Parents Know Best”

Posted on January 25, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Wednesdays, I will be reviewing the original Love Boat, which aired on ABC from 1977 to 1986! The series can be streamed on Paramount Plus!

All aboard!

Episode 1.22 “A Selfless Love / The Nubile Nurse / Parents Know Best”

(Dir by Roger Duchovny, originally aired on February 25th, 1978)

The week’s cruise begins with the walking HR nightmare known as Dr. Adam Bricker announcing that he’s hired a new nurse and she’s a former Las Vegas showgirl! Gopher and Isaac are excited to learn this but no one is more excited than Doc, who quickly makes it clear that he’s hoping that she’ll be more than just his nurse.

However, it turns out that Dawn Delaney (Elaine Joyce) not only takes nursing very seriously but she would also rather do her job than make out with her boss. Needless to say, this upsets the doctor. It also turns out that she knows about all of the latest medical developments. This also upsets Doc Bricker because it leads to him getting upstaged. The final straw is when Dawn manages to cure Captain Stubing’s hiccups. Bricker gets upset but then Dawn explains that she actually wants to be a doctor but, because she’s a former showgirl, no medical school is willing to accept her. Bricker promises to use his contacts to got her admitted and then they share a long passionate kiss. And that’s the end of that story.

As I watched Doc react to his nurse, it occurred to me that this show was very lucky that Bernie Kopell agreed to play the role because Doc, to be honest, is a terrible doctor who violates his Hippocratic oath on every cruise. In the real world, Doc Bricker would be unemployable. On The Love Boat, everyone loves him and the reason that we believe he would be so popular is because Bernie Kopell was so naturally likable that it made it easy to overlook all of the character’s shady behavior.

While Doc hit on his new nurse, two parents (Monty Hall and Janis Page) tried to hook their dorky son (Mark Shera) up with a girl (Laurie Prange) on the cruise. What the parents didn’t know is that the girl was actually their son’s girlfriend and the entire cruise was an elaborate ruse to get them to finally meet. Seriously, that was the entire story. It was a bit forgettable.

Finally, Harry Morrison (Leslie Nielsen) is an old friend of Captain Stubing’s. He’s going to Mexico with his much younger girlfriend, Laura (Lynda Day George) and they plan to get married. However, Harry starts to worry that Laura is too young for him and Laura starts to worry that Harry would rather hang out with people his own age. She makes a reference to Donnie and Marie Osmond and Harry admits to not knowing who they are. Agck! Fear not, though. After talking about it, Harry and Laura decide to get married anyways. It was a predictable story but how can you not like watching the future stars of The Naked Gun and Pieces acting opposite each other?

It was a bit of an odd episode. The Doc/Nurse storyline was cringey. The son and his parents storyline were forgettable. But I liked Leslie Nielsen and Lynda Day George’s story. They saved the cruise!

Next week, we’ll continue to set sail for adventure with three new stories!

Scenes That I Love: Happy New Year From The Poseidon

Posted on January 1, 2023 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Happy new year!

With 2023 coming in like a tidal wave, it only seem fitting that the first scene that I love for this year should come from 1972’s The Poseidon Adventure. Just as how Die Hard has recently been acclaimed as one of the great Christmas films, The Poseidon Adventures is one of the best of the New Year’s Day films. It’s also perhaps the only film in which Gene Hackman managed to overact more than even Ernest Borgnine. I mean, don’t get me wrong. It’s a strong competition between two great actors, neither of whom was known for being particularly subtle when it came to barking out their lines. But, in the end, Hackman still managed to take the overacting crown for this film.

(That said, what’s New Year’s Day without Borgnine shouting, “Where’s your God now, Preach-ah!?”)

In the scene below, the passengers ring in the new year while Leslie Nielsen faces the tidal wave that will soon turn the boat upside down. Whatever else you may want to say about this particular film, it does a great job of contrasting the celebrations in the ballroom with the dread on the bridge. While everyone else is counting down and celebrating and mugging for the camera, Nielsen can only stare in stoic horror as the wave approaches. He does the only thing that a captain can do. He sounds the alarm. He sends out an S.O.S. Unfortunately, the alarm can barely be hard over the celebrations of the new year and the S.O.S. man is quickly swept away by the crashing of the wave.

