‘Twilight Zone’: A Word From the Producer : Deaths: Frank Marshall, who never testified about the tragedy that killed three, says, ‘It was an accident.’

Frank Marshall, who is making his directing debut with “Arachnophobia,” was one of those present on the set of “Twilight Zone--The Movie” the night in 1982 when a camera helicopter crashed and killed actor Vic Morrow and two immigrant Asian children that Marshall knew were illegally employed by the film company.

A longtime associate of Steven Spielberg, Marshall was the executive producer of “Twilight Zone” and in the years leading up to the 1987 criminal trial of director John Landis and four associates, Marshall was repeatedly sought by the Los Angeles district attorney’s office to testify.

While Marshall himself was not indicted in the case, deputy district attorney Gilbert Garcetti told reporters after the trial that his office made “every effort possible to subpoena Frank Marshall but he was able to get out of our hands.”

Marshall, who signed the petty cash checks paid to the parents of the two Asian children before their deaths, never did testify and until now has never responded to questions about his knowledge of “Twilight Zone” events or his refusal to testify. Asked to comment on those matters during an interview for “Arachnophobia,” Marshall called the stories about his alleged evasion of subpoenas “all hype. There’s no truth to it at all.”

Marshall said he was busy throughout the pre-trial investigations on “The Twilight Zone” case, and blamed investigators for not reaching him in the beginning.

“Actually I was here (Los Angeles) a long time, two years, and nobody ever talked to me,” Marshall said. “Then we went off to England and made ‘Empire of the Sun,’ ‘Roger Rabbit’ and ‘Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade.’ So I lived in London, and the time most of the trial was going on, we were in China (filming ‘Empire of the Sun’).

“So, I was inaccessible. And I didn’t really feel that I had anything to add that wasn’t already out there, than what had already been revealed.”

Marshall said the accident itself was a terrible tragedy that “was terrible and horrible for everybody. But it was an accident. Which is eventually what the jury decided.”