Act Break

Maury Winkler, struggling playwright and occasional bill payer. Maury knows that all the world's a stage and all the men and women merely players. What Maury doesn't know is he is about to take center stage in an off-Broadway production in the Twilight Zone.

Maury is a playwright who is desperately behind in his rent. After incessant hounding by his landlord and arguing over their latest play, his partner Harry dies of a heart attack. Harry, in his last moments, hands Maury an ancient relic and explains to Maury that the bearer of this relic grants the individual one wish and one wish only. He continues by telling Maury that he had already used his wish and needs Maury to use his wish to heal him. After pondering for a moment, Maury apologizes to Harry and tells him that the wish should be used for something a whole lot more. Harry dies and Maury wishes he could have the greatest playwright ever as his partner.

Maury finds himself dressed in Elizabethan-era clothing, and realizes he has gone back in time. Maury sees a man speaking to himself and recognizes him as William Shakespeare. Realizing he has made a serious miscalculation in his wish, Maury informs Shakespeare that he cannot work with him and that he does not belong there. Before he can think of a way to return to his own time, Maury notices that the relic is now in Shakespeare's possession. Clenching it in his hand in a gesture of thought, William says to Maury, "I wish for you to work with me." Suddenly Maury is filled with thoughts of all the plays that William has written. Realizing that his fate has been set, he succumbs and sits at a desk and begins to write Hamlet from memory.

The premise of this episode is similar to "The Bard", in the original series of The Twilight Zone. Shakespeare appeared in that episode, but the situation there brought him into the present.

• List of The Twilight Zone (1985 TV series) episodes

• "Act Break" at IMDb
• "Act Break" at TV.com