Night Gallery: The Complete 1st Season Disk 1

Sci-Fi

Rod Serling	Host
Night Gallery
Joan Crawford
Sally Field
Diane Keaton
Roddy McDowall
Vincent Price
Carl Reiner
Lindsey Wagner

Director	Edward M. Abroms; Steven Spielberg; Allen Baron; Leonard Nimoy
Producer	Rod Serling
Writer	Conrad Aiken; H.P. Lovecraft

The entire first season of Rod Serling's "Night Gallery" is presented in its entirety in this gripping, sometimes-frightening and always entertaining collection. Shorter versions were aired on the Sci-Fi Channel, but this volume makes use of the originals, ensuring episodes are viewed as they were intended. The horror begins with a frightening painting hung in a most unusual gallery. Where it leads is always a hair-raising mystery. …

The series was introduced with a pilot TV movie that aired November 8, 1969, featuring the directoral debut of Steven Spielberg and one of the last acting performances by Joan Crawford. Unlike the series, where 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 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."

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. Despite these distractions, Serling produced many distinguished teleplays, including "Camera Obscura," "The Caterpillar," "Class of '99," "Cool Air," "The Doll," "Green Fingers," "Lindemann's Catch," and "The Messiah on Mott Street." Notable 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.

In order to pump up the number of episodes available for syndication, the 60-minute episodes were reedited into a 30-minute time slot, with many segments either severely cut or extended 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 Starz movie networks and the Mystery cable network, allowing fans to see the episodes in their original format for the first time in 30 years. A DVD collection (including the pilot film and the six episodes of the first season) was released by Universal in 2004.

NBC Universal's horror-themed cable channel Chiller, which launched on March 1, 2007, is airing Night Gallery. The series airs weekdays at 5:00 a.m., 5:30 a.m., 7:00 a.m. and 7:30 a.m. Eastern time, Saturdays from 9:00 a.m. to 12 noon Eastern time, and Sundays from 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. Eastern time. [1] Episodes of "The Sixth Sense" rotate with "Night Gallery." The "Night Gallery" pilot movie will air on Chiller beginning in July.