NET Playhouse; Five Tomorrows

to Five film dramas, distant early warnings by artists who have looked ahead, not to the science fiction future, but to the day after tomorrow. This is what they have seen. A place where love is a crime against society. A town where crossing the street is a crime against its total order. A missile silo which holds the ultimate weapon and the men who control it. Or do they? A city haunted by the fear of its own violence. A world in animation, constant, frantic animation, satirically viewed. Five dramas and a visit with one of America's most provocative novelists writing about the future.

Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Sector A, nothing to report. Sector B, nothing to report. Sector C, nothing to report. Sector D, nothing to report. Sector E, nothing to report.

Serious accident in Sector E. Here he is, that's him. Since we discovered him, he's been under our surveillance. How did you single him out? By chance, a week ago. He still reads poetry books. It's strange, but individuals like him still exist. We haven't singled out anyone for a long time. On the surface, he seems like all the rest. Types like that have caused us trouble in the past. This one lives completely apart from the social community. Do we consider him dangerous? We cannot say for sure yet. We don't know the state of his emotivity. We must test his potential for entering into the social community. Did someone logic complain against him?

Yes. And if it is reliable, the appointment which is going to now in the dismantleman's sector will confirm for us his uncontrolled emotional state. I love you. Yes. It's intolerable. These feelings are still so primitive. Catch him.

He is in love with me. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him.

Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him.

Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him.

Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Catch him.

Catch him. Catch him. Catch him. Now we ask why you persist in leading such a life? Because I am a man. The obstinacy of your behaviour lies outside of our society,

which has aimed through long years of teaching, of propaganda and indoctrination, to reach a complete depersonalisation of humanity, to build continually greater energies for the progressive expansion of general welfare. Humanity must be conditioned to a way of life, totally controlled by essential authority that has established specifically guidelines. For more information, visit our website at www.mesmerism.info and visit our website at www.mesmerism.info

Since we consider you dangerous for the rest of humanity, we sentence you to forced mental conditioning. We abolish your individual intellectual capacities by an occupation of X-18-0. No! No! No!

Although the X-18 serum that turned the man into a robot was a scientific invention, science wasn't the villain. It's man's stupidity in applying technology that makes all the trouble. There's a fresh thought. Man is often killing himself. This is Brookhaven Laboratory's High Flux Beam Reactor. The work here reflects the most positive aspect of science and technology, the peaceful application of atomic energy. Against this background, we ask one of the widest of science fiction writers, Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Why he views automation and the new technology with such skepticism? Yes, well, somebody is making certain sorts of men obsolete, and I perceive a certain malice in this.

I think the people who enjoy seeing people replaced by machines do enjoy it. I think they get a kick out of eliminating certain persons as inferior. When you get a little of that, or you get a lot of it actually, in science fiction, where Earth is treated as a launching platform to something much better, and the ordinary inhabitants of Earth are treated with some contempt as whoever is on the rocket ship is going to meet a lot nicer, smarter, more humane people somewhere else up in the sky. We have so much information now as the scientific projections are just simply available. It's pretty positive at this point to rely on one's imagination, the only area that is open to imagination now for a responsible science fiction writer is imagination about what it's going to be like to be a person alive in the year 2000.

The audience who want to reach is the young audience, because they're the most beautiful people and most responsive, and also have more spending money. And they are forced to read books in college, which is great. Sometimes they're forced to read mine, and the hope is corrupted. That's what you do to college students if you get the chance. It's poison their minds with humanity, that's right. It's make kindness fashionable. And sooner or later this is going to attract the attention of certain committees in Congress, so I'm sure that this is what is ruining the children. This is where they're getting their rotten ideas, is from books and movies. These films deal with what it's like to be an average citizen walking around a modern city, working in a modern factory. We are at a point actually now where the factories don't want people anymore. Nobody wants people anymore.

There was a time when Karl Marx was right about how the rich people exploited the poor. It's something that's happened now. There's a rich people who have no use for the poor anymore. He can't imagine what to do with them, except maybe grind them up for dog food. This contempt has infected our whole view of man. Increasingly, man has become something to be manipulated and subjugated, less and less important and therefore easier to control. If man refuses, we know how easy it is to do away with him. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. This isn't. This isn't. This isn't.

This isn't. One, two, three, four. Ten. Ten.

Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten.

Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten.

Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten.

Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten. Ten.

Ten. I am also loyal and honest. I've been watching you lately Ralph. That's nice. I think you're suffering from claustrophobia. How do you spell it? From a cute monotony. From the uniform texture. From the uniform texture. stabbed pale green.

From the electronic wine. From the electronic wine. From the electronic wine. From the functional paste. We have seven high at number four. Acknowledged, acknowledged, strike team alarmed. Sabotage unlikely. Roger? Call you back later. Report when number four is in restart. We'll do. Break now, break. Roger, and break. Probably that'll do us a favor. Good. What about the rest of our missiles? All frequencies operating normal? Propulsion? All systems go. Can give me just a lot of trouble right now.