The scene goes from celebrating the future to highlighting the type of old-fashioned, nature-fueled destruction that has been wiping out civilizations since the beginning of time. It doesn’t matter how many plans you’ve made. It doesn’t matter how rich you are. It doesn’t matter how safe you feel or how much you cling to the furniture as the world turns upside down. Fate, whether it’s in the form of a wave or some other natural disaster, is pitiless. That’s one reason why disaster movies, as melodramatic as they could often be, so entranced audiences. Everyone knew that it would just as easily happen to them. Just as no one expected the tidal wave on New Year’s, no one would be expecting to leave the theater to be confronted by an earthquake or a tornado. But it could definitely happen. Life, like society, is a fragile thing. If not even Gene Hackman, Stella Stevens, Shelley Winters, and Roddy McDowall could make it to the end of the movie, what hope is there for anyone? Of course, the thing to remember is that they may not have made it but Ernest Borgnine, Red Buttons, Carol Lynley, and a few others did. They survived, though I imagine they spent the rest of their lives dreading January 1st.

Needless to say, neither the passage of time nor the wave can be escaped. As much as we may have things left to do in 2022, it’s too late now. 2023 is here and the world has moved on.

Retro Television Reviews: The Love Boat 1.10 “Dear Beverly/The Strike/Special Deliver”

Posted on November 9, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Come aboard! We’re expecting you!

Episode 10.10 “Dear Beverly/The Strike/Special Delivery”

(directed by Allen Baron, originally aired December 3rd, 1977)

Tonight’s voyage is all about misunderstandings!

For example, Beverly Blanchard (Eva Gabor) is an advice columnist who has built a career out of helping people work their way through misunderstandings. When she boards the Love Boat, she is swarmed by fans who all want her advice. She even leads a little seminar by the pool, in which she asks people if they have any problems that she can help with. Unfortunately, what she doesn’t understand is that her husband, Russ, is feeling neglected. Usually, I would say that Russ should stop feeling sorry for himself but Russ is played Leslie Nielsen, who is so superlikable in his stiffly earnest way that it’s hard not to have some sympathy for him. When Beverly finds out that Russ has been spending time with another passenger (Stephanie Blackmore), she writes a column in which she announces her retirement so that she can give Russ the attention he deserves. Personally, I would think a better column would be about why husbands shouldn’t cheat on their wives, especially with someone who they’ve known for less than 24 hours.

Speaking of cheaters, Jeff Smith (Robert Urich) cheated on his wife, Gail (Pamela Franklin), and now they’re separated. When Jeff boards the ship, he tries to pursue a romance with Julie but he quickly admits that he’s still hung up on his wife. What Jeff doesn’t know is that Gail is also on the ship and she’s 9 months pregnant! Now, considering that this is The Love Boat, it probably will not surprise you to learn that Gail goes into labor while on the boat and it’s up to Doc and Jeff to deliver the baby while the rest of the crew waits outside. Fortunately, the baby makes it and Jeff and Gail get back together. But what about Jeff cheating on Gail? Well, Gail takes responsibility for that, saying that she drove him to it. I was expecting at least one member of the crew to tell her that Jeff was responsible for his own decisions but instead, everyone nodded alone. Like, what the Hell?

Meanwhile, Captain Stubing was upset to learn that Chef Antonio Borga (Al Molinaro) was going to be in charge of the ship’s kitchen for the cruise. Apparently, there was bad blood between the two. When Borga refused to work, Stubing attempted to prepare dinner himself. The results were disastrous but the Chef respected the Captain for trying. And perhaps Chef Borga realized that Captain Stubing could probably get him fired for insubordination. Well, the important thing is that everyone came to an agreement and people got to eat.

This was a weird episode. The Chef storyline seemed like filler. The other two stories both featured women making excuses for cheating husbands. If this episode wanted to remind me that The Love Boat is very much a show of the 70s, it succeeded. This episode had a lot of boat but not a lot of love.

Hopefully, next week’s cruise will be a bit less problematic.

