Night Gallery
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| Night Gallery | |
|---|---|
| Genre | Anthology |
| Created by | Rod Serling |
| Presented by | Rod Serling |
| Theme music composer | Gil Mellé |
| Composer(s) | Robert Bain Paul Glass John Lewis Gil Mellé Oliver Nelson Robert Prince Eddie Sauter |
| Country of origin | United States |
| Language(s) | English |
| No. of seasons | 3 |
| No. of episodes | 46 (+ 1 pilot) (List of episodes) |
| Production | |
| Executive producer(s) | Paul Freeman |
| Producer(s) | Jack Laird William Sackheim |
| Camera setup | Single-camera |
| Running time | 50 minutes (seasons 1 & 2) 25 minutes (season 3) |
| Production company(s) | Universal TV |
| Distributor | Studios USA Television |
| Broadcast | |
| Original channel | NBC |
| Audio format | Monaural |
| Original run |
November 8, 1969 (pilot) December 16, 1970 – May 27, 1973 |
Night Gallery is an American anthology series that aired on NBC from 1970 to 1973, featuring stories of horror and the macabre. Rod Serling, who had gained fame from an earlier series, The Twilight Zone, served both as the on-air host of Night Gallery and as a major contributor of scripts, although he did not have the same control of content and tone as he had had on The Twilight Zone.
Contents |
[edit] Plot
Serling appeared in an art gallery setting and introduced the macabre tales that made up each episode by unveiling paintings (by artist Tom Wright) that depicted the stories. Night Gallery regularly presented adaptations of classic fantasy tales by authors such as H. P. Lovecraft, as well as original works, many of which were by Serling himself.
The series was introduced with a pilot TV movie that aired on November 8, 1969, and featured the directorial debut of Steven Spielberg, as well as one of the last acting performances by Joan Crawford. Originally, Bette Davis was set to star in the segment, but she felt her work was not important to a young director. Unlike the series, in which the paintings merely accompanied an introduction to the upcoming story, the paintings themselves actually appeared in the three segments, serving major or minor plot functions.
Night Gallery was part of a rotating anthology series called Four-In-One. This 1970–1971 television series rotated four separate shows, also including McCloud, SFX (San Francisco International Airport) and The Psychiatrist. Two of these, Night Gallery and McCloud were renewed for the 1971–1972 season with McCloud becoming the most popular and longest running of the four.
[edit] Reception
The series attracted criticism for its use of comedic blackout sketches between the longer story segments in some episodes, and for its splintered, multiple-story format, which contributed to its uneven tone. Serling wrote many of the teleplays, including "Camera Obscura", "The Caterpillar" (based on a short story by Oscar Cook), "Class of '99", "Cool Air" (based on a short story by H.P. Lovecraft), "The Doll", "Green Fingers", "Lindemann's Catch", and "The Messiah on Mott Street" (heavily influenced by Bernard Malamud's "Angel Levine"). Non-Serling efforts include "The Dead Man", "I'll Never Leave You—Ever", "Pickman's Model", "A Question of Fear", "Silent Snow, Secret Snow", and "The Sins of the Fathers."
By the final season, Serling, stung by criticism and ignored by the show's executives, all but disowned the series.
