Original subtitles

(upbeat music)

- Ah, good morning Uncle Martin.

Uncle Martin?

(audience laughing)

Boy, if there's one thing I can't stand,

it's a blabbermouth.

(audience laughing)

What is that you're working on?

- What?

- That machine, what's it for?

- Oh, my equilibrium establisher.

When I arrived on earth, my sense of balance

had to be changed to suit your gravity.

Going back to Mars requires a return

to my former sense of balance.

(phone ringing)

- Hello?

Oh, hi Mister Benson.

Yes sir.

Who?

I'll get right there.

(phone slamming)

Of all the rotten luck.

- Luck, good or bad, is usually of our own making.

- Oh, come on Uncle Martin, would you

please forget the platitudes?

Right now, I am facing a catastrophe.

- Catastrophe?

What sort of catastrophe?

- Well, I don't know yet exactly

but you can bet your last martian dirkle

that there's gonna be one.

I've just been assigned to a story with Jerry McClain.

- McClain?

Isn't he the rather ingratiating

young photographer you introduced me to last week?

- Mm-hm.

Oh, he's a nice guy all right, but,

well Uncle Martin, it's just that he's a Jonah.

Every time he's on an assignment,

something always goes wrong.

Always.

- Purely an environmental byproduct.

- Huh?

- The last time I met the young man,

I read not only his mind, but his memory bank.

From the time Jimmy was a small boy, Tim,

he's been told he couldn't do this right

and he couldn't do that right,

so that by now he's come to accept it as a truth

even before the fact.

- What do you mean?

His goofs are sort of psychological reflex action?

- Exactly.

He's lived so long with a conviction that people

expect him to commit errors that he subconsciously

feels he must accommodate them.

- Well that's just great.

Now I have an emotional problem.

I don't know if I should feel sorrier for him

or for myself.

(audience laughing)

- Tim, where is your assignment?

- Eh, it's down at the police station.

They just picked up Big Red Higgins.

Huh, with Jimmy on that assignment,

Big Red will probably escape,

probably shoot three reporters on the way out

and you can just bet your bottom dollar

I'll be one of them.

(audience laughing)

- Well, perhaps I can be of some help.

- Getting me shot?

Thanks a lot.

(audience laughing)

- No, no, no.

I mean helping Jimmy to get over this

foul up fixation of his.

- Well, I hope you don't have to help him

over my dead body.

(audience laughing)

- No, you just wait, something will go wrong.

Oh, oh, oh, oh, you see?

You see?

It started already.

(audience laughing)

(upbeat music)

- Jimmy.

- Well hi Tim, Mister O'Hara.

- Oh, how are you this morning Jimmy?

- Oh, well, same as usual.

So far everything is okay, but give me time.

It's early yet, I'll foul up somewhere.

(audience laughing)

- Now then, your failures are all in your mind.

- And in the personnel files of the three

newspapers I've been fired from in the last six months.

(audience laughing)

Boy, if I blow this one, I won't make

copy boy on the hobo news.

(audience laughing)

- Hey, what's happening?

- Well, they got Big Red Higgins up on the fifth floor.

They're gonna bring him down in this elevator.

With my luck, they'll probably use that one over there.

(audience laughing)

- Hey, here they come now.

(buzzing)

(upbeat music)

- He got away.

Big Red slugged me and he got away.

(intense music)

(audience laughing)

(circus music)

- I got it.

I got a shot of the capture.

For once, a loser comes out on top.

- Hey Uncle Martin, that was quite a catch.

- Mm-hm, that's also going to be quite

a photograph that Jimmy took.

Unfortunately, I'm allergic to isotopium.

- Huh?

- That's the primary element in my equilibrium machine.

Therefore, I sprayed myself with a ray-proof compound.

In brief, I'm currently invisible on film.

(audience laughing)

Oh, and to make matters worse,

he's telling your editor that he's got

an exclusive picture of me and Big Red.

- Oh no.

- Tim, what am I going to do?

If I destroy it, Benson will fire him.

If I don't, my identity as a martian

is sure to be disclosed.

- Do you realize you can get yourself into

more spots than a dry cleaner?

(audience laughing)

- I'm going to hate myself Tim, but, uh.

(space sounds)

- I finally did it.

Nobody's gonna me an 8-ball anymore, no sir.

No editor is going to pink slip me anymore

Not with this baby, no sir.

Oh, they're going to fire me, that's what they're gonna do.

Fire me.

(audience laughing)

The film, it's ruined.

I must have forgot to push the slide in.

- Gee, that, that's tough luck Jimmy.

- Yeah, tough luck, that's me.

Tough luck McClain, the General Custer

of the fourth estate.

(audience laughing)

(upbeat music)

- Do you have the vaguest idea of what Benson just did?

