Tales of Tomorrow: Collection One

"Tales of Tomorrow was The Twilight Zone (or The Outer Limits) of its day, a science fiction anthology series that ran in the early days of television, offering both original stories and adaptations of works by authors such as Philip Wylie, Lewis Padgett, and Theodore Sturgeon. The series also used such directors as Don Medford and Charles S. Dubin, who were to achieve greater recognition in subsequent decades. The series is most well known for its ""Frankenstein"" episode, starring Lon Chaney Jr. as the monster, which itself is sort of notorious because Chaney was apparently so drunk that he thought it was the dress rehearsal rather than the actual broadcast, and stepped out of character in the final moments of the telecast. That show is here, along with 12 others from the first season of the series. The quality of the materials is typical of the kinescopes of the era, a little faded and with a seeming ""film"" over the action. The sound is loud but narrow in range, and biased toward the treble. There are blemishes and flaws in the materials that crop up, mostly in the transitions, but the stuff is overall very watchable -- the original, very threadbare budgets are in evidence, but assuming that one gets past that (and also the use, evidently without permission, of Brian Easdale's music from The Red Shoes to underscore some suspenseful moments), there's a lot to enjoy for real science fiction enthusiasts. ""Verdict From Space,"" from a story by Theodore Sturgeon and starring Lon McCallister, is sort of a very dark-toned antecedent to Arthur C. Clarke's The Sentinel. Other familiar names that turn up include Lee J. Cobb, Phyllis Kirk, Jack Warden, Richard Derr, Lola Albright, Paul Newman (in his first professional appearance onscreen), and Joan Blondell. Additionally, some of the stories, such as ""The Little Black Bag"" and ""What You Need,"" will be familiar for versions done subsequently on Night Gallery and The Twilight Zone. The black-and-white images are mastered full-screen (1.33:1), and each show gets more than a half-dozen chapters."