exactly these writers were pursuing. It wasn’t just science fiction, or horror, or social commentary. When asked, George would describe it as writing with “a touch of strange.”
Now, I like to read and I discovered the origin of this term. This is, if I do say so myself, my original discovery. The term goes back to 1898 and the short story, The Turn of the Screw, by Henry James. You’ll find it there and it basically refers to something not quite right, unnerving and unsettling. And then I come to find that Theodore Sturgeon made note of this term and named one of his own short stories after it. So, this is a very literary thing going on and it takes time to process such things. It seems as if we’ve lost the art of doing this. Of course, we haven’t exactly. It goes on–and it must. We need to celebrate this kind of thinking, and writing, every time we come across it.
David Weiner: We’re going through something that is very profound, the advent of A.I. and how that could affect writers. The nightmare scenario is that clients, who might prefer to not pay writers, could turn to A.I. Let’s talk about the writing process and the human touch. What was it about The Group, working as a group of writers versus writing alone?
Mark Habegger: I think that George was the kind of writer who saw something magical in the audience interaction with the storyteller. He saw himself as a shaman-storyteller. I think that The Group that we’re talking about, and other writing groups, like the writers he went down to Mexico with, even Cafe Frankenstein, were all opportunities to “gather around a campfire” and have an immediate interaction. I think he was a futurist-humanist. He wanted to take his forward-thinking sci-fi ideas and see how we would be affected by them, see how people would rise above it. It’s all a very human story. And I think he would have seen A.I. as a threat to all that. Not that he wouldn’t have embraced new ideas but he would have found very human ways to respond to them. None of us want to see the end of human creativity. It’s those human imperfections that inform the best art.
Wendy All: I have an example of how George would have agreed with the human factor. I asked him once how he came up with the idea for Ocean’s Eleven. He said that they (George and Jack Golden Russell) were sitting watching a grocery store being closed up. And it occurred to them how easy it would be to rob the grocery store safe. And then, George thought, may as well go where the big money is . . . go to Las Vegas. The details that George came up with were enough for the Nevada Gaming Commission to change some of its procedures. So, if you fed an A.I. computer footage of a grocery store, I don’t think it would come up with a heist movie.
Marc Zicree: Getting back to the idea of a circle of writers. I think of the energy that comes from being around other writers, great writers. I would seek out such writers, like J Michael Straczynski, James Michael Reaves, and many others–and I would then pace myself to them. It made me have to strive to do my best and really get proficient. That’s the same thing that happened with George. He came from a very impoverished background, his mother was an alcoholic. He had a very hard scrabble childhood. And he was now with all these big writers for television. A TV show on one of the Big Three networks, per episode on average, would have from 30 to 40 million viewers. Not like today at all. Charles Beaumont was at the core of all that with all of his astonishing energy. Ray Bradbury was on high as the patron saint.
When Beaumont died, at only 38, that whole circle of writers went spinning off into space. George and Bill Nolan were very good friends and went on to write together the novel, Logan’s Run. But when they go together to write a sequel, what had happened in the interim was . . . well, George was a chain smoker, of tobacco; but when the Surgeon General’s report came out, George made the switch from tobacco to weed. So, that brought on a change. George grew his hair long and became a hippie and all that. When they tried getting back to work, George had a fistful of joints that he placed in an ash tray. Bill Nolan took one look, and being so strait-laced, he shook his head and said he couldn’t work with George. That was the breakup of their collaboration with both agreeing to write their own sequels as they shared the property.
This is a case of who you are as a writer, the identity of being George Clayton Johnson, or Ray Bradbury, versus the reality of sitting down and doing the hard work of writing, having that discipline, that clarity of mind. Sometimes, when you lose that circle of colleagues, you lose something. George was extremely good at being George Clayton Johnson but, in terms of the ongoing discipline of writing, well, years ago, I read the outline to his sequel for Logan’s Run but, as far as I know, that never reached fruition. So, I think, there’s always that challenge.
