I Saw That!

One woman's opinions about popular entertainment.

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Amateur boxing coach, Christian (but not so heavenly-minded that I'm no earthly good) singer, writer, self-defense advocate, childfree. feminist www.smartwomenboxingtraining.org

Thursday, March 06, 2008

"Night Gallery" (1970-1973)

Rod Serling hosted this anthology series, and wrote some of the episodes. Originally, "Night Gallery" episodes rotated as part of a NBC series called "Four In One" that aired three other series including "McCloud" a detective show starring Dennis Weaver. Eventually the show was moved to its own time slot.

Each episode opened with Serling standing in an art gallery where bizzare paintings were displayed. Each painting represented an equally bizzare story. Some of the stories were quite scary. The pilot episode was a TV-movie that featured a tale of an underhanded nephew (Roddy McDowell) who hastened his uncle's death so he could get his fortune. The uncle was buried in a family plot just outside of the door of the house. A painting located on the stairwell seemed to show the uncle climbing out of his grave, walking up to the house and knocking on the door. The nephew thought he was imagining it, until he heard the knocks on the door. Other stories were short and amusing (but still bizarre), like the one where a vampire (Joseph Campanella) hires a babysitter to watch his son. The little boy turned out to be a werewolf.

The stories were hit or miss. I would say that the ones penned by Serling were better, but there were some others just as good as the ones he did. The series was not quite the same as "The Twlight Zone" (1959-1965), but it had its moments.

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