Editing Charles Beaumont (section)

==Illness and death==
In 1963, when Beaumont was 34 and overwhelmed by numerous writing commitments, he began to suffer the effects of "a mysterious brain disease" which seemed to age him rapidly. His ability to speak, concentrate, and remember became erratic. While some people attributed all of this to Beaumont's heavy drinking, his friend and colleague John Tomerlin disagreed: "I was working closely with Chuck at the time, and we were good enough friends for me to know that alcohol by itself could not possibly account for the odd state of mind that he was in."<ref name = "tzcomp"/><ref name="sd" />

"He was rarely well," his friend and colleague [[William F. Nolan]] later recalled.<ref name="tzcomp">{{cite book | title=[[The Twilight Zone Companion]] | last=Zicree | first=Marc Scott | author-link=Marc Scott Zicree | isbn=0-553-01416-1 | oclc=9022567 | year=1982 | publisher=Bantam Books | location=Toronto; New York}}</ref> "He was thin, and kept having headaches. He used [[Bromo-Seltzer]] like most people use water. He had a big Bromo bottle with him all the time". The disease also affected his work.<ref name="tzcomp"/> "He could barely sell stories, much less write. He would go unshaven to meetings with producers, which would end in disaster. [A script writer has] got to be able to think on your feet, which Chuck couldn't do anymore; and so the producers would just go, 'We're sorry, Mr. Beaumont, but we don't like the script'."

The condition might have been related to the [[meningitis|spinal meningitis]] he suffered as a child. His friend and early agent [[Forrest J. Ackerman]] has asserted an alternative, that Beaumont suffered simultaneously from [[Alzheimer's disease]] and [[Pick's disease]]. This claim was supported by the UCLA Medical Staff, who subjected Beaumont to a battery of tests in the summer of 1964 that indicated that it might be either Alzheimer's or Pick's. Nolan recalls that the UCLA doctors sent Beaumont home with a death sentence: "They said 'There's absolutely no treatment for this disease. It's permanent and it's terminal. He'll probably live from six months to three years with it. He'll decline and get to where he can't stand up. He won't feel any pain. In fact, he won't even know this is happening'." In Nolan's own words: "Like his character '[[Long Live Walter Jameson|Walter Jameson]],' Chuck just dusted away".

Several fellow writers, including Nolan and friend [[Jerry Sohl]], began [[ghostwriting]] for Beaumont during 1963–1964, so that he could meet his many writing obligations.<ref name="tzcomp" /> Privately, he insisted on splitting these fees. By 1965, however, Beaumont was too ill to even create or sell story ideas. His last on-screen writing credit was for the 1965 film ''[[Mister Moses]]'', officially a screenplay written with (but more likely written by) [[Monja Danischewsky]].

On February 21, 1967, Beaumont died in Woodland Hills, California at the age of 38. His son Christopher later said that his father, "[...]looked ninety-five and was, in fact, ninety-five by every calendar except the one on your watch".<ref name="tzcomp"/>