Dummy Robot Neon
Mystery!
[On all original Lost in Space
production documents, the second robot is referred to as the "dummy
robot." The term "stunt robot" is not correct.]
[Photograph reproduced with permission of Fred Barton 2004. From the
Paul Allen B9 restoration project ESF.]
Fred Barton
sent me this
intriguing photograph. This is the neon unit that Fred removed from the
dummy robot during his restoration of the robot in preparation for
display in Paul G. Allen's Science
Fiction Museum
and Hall of Fame in Seattle. Allen had purchased the dummy robot
for $230,000.00 at the Profiles in History auction (lot 104) on 26
April 2003. The dummy robot was sold by 20th Century Fox in the early
1970s when it was selling off its back lot in what is now Century City.
According to the catalogue:
Due to its age, the Robot was in need of
some minor cosmetic restoration. The Robot's original owner and
restorer was Academy Award-nominated Hollywood model maker Greg Jein.
The exterior of the Robot was repainted with matching paint; some of
the missing and/or broken chest lights were replaced with original
parts (spares acquired along with the Robot); and new matching claws
were created and affixed. Original
neon tubing was installed in the mouth, and the special effects
holes in the torso (originally made during filming of the series) were
repaired. [Profiles in History. The Ultimate Sci-Fi Auction, Star Date
April 26, 2003. Hollywood Memorabilia Auction 14. Catalogue. p. 34.]
Is this neon unit original to the dummy robot? The catalogue
description suggests otherwise, although the words "Original neon
tubing was installed" suggest that this neon unit was among the spare
robot parts that Fox sold to Greg Jein. Naturally, I cannot say that
this neon unit was never installed
in the dummy robot during filming of Lost
in Space, but this was not the "neon" unit seen in "Condemned of
Space," "The
Anti-Matter Man" or "The Space Destructors," two episodes in which the
dummy robot is prominently featured. This is also not the neon unit
that was in the dummy robot when Greg Jein first acquired the dummy
robot in the 1970s. Here are two photos of the dummy robot taken at the
time of its discovery:
[Photographs
gratefully borrowed from the B9 Robot
Builders Club
website]
You can see that there are still
fragments of decaying and rotting tubing hanging from the mouth opening.
Note that there are only nine rows
of neon in Fred Barton's photograph above. Note also that the Barton
neon unit is composed of real neon
tubes. Each row has its its own electrode. This would enable
a technician to replace a single row without having to replace the
entire unit in the event that a row broke.
The screengrab above is from "Condemned of Space" (Production number 1501; original airdate: 6 September 1967) the first episode to feature the dummy
robot. Note how the "neon" looks exactly like flexible neoprene tubing. This scene was filmed on 1 June
1967.
In
the screengrabs above and below,
taken from "The Anti-Matter Man," there are thirteen rows of tubes.
Note how the tubes are buckled up.
In the
screengrab above, from "The
Anti-Matter Man," notice how the "neon" tubes softly glow with a green
light
In the
screengrab above, taken from
"The Space Destructors," the strange shape of the "neon" tubes is quite
apparent.
Based on these screengrabs and on the photographs of the dummy robot in
the 1970s, one can conclude that the dummy robot did not
have genuine "neon" tubes. Instead, it looks to me as if he had clear
neoprene plastic tubes strung across the chest opening. This would
account for the buckling and strange shape to the rows of tubes. There
was also probably no back plate. A green flashing light bulb set behind
the tubes was probably used to illuminate the tubes during the
anti-matter robot scenes in "The Anti-Matter Man." Of course, it is
possible that a special green-glowing neon unit was created just for
this episode, but given the costs involved, I strongly doubt it.
The mystery neon depicted in
the
photograph at the top page, thus, cannot be the original "neon" for the
dummy robot. Instead, I wonder if it could be the temporary replacement
neon used during the filming of "War of the Robots" between Tuesday 25
January and Monday 31 January 1966. My initial estimate that
there were ten rows of tubes in the temporary neon unit may be wrong.
Perhaps there were only nine, and perhaps this mystery photo is indeed
the temporary neon unit!
Dummy Torso Problems
Now here is another mystery. Look at the back of the dummy robot's
torso. Could it be made of paper? This does not appear to be the same
torso used in "Junkyard in Space."
While the back of the dummy torso
seen in "Junkyard in Space" is deeply flawed, it is not quite as
crumpled as the torso in the screengrab above. Note also the strange
square patch.
Fred Barton has informed me that he
saw the unrestored dummy robot with a crumpled torso back in the 1970s.
Yet, the torso of the dummy robot that was delivered to him for
restoration in 2003 did not have these flaws. The torso that Fred had
in 2003 was smooth on both the interior and exterior surfaces. It could
not have been the same torso used in "The Space Destructors." One can
only conclude that the dummy robot had more than one torso during the
course of its screen career.
I would like to express my
heartfelt thanks to Fred Barton for providing me with valuable insight,
information, and with the photograph that inspired this paper.
Back
Copyright
2004 Frederick Hodges