Number four. What else? It has developed the personality of its own. It's non-compliant. It refuses to cooperate. General Hawkins is going to take it out. General Hawkins can't stand the non-conformist, even if it is only a rocket. Number four. The dammit. The silo-one-five. We have seven high at every missile. No, 10 high at every missile. Start. The silo-one-five. Uncalled Victor Charlie. Break. Repeating. Repeating. Uncalled Victor Charlie.

Uncalled Victor Charlie. This is warm up with a red dot message for silo-one-five. Number five, seven, two. I'm sorry, I'm sorry. This is the moment that my counter-four. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. This is the number one-five to the warbler.

The number one-five to the warbler. Message fractured. Repeat. Please repeat. The number one-five to the warbler. Beeeee. Hello, miss. It's dead. Don't be just rang. It's dead, aren't you? Ralph. The glass door. Yeah, that's gone too, gone for good.

Can't be opened. What in the name of God can have happened? We've been hit. It's like nonsense to me. Try looking glass. This is Solo 1.5 with a paramount message to Warblow. Red phone is dead. Repeat previous message, please repeat. I still say try looking glass. Damn your suggestion. Are you deaf or something? This is Solo 1.5. It's no good calling Warblow. If headquarters is wiped out. We must try looking glass. It's a bomber. They can't hit a plane with an ICBM. Okay, go on, you try it. This is Solo 1.5 with a paramount message to looking glass.

Come in looking glass. This is Solo 1.5 with a paramount message to looking glass. Come in looking glass. Come in. Please. This is Solo 1.5 with a paramount message to looking glass. Come in looking glass. Come on, Hank. What? Can't you see the damn radio's out of order? We still have power. We're still transmitting. To whom for God's sake? This is Solo 1.5 calling looking glass. Quite be in a fool. Calling Warblow? You've been through a thousand rehearsals. I've never failed to make contact before.

This code is Warblow. Not good. Looking glass, not good. Primary alert system. There we are. This is Solo 1.5 to fibro. Acknowledge fibro, acknowledge. God, take shut up, will you? Now put that thing down. That is an order. Put it back on your neck. Good. Now let's start thinking. If that wasn't a tank, they slightly missed us.

They're running on emergency power. The air supply is normal. Do you think they're okay? And there are no restarts. Right. I mean, let's reason this. Could have been disaster, I don't know this quite good. Could be. But the breakdown and communications, how about that? Search me. Sunspots perhaps? Not the year for sunspots. Doesn't mean anything. True. But again, we're not running on short waves only. Bulls are. And number four is in restart, right? That leaves us nine birds. We can fire them till we get a second vote from Solo 1.6.

On the other hand, the wireless is dead. And we can't ask for a second vote from 1.6. That's no trouble. We don't need to ask Solo 1.6 for a second vote. By now they already know where different. Now this is the real thing. The second vote's already been given. So we can justifyably fire away. What do you think? I don't know. You don't know what. I'm not inclined to jump to hasty conclusions. What hasty conclusions? I don't know. It's crazy. I mean, there's no way out of this mess. What mess? The whole business is confused, Ralph. Your muddle headed, Lieutenant.

There's nothing obscure about it at all. So you say. Now listen to me carefully. I'll go through it again and try to pay attention on it. If there's nothing wrong, if we're at peace, then we cannot launch the birds. Clear? Good. But if this is war, we've got a fire as fast as we can. Now headquarters know that we're in some sort of predicament. Do they? Will they try to talk to us? Or didn't they? And they know that our birds are fit to fly. Now if they want us to shoot, they've already given the second vote and they expect us to use our heads. In other words, do arms switch and fire away? What are you going to? Go ahead. I'm listening.

What? Paying attention. Are you out of your mind? No. I'm hungry. It's nerves, captain. But I'm really nervous. No, man. No, man. Man is a hatter. Get back to your battle station, Lieutenant.

Don't play with a thing, Ralphie. It's likely to go off. And if we're still at peace, it's murder. On the other hand, if it's war, you can't do without me. The switches must be turned simultaneously. Get me all, buddy. The chairs are eight feet apart.

No man with arms that long gets a job down here. No one man can fire the birds. That door is a solid job. Ten tons, to be exact. Behind it a sea of rubble. Now, if this is the real war, Ralph, you can rest assured there is no man left alive for a radius of 50 miles. Those who may have survived have better things to do than to dig for nuclear age warriors. Come to the point. The point, I think, is guts, Ralph.