[edit] List of episodes
[edit] Pilot
| Title | Original airdate | Writer | Director | Cast | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| "The Cemetery" | 1969-11-08 | Rod Serling | Boris Sagal | Roddy McDowall, Ossie Davis, George Macready | |
| "Eyes" | 1969-11-08 | Rod Serling | Steven Spielberg | Joan Crawford, Barry Sullivan, Tom Bosley | |
| "Escape Route" | 1969-11-08 | Rod Serling | Barry Shear | Richard Kiley, Sam Jaffe |
[edit] Season 1
[edit] Season 2
[edit] Season 3
| Title | Original airdate | Writer | Director | Cast | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| "Return of the Sorcerer" | 09/24/1972 | Vincent Price, Patricia Sterling, Bill Bixby | Based on a short story by Clark Ashton Smith | ||
| "The Girl with the Hungry Eyes" | 10/1/1972 | James Farentino, John Astin, Joanna Pettet | |||
| "Rare Objects" | 10/22/1972 | Rod Serling | Mickey Rooney, Raymond Massey | ||
| "Spectre in Tap-Shoes" | 10/29/1972 | Sandra Dee, Dane Clark, Christopher Connelly | |||
| "You Can Come Up Now, Mrs. Millikan" | 11/12/1972 | Ozzie Nelson, Harriet Nelson, Roger Davis, Michael Lerner | |||
| "Smile, Please" | 11/12/1972 | Cesare Danova, Lindsay Wagner | |||
| "The Other Way Out" | 11/19/1972 | Burl Ives, Ross Martin | |||
| "Fright Night" | 12/10/1972 | Stuart Whitman, Barbara Anderson, Alan Napier | |||
| "Finnegan's Flight" | 12/17/1972 | Rod Serling | Burgess Meredith, Cameron Mitchell, Barry Sullivan | ||
| "She'll Be Company for You" | 12/24/1972 | Leonard Nimoy, Lorraine Gary, Kathryn Hays | |||
| "The Ring with the Red Velvet Ropes" | 01/07/1973 | Gary Lockwood, Joan van Ark, Chuck Connors | |||
| "Something in the Woodwork" | 01/14/1973 | Leif Erickson, Paul Jenkins, John McMurtry, Geraldine Page, Barbara Rhoades | |||
| "Death on a Barge" | 03/04/1973 | Leonard Nimoy | Lesley Ann Warren, Lou Antonio, Brooke Bundy, Robert Pratt | ||
| "Whisper" | 05/13/1973 | Dean Stockwell, Sally Field | |||
| "The Doll of Death" | 05/20/1973 | Susan Strasberg, Alejandro Rey | |||
| "Hatred unto Death" | 05/27/1973 | Steve Forrest, Dina Merrill, Fernando Lamas | |||
| "How to Cure the Common Vampire" | 05/27/1973 | ||||
| "Die Now, Pay Later" | Will Geer, Slim Pickens | ||||
| "Room for One Less" | Lee Jay Lambert, James Metropole |
[edit] Award nominations
Night Gallery was nominated for an Emmy Award for its first-season episode "They're Tearing Down Tim Riley's Bar" as the Outstanding Single Program on U.S. television in 1971. In 1972, the series received another nomination (Outstanding Achievement in Makeup) for the second-season episode "Pickman's Model."
[edit] Syndication
In order to increase the number of episodes that were available for syndication, the 60-minute episodes were reedited into a 30-minute time slot, with many segments either severely cut or extended by using newly shot scenes and stock footage to fill up the time. Meanwhile, episodes of a short-lived supernatural series from 1972, The Sixth Sense, were also incorporated into the syndicated version of the series, with Serling providing newly filmed introductions to those episodes.
In recent years, the original, uncut version of the series has been shown on the Encore Mystery cable network, allowing fans to see the episodes in their original format for the first time in 30 years. The show is also available in some markets through the Retro Television Network.
[edit] DVD releases
In 2004, Universal released the Region 1 DVD collection (including the pilot film and the six episodes of the first season) of the series, plus bonus episodes from Seasons 2 and 3 as extras. On October 16, 2006, the first season (including the pilot film and two bonus episodes, one from Season 2 and one from Season 3) was released on Region 2 DVD.
In August 2008, Universal announced a November 18, 2008, release of the complete Season 2 DVD collection (only Region 1). Later, they announced that one story segment from Season 2, "Witches' Feast", would not be included, due to the fact that "Universal was not able to locate portions of the 40-year-old episode." When and if Universal releases the third season of Night Gallery on DVD, the studio expects to release "Witches' Feast" as part of that set.[1]
The third and final season will be released on April 10, 2012.[2]
| DVD name | Ep # | Release date | Additional information |
|---|---|---|---|
| The Complete First Season | 17 | August 24, 2004 | |
| Season 2 | 61 | November 18, 2008 |
|
| Season 3 | 20 | April 10, 2012 |
[edit] See also
- Alcoa Presents: One Step Beyond
- The Twilight Zone (1959 TV series)
- The Twilight Zone (1985 TV series)
- The Twilight Zone (2002 TV series)
- The Outer Limits (1963 TV series)
- The Outer Limits (1995 TV series)
[edit] References
- Skelton, Scott and Jim Benson. Rod Serling's Night Gallery: An After-Hours Tour. Syracuse University Press: 1999. ISBN 978-0815627821
- The Simpsons' Halloween Episode "Treehouse of Horror IV" parodies the series by showing Bart, in a Rod Serling fashion, introducing us to each episode, by showing hanging pictures depicting their respective plots.
[edit] Note
[edit] External links
- Night Gallery at the Internet Movie Database
- Night Gallery at TV.com
- Rod Serling's Night Gallery: A Shadowy Museum of the Outre
