The Twilight Zone Episode "People Are Alike All Over"

I can’t believe I’ve never seen this one, or maybe I did and forgot, but did Star Trek blatantly rip this off in the pilot episode? I think it has the same actress coaxing him into his cage of illusion, hell the planet surface looks like the same damn set.

Here is what Wiki says about that episode of Twilight Zone. (I left the links in.)

Influence

The original pilot of Star Trek (“The Cage”, later reworked into the two-part episode “The Menagerie”) included plot points similar to that touched upon in this episode, particularly the aspect of humans being put on display for study. Coincidentally, that pilot also co-starred Susan Oliver in a similar role (Vina, a female has the task of making the captive feel more at ease). The Star Trek animated episode “Eye of the Beholder” would also feature some of the crew of the USS Enterprise being placed in a zoo by the inhabitants of Lactra VII.

Coincidentally, “Lost in Space” had a two-part episode called “The Keeper” (Michael Rennie) , the title character of which a “menagerie” of various interplanetary life forms. January 1966.

“The Cage” (retitled “The Menagerie”) was screened by NBC executives in February 1965. The two-part version of “The Menagerie” was aired on 17 and 24 November 1966.

The first draft of the pilot story outline is dated 29 June 1964.

How come this trope never ends with the astronaut throwing his poop at the alien spectators?

If you’re trying to get me up to speed on “The Cage” having preceded “The Keeper” two-parter from “Lost in Space,” you’re about 21 years too late.

But maybe it will be news someone else. :slight_smile:

Not everyone knows that the title on the first draft of the story outline is “The Cage,” but (according to The Making of Star Trek, published in 1968) Roddenberry changed the title to “The Menagerie” prior to shooting “because he felt the new title more closely described the situation in which Captain Pike (now renamed [from April]) found himself during the course of the story.”

“The Menagerie” was kept for the two-parter, and (to avoid confusion) the original “The Cage” was restored to the first pilot when it was released on videotape in the '80s.

I saw an uncut B&W print of “The Cage” in February 1986 when Roddenberry was making a tour to promote Star Trek. (A few months later, it was announced that filming had begun on TNG.) I also got to shake his hand as I was leaving the auditorium.

At that time, it was apparently not known that an intact color print or negative was still in the vault in California. IIRC, it was the B&W version that was released first on videotape, and the color version followed about a year later.