Time and the Arts

This file is in the public domain, so clarified as of 2009-05-17 by Arthur David Olson.

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See also Sources for Time Zone and Daylight Saving Time Data.

Data on recordings of "Save That Time," Russ Long, Serrob Publishing, BMI:

Also of note:

• An episode of "The Adventures of Superman" entitled "The Mysterious Cube," first aired 1958-02-24, had Superman convincing the controllers of WWV to broadcast time signals five minutes ahead of actual time; doing so got a crook trying to beat the statute of limitations to emerge a bit too early from the titular enclosure.
• The 1960s ITC television series "The Prisoner" included an episode entitled "The Chimes of Big Ben" in which our protagonist tumbled to the fraudulent nature of a Poland-to-England escape upon hearing "Big Ben" chiming on Polish local time.
• The series "Seinfeld" included an episode entitled "The Susie," first broadcast 1997-02-13, in which Kramer decides that daylight saving time isn't coming fast enough, so he sets his watch ahead an hour.
• The syndicated comic strip "Dilbert" featured an all-too-rare example of time zone humor on 1998-03-14.
• Surrealist artist Guy Billout's work "Date Line" appeared on page 103 of the 1999-11 Atlantic Monthly.
• "Gloom, Gloom, Go Away" by Walter Kirn appeared on page 106 of Time Magazine's 2002-11-11 issue; among other things, it proposed year-round DST as a way of lessening wintertime despair.
• The "20 Hours in America" episode of "The West Wing," first aired 2002-09-25, saw White House staffers stranded in Indiana; they thought they had time to catch Air Force One but were done in by intra-Indiana local time changes.
• "In what time zone would you find New York City?" was a $200 question on the 1999-11-13 United States airing of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" "In 1883, what industry led the movement to divide the U.S. into four time zones?" was a $32,000 question on the 2001-05-23 United States airing of "Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?" At this rate, the million-dollar time-zone question should have been asked 2002-06-04.
• A private jet's mid-flight change of time zones distorts Alison Dubois' premonition in the "We Had a Dream" episode of "Medium" (originally aired 2007-02-28).
• In the "30 Rock" episode "Anna Howard Shaw Day" (first broadcast 2010-02-11), Jack Donaghy's date realizes that a Geneva-to-New-York business phone call received in the evening must be fake given the difference in local times.
• In the 1946 movie "A Matter of Life and Death" (U.S. title "Stairway to Heaven") there is a reference to British Double Summer Time. The time does not play a large part in the plot; it's just a passing reference to the time when one of the characters was supposed to have died (but didn't). The IMDb page is at http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0038733/ . (Dave Cantor)
• The 1953 railway comedy movie "The Titfield Thunderbolt" includes a play on words on British Double Summer Time. Valentine's wife wants him to leave the pub and asks him, "Do you know what time it is?" And he, happy where he is, replies: "Yes, my love. Summer double time." IMDB page: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0046436/ . (Mark Brader, 2009-10-02)
• The premise of the 1999 caper movie "Entrapment" involves computers in an international banking network being shut down briefly at midnight in each time zone to avoid any problems at the transition from the year 1999 to 2000 in that zone. (Hmmmm.) If this shutdown is extended by 10 seconds, it will create a one-time opportunity for a gigantic computerized theft. To achieve this, at one location the crooks interfere with the microwave system supplying time signals to the computer, advancing the time by 0.1 second each minute over the last hour of 1999. (So this movie teaches us that 0.1 x 60 = 10.) IMDB page: http://us.imdb.com/title/tt0137494/ . (Mark Brader, 2009-10-02)
• In the "Run by the Monkeys" episode of "Da Vinci's Inquest" (first broadcast 2002-11-17), a witness in a five-year-old fire case realizes they may not have set their clock back when daylight saving ended on the day of the fire, introducing the possibility of an hour when arson might have occurred.
• In "The Todd Couple" episode of "Outsourced" (first aired 2011-02-10), Manmeet sets up teledates for 6:00 and 9:00; since one is with a New Yorker and the other with a San Franciscan, hilarity ensues.

• "We've been using the five-cent nickel in this country since 1492. Now that's pretty near 100 years, daylight saving." (Groucho Marx as Captain Spaulding in "Animal Crackers", 1930, as noted by Will Fitzgerald)
• Brady: "...[Bishop Usher] determined that the Lord began the Creation on the 23rd of October in the Year 4004 B.C. at -- uh, at 9 A.M.!"
  Drummond: "That Eastern Standard Time? (Laughter) Or Rocky Mountain Time? (More laughter) It wasn't daylight-saving time, was it? Because the Lord didn't make the sun until the fourth day!"
  (From the play "Inherit the Wind" by Jerome Lawrence and Robert E. Lee, filmed in 1960 with Spencer Tracy as Drummond and Fredric March as Brady, and several other times. Thanks to Mark Brader.)
• "Good news." "What did they do? Extend Daylight Saving Time year round?" (Professional tanner George Hamilton, in dialog from a May, 1999 episode of the syndicated television series "Baywatch")
• "A fundamental belief held by Americans is that if you are on land, you cannot be killed by a fish...So most Americans remain on land, believing they're safe. Unfortunately, this belief—like so many myths, such as that there's a reason for 'Daylight Saving Time'—is false." (Dave Barry column, 2000-07-02)
• "I once had sex for an hour and five minutes, but that was on the day when you turn the clocks ahead." (Garry Shandling, 52nd Annual Emmys, 2000-09-10)
• "Would it impress you if I told you I invented Daylight Savings Time?" ("Sahjhan" to "Lilah" in dialog from the "Loyalty" episode of "Angel," originally aired 2002-02-25)
• "I thought you said Tulsa was a three hour flight." "Well, you're forgetting about the time difference." ("Chandler" and "Joey" in dialog from the episode of "Friends" first aired 2002-12-05)
• "Is that a pertinent fact, or are you trying to dazzle me with your command of time zones?" (Kelsey Grammer as "Frasier Crane")
• "Don't worry about the world coming to an end today. It is already tomorrow in Australia." (Charles M. Schulz, provided by Steve Summit)
• "I put myself and my staff through this crazy, huge ordeal, all because I refused to go on at midnight, okay? And so I work, you know, and then I get this job at eleven, supposed to be a big deal. Then yesterday daylight [saving] time ended. Right now it's basically midnight." (Conan O'Brien on the 2010-11-08 premier of "Conan.")