Trivia / Desk Set

• Inspiration for the Work:
  • The character of Bunny Watson was based on Agnes E. Law, a real-life head librarian at CBS who retired about a year before the film was released.
  • The EMERAC machine was based on the real-life ENIAC and UNIVAC machines, which were beginning to replace whole offices of workers at the time the story debuted. (See No Celebrities Were Harmed on the main page.)
• Technology Marches On: Bunny is worried that EMERAC will replace the whole department. EMERAC is cutting-edge for 1957, a huge machine with whirling spools of tape and panels of lights that flash for no good reason, but is rather hilarious to modern eyes. Equally funny is the treatment of the computer: The characters type out questions in standard English and are given answers in the same. For instance, in a demonstration, EMERAC is asked, "What is the total weight of the Earth?" and in reply prints out, "With or without people?" (which presumes that people are the weightiest form of life on earth; we are not even close, but that's beside the point ... the mass of every living thing on the planet combined is insignificant compared to Earth's overall mass).
• What Could Have Been: Bunny was originally going to be played by Oscar- and Tony-winner Shirley Booth (who would later be known as the title role in the sitcom Hazel), as she had originated the role on Broadway.

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