Retro Television Reviews: Fantasy Island 1.8 “Superstar/Salem”

Posted on November 1, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Tuesdays, I will be reviewing the original Fantasy Island, which ran on ABC from 1977 to 1986. The entire show is currently streaming on Tubi!

Despite being exhausted last night, I still made sure to watch the next episode of Fantasy Island before allowing myself to fall asleep. It’s all about priorities.

Episode 1.8 “Superstar/Salem”

(Dir by Earl Bellamy, originally aired on March 25th, 1978)

After a conversation with Tattoo about Tattoo’s sudden interest in photography, Mr. Roarke heads to the docks to meet this week’s guest stars!

First up, we have Richard Delaney (Gary Burghoff) and his wife, Dora (Darleen Carr). Dora thinks they are on a business trip but actually, Richard has a fantasy. Despite the fact that he is short, middle-aged, and not at all athletic, Richard’s fantasy is to not only pitch in a baseball game but to also strike out the best baseball players around.

(As a side note, as soon as I saw that this was going to be a baseball episode, I woke up Erin and made her watch it with me. Of course, it was also one in the morning at the time but still, I would have been a bad sister if I hadn’t.)

Anyway, Richard gets his chance. It turns out that Fantasy Island is holding a charity baseball game and Mr. Roarke has told everyone that Richard is the best amateur pitcher in the world. With the help of some Fantasy Island magic, Richard is able to strike out every batter who comes up to the plate. (According to Erin, all of the batters were real baseball players.) We know that Richard’s skills are due to magic because, whenever he throws the ball, we hear goofy sound effects. (“This is dumb,” Erin said, “Why did you wake me up for this?”) Richard is offered a try-out with the Dodgers. Yay!

Richard immediately get a little bit full of himself but it turns out that Richard’s fantasy didn’t include becoming a professional baseball player and he loses his ability to pitch. Unfortunately, Richard doesn’t discover this until after he tells off his boss. Fortunately, his boss is impressed by Richard’s honesty and he gives Richard a raise. Richard may never play pro ball but at least he’ll make a lot of money as an accountant or whatever it is that he does for a living. Yay! (“Is it over?” Erin asked, “Can I finally get some sleep now?”)

Meanwhile, Martha and Walter Tate (played by Vera Miles and Stuart Whitman) think that the world has become too permissive of bad behavior so they want to go some place where people are better behaved. Mr. Roarke promptly sends them to 17th century Salem, where they are both accused of being witches and narrowly avoid being executed. You know, Mr. Roarke, you could have just sent them to a friendly rural community in Nebraska or something. NOT EVERYTHING HAS TO BE A LESSON!

The best thing about the Salem storyline was that the evil and feared Dr. Whitfield, the man who ruled Salem with a iron fist, was played by Leslie Nielsen. When we first meet Dr. Whitfield, he’s explaining how the town drunk came to die.

Dr. Whitfield wanted to hang both Martha and Walter for the sins of dancing and giving aspirin to a child.

Leslie Nielsen may be playing a villain but he delivers his lines in the same style that later made him a comedic icon. If nothing else, that makes this episode fun to watch.

Martha and Walter end up fleeing Salem and, miraculously, they find themselves back on Fantasy Island. Mr. Roarke says that he hopes they have had an enlightening fantasy. Personally, if I was Mr. Roarke, I would be more worried about the lawsuit that they’re probably going to file against him.

This was a pretty silly episode but, as a general rule, I enjoy anything that features Leslie Nielsen playing a humorless villain. Add to that, it was hard not to smile at the sight of Mr. Roarke and Tattoo casually emerging from the jungle in their white suits to greet Walter and Martha after the latter two escaped Salem. It may have been a silly episode but it was also a fun one. And really, what else does one expect from Fantasy Island?

Film Review: Men With Brooms (dir by Paul Gross)

Posted on February 8, 2022 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Yesterday, having watched a bit of the Winter Games, I decided that I wanted to watch a movie about curling.

