The Night Gallery (1970-1973): Starring Rod Serling, John Astin, Michael Laird, Larry Watson, Joanna Pettet, Matt Pelto, Alan Napier, Jack Laird, Geraldine Page, John J. Fox, Burgess Meredith, Jeff Corey, Jeanette Nolan, James Sikking, Cathleen Cordell, Arthur Malet, Josehph Campanella, Jason Wingreen, Albert Popwell, Louise Sorel, Roger E. Mosley, Raymond Massey, Susan Strasberg, Leif Ericson, John Williams, William Windom, Terence Pushman, James Farentino, Ivor Francis, Bill Quinn, Ross Martin, Lindsay Wagner, Charles Davis, Leslie Nielsen, Patricia Donahue, Victor Bruno, Susanna Darrow, James Metropole, Cameron Mitchell, Stuart Whitman.....Directors Leonard Nimoy, Edward M. Abroms, Allen Baron, Jeannot Szwarc, Boris Sagal, Barry Shear, Screenplay/Writing Credits Rod Sterling and Jack Laird.
"A nightmare frozen in time"............
TV writer Rod Serling was the creative force behind the popular supernatural/horror series "The Twilight Zone" in the 1960's, a series of half hour episodes in which the bizarre, frightening and unnatural filled TV screens across America to critical acclaim. After "Twilight Zone" was canceled, Rod Serling's "The Night Gallery" came to television from 1970 to 1973. It was hosted by Rod Serling himself, a bit older than he looked when he hosted "Twilight Zone" as he walked us through an art gallery replete with strange, demonic often very intimidating artwork. Each work of art told a story which was the focus of each half-hour episode. The series did very well and it was, if anything, a more intense follow-up to "Twilight Zone". Because it was the early 70's, the episodes of Night Gallery were a tad more uncensored and graphic. It was on late night on television so that younger viewers would not be exposed to it. Various directors worked on the series, among them Leonard Nimoy, Spock from Star Trek and European-bornJeannot Szwarc who would later direct the 1980 romantic time-travel film "Somewhere In Time" starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour. Several TV and film actors guest starred during the run of the series. They included Vincent Price (himself a horror film figure), Al Lewis (Grandpa Dracula from "The Munsters"), John Astin (Gomez from "The Addams Family") Phyllis Diller, Elsa Lanchester, Carl Reiner, Burgess Meredith, a young Diane Keaton, Cesar Romero (The Joker from "Batman") Tom Bosley (from Happy Days) and Zsa Zsa Gabor. Clearly, this series enticed a number of celebrities at the time who probably enjoyed watching this scary series themselves.
While Night Gallery's frightening aspects are considerably tame and even cheap by today's digital age, it can be haunting and scary in its own light. Rather than focusing on graphic violence, blood and gore, Night Gallery's stories were very well-written, chilling both psychologically and emotionally and often coming off like the sort of thing that Stephen King was possibly inspired by. But it is clearly a series modeled after Alfred Hitchock Presents. Rod Sterling himself called himself a lesser, thinner Hitchcock. All of the episodes contain great things one can spend hours talking about. Here are some of my favorites: "The Painted Mirror": Zsa Zsa Gabor plays a bitchy heiress who wishes to put an elderly antique shop owner out of business. A strange mirror, painted over in black, fades to reveal a pre-historic dinosaur world dimension. It is Zsa Zsa Gabor's character who is punished by being trapped in that world. A similar story has a greedy corporate businessman/fraud who is punished by being trapped in a dimension of soulless zombies. In the episode entitled "Green Fingers" Elsa Lanchester stars as an elderly gardener who owns a home in the path of freeway construction. The man behind the project hires a hit man to kill her but she gets her revenge by literally "planting" her own fingers and then coming back from the dead. Other episodes included demons, ghosts, the living dead, vampires and aliens from outer space. Some episodes were too bizarre and ambiguous to fully be understood. The episode directed by Jeannot Szwarc (Somewhere In Time) dealt with a medical bag from the future that contained the cure to all known diseases (including cancer) is in the hands of a time traveler but they, that is people from the past, don't believe his story and they throw away the bag. Often, short stories by noted horror genre authors such as H.P. Lovecraft were included such as the well-done "Pickman's Model" about a 19th century artist whose "monster" subject for one particularly gruesome painting turns out to be based on a real monster who inhabits his home. This was an excellent series, full of mystery, intrigue, suspense, danger and surrealism. For me, it surpassed "The Twilight Zone" which, despite being a classic, was sometimes too dull and talky. For those of you who are interested in this series, it is now available on DVD in its entirety (four seasons).
