October 2019 will mark the 60th anniversary of The Twilight Zone’s 1959 debut. To celebrate, the Rod Serling Memorial Foundation will be hosting “Serling Fest 2019” in Serling’s hometown of Binghamton, New York. The three-day event will be held at the Helen Foley Theatre (part of the Rod Serling School of Fine Arts) on October 4, 5, and 6.
Confirmed guests include Anne Serling, Rod Serling’s daughter, author of As I Knew Him: My Dad, Rod Serling; Scott Skelton, author of Rod Serling’s Night Gallery: An After-Hours Tour; Mark Dawidziak, performer and prolific author of Everything I Need to Know I Learned in the Twilight Zone; Nicholas Parisi, author of Rod Serling: His Life, Work, and Imagination; Amy Boyle Johnston, author of Unknown Serling; Reba Wissner, author of A Dimension of Sound: Music in the Twilight Zone; and yours truly, author of The Twilight Zone: Unlocking the Door to a Television Classic.
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| Boscov's in Binghamton, NY. |
The event will include screenings, author signings and panel discussions, as well as visits to landmarks in Binghamton that were featured prominently on The Twilight Zone. On a tour of Binghamton back in 2015, I was able to visit the pavilion and carousel that Serling used in “Walking Distance,” and Boscov’s featured prominently in “The After Hours.” Besides fascinating panels, slide show seminars and book signings, you can tour Serling’s small home town and visit the bus station he wrote into “Mirror Image,” check out the Bundy Museum where an entire room is dedicated to Rod Serling, and ask an employee at Boscov’s if they have thimbles for sale on the 13thfloor.
CBS may be preparing a special telecast on the anniversary of the program’s premiere, but you can make plans to visit Serling’s home town for a little relaxation and hang out with folks who share a common interest.
For more information as it becomes available, stay tuned to www.rodserling.com.
