Night Gallery (TV Series) The Dead Man/The Housekeeper (1970) User Reviews

Hypnosis & Magic

[AaronCapenBanner · 7/10 · 11 November 2014]

'The Dead Man' - A doctor/hypnotist uses a young man as his subject to cheat death, but the man is having an affair with his wife, unconsciously forcing him to put him in a state of living death... Effective story with a most chilling ending.

'The Housekeeper' - Larry Hagman plays a frustrated yet determined man who decides to use black magic to get rid of his unloving wife, and needs a willing but ignorant woman to aid him by a soul transference, no matter how long it takes... Amusing story where the final line is the payoff.

First episode of the TV series.

Off to a Pretty Good Start

[Hitchcoc · 8/10 · 2 June 2014]

So I need to review two complete episodes. The first, "The Dead Man" is a tale of a man's arrogance, such an arrogance that he revels in the pain of his subject. He has found a man who when signaled, shows symptoms of whatever has been programmed into his brain. When the good doctor, played by Carl Betz, the father on "The Donna Reed Show," taps, the guy becomes filled with sores, grey with a blood condition, or, in the final test, dead. I didn't catch where this guy came from other than he is rich and bored and interesting in the doctor's young, beautiful wife. There is that tussle that often takes place in shows like this, where despite his need for this not so subtle attraction to progress his research, he harbors some pretty serious anger. This leads to a great mistake. I remember this episode like it was yesterday, and the conclusion is to die for.

The second episode, "The Housekeeper," has the ever entertaining Larry Hagman married to a virago who has a fortune of seven million dollars. There is no pre-nup, so he must put up with her dalliances. Through a study of the black arts, using frogs, he has found a way to transfer the brain and personality from one person to another (at one point we are let in on his experiments where a pig crows and a rooster oinks. He puts out an add for an unattractive old lady with a kind heart. He hopes to transfer her kind demeanor to his wife's body, and get his hands on her money. This is utterly silly and yet delightful. When he and the old lady goes to the fancy restaurant, he orders frog legs. Interesting.

The Dead Man is Worthwhile Watching

[claudio_carvalho · 7/10 · 19 March 2018]

Divided in two segments hosted by Rod Serling, the first episode of "Night Gallery" presents two supernatural stories.

Dr. Miles Talmadge (Jeff Corey) is invited by his colleague and friend Dr. Max Redford (Carl Betz) to come to his isolated clinic to witness his recent research. Max shows his only patient John Michael Fearing (Michael Blodgett) that has psychosomatic illness and is capable to receive suggestions under hypnosis to change his body instantaneously from healthy to sickness and vice-versa. Fearing is in love with Dr. Redford´s younger wife Velia Redford (Louise Sorel) and this is the only reason for him to accept to be submitted to Dr. Redford´s experiments. When he decides to defeat death using Fearing, his signal does not bring his guinea pig back to life and Fearing dies. Velia becomes insane until the day Dr. Talmadge discovers his friend committed a mistake in his signal. What will happen next?

"The Dead Man" is a creepy tale. The tension increases and the conclusion is excellent. My vote is eight.

Cedric Acton (Larry Hagman) is unhappily married with the wealthy Carlotta Acton (Suzy Parker). He requests an ugly and lonely housekeeper and Miss Wattle (Jeanette Nolan) applies for the job. She is interviewed by Cedric and soon she leans his intentions. Will she accept his proposal?

'The Housekeeper" is a shorter and weaker episode with many flaws and confused conclusion without explanation for Cedric´s final words. Maybe the episode was edited to 20 minutes running time and become nonsense. My vote is six.

My global vote to this episode is seven.

Title (Brazil): "O Morto / A Empregada" ("The Dead Man / The Housekeeper")

The only episode of Night Gallery I remember

[dunbar-7 · 14 January 2007]

I remember this episode, well, really only the end of the episode, because it kept me up for nights after I saw it. Earlier that day I took a walk around a local cemetery, spending several hours there looking over the tombstones. It was as if I couldn't tear myself away from the place. Later that night, I watched this episode of "Night Gallery." When the coffin opened up and the corpse popped out, I nearly jumped out of my skin. The hair, the long nails, these are the images that kept this 10-year-old awake for many night after viewing the show. I couldn't even watch Carl Betz in anything for a long time after that. Indeed, a terrifying resurrection. Well put, Mr. Garrard!