- He fired Jimmy.

- Burned him at the stake is more like it.

He took away his press card, his parking pass.

- Please Tim, spare me the details.

I feel badly enough about having divorced

Jimmy from his job without hearing the terms

of the property settlement.

(audience laughing)

- It's not your fault Uncle Martin.

What else could you do?

- Tim, if it hadn't been for me,

Jimmy would have his picture and his self-confidence back

so I'm going to have to set things the way they should be.

- How?

- Simply by getting Jimmy to accomplish one job well done.

- Uh, that'll be very rare for Jimmy.

Let's face it, he's fired, out, kaput, finished, done.

(audience laughing)

- Benson will take him back.

- Ha, he'd sooner hire his own mother in law.

(audience laughing)

- Even if Jimmy had the scoop of the year?

- You don't mean that you're thinking of

revealing your identity?

- Hardly, but would my futuramic camera,

I should be able to ascertain tomorrow's

front page today.

(upbeat music)

- Tim.

- Well, I hate to sound trite but you

look like the cat that swallowed the canary.

- I believe in this case, the word pigeon

would be more aptly substituted

for the proverbial canary.

- Huh?

- Do you recall a gambler by the name of Joey Macon?

- Oh, are you kidding?

I wrote enough pages at his trial to be able

to wallpaper the entire Grand Canyon.

(audience laughing)

But anyway, Macon got off scott free.

Some Joker by the name of um, um, Beardon,

Leon Beardon took the rap for him,

but what does Macon have to do with Jimmy?

- My nose for news briefly inhaled Mister Macon

as I passed him on the street.

I got a whiff of something newsworthy.

- Beardon?

Well, that must mean that he's out of jail now.

- And due to meet Macon at 8:00 tonight.

Observe.

- Yeah, well that's Macon.

Yeah, that's Beardon.

Hey, it looks like Macon's paying him off.

Uncle Martin, this could be dynamite.

- Enough to blast Jimmy back onto the payroll

and give him some of the self-confidence

he so sadly lacks.

Now all we have to do is to get Jimmy

to take the same picture.

Call him up.

(ghostly sounds)

- Oh, now, now, now, wait a minute.

I appreciate all the things that you're doing

for Jimmy, but messing around with Macon and his boys, um.

- You are reaching a disconnected number.

(audience laughing)

Please try again.

(upbeat music)

- You know, maybe you should have covered him

with some kind of a martian protective screen

on the way over.

He is already 25 minutes late.

- He'll be here.

- Oh sure, by Easter or Christmas,

if he hasn't run out of gas or cracked up his car.

- Tim, it's lack of faitH in Jimmy such as yours

that has made him what he is today.

Kindly remember, it was my interference that prevented

him from starting on his new road to accomplishment.

(door knocking)

- Ah.

(punch)

(audience laughing)

- Gosh, I'm sorry, your lip.

- Oh, it's all right.

I've got another one.

(audience laughing)

Well, I think our boy has detoured off

the new road you were talking about.

(audience laughing)

- I'm sorry I'm late, but I had to stop off

to get myself disengaged.

- Disengaged?

- From Peg, the girl I was going with.

You met her Tim.

- Oh yeah, yeah, she was a very nice girl.

- Yeah, no sense in her making plans with

a guy who can't hold down a job.

My luck, I couldn't even break us up.

She wasn't home.

(audience laughing)

- Well, perhaps by the time the night's over Jimmy,

you'll have changed your mind.

- Yeah, what my uncle means is

we have an assignment for you.

- An assignment?

Look, maybe you fellows didn't get the word

but I'm applying for unemployment insurance tomorrow.

(audience laughing)

That is if I can ever find my social security card.

- Jimmy, this assignment could easily

get you back on the paper and there'd

be no necessity for becoming disengaged.

- Yeah, it's the scoop of the year.

- And you want me to cover it with you?

That's all Benson would have to hear.

That you took me along.

Look, Tim, you're a nice guy.

Why would I want to get you fired?

- Jimmy, for Pete's sake, I can almost guarantee

that you'll make it.

Now just think of it.

An exclusive photo by Jimmy McClain of

Joey Macon paying off Leon Beardon.

- You're making with the jokes.

- Tim received a tip-off that they're meeting

at the junk shop on Madison at 8:00 tonight.

- And you want me to get the shots?

You better see a doctor Tim,

you're coming down with something.

You're delirious.

(audience laughing)

That's a fine thing to say to a man

who has all the confidence in the world in you.

Who believes you to be one of the most capable

photographers in the country.

(audience laughing)

- You really think that much of me Tim?

- Oh, well, I've always said to Uncle Martin

that's there only one around like you.

(audience laughing)

- Well Jimmy, are you going to confirm

Tim's faith in you or not?