Now, don't get me wrong. I don't mean bravery. I mean the digestive tract, guts. Missed the call, right? Air flows in mirror. The batteries function okay. The computer's hot. There's nothing wrong with the machine's power. It's the frail human body that is doomed. The stomach, Ralphie, the guts. Starvation, do you read me? I can't believe it. Have something to eat. It suits the nerves. It can be not you of all people.

Oh, it's crazy. The whole thing is crazy. Here. Ten switches. Nothing fanciful. Just ordinary hardware. The switch you'd expect to find in any suburban household. Switch them on. That's like switching on the light in your bedroom. It's going mad. Oh, no. Not me. It's the cell. You're dancing at the end of a string pulled by machines. Kick, kick, knock, knock. The voice barks you bark back. The lids blow away, the missiles cook in their holes, then up they go. Kick, kick, knock, knock. Your job is done.

You're really nothing of no importance. It's the machines. Tick, tick, knock, knock. You're bloody mad. Moscow. Karkov. Rostafandar. Four and a half million. One million. A half a million people. Six million altogether. Did the machines know that? The machines don't really know they are conditioned. Just tick, tick, knock, knock. You're a traitorer, don't all the bloody traitor. Hiding me on lunatic words won't give you respectability.

You've let your people down a no-clowning. No oration can change that fact. Very loyal. Big words, Ralph. Ten minutes ago they meant everything. Now they're dead, perished with the crackling voice. With the world you and I left behind that blaster. If only one man were enough. Now that's an uncanny problem. Almost comical. If you kill one, you won't have a chance to kill six million. The guy who designed all this must have been a great joke. He was the real traitor, Ralph.

He knew two human heart-solden beaters won. Where are a couple of babbling idiots? Not idiots. Just children. Frightened. Restless. Not too much speechifying, please. I've had it up to here. Don't you understand you're still a soldier? Dead, alive, or half dead? Is that so damn hard for you to realize? Your nation is being decimated. Probably exterminated completely. Am I getting through to you? Loud and clear, Ralph. I had splendid. But would you mind explaining to me what you're waiting for? This is a missile command post.

Not a stock market. You're not buying and selling shares. Now why did you take the job? Why did you volunteer? Why for God's sake? You knew you couldn't face the real thing. If you felt that you'd crack under the stress, why didn't you tell General Hawkins or me, or anyone else? Why? There are three cities with six million people at the end of the line. And what difference does it make if they live a half an hour longer? Now if it were a military target like this right-hal, a hostile force, and it makes some sort of sense, it would alleviate the slaughter. I simply cannot bring myself to doing it, Ralph. You knew that yesterday didn't you, and the day before that, and the year before that? What's speak up? I simply cannot bring myself to doing it. Ralph.

You knew that yesterday, didn't you? And the day before that, and the year before that? Well, speak up. Why didn't you ask for a transfer? I knew I had acquired abnormal power. No, I know I cannot handle it. Well, I can. I've given you an order. There you go.

It's in. Once the key has been inserted, I can't be removed. It's my compromise. Of course, I'm an obstacle. I refuse to cooperate. So shoot me. There are plenty of metal strips on this. Babies, you could take one off. Make a mechanical device for yourself.

Sort of an extension to your short arms. It might work, but it's worth a try. Now, if I'm the obstacle, get rid of them. But if it's you yourself, Ralph, don't try and pass the buck. Are you implying that I'm the one with COVID? I imply nothing. I offer you a solution. It's up to you to make use of it. Why don't you give me your gun, and I'll do the job for you. You're a fool. You make me sick. It's the likes of you that are the real cause of this disaster.

The waiver is the long-haired intellectuals, the shillish alley illusionists. Your clap traps have dug the grave for mankind. We could have kept the bomb to ourselves and threatened any other nation that wanted to build it. We could have saved man, but no. The likes of you, the godforsaken dreamers, had a better solution. Talk nicely, politely, endlessly. Well, you can copped it a fine dish, pal. The trouble is you've got no guts to spoon it up. This is war, Hank. For your own sake, try to realize it, war. Kill one, kill a million, it's the same. I can't go along with you. I'm right, you're wrong. We're both wrong.

You underact at your best line. You lack conviction. You should have saved. You are wrong, and I am right. But maybe I'm not so sure anymore. Up there, that's where I'm sure of. People, that's what I care about. When you think I'm a miscellaged hoodlum, a smexies lips with the light while delivering the finishing stroke of a dreadful business. Well, I don't care. You think what you like. I'm sorry, I'm bound to disappoint you. You're a soldier, honest, upright, and full hearty. And you're a bloody traitor. You realize I could execute you for mutiny? Just think of it. You and I, friends, destined to kill each other. Kill.