"You told him to die, and he did!"

[classicsoncall · 7/10 · 13 May 2017]

Rod Serling hearkened back to his days as host of 'The Twilight Zone' when he opened up this show with the words "we submit for your approval this and other frozen moments of nightmare placed on canvas". You could always count on Serling for some poignant remarks about the story to follow, so that was a nice bit of nostalgia for Twilight Zone fans.

I had the opening story figured out after the first round of signals offered by Dr. Redford (Carl Betz), thinking to myself, how did he remember the various sequence of knocks for each of the conditions simulated by John Fearing (Michael Blodgett)? That he could get confused when bringing Fearing back from the dead was entirely plausible, but therein lies an inconsistency in the story. If Fearing were 'dead', how would he respond to the three-two knock in the first place? No sense worrying about it, the payoff was what one tuned in for with this show, and the one here was perfectly suited for the story.

'The Housekeper' segment had an inconsistency of it's own which I'll get to, but wasn't Larry Hagman a trip in this episode? I believe it's the only time I've ever seen him in a role with a beard, and I have a suspicion it wasn't real, but who cares. The story combines a little science with a little black magic, and for any married man watching the show, might contain perhaps a little bit of 'what if'? Cedric Acton hit upon the perfect solution to replacing his wife but invariably fell victim to a unique case of unintended consequences. The ending would have been classic, except for one thing. If the former Miss Wattle's (Jeanette Nolan) personality now resided in Acton's wife Carlotta (Suzy Parker), then how would the 'new' exchange prospect have the understanding to ask Acton how many more times they would have to do this. The response 'Until we get it right' was a great twist ending, but not really possible given the original premise.

Decay of the Body and the Soul

[P_Cornelius · 9/10 · 15 May 2009]

I was transfixed by this segment. I simply couldn't take my eyes off it. Yes, the ending is obvious (although this might not be so much NG's fault as this story has been reworked and re-envisioned what must be at least a dozen times or more since NG on all those other syndicated horror anthologies). But the construction and portrayal was so tight and effective that it worked.

All the characters were crazed. From Carl Betz' sardonic Max to Louise Sorel's Velia Redford, who eventually looked like a 1960s version of the Bride of Frankenstein, each one was mad as a hatter--and morally empty. Even the supposedly "sane" Miles Talmadge looked the part of a crazed fanatic. His face hidden behind coke bottle sized eyeglass lenses, bushy brows that would create envy in a Neanderthal, and a frizzed out hairdo that probably inspired Dr. J, Miles quickly succumbed to investigating the failure of the experiment, rather than locking up the madman responsible for it.

In a deft little touch that seems to symbolize Miles' descent into the darkside, there is a drastic shift in photography when Talmadge essentially joins in with Max. Whereas the story had been photographed rather straightforwardly, albeit in numerous close-ups, when Miles files out, after the attempt to revive Fearing has failed, and settles on the staircase next to Velia the photography suddenly becomes Expressionistic. Deep shadows fall across characters and their situations. The close-ups are replaced by extreme low and high angle shots--more low than high, however. And the entire set begins to seem like something designed by Dr. Caligari.

This is all very effective. Yet I hesitate to call the segment "good". Why? Maybe it's because there is no catharsis for the viewer with this tale. Instead, I'm left feeling "disturbed" and "uneasy". I can still, long after the actual viewing, "feel" the weight of the segment. The interior of the Queen Anne/Eastlake style house was stifling. Its Edwardian decor, with the heavy curtains and drapes, the massive wooden beams, made for such a close feeling that I thought I would have trouble breathing. And then there was the "research room", where modern medical equipment seemed to be jammed into what was an already impossibly small room better suited for antiques, which just highlighted the ill fitting nature of it all.

In the end, I was drawn to this thing, although I'm not really sure why. Everything about it projected a sense of revulsion, decay, and disorder. I doubt I've ever seen a locale on television that I wanted to avoid more than this one.

A nice way to start this wonderful series. See it mostly for 'The Dead Man".

[b_kite · 7/10 · 25 March 2018]

The first main episode of Night Gallery consists of two sedgments.