Unfortunately, I quickly discovered that there aren’t really a lot of curling films out there. There’s several films about ice skaters, of course. They all feature haughty skaters being forced to partner up with blue collar amateurs and almost all of them end with everyone falling in love. (Yay!) And there’s plenty of hockey movies. They all feature brawny Canadians getting into fights and almost all of them end with someone losing their front two teeth. (Yay!) But there aren’t a whole lot of curling movies. I guess some people don’t believe that a broom on ice can be cinematic. Well, the joke’s on them! Brooms are very cinematic! However, I did finally come across the 2002 Canadian film, Men With Brooms, on Tubi.

Now, you should understand that when I say that Men With Brooms is a Canadian film, I mean that it is very, very Canadian. This isn’t just a film that was shot in Canada by an American company looking for tax credits and a city that looked like New York without being as expensive. Instead, this is a film about very polite people who say “eh?” frequently and who are usually wearing several layers of clothing in order to protect from the chill in the air and the snow on the ground. This not a film that was shot in Canada for an American audience. This is a film that was made by Canadians for Canadians and that’s actually kind of nice. There’s even a scene where the characters bemoan the arrival of another “American” fast food restaurant. Speaking as an American, I think we are far too often guilty of taking our neighbors to the north for granted. It’s good to be reminded that they are a separate nation with a separate culture and their own individual way of looking at the world.

The film begins with the death of an old man named Donald Foley (James B. Douglas). Ten years before he died, Donald was the head coach of the greatest curling rink to ever play in Ontario. (For those — like me! — who are not familiar with all of the details and lingo of curling, a rink is just another word for team.) However, the rink broke up under mysterious circumstances. The former rink skip (team captain), Chris Cutter (Paul Gross), left Foley’s daughter at the altar and skipped town. He also tossed the rink’s curling stones into a lake! In fact, it was while he was retrieving the stones that Donald had the heart attack that killed him. Way to go, Chris, ya hoser!

The entire team reunites for Foley’s cremation and they discover that the coach has had his ashes put into a curling stone. And he wants the team to come back together and to win a championship using that very stone! And he also wants Chris to reconnect with his father, Gordon (Leslie Nielsen). Of course, it turns out that Chris is not the only member of the team to have issues. One team member has a low sperm count. Another one is a drug dealer and another is having a mid-life crisis. But they’ll all set aside their differences and try to win one for the coach! And if they even think about quitting, there will always be a helpful townsperson around to say, “You’re going to win the Golden Broom, eh?”

Tonally, Men With Brooms is all over the place. Odd comedic moments are mixed in with scenes of sentimental drama and the end result is a film that never seem to be quite sure what it’s trying to be. Not all of the big emotional moments pay off. Leslie Nielsen, though, is pretty good playing a relatively straight role. (He still gets his share of funny lines but this performance is definitely a different comedic beast from the deadpan style of self-parody that he’s best known for.) Ultimately, flaws aside, it’s a likable and fairly well-acted film, one that has a gentle spirit in even its raunchier moments. It’s just so damn Canadian that it’s hard not to appreciate it.

Add to that, it’s a good film to watch if you’re trying to teach yourself about curling. It may have been a slight film but, thanks to Men With Brooms, I now officially know that a curling team is called a rink. You learn something new every day.

Four Rode Out (1970, directed by John Peyser)

Posted on September 21, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

In this self-conciously hip western, former Lolita Sue Lyon stars as Myra Polsen. Myra has a reputation for being the town tramp and, when her father discovers Myra in bed with wanted outlaw Frenando Nunez (Julian Mateos), it leads to her father having a violent breakdown which ends with him shooting himself and Frenando escaping into the desert. (Before anyone comments, that’s not a misspelling. The outlaw’s name actually is Frenando.) World-weary U.S. Marshall Ross (Pernell Roberts) heads into the desert to try to capture Frenando. Accompanying him are Myra (who still loves Frenando) and the mysterious Mr. Brown (Leslie Nielsen!), a detective who is obsessed with Frenando and who says that he’ll kill the outlaw as soon as he sees him.