One with a bullet. The other with a word. Well, for a would-be killer of six million, you show considerable restraint when it comes to killing a single individual. Why should I save your precious six million? Why? Because they're unarmed, innocent, without the immediate means to kill? So it's the bundle of baby snakes in your garden that you crush their heads. Hank, you don't let them grow up and kill you. We are not discussing snakes, Rob. We're discussing human beings. And what does it matter if that Chinese Mongolians are hot? I'm not interested. I see. From now on, it's your show. You're on your own. I feel sorry for you in a way. Being left alone with science, Rally. The same thing has happened to you.

I feel sorry for you in a way. Being left alone with science, Rally. The sole human object is the toilet. When your intestines generate enough pressure, you will descend upon it with dignity. When your intestines generate enough pressure, you will descend upon it with dignity. This is Warbler with a paramount message to silo-15,

acknowledge silo-15 at my count of four. Silo-15 acknowledge at my count of four. Silo-15 acknowledge at my count of four. Silo-15.

Is that you, Thompson? This is General Hawkins. Yes, General. Have no time for details. Been hit with an earthquake, one of the strongest and record. Four silas crushed a smithereens, including a part of 16. You hear me, Thompson? Yes, General. Now, then, I'll have to take your power away for a while. I was a rescue team on the way now. Did you guys out? You boys did a splendid job on pressing the panic button. You with me, Thompson? Yes, sir. Yes, sir. Silo-15 acknowledge at my count of four. One, two, three, four. Silo-15 acknowledge at my count of four. One, two, three, four.

I've made my living telling people the world is going to end, and very soon. But if I see a movie like The One About the Silo, which implies that the world may have ended, I hate it, I don't want to hear stories like that. Is I gladly tell students that the humanity is going nowhere, but I take the news myself very badly I find. Artists cannot be ahead of their time technologically now in making predictions because the technology is so terribly sophisticated. And one thing that is repellent about science fiction is that most of it is hung up on the level of the popular mechanics of 1932. It's almost science fiction writers can do is handle a little Newtonian physics.

So the stories are not in the future at all. It's actually there about 40 or 50 years in the past. Almost all science fiction that does not have a rocket ship in it deals with a recent past rather than what is coming. Hitler was a fantastic experience. The human slavery in the United States was a fantastic experience, and we have a great need to understand these ghastly adventures. So science fiction talks about them. Most science fiction is man dealing with these past trying to understand that to make his peace with it. And the way to do this without nauseating people without driving them away is to pretend that happened in the year 2000. This is done instinctively.

Now you know too, no one can ever escape fromorama. The last city on this planet to fall into the hands of an invisible enemy. The last city to wither away. We cannot use this time to call for help. Now I can these silent stones yield up a way to live. Their eyes are empty and needless, which withhold answers to your everyday questions and only watch us die, hopeless prisoners of our own violence. In this motionless space, the shapes do not make sense. They are ruins doomed to disintegrate until the entire planet will become an immense desert.

Forayma, with your deserted streets, your blank walls, endless gardens strewn with lifeless statues. I remember when I first met you, he were gazing at silent forsaken buildings all around you, relinquished to the fading light of this endless dusk. He turned and looked at me, as if you were waiting for me. Later we began walking along these long passages, and we reached a place where I had never been before.

I am afraid for you, and every evening I fear I shall never see you again. You are too fragile for a city like the Rayma that sets up numberless barriers in the light of infinite space. You are too fragile for the monsters that pass before your eyes. These white towers you always look at and bewilderment. You are too fragile for this city, where you try to lose yourself without even hoping you might be saved. You know that nothing will remain. Swarms of seagulls are already leaving the cliffs, never to return again. On the sundry and shores they leave these giants of stones, solitary witnesses of a story robbed of voices to speak it.

An ancient images float up from the sea bed of time, remote memories that fly towards useless emptiness, civilizations are obliterated by the urgent present. You are my only present. You who have not yet learned the taste of hatred. The day is made of hiding light. We live the day in order to pretend. Everyone represses his most secret violence and nurses the hatred that degenerates him.

You now know and must not forget that hate is a prison that stifles for Rayma. An epidemic that grows, spreads and contaminates. Even the stadiums are useless. These gigantic containers of violent sprawl, empty and absurd. Even you know that the story will end here and for Rayma. Only time will continue to keep our memories, indescribable tablets of an neglected past.

There is no more sand before the horse and little by little the sea climbs the steps to reach the palace. There is no more life within Rayma, but only shadowy figures like beasts waiting for nightfall. The violence fed by centuries has destroyed Rayma. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. Now you know too. The story will end in Rayma. Only time will continue to keep our memories, remote moments, fragmented and destroyed.

Rayma is in the New York Times every day. Only there is called New York or Chicago. The city is dying and it is the young people who are most aware of its death. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

The war is over. The war is over. The war is over. The war is over.

Where are we going? Where are we going? I don't know. I don't know.

I don't know. I don't know. This is PBS, the public broadcasting service.