Food For Thought

"A domineering carny mind reader can taste his lovely assistants thoughts...but he'll have death for dessert."

-- DVD description for the episode

Food For Thought
Season	5
Episode	4
Airdate	October 6, 1993
Comic Source	Tales from the Crypt #40
Next Episode	People Who Live in Brass Hearses

Summary

A carnival psychic and part-time cook named Zambini (Ernie Hudson) goes off the deep jealous end when he soon finds out that his wife and assistant (Joan Chen) is in love with the show's fire-eater (John Laughlin).

Plot

At the carnival, Zambini is cooking a meal for he and his wife Connie, when he tells her to concentrate so he can read her thoughts. She complains she is tired and asks if it isn't enough for him that she can read his. Her mind is a "morsel" that he craves, to which she replies everything is food to him. He makes guesses to what she's thinking about, and is denied. He tells her she needs to teach him how to read her mind like she does his. She storms away, only to be stopped by Zambini's inner thoughts. As he is licking his dinner plate, he is thinking dirty thoughts about how he wants her for dessert, making her increasingly and understandably uncomfortable. She tells him to stop, but he doesn't, saying "Zambini wants his favorite treat" to which she hesitantly succumbs. He tells her no stopping this time, and while she is kissing him, he eats some chocolates from a box.

At a carnival presentation, Zambini introduces Connie to the crowd, blindfolding her, and says that she will be his radio to which a heckling audience member says he wants to twist her dials. Zambini asks Connie what the heckler is wearing to which she responds 'dirty underwear', embarrassing the heckler. Zambini grabs something from the man's pocket and asks Connie what it is. It is a dark purple bible. The heckler picks a passage and Zambini asks Connie again what it is to which she correctly replies, gaining applause from the audience.

Outside, a ringmaster named Emmett, who has a condition known as Dwarfism, is hassling Nabunga, a female ape, by throwing peanuts at her while asking her if they're too good. The flame-eater, Johnny, intervenes and tells him to leave her alone. He then consoles Nabunga. After Zambini's show, Connie and Johnny lock eyes, but Zambini comes out of the tent and tells Connie to go, with her saying she wants to stay. He tells her again she needs to leave with him because they're about to have different. Johnny intervenes again and says to let Connie stay if she wants to. She ultimately leaves with Zambini out of hesitation. Later in their trailer, after Zambini has passed out with a plate of food in his lap, Connie leaves and sees Johnny taking care of Nabunga. They flirt for a bit and he tells her he is leaving for St. Louis. His cousin says there are jobs, and he kindly offers her to come with him if she wants. Johnny says he can't stand the way Zambini treats her which is understandable, but Connie says he should be afraid of him, and she is afraid to leave him. She thinks Zambini is wearing makeup to hide from the authorities after he beat up his last assistant when he was highly intoxicated by alcohol, possibly killing her. As their passion ignites, Connie and Johnny then kiss in the carnival tent. Zambini wakes up from his sleep, noticing she is gone, and tries to summon her by using his psychic abilities when he sees Connie and Johnny having an affair.

She hears him and runs away from Johnny, terrified that she'll be hit by Zambini. At their trailer, he says he was reading her mind and Connie doesn't believe him. However, he quickly grabs her and drags her away before hitting her in the face. The next day, after taking a shower, she has a bruise on her face and Johnny finds out about the domestic violence that went on the trailer. When he tries to tell her about how Zambini isn't treating her right, Connie says she doesn't care about what he does anymore and says she is leaving with Johnny at dawn, telling him she loves him. They kiss and hug as Connie says she loves him. Behind them, Nabunga is freaking out in her cage. Zambini is taking out his frustrations in their trailer by cooking and chopping food which makes Connie come back, asking him if there's something wrong to which he responds with, "Everything's fine...!" Later that night, Johnny is saying his goodbye to Nabunga, when he is suddenly splashed with a bucket of something (kerosene, most likely) and turns around to see that Zambini has a lit stick in his hand. He tells him if he plays with fire, he gets burned, then he throws the stick on him in a fit of green-eyed envy. Johnny is burned alive while Nabunga watches helplessly. Emmett and 2 carnival crew members hear the sound, and Connie finds out what happened to Johnny. Emmett tries to say that it was an accident, but Connie discovers the truth of what happened because of Zambini. In grief, she packs her things and leaves Zambini for good after his failed attempt to invade her thoughts to stop her from leaving.

Zambini calls Connie a "little bitch" and says she'll be sorry when she comes back to the trailer. Later, he's alone in his trailer, drinking multiple pints of alcohol, when he tries to summon Connie telling her he forgives her for leaving him and begging her to come back to him. A voice, which presumably turns out to be Connie, communicating with Nabunga, responds that they're coming, and they can't stay away from him. Nabunga then crashes through the window in the roof and Zambini recognizes her voice. Nabunga, after witnessing Zambini kill Johnny, takes her revenge and sees the butchers knife on the chopping board. The voice then says they want to taste Zambini's mind, and Nabunga takes the knife while Zambini tries to escape. Afterwards, the conjoined twin sisters, who were possibly aware that the incident occurred, alert Emmett about what happened and the carnival crew shows him the broken cage and sees Nabunga eating Zambini's cerebral tissue like a pot of honey while a farmer says, "Now that's a man-eating gorilla."

Opening Segment

"Hmm, frankly your hacks-rays look terrible. You've got to pay closer attention to your oral die-giene or you'll end up looking like me. I want you to brush after every meal, floss and gargoyle twice a day. Hmm, yes, looks like I'll have to drill. This won't hurt me a bit! In the meantime, to take your mind off the pain, I've got a little dose of fright-rous oxide for you. It's about a sideshow mind-reader who's lost his head over a pretty girl. I call it Food for Thought."

Closing Segment

"Mmm, yummy! I sure hope Nabunga ate it all. You know what they say, kiddies - a mind's a terrible thing to waste. Maybe she saved some for breakfast and had it in a brain muffin! I'm afraid it's going to have to come out. Oh, yes, it does. Now, put your head back! Open wider. Wider!"

[Crypt Keeper pulls out patient's tongue]

"Got it! They don't call me the tooth scary for nothing."

Gallery

Mike Vosburg's comic cover

Connie

Zambini tries to summon Connie

Zambini prepares to light Johnny on fire

Johnny burns

Now that's a man-eating gorilla.