"The Dead Man" features Dr. Miles Talmadge (Jeff Corey) who is invited by his colleague and friend Dr. Max Redford (Carl Betz) to come to his isolated clinic to witness his recent research. Max shows his only patient John Michael Fearing (Michael Blodgett) that has psychosomatic illness and is capable to receive suggestions under hypnosis to change his body instantaneously from healthy to sickness and vice-versa. Fearing is in love with Dr. Redford's younger wife Velia Redford (Louise Sorel) and this is the only reason for him to accept to be submitted to Dr. Redford's experiments. When he decides to defeat death using Fearing, his signal does not bring his guinea pig back to life and Fearing dies. Velia becomes insane until the day Dr. Talmadge discovers his friend committed a mistake in his signal. What will happen next? (courtesy of IMDB)

"The Housekeeper" features Cedric Acton (Larry Hagman) who is unhappily married with the wealthy Carlotta Acton (Suzy Parker). He requests an ugly and lonely housekeeper and Miss Wattle (Jeanette Nolan) applies for the job. She is interviewed by Cedric and soon she leans his intentions. Will she accept his proposal? (courtesy of IMDB)

"The Dead Man" is a very freighting episode which tells the age old story of man trying to cheat death only to have it come back and bit him were it hurts. It was based on a short story by Fritz Leiber, and the teleplay was written by Douglas Heyes (surprisingly not Sterling) who also directed it as well. Its boosts a fine cast and all four of the actors are on board here. The story builds good suspense through out leading up to the shocking conclusion, which really scared me when I was younger, the old deserted mansion setting really adds to the creepiness. "The Housekeeper" moves more into comedic territory as we have Larry Hagman from Dallas fame trying to replace his beautiful wife's dark mean personality with that of a kind housekeeper, he has some way found a way transfer them using black magic. While the episode seems to be played majorily for laughs, Hagman plays the role dead serious which adds to the comedy. At one point we are let in on Hagman's experiments and we see different animals with different personalities. For example a pig crows. The twist is silly and is made confusing by some choppy editing, but, the whole story has a delightful charming feel to it despite the goofiness. It was also written by Heyes, but was directed by John Meredyth Lucas.

All in all, a nice way to start this wonderful series. See it mostly for 'The Dead Man".

Character Sketch

[P_Cornelius · 9/10 · 15 May 2009]

A brief character sketch, "The Housekeeper" spotlights Larry Hagman playing against type. Remember, back when this first aired, Hagman was universally identified with the wacky, bumbling Maj. Anthony Nelson on I Dream of Jeannie. Thus I guess you could say Night Gallery was somewhat prescient in presenting Hagman's Cedric as a sort of greedy, lustful, evil wizard, foreshadowing the conniving J.R. of Dallas.

Other notable touches in the segment: 1) presenting Miss Wattle against a tulip patterned stained glass background, at once emphasizing her as a hag and maybe someone more vain than appearances would let on. 2) Cedric's lab, which had all the successful earmarks of a Hammer horror lab suitable even for Frankenstein. 3) Carlotta being cornered by her full length three dimensional mirrors, before being switched into the hag's body, where, presumably she immediately and suddenly would see her new self in the mirror.

A good start to the series.

[Hey_Sweden · 7/10 · 23 September 2019]

This is a good, if not great, official first episode to the Rod Serling series. He hosts, introducing each segment with his trademark delivery, but did not adapt these stories. They're certainly entertaining, with the second of the two having a little more "punch" with its final punchline.

'The Dead Man' (scripted and directed by Douglas Heyes, based on the tale by Fritz Leiber Jr.) stars Carl Betz as Max Redford, a doctor who's found a remarkable young patient in the studly John Michael Fearing (Michael Blodgett). Through the power of suggestion, Max can get John to simulate any disease. Tragedy arises when he tries to get John to simulate death, and John dies for good. Max's wife Velia (Louise Sorel), deeply in love with John, goes insane with grief, and his associate Dr. Talmadge (the great character actor and acting teacher Jeff Corey) realizes the mistake that was initially made. But what will the final result be, when Max tries to make things right?

'The Housekeeper') offers a nifty premise when Cedric Acton (Larry Hagman) tries to replace the cold personality of his wife Carlotta (Suzy Parker) with the much more appealing soul of kindly old housekeeper Miss Wattle (Jeanette Nolan). Miss Wattle is not happy with this idea, but Cedric is determined to see his plan come to fruition. Heyes also wrote this segment (under a pseudonym), which is directed by John Meredyth Lucas.

'The Dead Man' doesn't have a particularly imaginative conclusion, but it IS sad and creepy, with 'The Housekeeper' containing more blatantly comedic and silly touches. Cedric has a basement laboratory that would make Dr. Frankenstein proud, and as evidence of his experiments, we see a crowing pig and an oinking rooster.

Overall, the acting is excellent (horror fans will recognize Cathleen Cordell, who played the Colonels' wife in "The Return of the Living Dead", in 'The Housekeeper'), and the directors offer some good atmosphere, pacing, and humor.

Seven out of 10.

If only the rest of the shows had been this good!

[garrard · 9/10 · 2 May 2006]

"The Dead Man" was the first installment of the series, following the airing of "The Night Gallery" pilot a year earlier. In this story, Carl Betz plays Max Redford, a doctor/researcher that has found the perfect subject in the guise of John Fearing (Michael Blodgett), a young man that through subconscious suggestion can mimic many fatal diseases, even death. To keep the strapping hunk in his care, Max allows the twenty-something to have an affair with Max's wife Velia (played by soap veteran Louise Sorell, in her younger days).

When Max's friend Miles Talmadge (played by acting legend Jeff Corey) comes for visit, things go awry. Max accidentally gives Michael the wrong revival cues and the young man does not return from his death state. Thus, the young man is buried.

Max is distraught and Velia is despondent. He asks his friend Miles to listen to the tapes to find out what went wrong during the session. Miles returns some time later to tell Max that he gave the cues wrong. Velia while just outside the laboratory, hearing all that has transpired, runs madly to the cemetery (conveniently located just over the hill) and gives the right signal at the crypt of Fielding.

There has never been a more terrifying "resurrection."

Nice early work from Larry and a neat clever way to change your trophy socialite wife!

[blanbrn · 6/10 · 29 November 2012]

Just watched this now classic episode of "Night Gallery" from season one I believe the first episode it's even more special now that TV legend Larry Hagman has passed. Anyway it was odd seeing Hagman sport a beard I was always used to him being clean shaved. Anyway again about seven years before his big role as J.R. Ewing on "Dallas", Larry was a guest star on this sci-fi, horror suspense series "Night Gallery". In this episode Larry is a man that has an attractive trophy socialite type wife, but her attitude on the inside is terrible. In a clever twist the Hagman character hires a sweet and innocent old lady as a housekeeper, once he sees this old lady's attitude is so much better than his wife's he's got a plan. It's in the form of a frog it's a strange creature transformation that you have to watch to see it explained. The body and attitude turns out to both be switched between his wife and the old lady! Overall good clever episode nice to see some Hagman work before he became J.R. and this episode had good montage editing with old "Frankenstein" clips!

Two tales of terror, with one creepy and the other funny

[Woodyanders · 8/10 · 22 August 2018]

"The Dead Man" - John Fearing (a nicely cocky turn by Michael Blodgett) can mimic the symptoms of any disease. However, since Fearing is having an affair with Velia (the fetching Louise Sorel, who's quite good), this begets the jealous wrath of her doctor husband Max Redford (a solid and lively performance by Carl Betz). Director Douglas Heyes relates the compelling premise at a snappy pace, neatly explores the themes of death and mortality, and pulls out the spooky stops for a corker of a macabre climax. Moreover, Jeff Corey lends excellent support as Max's baffled colleague Dr. Miles Talmadge.

"The Housekeeper" - Black magic practitioner Cedric Acton (smoothly played by a bearded Larry Hagman) plans to put the sweet soul of elderly housekeeper Miss Wattle (a delightfully dotty Jeanette Nolan) into the body of his snippy socialite wife Carlotta (a perfectly snarky Suzy Parker). While the story is on the slight side, the likeable lighthearted tone and especially the priceless last line make it a real hoot and a half all the same.

One great story--another not so great story

[preppy-3 · 7/10 · 25 February 2023]

The first episode of the "Night Gallery" TV series. First is "The Dead Man" where a scientist can make a man either live or die by hypnosis. He also has a lovely young wife who falls for the young man he's experimenting on. Then he wills the young man to die...but can't bring him back to life. It all leads to a downright terrifying ending. Scary and well-done with great acting.

"The Housekeeper" isn't half as good. Larry Hagman stars as a man who experiments in black magic. He also has a wife who is beautiful but cold and cruel. He wants to transfer the soul of a kind and gentle old woman (Jeanette Nolan) into his wife's body. He does but the results are not what he hoped for. Boring and silly.

Watch it for the first story--skip the second.

Night Gallery: Episode 2

[Scarecrow-88 · 5/10 · 16 July 2010]

In this episode of Night Gallery, the first tale called THE DEAD MAN, concerns a psychiatrist who releases all his other patients from an asylum he operates to focus on a handsome psychosomatic young man. Dr. Max Redford(Carl Betz)calls over his mentor, Dr. Miles Talmadge(Jeff Corey)to happily show him a patient named John Fearing(Michael Blodgett). Fearing's body can be inflicted with any disease and return to health! Redford has found a way to actually control Fearing's body, using a specific pattern of taps to coordinate what psychosomatic reactions the male experiment will have through hypnotic suggestion. Meanwhile, Max's wife Velia(Louise Sorel)has fallen in love with Fearing and her husband is becoming increasingly jealous. Talmadge warns Max not to use his technique to harm Fearing, no matter how he feels wronged by his wife's fondness for his human lab animal. But, Max's obsession with using Fearing's physical condition to test his theory of immortality could lead to devastating consequences. To be honest, I found THE DEAD MAN rather lackluster in it's execution. It takes quite a while to get to the macabre final image(it's obvious the show is built towards this), and Sorel goes over the top(more like melodramatically overboard)towards the end when she discovers her husband's mistake in the fate of Fearing..the wailing hysterics and flailing of the arms. The second tale, THE HOUSEKEEPER, has a devious(and cunning)Larry Hagman as a scheming husband, Cedric Action wanting to use black magic to perform a "personality transplant" on his adulterous(and beautiful)wife, Carlotta(Suzy Parker)with an "old hag"(who seems to have a sweet heart and gentle personality), Miss Wattle(Jeanette Nolan). Sufficed to say, it doesn't quite go as Cedric had planned. Sure the transplant is a success, but his wishes for a more subservient wife fails more than a bit miserably. Hagman, as some sort of mad scientist, is a hoot..not exactly a role we are accustomed to seeing Hagman portray, but he can play conniving and devilish with the best of them.

Another pair of portentous paintings.

[BA_Harrison · 10 February 2023]

Rod Serling introduces two macabre tales based around the exhibits in his 'night gallery'.

In The Dead Man, Dr. Max Redford (Carl Betz) invites his friend Dr. Miles Talmadge (Jeff Corey) to his home, to introduce him to John Fearing (Michael Blodgett), a patient who he has conditioned using hypnotic suggestion to fall ill, and return to health, on his command; Max believes that his control method may even help conquer death. Redford's experiments take a horrific turn when his subject dies and he is unable to bring him back as planned. When Miles goes through Max's case notes and recordings, he discovers his friend's mistake - an error that proves to have deadly consequences. The final EC-style twist in this episode is enjoyable, but like the stories in the pilot, I think it would have been more impactful if they had been able to up the gruesomeness.

Story number two is a more whimsical affair, Larry Hagman playing Cedric Acton, the husband of a wealthy and attractive woman with a horrible personality. Using the dark arts, Cedric hopes to carry out a personality transplant, replacing his wife's obnoxiousness with the more benign nature of housekeeper Miss Wattle (Jeanette Nolan). Obviously, things don't go according to plan. The light-hearted tone makes this an inoffensive bit of fun, while the short running time ensures that it never bores. Unlikely to give you nightmares, but entertaining nonetheless.

Control of death / Promise of Beauty and money

[AvionPrince16 · 7/10 · 30 October 2023]

The Dead man review:

So i need to say the talks about the death and the relationship between death and spirit. And how the mind influence the body. But this episode go more extreme by a man who control illness with the mind of a patient an even more with death but things will get pretty wrong when the man will get jealous and will cause a death that he didnt want. And the discovery of the tapes and theories of that man who controlled by hypnosis John was very ineresting and make us understand the problem and how it gone wrong because of the signal.

And it will be more dramatic when Velda will try to revive the dead man. I also love the shots on the cemetery and that strange music that we hear and realy fit the mood of that particular scene. And that final scene quite scary. A nice first episode. Love the themes that they talked about too(hypnosis, mind, body, jealousy, emotions).

The Housekeeper review:

So its basically a story of a men who get tired of his wife and get scared because she has the money and scared that she leaves her. And the new housekeeper supposed to take her place with a scientific solution?. It was a bit too much out of reality for me. But i understand the horrible situation that the man want for his wife and get control over that housekeeper that become her wife. It was just a story of a man who want control of his wife because everything gone even her love with him. It is what it is. That housekeeper become his wife but even with that money cant buy anything. And the housekeeper will trappe also with that man desires.

Wrong actress credited

[folklegend · 8/10 · 29 October 2021]

The old woman at the end of The Housekeeper segment is not Judith Lowry. It's Merie Earle of The Waltons and Green Acres fame. It's baffling that the ignorant children who run this site refuse to correct it and admit they screwed up even after being shown screen shots of the episode and photos of both women because "it can't be verified" when they clearly never verified crediting Judith Lowry who looks nothing like Merie Earle.

First time

[BandSAboutMovies · 6/10 · 3 December 2022]

Originally airing on December 16, 1970, Night Gallery returned from its pilot a year later with two new stories, starting with Serling walking out of a floating gallery and saying, "Good evening, and welcome to a private showing of three paintings, displayed here for the first time. Each is a collector's item in its own way-not because of any special artistic quality, but because each captures on a canvas, suspended in time and space, a frozen moment of a nightmare."

The first story, "The Dead Man," was written and directed by Douglas Heyes (Kitten With a Whip). Based on the short story by Fritz Leiber, it's a very Amicus-style story of Dr. Max Redford (Carl Betz) and Dr. Miles Talmadge (Jeff Corey) discussing a medical technique in which different taps can make a person sick or well. One of those patients, John Fearing (Michael Blodgett), has come back numerous times sick from a variety of afflictions despite looking like the picture of health. Meanwhile, Reford's young wife Velia (Louise Sorel) is falling for this paranormal patient. Of course, the doctor ends up causing the death of his patient and the mental collapse of his wife.

"The Housekeeper" was directed by John Meredyth Lucas and written by Heyes. Cedric Acton (Larry Hagman) is married to Carlotta (Suzy Parker), a rich woman who is cruel to him. He hopes to move the brain of his new housekeeper Miss Wattle (Jeanette Nolan) into the body of his gorgeous young wife. It's a comedic instead of a frightening story - Night Gallery would suffer from more of this in the second season - but Hagman is good, just coming off his run on I Dream of Jeannie.

Two Fine Openers for the Series

[chrstphrtully · 8/10 · 27 November 2018]

"The Dead Man" (9 stars out of 10)

Night Gallery as a series started off with a bang in this spooky and compelling episode. Doing double-duty as writer and director, Douglas Heyes pulled from the "mad scientist" genre, but his script effectively anchors the story in two believable central characters rather than surrendering to the temptation to do this is high camp. The Redford character's rising obsession with manipulating the human psyche to cure disease plays less like Dr. Frankenstein, and more like that of an inventor becoming more and more amazed (and, self-satisfied) with what he has been able to accomplish. This growing obsession helps to fuel the pace of the first half of the story, leading to the tragic plot twist; at this point, the focus shifts to the drive of the Talmadge character to find what has gone wrong to ramp up the energy, leading to the Grand Guignol climax. Heyes' direction is equally up to the task, using his camera to reflect the increasing chaos at the climax of the episode.

If Heyes' script sets the train in motion, the story is helped immeasurably by the two powerful lead performances at its center. Betz is superb as Redford, correctly choosing to rest his portrayal on a believable sense of scientific wonder and self-absorption, tempered by a very believable descent into almost paralyzing grief; Corey is every bit his match as his conventional counterpart - on the one hand, he is Redford's conscience, while on the other he is almost maddeningly conventional. If there is one sore spot in the episode, it is Sorel as Redford's wife, who seems to go from bland to hysterical in almost no time at all. Fortunately, her time on screen is limited.

Although Serling would write the majority of the strong episodes of Night Gallery, this episode served to demonstrate that the format, even at its best, was not of Serling's sensibility, but rather rooted in classic horror. So long as the quality of the horror writing was at this level, the series would succeed; unfortunately, outside of Serling's script, that level of quality was not generally to be seen.