David Weiner: Let’s go down the line and have panelists share with us their favorite moment or story by George Clayton Johnson, one of the great writers of that era.
Martin Olson: Well, everything that Marc, and Henry, have said about The Twilight Zone, and what I’ve come across myself is so interesting and then you add this: George wrote the very first episode of Star Trek! Are you kidding me? Then, when Steven Spielberg, of all people, decided to do a movie of The Twilight Zone, he arranged for different directors to do various classic episodes and, for his episode, Spielberg chose none other than George Clayton Johnson’s “Kick the Can.” That story was about a group of old people who, through fearing death, they discovered the secret to eternal youth. “Immortality is accessible to all of us,” that was what he was saying. “It exists forever in our memories, in our hearts, and in our minds.” That’s the strength of George’s writing.
Marc Zicree: I want to say something about “Kick the Can” in connection to The Twilight Zone movie. I was a consultant on the film. I believe it was Kathleen Kennedy I was talking with and I asked about what episode Spielberg was going to do and she said he was leaning towards doing “The Trade-ins,” about old people trading in their bodies for new ones. He wanted to do something with old people. So, I asked if he’d seen “Kick the Can.” She said she thought he had. And then I asked if he’d seen in recently. When I got a no, I immediately went to get my own copy of the episode to show it to him. It was a VHS that I taped off my TV. And he then chose to direct “Kick the Can.” What’s cool is that the payment George got for using the episode allowed him to make the last payment on his home.
A celebration of individualism!
Mark Habegger: My personal connection with George was through Comic Fest. My favorite part of my interview with George was at the very end. He was telling his stories and his son, Paul, was in the room. There’s a point when Paul ends up sitting in George’s chair, a sort of passing of the baton. Paul was chomping at the bit to get the details right on something. George gives Paul the mic and Paul goes on to talk about the artist group that George traveled with to Mexico. It was a very fortuitous way to end the interview. I think this idea of gathering around like a tribe, being around the kids at Comic-Con, was something that George loved.
George Clayton Johnson
Phil Yeh: When George would come by our booth at Comic-Con, most of time people had no idea who George was. But he would talk, and all these ideas would come out of him. He was very animated. One time, I recall, one of my son’s friends was listening to George, then he went over to buy a book by George, this was like an hour later, and when he came back, George was still talking, still very lively. George was, more than anything, great about encouraging younger generations about the world of ideas.
Henry Chamberlain: I wanted to point out a few things before we wrap up. There’s a collection of the work by George Clayton Johnson, All of Us Are Dying, and it’s the size of an old classic thick phone book so he did do quite a lot of things beyond the well-known work. He was always looking for original ideas. He liked to say that, as human beings, we’re free agents, we could rob a bank if we chose to. He was constantly thinking up plots and scenarios. He was an idea machine. He wrote a story that was the basis for Charlie’s Angels. There’s a musical he wrote about Emile Zola. There’s a satirical play he wrote about Christopher Columbus.
Henry’s book, George’s Run, is a must-read for fans of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Twilight Zone, and Star Trek. George was in the thick of all of that. George was such an unusual character. This book is about storytelling and humanism. So, for those of you who appreciate these things, get this book, George’s Run, because it goes to the core of what happened within The Group, this celebrated writing group. It’s just a beautiful surreal brilliant graphic novel.
— Martin Olson
Marc Zicree: Well, George talked to me about his famous episode, “A Penny For Your Thoughts,” starring Dick York, about a bank teller who flips a coin and it lands on its edge. As long as that coin stays on its edge, the character has telepathic powers. He comes to listen in on the thoughts of people and finds they don’t always do what they think or vice versa. So, George actually wanted to turn that episode into a full-fledged series. Each week would follow a new person on a coin adventure. Finally, there’s one episode that features a high stakes poker game and the main character with telepatyhic powers thinks he’s going to win big. Except, in turns out, the greatest poker player in the world is Chinese, thinks in Chinese, and our hero can’t understand a word!