All you have to do is set your mind to it.

- Well, what, what can I say to a guy

who said that about me?

I'll do it.

(beeping)

Sorry, I almost knocked it over.

If I set my mind to it, there's nothing I can't do.

(crashing)

(audience laughing)

- Uncle Martin?

- I know, I know.

He switched on the machine and acquired

a martian sense of equilibrium.

He'll be clumsy as a clod until the effect wears off.

- Well don't just stand there, do something.

- Well what would you suggest that I do?

- Panic?

(audience laughing)

(suspenseful music)

(audience laughing)

- It's the funniest thing.

I don't feel dizzy or anything,

but I keep going one way and my feet go another.

- Yeah, well that's why I came along.

I noticed that you were having problems.

- Boy, is this ever weird?

- Possibly you've caught a virus of some sort.

It'll dissipate itself within a few hours.

- I sure hope so.

- I think we better move over behind

that wardrobe over there.

(suspenseful music)

(audience laughing)

(crashing)

- Well, I think you're right Uncle Martin.

I think we are gonna make the front page, also page 37.

- 37?

- Yeah, that's where they write the obituary column.

(audience laughing)

(upbeat music)

- Please don't, don't help me.

I'm perfectly capable.

(audience laughing)

(springing sounds)

(audience laughing)

Maybe if I stood up now.

(audience laughing)

(suspenseful music)

(springing noise)

Funny, I can't seem to keep my feet under me.

(crashing)

- You all right Uncle Martin?

- I'll know in a moment.

- Well I hate to tell you but your finger isn't working.

(audience laughing)

Oh come on Uncle Martin, it's almost 8:00.

Now, what are you gonna do about Joey Macon

without the (whistles).

- An excellent question considering that at this moment,

I couldn't lift a feather even with the aid

of an atlas booster.

(audience laughing)

- Hey, they're here.

- Behind the wardrobe, quickly.

- My shoe, my shoe, I lost a shoe.

- [Tim] No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

- Thanks, I dropped it.

- Shh.

(frantic music)

What are we gonna do?

- Hide, turn this around and hide behind it.

(audience laughing)

And I don't have another one.

(audience laughing)

- I'm sorry Uncle Martin but there's no back on this closet.

- There's Beardon.

(suspenseful music)

- You're right.

(audience laughing)

- And there's Joey Macon too.

(suspenseful music)

We're actually seeing a payoff.

- $25,000.

That's pretty good for a year of doing nothing, ain't it?

- [Jimmy] My camera, where's my camera?

- Here, here.

I put an infrared flash in it.

They'll never know you took the picture.

Go ahead, take it.

Take it!

(crashing)

- Over there, get them.

Get lost, get lost.

- All right, hold it right where you are.

Give me those plates.

- Oh yeah, here you are.

(glass breaking)

(audience laughing)

- Come on, come on, get up.

(audience laughing)

- All right, give me that film.

Search them.

- This guy's got a press card.

- Yeah I, I made it myself.

(audience laughing)

- I don't listen to people I don't hire to talk.

Shut up.

(audience laughing)

Put them on ice until I get back.

- Get to it.

- Yeah, well now, now, now, wait a minute.

What do you want to take us prisoner for?

I mean, I mean after all, the police wouldn't believe us.

You have the photograph.

- What did I just tell you a minute ago?

- Shut up?

- Yeah, them were my very words, shut up, get out of here.

(audience laughing)

Get them out of here, will you?

(audience laughing)

(suspenseful music)

- How's your finger?

- About as useful as a firefly in a lighthouse.

(audience laughing)

- Look, why don't you just use that subliminal hypnosis?

You know, convince them that we're really nice guys

and they ought to let us go.

- I tried that.

Apparently their brain cells are too primitive

to receive my transmission.

(audience laughing)

- What are we waiting for?

- The bus to Pomona.

- No, I mean why are they keeping us here all tied up?

- Because Joey Macon is taking your camera

and film out to develop it.

He wants to be sure that he got the negative

on that picture you took of him paying Beardon off.

- Oh, I wish they'd hurry up.

These ropes are making my hands stiff.

- Oh?

Well you just wait until Joey Macon gets back.

He's going to make us stiff all over, permanently.

(audience laughing)

- You mean they're going to?

Oh, they wouldn't, would they?

(audience laughing)

- I'm afraid he's right.

They have very limited plans for our future.

(audience laughing)

- Well, I guess I finally did it.

I not only cooked my last chance, but yours as well.

- Tim, this is serious.

- You noticed.

(audience laughing)

- I mean Jimmy, he's completely given up.

- Oh, well that makes two of us.

Would you care to make a threesome?

(audience laughing)

- No thank you.

A martian never says die.

- Oh?

Well what is Joey Macon gonna say?

