The original The Twilight Zone has had one of the most enduring legacies in entertainment. Though it only ran for five seasons (156 episodes, some of which are among the best TV shows ever), its influence and reach are remarkable. Three further series have been created over the years, including Jordan Peele’s short-lived reboot, and one ill-fated movie.
Its influence has also been felt in the huge number of stars appearing on the show early in their careers. Some were established actors who found great fame later, and some were just starting. Here is a quick list of actors who found huge fame after appearing on The Twilight Zone.
William Shatner
Star Trek legend William Shatner appeared in two episodes of The Twilight Zone before landing his gig as captain of the Enterprise. His first episode, "Nick of Time," came in Season 2, but his most remembered is "Nightmare at 20,000 Feet" in Season 5. Both are considered among the best episodes of the show.
Charles Bronson
Future action movie legend Charles Bronson took the slow road to fame. Throughout the 1950s and early 1960s he, like so many actors, grabbed gigs wherever he could on film and TV. One included a spot on an episode in Season 3 called "Two." In the episode, Bronson plays one of the last two people on earth who finds love with the only other one.
Carol Burnett
The Season 3 episode "Cavender Is Coming" is not a well-thought-of episode of the show, but it is notable for starring a true legend. Carol Burnett, in a very early role for her, plays a down-on-her-luck woman who is helped by an angel to get her out of her doldrums. While it does provide Burnett with an opportunity to show off her comedic chops, in the end, comedy doesn't really work in The Twilight Zone.
Burt Reynolds
Burt Reynolds appeared on one episode of The Twilight Zone very early in his career, playing a satirized version of Marlon Brando in an episode in Season 4 called "The Bard." The episode focuses on William Shakespeare, who arrives in the present day to help write a TV show but is horrified by the Reynolds' character's acting style.
Dennis Hopper
Watching the Season 4 episode "He's Alive" is a wild experience in the present day. There is no other episode in the series that is so prescient today. The episode stars Dennis Hopper as a Neo-Nazi in America who has a run-in with Hitler himself. It proves just how edgy the show was, especially for its day.
Cloris Leachman
Season 3's "It's A Good Life" is one of the most enduring episodes of the whole series. It stars Cloris Leachman as the mother of a boy with the devastating power of conjuring whatever he wants who often uses it for ill.
Donald Pleasence
Donald Pleasence was most famous in the mid '60s through '70s, most notably for his role in The Great Escape and for his oft-forgotten turn as James Bond's #1 enemy, Blofeld in You Only Live Twice. But, in the '70s and '80s, he was most famous, of course, for his role as Dr. Loomis in the Halloween franchise. Before those roles, he starred in the Season 3 episode "The Changing of the Guard."
Robert Redford
Robert Redford is one of the biggest movie stars of all time, but like many actors, he got his start in television. In addition to a lot of credits in the early '60s on other big shows, Redford starred in one episode of The Twilight Zone in 1962. The episode, "Nothing in the Dark," aired during Season 3.
Sally Kellerman
In truly a "blink or you'll miss her" moment, Sally Kellerman appeared in the episode "Miniature" in The Twilight Zone's fourth season. In an uncredited role, the Back to School star plays an office worker who is seen just at the very beginning. Interestingly, her M*A*S*H co-star Robert Duvall also appears in the episode.
Burgess Meredith
For a generation of movie fans, Burgess Meredith will always be Mick from Rocky, but the actor had an accomplished career outside of that series, including starring in four different episodes of The Twilight Zone. His first is in one of the most beloved episodes of the whole series, "Time Enough At Last" in the first season. Later he starred in "Mr. Dingle, the Strong" and "The Obsolete Man" in Season 2, and "Printer's Devil" in Season 4.
Don Rickles
Don Rickles is best known for his no-holds-barred insult comedy. A true legend of Hollywood. He also strung together quite the acting resume when he wasn't making fun of his peers. That career included one episode of The Twilight Zone in Season 2, "Mr. Dingle, the Strong," alongside Burgess Meredith.
Ron Howard
It's hard to imagine there was ever a time that Ron Howard wasn't famous. He first found fame when he was just six years old on The Andy Griffin Show, but even before that, he appeared on a Season 1 episode of The Twilight Zone called "Walking Distance."
Robert Duvall
Before making one of the most impressive movie debuts ever as Boo Radley in 1962's To Kill A Mockingbird, Robert Duvall appeared on a handful of TV shows. One, of course, was The Twilight Zone, in an episode called "Minature," in Season 4.
Ann Jillian had a long career in Hollywood before she retired in 2000 to devote herself to raising her son. Her career started in the early '60s when she was a kid. In Season 4 of The Twilight Zone, she starred as an orphan who refused to speak, or so thought the aunt and uncle raising her. It's a classic, creepy episode called simply "Mute."
George Takei
Star Trek legend George Takei is best known as the senior helmsman of the Enterprise, but years before that, he starred in the Season 5 episode "The Encounter." In it, Takei's character and his neighbor end up in a very unfortunate, but seemingly inevitable, situation that only the show can provide.
John Astin
It was a different show where John Astin was "creepy and kooky," when he starred as Gomez Addams in the original Addams' Family. A couple of years before that though, he starred in a Season 2 episode called "A Hundred Yards Over the Rim." The show co-starred the great Montgomery Clift, as well.