Also accompanying them is a ghostly folksinger played by Janis Ian, of At Seventeen fame. Ian sings songs that comment upon the story and they’re just as empty-headed and bad as you would expect them to be. Janis Ian’s presence marks this as being one of the handful of new wave westerns that were released in the wake of Easy Rider, The Wild Bunch, and the films of Sergio Leone. These westerns attempted to appeal to the counter-culture by sympathizing with the outlaws and featuring crooked lawmen. The addition of Janis Ian and her songs is Four Rode Out‘s way of saying, “This may be a western but this is a western that gets it.” Instead, it just comes across as artificial and forced. There’s a lot of room for both moral ambiguity and political subtext in the western genre, which was something that Leone and Sam Peckinpah proved. There’s less room for a hippie folksinger, as Four Rode Out demonstrates.

Other than Janis Ian’s songs and some dialogue that tries too hard to be profound, Four Rode Out isn’t bad. Sue Lyon really digs into the role of Myra and even Pernell Roberts gives a good performance. Of course, if you’re watching this movie in 2020, it’s probably going to be because of Leslie Nielsen. This movie was made before Nielsen recreated himself as a comedic actor and it’s interesting to see how the same things that made Nielsen so funny — the deadpan delivery, the overly serious facial expressions — also made him a good villain. For modern audiences, it can be difficult to look at Leslie Nielsen without laughing. That’s how much we associate him with comedy. But once you accept the fact that this is Leslie Nielsen playing a bad guy, he’s very convincing in the role.

One final note of interest: Four Rode Out was based on a story idea from the actor Dick Miller. Yes, that Dick Miller. Unfortunately, Miller himself is not in the movie.

The Night the Bridge Fell Down (1983, directed by Georg Fenady)

Posted on August 18, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

When civil engineer Carl Miller (James MacArthur) discovers that the Madison Bridge is on the verge of collapsing, he goes to his superior (Philip Baker Hall!) and explains that the bridge has to be closed down or people could die. Since there wouldn’t be a movie if anyone listened to Carl’s concerns, he’s ignored.

No sooner has Carl been told that he doesn’t know what he’s talking about than the bridge suddenly starts to collapse. With both ends of the bridge collapsing into the river below, a diverse group of people find themselves stranded in the middle. The group is made up of the usual group of disaster movie characters and, of course, one of them is played by Leslie Nielsen. This time, Nielsen is a crooked businessman with a mistress (played by Barbara Rush) and a baby to worry about. Eve Plumb (who was a member of the original Brady Bunch) is a nun. Richard Gilliland is a wounded cop. Gregory Sierra is a landscaper. Perhaps most improbably, clean-cut Desi Arnaz Jr. is a bank robber who keeps losing his temper and pointing a gun at everyone. Carl has to figure out how to get everyone off of the bridge before the entire things collapses. This leads to many shots of chunks of concrete falling off what’s left of the bridge, as if we need to be reminded that it’s dangerous to be on a bridge that’s in the process of very slowly collapsing.

After finding success making movies about fires, overturned ocean liners, volcanoes, cave-ins, and killer bees, I guess it only makes sense that Irwin Allen would finally get around the producing a movie about a collapsing bridge. The Night The Bridge Fell Down was filmed in 1980 but it wasn’t aired until 1983. When it did air, it played opposite the series finale of M*A*S*H, which remains one of the highest rated single episodes of television ever aired. It’s obvious that no one had much faith in a three hour film about a collapsing bridge and it only aired because NBC needed something — anything — to air at a time when they knew no one would be watching.

Because of the lengthy amount of time between the film’s production and it’s airing, The Night The Bridge Fell Down is the type of serious and plodding disaster film that was popular in the 70s but, by the time 1983 rolled around, had been rendered obsolete by the satiric bards of Airplane! Airplane‘s Leslie Nielsen even appears here, giving the type of serious performance that he specialized in before people discovered that he was actually a very funny man. Nielsen doesn’t give a bad performance but everything he says is thoroughly undercut by how difficult it is to take Leslie Nielsen seriously. No matter what Nielsen says, it always seems like he’s on the verge of adding, “And don’t call me Shirley.”

The main problem with The Night The Bridge Fell Down is that it’s a three-hour movie and that’s a long time to spend with a group of thinly characterized people on a bridge. I guess the film does feature an important message about maintaining roads and bridges. Watch it next Infrastructure Week.

