Ray Bradbury

Dinosaurs ice cream on The Ray Bradbury Theater

Ray Bradbury (1920-2012) was a writer primarily of science fiction, ranking with the likes of Isaac Asimov as one of the 20th century innovators in the field. Some of his best known works include The Martian Chronicles, Fahrenheit 451, The Illustrated Man, The Halloween Tree, and the short story "A Sound of Thunder" (a time travel tale which introduced the concept of "the butterfly effect," a minute action in the past having ripples in a changed future). Many of Bradbury's stories, in addition to other familiar science fiction concepts such as robots, space travel, and alien-human relations, deal with memory and nostalgia, both wistfully and warningly. Children in Bradbury stories are often either wise or actually menacing.

In his personal life, Bradbury was close friends with another Ray associated with science fiction and fantasy, Harryhausen. Bradbury periodically wrote in other genres, including more realistic-style novels and the screenplay for the Gregory Peck film Moby Dick. His stories were adapted for radio and films, as well as TV anthologies including Alfred Hitchcock Presents and The Twilight Zone. He later hosted his own anthology series, The Ray Bradbury Theater (1985-1992).

References

• The 1950 Bradbury story "The Veldt" (adapted multiple times on radio) deals with a family's futuristic house and an immersive playroom whose jungle setting turns out to be too vivid, with smells and sounds seeming to come from it. The children use it to have lions come to life and devour their parents. The script for Sesame Street Episode 1118 uses "The Veld"(sic) as a scene title for a more benign version of the concept: Big Bird paints a plain green grass landscape, which Susan fails to recognize until the Kids add the various mostly jungle animals they drew. However, jungle noises suddenly emanate from the artwork.

• The first issue of Muppet Magazine, in Statler and Waldorf's "At the Movies" column, covers Something Wicked This Way Comes, the 1983 film adaptation of Bradbury's 1962 novel (although the author is not named).

• It Came from Outer Space, parodied as the poster It Called from Outer Space decorating the Muppet*Vision 3D attraction, was based on an original story/script treatment by Bradbury.

Muppet Mentions

• The Ray Bradbury Theater TV anthology episode "The Handler" (1992) includes a poster for Dinosaurs ice cream on a wall, behind a sweeping worker. While set in the United States of America, the episode was shot in Australia, where Peters Ice Cream was marketing Dinosaurs ice cream.

Connections

The Ray Bradbury Theater (1985-1992):

• Eddie Albert played old Jonathan Hughes in "Touch of Petulance" (1990)
• John Bach played Travis in "A Sound of Thunder" (1989) and Lazlo in "Sun and Shadow" (1992)
• Drew Barrymore played Heather Leary in "The Screaming Woman" (1986)
• Zachary Bennett played Hank Walterson in "Black Ferris" (1990)
• Ken Blackburn played Timulty in "The Anthem Sprinters" and a policeman in "Sun and Shadow" (both 1992)
• James Coco played Braling in "Marionettes, Inc." (1985)
• Marton Csokas played Sid in "By The Numbers" (1992)
• Tyne Daly played Cora Gibbs in "Great Wide World Over There" (1992)
• Shelley Duvall played Leota Bean in "The Tombstone" (1992)
• Louise Fletcher played Miss Weldon in "The Dead Man" (1992)
• John Glover played Walter Grip in "Silent Towns" (1992)
• Jeff Goldblum played Cogswell in "The Town Where No One Got Off" (1986)
• Elliott Gould played Leo Auffmann in "The Happiness Machine" (1992)
• Harold Gould played the old man in "To the Chicago Abyss" (1989) and Colonel Stonesteel in "Colonel Stonesteel and the Desperate Empties" (1992)
• Tom Harvey played a doctor in "The Fruit at the Bottom of the Bowl" (1988)
• Howard Jerome played Van Plank in "The Concrete Mixer" (1992)
• Carol Kane played Polly in "Tomorrow's Child" (1992)
• Sally Kellerman played Clara Goodwater in "Exorcism" (1990)
• Janet-Laine Green played Mrs. Leary in "The Screaming Woman" (1986)
• Hal Linden played Captain Black in "Mars Is Heaven" (1992)
• Leslie Nielsen played Fantoccini in "Marionettes, Inc." (1985)
• Peter O'Toole played John Hampton in "Banshee" (1986)
• Gerry Parkes played Mr. Smith in "The Day It Rained Forever" (1990)
• Larry Parr directed the episode "Sun and Shadow" (1992)
• William Shatner played Charles Underhill in "The Playground" (1985)
• Jean Stapleton played Grandma in "Fee Fie Foe Fum" (1992)
• Gordon Thomson played Douglas in "The Lake" (1989)
• John Vernon played La Farge in "The Martian" (1992)
• Ron White played Walter Bean in "The Tombstone" (1992)
• Thick Wilson played the fat man in "Skeleton" (1988)

Other adaptations:

• Robert Beatty played General Halstead in The Martian Chronicles (1980 TV miniseries)
• Paul Bürks played Ray Bradbury/narrator in "The Veldt" (German radio, 1984)
• Sid Caesar played Sid Zellman in The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1998 film)
• Peter Capell, on radio, played Simms in "To the Future" (1950) and Captain Parsons in "The Dwellers in Silence" (1951) on Dimension X and Dr. Horst in three different broadcasts, two on the former series (1950, 1951) and once on X-Minus One (1955)
• Klaus Dittmann played Tom Carmody in The Jar (German radio, 1987)
• Jack Dodson played Dr. Douglas in Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983 film)
• Robert Eddison played the crew of the Cetus-7 Quell in Leviathan '99 (BBC Radio, 1968)
• Gerlach Fiedler played a carnival showman in The Jar (1987) and a gun dealer in The Long Way Home (1989, both German radio)
• Nicholas Hammond played Captain Black in The Martian Chronicles (1980 TV miniseries)
• Derek Jacobi played Captain Wilder in The Martian Chronicles (BBC Radio, 2014)
• Michael Kilgarriff played Dominguez in The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (BBC Radio, 1971)
• Alf Marholm played the narrator in Fahrenheit 451 (German radio, 1970)
• Peter Marinker played McClure in The Martian Chronicles (1980 TV miniseries)
• Howard Morris played Leo Zellman in The Wonderful Ice Cream Suit (1998 film)
• Stanley Myers scored The Martian Chronicles (1980 TV miniseries)
• Leonard Nimoy read stories from The Martian Chronicles (1975 audiobook), The Illustrated Man (1976), and voiced Mr. Mounshroud in The Halloween Tree (1993 animated special)
• Jonathan Pryce played Mr. Dark in Something Wicked This Way Comes (1983 film)
• Lynn Redgrave played Mrs. Hepp in Walking on Air (TV, 1987)
• Armin Rohde played John Wallenbeck in A Sound of Thunder (2005 film)
• Maureen Stapleton played Grandmother in The Electric Grandmother (TV, 1982)
• Franz-Josef Steffens played Kelly in The Long Way Home (German radio, 1989)
• Fritz Weaver played Father Peregrine in The Martian Chronicles (1980 TV miniseries)
• Douglas Welbat played a man in The Long Way Home (German radio, 1989)