Buddy Ebsen
Buddy Ebsen had a very interesting career. He was famously cast as the Tin Man in The Wizard Of Oz but had to leave the production due to a serious medical reaction to the silver paint for the costume that landed him in the hospital (the production also used asbestos for snow). He then left for World War II and when he returned to Hollywood after, didn't find a ton of success. He starred in a Season 2 episode of The Twilight Zone called "The Prime Mover" in 1961, just before landing the role he would become world famous for, Jed Clampett on The Beverly Hillbillies.
Elizabeth Montgomery
The first episode of Season 3, "Two," stars Charles Bronson as one of the two, and Elizabeth Montgomery as the other. Her star had just begun to rise as she was nominated for an Emmy around the same time for a one-episode turn in The Untouchables, but it was in 1964 when she landed the role of the one and only Samantha on Bewitched that made her part of television history.
Lee Marvin
Tough guy Lee Marvin was already starting to make a name for himself when he appeared in two episodes ("The Grave" in Season 2 and "Steel" in Season 5). Marvin was still a few years away from the superstardom he found in the late '60s with movies like The Dirty Dozen, Cat Ballou, and Point Blank.
Leonard Nimoy
Before Star Trek, Leonard Nimoy appeared in an episode of The Twilight Zone as a soldier on a Pacific island in World War II. The episode, "A Quality of Mercy," aired in December of 1961, in the show's third season. Nimoy would continue to guest spot on TV shows for another five years before landing his iconic role as Spock.
Dean Stockwell
When Dean Stockwell died in 2021, he had been in show business for more than 70 years. It's an astonishing feat, and as you'd expect, he had a whole slew of acting roles, including the Season 3 episode of The Twilight Zone titled "A Quality of Mercy," alongside Leonard Nimoy.
Jack Klugman
Future Odd Couple star Jack Klugman was as close as an actor could be to being a regular on The Twilight Zone. In total, he appeared in four episodes of the show. First, he starred in "A Passage for Trumpet" in Season 1, followed by "A Game of Pool" in Season 2, alongside the great Jonathan Winters. In Season 4, Klugman appeared in "Death Ship," and finally, in the Season 5 episode, "In Praise of Pip."
Julie Newmar
Before finding her greatest fame as Catwoman in the first two seasons of the '60s Batman series, Julie Newmar starred in the Season 4 episode, "Of Late I Think of Cliffordville." In the episode, Newmar doesn't have cat ears, but she does have devil horns, as she plays Satan trying to get the protagonist played by Albert Salmi (who played Danny's father in Caddyshack) to make a deal with the devil.
James Coburn
By 1963, when James Coburn starred in the Season 5 episode "The Old Man In The Cave," the actor was already well on his way to fame. Earlier that year he had starred in the legendary World War II movie The Great Escape, and by the next year, he was one of Hollywood's most famous stars.
Ted Knight
Judge Smails in Caddyshack and Ted Baxter in The Mary Tyler Moore Show will forever be the roles that the great Ted Knight will be remembered for. It took him quite a while to find big fame in Hollywood and along the way he had a lot of voice-over work and small TV roles, including an uncredited role in "The Lonely" from Season 1. At first, he's hard to spot, but once he delivers one of his few lines, viewers will immediately know it's Knight from his distinct voice.
Peter Falk
When you think of Peter Falk you probably think of one of two roles, that of the titular detective in Colombo or as the grandfather in The Princess Bride. Those are only two roles in a storied career, however. Before ever landing his role as TV's most famous bumbling detective (all due respect to Monk), Falk starred in an episode in Season 3 called "The Mirror" where he weirdly played a Fidel Castro-like dictator in an unnamed Central American country.
Richard Kiel
"To Serve Man" in Season 3 of The Twilight Zone is one of the most famous episodes of the series. Starring as the unspeaking, imposing alien is the one and only Richard Kiel. It's a perfect role for the actor who would become most famous for playing one of the all-time great henchmen in the James Bond movies, Jaws.
Telly Savalas
"Who loves you, baby?" It's one of the most iconic catchphrases in TV history, made famous by Telly Savalas in Kojak. A decade before he starred as the super cool TV detective, he played a gruff stepfather who gets into a fight with his stepdaughter's baby doll in the Season 5 episode "Living Doll."
Jonathan Winters
Jonathan Winters was most renowned for his comedy work. In addition to many comedy albums, his appearances in movies like It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World and on TV shows like Mork & Mindy made him very famous. On The Twilight Zone, he played a more serious role of a legendary pool shark called down from heaven to prove another player's mettle in "A Game Of Pool" from Season 3.
Martin Landau
When Martin Landau won an Oscar in 1994 for his role in Ed Wood, he'd been in the business for decades. His big breakout came as part of the cast of the original Mission: Impossible TV show in the late '60s. Before that, he starred in two episodes of The Twilight Zone, "Mr. Denton on Doomsday" from Season 1 and "The Jeopardy Room" from Season 5.
Roddy McDowall
Roddy McDowall is most famous for playing Cornelius in The Planet of the Apes series, appearing in three of the original movies. He also starred in "People Are Alike All Over" from the first season of The Twilight Zone.
Sydney Pollack
Sydney Pollack is one of the best directors in Hollywood history, known for films like Tootsie, Out of Africa, and Michael Clayton. It makes perfect sense that in an early acting role, he played a director in the Season 2 episode, "The Trouble with Templeton."
This is a list that could go on and on, especially when you add in already established stars like Buster Keaton who also appeared in episodes, but for now, we'll leave it here with these big names who starred in The Twilight Zone early in their career.