Snatched (1973, directed by Sutton Roley)

Posted on August 3, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Three women have been kidnapped and are being held prisoner in a lighthouse. Robin Wood (Tisha Sterling), Kim Sutter (Sheree North), and Barbara Maxvill (Barbara Parkins) are married to three wealthy men and the kidnappers (one of whom is played by the great Anthony Zerbe) assume that the husband will be willing to pay whatever is necessary to get back their wives. Paul Maxvill (John Saxon) and Bill Sutter (Leslie Nielsen!) are willing to put up the money but Duncan Wood (Howard Duff) scoffs at the idea of paying a million dollars just to see his adulterous wife again!

It sounds like the set-up for a Ransom of Red Chief-type of comedy but Snatched is actually a very serious and intelligent thriller, one that will definitely keep you on your toes as you try to keep up with who is working for who. Kim is diabetic and is growing weaker every minute that she’s being held in the lighthouse. Paul, Bill, and police detective Frank McCloy (Robert Reed) try to get Duncan to pay his share of the ransom but Duncan is convinced that his wife has been cheating on him and he refuses to pay for her. On top of that, it turns out that one of the wives might be in on the scheme. When she tells the kidnappers that she’s actually the one who came up with the plan, is she just trying to protect the other wives or is she telling the truth? It leads to betrayal and a surprisingly downbeat ending.

Snatched is a well-produced made-for-TV movie. The mystery will keep you guessing and the cast is made up of a collection of old pros. Leslie Nielsen, cast here long before he reinvented himself as a comedic actor, is especially good as Bill Sutter and John Saxon gives one of his better performances as Paul. Even Robert Reed gives a good performance. Snatched is a classic made-for-TV mystery.

Cave-In! (1983, directed by Georg Fenady)

Posted on July 30, 2020 by Jedadiah Leland

Sen. Kate Lassiter (Susan Sullivan) is visiting a cave in order to determine whether it’s safe to leave it open to the public. Giving the senator and her group the grand tour is Gene Pearson (Dennis Cole), who is not only a park ranger but who is also Kate’s ex-boyfriend. The question as to whether or not the cave is safe for the general public is answered by a sudden cave-in, which leaves Kate, Gene, and the others trapped. Now, Gene has to lead the group across often dangerous terrain to safety.

Along with Kate, the group includes a bitter cop named Joe Johnson (Leslie Nielsen!), his wife Liz (Julie Sommars), arrogant Prof. Harrison Soames (Ray Milland), and the professor’s shy daughter, Ann (Sheila Larkin). Joe and Liz are struggling to keep their marriage together. Prof. Soames refuses to allow his daughter to have a life of her own. The six of them are going to have to somehow work together if they’re going to survive this cave-in! Of course, they’re not alone. There’s a seventh person in the cave. Tom Arlen (James Olson) is a dangerous convict who was in the cave hiding out from the police. Now, he’s trapped along with everyone else.

Cave-In is a pretty standard disaster movie. Produced by Irwin Allen, it was originally filmed in 1979 but it didn’t air on NBC until 1983. By that time, Airplane! had pretty much reduced the disaster genre to a joke. Ironically, Leslie Nielsen himself has a starring role in Cave-In, playing exactly the type of character that he parodied in both Airplane! and Police Squad. At the time he filmed Cave-In, Neilsen was still a dramatic actor but by the time the movie aired, his deadpan style was firmly associated with comedy. Even when his dialogue is serious, the natural instinct is to laugh.

Cave-In gets bogged down by flashbacks. Even though everyone should be concentrating on making their way to safety, it instead seems that they’re too busy obsessing on their backstory. Since no one’s backstory is that interesting, the flashbacks don’t do much to liven up the film and, unfortunately, a cave-in just isn’t as compelling as a fire in skyscraper or an upside down boat.

On the plus side, every disaster movie needs an arrogant bastard who makes escape unnecessarily difficult and, in the 70s, no one played a better arrogant bastard Ray Milland. Otherwise, Cave-In is a forgettable entry from the final days of the disaster genre.

