Text: "Thriller" at its finest. My late brother and I watched it on 6/13/61, a beautiful, sunny early summer evening; maybe that's why we found it more exciting and (yes) Thrilling than terrifying. However, in late '63, we caught it in syndication on a cold, dreary November night (this was our second viewing and we were 2+ years "more mature"), after which we were so FREAKED that we almost had to sleep with the lights on. Such is the power of this great episode.
Revue TV's House Director, Herschel Daugherty, is again SUPERB in his guidance of this show-- acting, pacing, staging, lighting, atmosphere --ALL remarkably solid. He was truly one of THRILLER'S unsung heroes. Case in point: how would we EVER know that Natalie Schafer was such a terrific actress if it were not for this single 50-minute film, featuring the most convincing DRUNK scene I have ever witnessed? And the effect of the roaring, roilng, rolling (whatever) fireplace flames on the Reaper during this scene in the library is perhaps the single most impressive image from the entire series. Bravo, Mr. Daugherty.
Then there's actor Scott Merrill, whose performance I enjoy more every time I watch it; here's a Broadway/dance guy whose career highlight was playing the male lead (Macheath, aka: "Mack the Knife") in the big, historic revival of "The Threepenny Opera" on Broadway from 1954 through December of 1961 (his performance is preserved on the famous cast recording). He was apparently whisked away from the production to film "Grim Reaper", his ONLY credit listed on IMDB, probably returned to the stage show, which closed at the end of the year. After that...NO stage credits listed either.
So here we have this very talented guy's ONLY visual legacy, as he deftly, coyly slinks his way through the proceedings (I LOVE the moment when Robert Cornthwaite confirms that "your wife loved you very deeply, Mr. Keller" and Scott just blows him off with "Yes, I know; shall I see you out?"), only to meet his match in the Shat man, who nails it dramatically in the poisoning scene---c'mon, everybody..lets' all admit it---Shatner is REALLY good in this scene, and does indeed seem very impatient that Scott just stop screwin' around and DIE ALREADY!
Call me weird, but I LOVE the opening dialogue stuff in Act 2, especially that great set with windows, glass doors, balconies, that parasol-style lamp, sun-rooms, etc through which the cast moves in, out, and around. Again, the mark of a fine director's hand.
THE MUSIC: We've all seen the classic medieval images of Death serenading his victims via his fiddle playing; Jerry Goldsmith's score for "Reaper" gets my vote as the single greatest score of all time for episodic TV --- his use of the steely, grating "Death's Fiddle" within the string orchestra, which at times seems to be stirring up the infernal winds of Hell, colored by the biting, reverb-y effects of the Novachord (an early keyboard synthesizer) is so far above and beyond the norm of what could have been expected from a composer in such rushed circumstances that it almost defies reality.
Thus "Thriller" ended its incredible 1st-season ascent and, as the summer of '61 began, genre fans entered an all-too-brief Golden era, with "Thriller", Hitchock, and TZ all in reruns ("Purple Room" would be shown the next week), plus the tail end of Roald Dahl's bizarre "Way Out" and, in July, NBC'S own "Thriller-Lite" summer replacement show "Great Ghost Tales" which, like "Way Out" contained a few of those HOLY GRAIL excursions into horror that typified this incredibly cool time in the history of TV. But that was long ago.... LR