The Twilight Zone: A Game of Pool

Some time ago I came across a website called The Billiards Tour that has a list of movies about pool, among many other things. I set about googling them and was stoked to find a few of them were availabe on Netflix. One in particular, an old episode of The Twilight Zone, caught my attention. It's called "A Game of Pool" and it features Jack Klugman and Jonathan Winters. It originally aired October 13, 1961, which I just checked and found out was less than three weeks after the release of The Hustler.

In "A Game of Pool" Klugman plays Jesse Cardiff (above), a pool player who has more or less dedicated his life to the game. He feels, however, that his talent is overshadowed by that of the late, legendary James Howard Brown, aka Fats Brown, played by Winters. In the opening scene, Jesse makes a nice four-rail billiard-type shot and then goes on to complain about how everybody still considers Fats the best player, even though he's been dead 15 years. Jesse goes over to a wall where a picture of Fats is hanging and says he'd give anything, anything to have the chance to take on Fats in a game of pool. At that moment, Fats is shown playing at his purgatorial pool table. Like a doctor being paged in a hospital, a voice comes over the loudspeaker and summons Fats to report to "Lister's Pool Room, Randolph Street, Chicago," where Jesse is the main stick.

Fats appears in a dark corner of the room and spooks Jesse by announcing "At your service." Once Jesse is over his disbelief, the two get into a bit of an argument about who is the best and what it means to be the best. Fats taunts Jesse, saying "You like to play with fire, but you don't like to cook." He calls Jesse a second-rate player, "I've seen your kind before. A little skill, a knack, a style. But when the heat's on, you fold." Jesse counters by saying Fats' reputation is way overblown, like a balloon about to be popped using a pool stick as the needle. "I heard a man in this very pool room swear that he saw you make a nine-cushion bank," Jesse says. Fats responds "And you don't believe it?" "It's impossible! You hit the ball that hard it won't stay on the table. He had more imagination than brains, huh?"

When asked about the stakes of their upcoming game, Jesse pulls out a money clip and throws it onto the table, saying "Any or all of it." Fats says money is of no use to him and instead challenges Jesse to the ultimate stakes game: "Life or Death. You beat me, and you live. You lose, and you die." Jesse says that he is not insane and would never risk his life over a game of pool. To which Fats says "You know, where I come from, there's a race driver. Go to the track and whisper his name. Say Tazio Nuvolari and watch the heads nod up and down. Or go to a bullring and hear them speak of Manolete. Both men faced death daily, and both are legends. You never make the great at anything by playing it safe."

Fats starts to leave but Jesse stops him, saying he agrees to play by the ultimatum. They go over to the table to flip a coin and Fats gets out his pool cue. He says it was made for him personally in St. Louis, that it cost him $600 and that he made his living with it for 35 years. Then he says "Name the game. Rotation? Kelly? 14.1 rack? 8 ball?" Jesse says "Let's see how good you really are. 14.1 rack, one game, 300 points."

There are lots of nice shots in the episode, some nice caroms and so forth. And there are some misses as well, intentional and otherwise. Fats turns out to be more philosophical about the game, whereas Jesse only has his mind on winning. In fact, Jesse develops a bit of an ego once he's ahead in the game 59-7. The game gets interesting at the end when Jesse is ahead 299-296. I don't want to spoil the ending, as it's kind of clever, but you can find out by going to that Billiards Tour link. I am currently in the middle of my second renting of this Twilight Zone DVD, as I wanted to write an official "review" and take some screen shots. The other two pool movies I've rented on Netflix are Stickmen and The Shooting Gallery. Stickmen was made in New Zealand and was stylishly done but is otherwise horrible. Shooting Gallery is also pretty stylish, was filmed in New Orleans and features a sweet performance by Ving Rhames. There's also a lot of pool lingo taken from the book "Playing off the Rail." But I would suggest getting "A Game of Pool" before either of these.