TV Review: Night Gallery 2.1 “The Boy Who Predicted Earthquakes/Miss Lovecraft Sent Me/The Hand of Borgus Weems/Phantom of What Opera?”

Posted on June 1, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

The second season of Night Gallery premiered on September 15th, 1971. Once again, Rod Serling led viewers through a darkened museum, inviting them to look upon macabre paintings and imagine the story behind image.

The first episode had four — that’s right, four! — different stories! Apparently, the show’s producers demanded that, for the 2nd season, each episode feature shorter stories along with some light-heated segments. From what I’ve read, Rod Serling was not particularly happy with the directive and it’s perhaps significant that, after writing every story featured in Night Gallery‘s first season, he only wrote one of the stories featured in the second season premiere.

The Boy Who Predicted Earthquakes (dir by John Badham, written by Rod Serling)

Herbie (played by 12 year-old Clint Howard, younger brother of Ron) is a little boy with a very special gift. He can see the future. He seems like a normal child, the type who rambles about random subjects except that, at random, he’ll suddenly stop and ominously predict the future. After Herbie correctly predicts both the rescue of a missing girl and an earthquake, Herbie is given his own TV show. For a year, Herbie makes predictions, all of which come true. Then, suddenly, Herbie refuses to shares his latest prediction and says that he doesn’t want to do the show anymore. What has Herbie seen and is it a good thing or a bad thing?

The Boy Who Predicted Earthquakes gets the second season of Night Gallery off to a good start. Centered by a natural performance from Clint Howard, The Boy Who Predicted Earthquakes is an intelligently written and thought-provoking story. Not only does it examine the burden of being able to see the future but it’s also a provocative look at how society exploits the gifted. With the exception of Herbie’s grandfather (William Hansen), the people around Herbie are less concerned with what he predicts than that people keep watching. The segment ends on an appropriately dark note, one that will keep the viewer thinking.

Miss Lovecraft Sent Me (dir by Gene Kearney, written by Jack Laird)

A gum-chewing babysitter (Sue Lyon) show up for her latest job. It’s at a castle! And the owner of the castle (played by Joseph Campanella) has gray skin, is wearing a cape, and has a Transylvanian accent! What could it all mean?

This is a short comedic segment. Apparently, the producer of Night Gallery, Jack Laird, had the idea to liven things up with sketches like this one. Serling was apparently not a fan of the idea but Miss Lovecraft Sent Me isn’t that bad. It’s silly and insubstantial because Joseph Campanella and Sue Lyon handled their roles well. It’s impossible not to laugh when the babysitter reads aloud the names of the books that Campanella has sitting on his bookshelf.

The Hand of Borgus Weems (dir by John M. Lucas, written by Alvin Sapinsley)

Peter Lacland (George Maharis) sits in a doctor’s office and asks Dr. Ravadon (Ray Milland) to remoe his right hand. Peter explains that his right hand has a mind of its own and that it keeps trying to kill everyone who Peter comes into contact with. Peter explains that his hand has been possessed!

There’s a surprisingly large number of stories out there about possessed hands. The Hand of Borgus Weems doesn’t necessarily bring anything new to the genre and it gets a bit bogged down with its flashback structure but it’s still an enjoyably creepy little segment, featuring good performances from George Maharis and Ray Milland. Possessed hands are also creepy, no matter what. Like The Boy Who Predicted Earthquakes, it also has an effective ending, which is quite a contrast to the often insubstantial conclusions of Night Gallery’s first season.

Phantom Of What Opera? (written and dir by Gene Kearney)

This is a short, 4-minute comedic story — a skit really — featuring Leslie Nielsen as the Phantom of the Opera and Mary Ann Beck as Christine. This version starts out like a typical Phantom segment, with the Phantom kidnapping Christine, taking her down to the dungeon, and telling her never to remove his mask. Christine, of course, removes his mask while he’s playing the organ just for him to then discover that she’s also wearing a mask. It all leads to love and a happy ending! It’s kind of a sweet segment, actually.

So the 2nd season of Night Gallery got off to a pretty good start! Would future episodes continue the trend? We’ll find out soon as I continue to watch Night Gallery.

Previous Night Gallery Reviews: