Friday, August 7, 2020

NIGHT GALLERY / "Certain Shadows On The Wall" - 1970

Here's a strange little tale about a brother and three sisters, they live in luxury but the eldest sister in charge of the estate is an invalid and must be taken care of by the others. Makes you wonder... What would happen if she died?!

This story stars Louis (TERROR IN THE WAX MUSEUM) Hayward as Stephen, Agnes (HUSH.. HUSH, SWEET CHARLOTTE) Moorehead as Emma, Grayson (HOUSE OF DARK SHADOWS) Hall as Ann and Rachel (CHARLIE CHAN AND THE CURSE OF THE DRAGON QUEEN) Roberts as Rebecca Brigham.

Hey, check it out, we begin with some certain shadows on the wall...

Brother Stephen is reading to bed ridden Emma, it's her favorite book, Bleak House by Charles Dickens. He seems like a good guy, doing special favors for his sister and all. If that lamp is casting the shadow there, well, the perspective is a little goofy to say the least.

Years ago, Stephen failed in his career as a doctor, and now prescribes medication for Emma. He dissolves some tablets in a glass of water and has her drink it down...

Emma tells Stephen that she knows she doesn't have much time left, and the one thing she wants, she cannot have.. Life! Boy, Agnes looks like Hell, thanks to Bud Westmore.

Here are Rebecca, Stephen and Ann discussing their situation with Emma. They are all spoiled brats and enjoy their life of luxury because of Emma's health. A small price to pay for just taking care of the place.

Then it happens, Emma kicks the bucket so Stephen calls the authorities to tell them they can pick up the body any time...

Now this?!!.. Holy crap, there's Emma's shadow on the wall. Now wait a minute, what the?!

The next day, Rebecca takes Stephen some tea. She asks him what he's doing, and he tells her that he's cataloging the items in the house, and thinks he can get a fortune for them...

Rebecca's against the idea but Stephen gets up and and says that he's in control of the place, he's the eldest Brigham now, and, what are you gonna do about it?!

Then Rebecca shows Stephen the bottle of pills he gave Emma before she died. The brother gets a little panicked and asks her where she got them. She says, 'on the stairs' and hands them back to him, and reminds him, drink your tea!

Rebecca tells Ann what she did, she put some pills in his tea, he'll be with Emma soon...

The girls get to keep the place and brother gets to entertain Emma , forever!.. A really silly story. Join us again tomorrow when we keep on trucking down the old dusty trail, here at The Dungeon!!..

2 comments:

Dr. Theda said...

Wonderful... please do more Night Gallery episodes

KD said...

It's cool that the CometTV channel now runs a mini-marathon of Night Gallery episodes every week. The episode that blew me away was the one with Clint Howard as The Boy Who Predicted Earthquakes. When I first saw that segment, I lost some serious sleep afterward!

About Louis Hayward, he was married to Ida Lupino (first marriage for both) from 1938 to 1945. One of the Lupino biographies tells that when he came back from WW II, he was so changed by the experience of the war that he and Ida went their separate ways soon after.

He was handsome and talented, but for fifty years was addicted to smoking, 80 (!) cigarettes a day! After he was diagnosed with lung cancer, he said, "I got precisely what I deserved after a four-pack-a-day habit for fifty years." Seriously, I can't imagine smoking one cigarette a day, but I'm addicted to junk food! There are all kinds of addictions out there...

*(My info on Louis Hayward came mostly from the IMDb.)

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