"The Housekeeper" (8 stars out of 10)

One of the more loathsome elements of Night Gallery as a series was the tendency to resort to schlocky "comedy" bits, in the form of the infamous "blackout" skits. The Housekeeper shows that it the series' forays into comic territory didn't have to be so juvenile and, once again, Douglas Heyes' scriptwriting, served by a wonderfully offbeat comic performance from Hagman, deserves the credit. Hagman's portrayal is marvelous just to right or left of center, keeping the audience off-balance as to whether his intentions are sinister or merely eccentric. Nolan is solid as always as a woman with very low self-esteem, who can't quite believe her luck, and while Suzy Parker's performance is not a masterstroke of acting, she's perfectly cast as someone her oddball husband intends to be a literal vessel for his own desires.

Can't I give this one an 8.5? I guess not.

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 19 March 2011]

This first regular episode is a good indication of one direction the series would take. Unlike the pilot (where all three segments were written by Rod Serling), neither of the segments in this episode were written by Serling--mostly because NBC apparently could have cared less who wrote the show. All they apparently cared about was having this great writer as the show's host! Despite this dumb decision, however, this particular episode actually is very, very good.

"The Dead Man" is simply a classic--and perhaps among the very best segments in the show's run. I saw this one as a kid and it scared the crap out of me!! And, tonight, watching it again, I can easily see why. Jeff Cortey and Carl Betz star as two doctors. Betz has lucked upon a weird patient--one who is HIGHLY suggestible while under hypnosis--so suggestible that the patient can take on any illness perfectly and be restored to normal instantly! Later, Betz even discovers that he can make this patient become dead and revive--simply by hypnotizing him. However, this final experiment goes awry and the patient stays dead! Oops. Later, however, his mistake is discovered--with very, very, very creepy results! I could say more, but you just need to see this one for yourself. This one earns a 10.

"The Housekeeper" is strictly for laughs. It's about a bad husband (Larry Hagman) who is looking to 'replace' his wife, so to speak. While it's VERY trivial the ending is pretty funny and it earns a 7.

While the average of the two is 8.5, IMDb won't allow such a score, so I guess 8 is a reasonable score. All in all, a very good start to the series.

Some good casting, but.......

[ksdilauri · 5/10 · 28 January 2019]

If you like to revisit creepy TV memories of prime-time past, 'Night Gallery' can supply you with an occasional quick fix, with the refreshing absence of today's explicit gore---these two entries typify what was considered scary back in the poofy-haired, sideburned Seventies. Now, more than 40 years later, I found 'The Dead Man' to be the creepier of the two, complete with your standard crazed doctor, dark cemetery, and hysterical woman running around in a flowing nightgown. But in 'The Housekeeper' , the sole graces are the creepy/comic performances of Larry Hagman and Jeannette Nolan. The rest---especially if it's been edited for commercials-- is pure pastel-colored cheese, except for Hagman's final line of otherwise-silly dialogue. (Both of these compared badly to the excellent Twilight Zone episode 'The New Exhibit', with Martin Balsam, that aired directly afterward. Catch that if you can!)

Adverts ruined by incessant interruptions of a horror programme

[midbrowcontrarian · 4/10 · 19 September 2021]

Having nearly finished the excellent Thriller I'm looking for the next anthology, and gave The Dead Man a try as it's an early one with favourable reviews.

Big mistake. The only platform on which it's currently available has allowed it to be butchered by the ceaseless adverts of a well known, somewhat kitsch, entertainment/theme park company. These appeared no fewer than FIFTEEN times in 37 minutes. A particularly cruel refinement of this torture was that sometimes the programme would resume, only to return to the advert after a few seconds.

I'm not opposed to advertising in principle. Indeed, I'd prefer the BBC to be funded by it in place of the collectivist/socialist system where everyone with a television has to pay £159 pa for it whether they watch the BBC or not. But do advertisers really imagine such absurd overkill will endear them even to those who may be attracted to their products?

I refuse to watch any further episodes similarly disfigured. Alfred Hitchcock often made wry remarks about adverts but I doubt his shows had it this bad. Without the ads I'd have probably scored it 6 or 7.