"A nightmare frozen in time"............
TV writer Rod Serling was the creative force behind the popular supernatural/horror series "The Twilight Zone" in the 1960's, a series of half hour episodes in which the bizarre, frightening and unnatural filled TV screens across America to critical acclaim. After "Twilight Zone" was canceled, Rod Serling's "The Night Gallery" came to television from 1970 to 1973. It was hosted by Rod Serling himself, a bit older than he looked when he hosted "Twilight Zone" as he walked us through an art gallery replete with strange, demonic often very intimidating artwork. Each work of art told a story which was the focus of each half-hour episode. The series did very well and it was, if anything, a more intense follow-up to "Twilight Zone". Because it was the early 70's, the episodes of Night Gallery were a tad more uncensored and graphic. It was on late night on television so that younger viewers would not be exposed to it. Various directors worked on the series, among them Leonard Nimoy, Spock from Star Trek and European-bornJeannot Szwarc who would later direct the 1980 romantic time-travel film "Somewhere In Time" starring Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour. Several TV and film actors guest starred during the run of the series. They included Vincent Price (himself a horror film figure), Al Lewis (Grandpa Dracula from "The Munsters"), John Astin (Gomez from "The Addams Family") Phyllis Diller, Elsa Lanchester, Carl Reiner, Burgess Meredith, a young Diane Keaton, Cesar Romero (The Joker from "Batman") Tom Bosley (from Happy Days) and Zsa Zsa Gabor. Clearly, this series enticed a number of celebrities at the time who probably enjoyed watching this scary series themselves.
While Night Gallery's frightening aspects are considerably tame and even cheap by today's digital age, it can be haunting and scary in its own light. Rather than focusing on graphic violence, blood and gore, Night Gallery's stories were very well-written, chilling both psychologically and emotionally and often coming off like the sort of thing that Stephen King was possibly inspired by. But it is clearly a series modeled after Alfred Hitchock Presents. Rod Sterling himself called himself a lesser, thinner Hitchcock. All of the episodes contain great things one can spend hours talking about. Here are some of my favorites: "The Painted Mirror": Zsa Zsa Gabor plays a bitchy heiress who wishes to put an elderly antique shop owner out of business. A strange mirror, painted over in black, fades to reveal a pre-historic dinosaur world dimension. It is Zsa Zsa Gabor's character who is punished by being trapped in that world. A similar story has a greedy corporate businessman/fraud who is punished by being trapped in a dimension of soulless zombies. In the episode entitled "Green Fingers" Elsa Lanchester stars as an elderly gardener who owns a home in the path of freeway construction. The man behind the project hires a hit man to kill her but she gets her revenge by literally "planting" her own fingers and then coming back from the dead. Other episodes included demons, ghosts, the living dead, vampires and aliens from outer space. Some episodes were too bizarre and ambiguous to fully be understood. The episode directed by Jeannot Szwarc (Somewhere In Time) dealt with a medical bag from the future that contained the cure to all known diseases (including cancer) is in the hands of a time traveler but they, that is people from the past, don't believe his story and they throw away the bag. Often, short stories by noted horror genre authors such as H.P. Lovecraft were included such as the well-done "Pickman's Model" about a 19th century artist whose "monster" subject for one particularly gruesome painting turns out to be based on a real monster who inhabits his home. This was an excellent series, full of mystery, intrigue, suspense, danger and surrealism. For me, it surpassed "The Twilight Zone" which, despite being a classic, was sometimes too dull and talky. For those of you who are interested in this series, it is now available on DVD in its entirety (four seasons).