George was great about paying it forward. As Bradbury did. Beaumont did. And as Matheson did. As I do. The Twilight Zone Companion was my first book out of college. It was what led to my writing for television. I was 21 when I first got the idea to write the book and George encouraged me to pursue it. He introduced me to everyone he could involved with the show. Finally, I approached Rod’s widow, Carol Serling, who had turned down many professional journalists. This was only two years after Rod’s death. The book went on to great success. Years later, we were at a American Cinematheque tribute for The Twilight Zone, and I asked George why he was willing to take a chance on me, some 22-year-old kid. And he said that I seemed very intelligent and that I looked like I could pull it. If it hadn’t been for George, I wouldn’t have had a career.
George Clayton Johnson’s Cafe Frankenstein
Wendy All: I was so grateful to get a chance to honor George in 2012 at Comic Fest with my recreating George’s Cafe Frankenstein. Among George’s work, I loved “All of Us Are Dying” or “The Four of Us Are Dying.” I loved the idea of transformation. All the character had to do was concentrate and he’d change into someone else. It was interesting to read it and then seeing it on the screen.
Marc Zicree: The idea that someone could change their face, to be a shapeshifter, you see that go from “The Four of Us Are Dying” in The Twilight Zone to George’s “The Man Trap” in Star Trek. Interesting to see the shapeshifter motif cross over like that.
Martin Olson: In fact, the Star Trek story, “The Man,” was the first transgender alien story. And the whole idea of that salt vampire is a great example of George’s wild imagination.
George keeps on running!
Martin Olson: Marc, I want to say something to you. I didn’t know about the origin of your book, The Twilight Zone Companion, with George standing up for you. As a comedy writer, going back to 1980, I can tell you that every writer in a writer’s room had your book. We would read your book because it was a catalyst for great stories.
Marc Zicree: My big interest in writing The Twilight Zone Companion was the writers: how they did what they did. At the time, Bantam, my publisher wanted me to take out all the information on the writers. I told them that they could do whatever they wanted with the photographs, and I had all of them, but they’d have to leave the content on the writers alone.
Henry Chamberlain: Speaking about paying it forward, I want to thank Rutgers University Press for believing in me and my vision and publishing George’s Run. I am forever grateful to them.
Martin Olson: Henry, I want to say something about your book. I imagine that the first comic strip cartoonists were influenced by maybe three or four things, like motion pictures. Then you think about, Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Twilight Zone, and Star Trek make up the major influences on cartoonists of more recent generations. You know, without George Clayton Johnson, and people like him, there would be no Comic-Con.
Henry’s book, George’s Run, is a must-read for fans of Alfred Hitchcock Presents, The Twilight Zone, and Star Trek. George was in the thick of all of that. George was such an unusual character. This book is about storytelling and humanism. So, for those of you who appreciate these things, get this book, George’s Run, because it goes to the core of what happened within The Group, this celebrated writing group. It’s just a beautiful surreal brilliant graphic novel.
Ray Bradbury lit the fuse and a smaller core group, led by Charles Beaumont, took hold.
David Weiner: As we close out, Henry, give us some final thoughts on what George Clayton Johnson’s impact on pop culture is today. George was part of the foundation of so much of the pop culture that we love today.
Henry Chamberlain: I was asked on a radio show what I thought were the hot new science fiction writers today and I sort of drew a blank for a moment since it was such a big question. I keep coming back to the concept of “a touch of strange” and some writers have picked up on that. I think of Charles Yu, as just one example. It’s not hard science fiction we’re talking about. It’s more literary. That’s a big influence. And then there’s the love of storytelling in general. And love for the written word. The Twilight Zone was syndicated beyond belief. The local affiliate in L.A. broadcast it twice a day, at noon and at midnight. So, yeah, it ran, and still runs, very deep for people on many levels.
David Weiner: Thank you, Henry.
Henry Chamberlain: Thank you, David.
The Core of The Group!
And here is the video . . .
George’s Run: A Writer’s Journey Through The Twilight Zone is published by Rutgers University Press.
Long Live Comic-Con!