Remember one thing, his trigger finger isn't broken.

(audience laughing)

- Nor will mine be for long.

That's a hand crank generator, Tim,

and if it's still in working order,

I may be able to regenerate my levitating finger

with an electric charge.

Meanwhile, I'll have to do it the old-fashioned way.

- Do what the old-fashioned way?

- Levitate.

Finger levitation wasn't perfected until the year 5003.

(audience laughing)

The sturdy martian pioneers had to levitate

through sheer concentration and willpower.

- Oh, that must have been awfully difficult.

- Naturally, it's extremely exhausting

and very slow compared to modern methods however.

- Uncle Martin, wait one second.

- Hm?

- After all this time, do you think you can

really levitate through concentration?

- Well, I'm going to try.

(sniffing)

- What is it you're gonna levitate?

- The ropes on Jimmy's hands.

- His hands?

What about ours?

- Tim, there's more at stake here than just our lives.

A man's self-esteem must also be rescued.

(suspenseful music)

- Tic tac toe.

(audience laughing)

I win.

- I win, big deal.

Wins a lousy game of tic tac toe,

you make it sound like the daily double.

(upbeat music)

- Hey, what's the matter with you?

- Oh, he, uh, he's all worn out

from doing his sitting up exercises.

(audience laughing)

- How can you do sitting up exercises sitting down?

(audience laughing)

- It's uh, it's all done with the mind AC.

It's the next step after isometric exercises.

(audience laughing)

- Oh yeah, I heard of them.

You don't move around much.

(audience laughing)

(knuckles cracking)

(audience laughing)

Now that's the idea AC.

Now the next step is to do it in your head

without using your hands.

That shouldn't be too difficult for one

of your mental capabilities.

I've noticed you're a champion at tic tac toe.

(audience laughing)

- Yeah.

(audience laughing)

I'm gonna have to work on that.

(audience laughing)

(suspenseful music)

(audience laughing)

- Jimmy, you're free.

How did you do it?

- I don't know.

- It doesn't matter.

The important thing is now you can

sneak out and call the police.

- Me, sneak out?

Oh no, I'd just foul it up again.

But maybe I could untie you guys.

- No, no, no, no, no, no.

There's no time.

No, no, no.

Joey Macon will be back any minute.

Now hurry, now, while they've got

their minds on something else.

(upbeat music)

- You gonna play tic tac toe or are you

gonna stand there fiddling with your fingers?

- I'm not fiddling with my fingers, I'm thinking.

(audience laughing)

- Mister O'Hara, I can't do it.

- You've got to, you can do it.

- Yeah, just think, if Joey Macon comes back

and kills all of us, you'll never forgive yourself.

(audience laughing)

- All right, I'll try, but I'll never make it.

(suspenseful music)

(crashing)

- He'll never make it.

- I don't expect him to.

Here, pull that generator over here with your foot.

- Well you're closer to it than I am.

(dragging)

- All right, now wind it up.

You can do that can't you?

- I can try.

- Well then wind.

- All right.

(suspenseful music)

- Oh, well this isn't my day.

(audience laughing)

This isn't even my year.

- You were naughty, you tried to escape.

Now just so you don't forget and try it again.

(punch)

(audience laughing)

(punch)

(audience laughing)

(playful music)

(crashing)

- All right, everybody up.

(upbeat music)

- Uncle Martin, I believe that's a historical first.

Airmail special delivery, no hands.

(laughing)

(upbeat music)

(door knocking)

- Tim?

Tim?

Tim, someone's knocking at the door.

(knocking)

Tim, someone's knocking at the door.

- Oh, oh, I'm sorry Uncle Martin, I didn't hear it.

(upbeat music)

Hi Jim, come on in.

- Hi Tim.

Hello Mister O'Hara.

I've only got a minute.

I'm on my way over to Peg's.

We're going to set the date.

- Well that's wonderful Jimmy, congratulations.

- Thanks, I just wanted to tell you

the police found that picture I took.

Macon had it in his pocket.

He's a dead duck.

- Hey, how about Benson?

Did you talk to him?

- Oh I sure did.

He hired me right back with a bonus.

- Well then, I guess you're on top of the world tonight.

- Oh I sure am Mister O'Hara and I'm going to stay there.

I found I can do anything I set my mind to.

- You hold that thought Jimmy.

- Oh I intend to.

Well listen, I gotta run, Peg's waiting for me.

- Good night.

- See you tomorrow Tim at the office.

- Right.

(suspenseful music)

(audience laughing)

I did it.

I did it.

(audience laughing)

I levitated it.

(audience laughing)

The old-fashioned way.

(audience laughing)

- Congratulations.

Keep working at it Tim.

It'll keep you away from the girls and leave them for me.

(audience laughing)

(upbeat music)