That He Should Weep for Her

Milton Berle, like Jackie Gleason, sought out dramatic roles in the 1960s, to try and sink his teeth into serious acting apart from his well-earned image as a classic comedian. This has got to be one of his worst choices.

The story of guilt and revenge is tedious and never convincing in the slightest. Berle owns a jewelry store in a Latino neighborhood and is held up by co-star Alejandro Rey and a young man who Rey is supposed to look out for, and Berle shoots the boy in self-defense. Carol Lawrence is the boy's sister and starts a vendetta against Berle that includes starting up a platonic romance with Uncle Miltie.

With a co-worker of Rey's on hand to instigate blackmail (he knows Rey was the accomplice), the story drags on for an interminable 50 minutes with sad-eyed Berle (he seems to be channelling Emmett Kelly most of the time) aiming at pathos, making it difficult to sit through. Casting Lawrence as a vindictive woman out for revenge is ridiculous, and when the predictable conclusion comes it's attempt at a happy ending is beyond stupid.

Low point comes when all the kids start dancing a current "hip" dance like the frug or boogaloo at the local cantina (not a latin dance for some reason) and Berle briefly and awkwardly tries to join in - it's a barf worthy moment. Michael Blodgett, the handsome but unsuccessful young actor whose career peaked as the male lead in Russ Meyer's classic "Beyond the Valley of the Dolls", is one of the dancers.

Sam (Milton Berle) is a kind man. When two robbers try to hold him up, Sam doesn't fight...he figures it's not worth killing or getting killed. But when his employee begins fighting with the crooks and they are about to shoot him, Sam grabs his gun and shoots one of the robbers. The other one runs.

Later, the crook who got away (Alejandro Rey) tells the dead teen's sister, Marta (Carol Lawrence), a different version of the story....one that omits that he got the brother involved in the crime with him. As for the sister, she is odd. She is intensely angry at Sam....though her brother and another man were robbing his store and had a gun. She is so angry she is determined to get revenge on the shop owner.

Milton Berle is awfully good in this show...showing an acting range far beyond just comedy. This has been the case with many comedians in dramatic roles and it's a nice change of pace to see them this way. In particular, Berle does so much with his facial expressions and eyes...especially right after his character shoots the robber, but other times as well.

As for the story, it's good but far from the series' best. But the actors make the most of it and the show is well worth seeing.

That He Should Weep For Her is a decent, unexceptional Kraft suspense entry, and only moderately suspenseful at that since it's fairly easy for an experienced viewer to figure out where it's going and how it will end. The story concerns a jewelry store owner who shoots and accidentally kills a very young man during a botched robbery. As events unfold, the young man has an attractive sister who decides to take revenge on the middle-aged store owner and in time begins to romance him. Or is she up to something else? Maybe she's falling for him after all. He's certainly taken with her, and guilt-ridden, is spending a lot of money taking her out on dates.

I've seen better episodes in this series, and also much worse ones. In the leading role of Sam the jeweler, Milton Berle gives a straight, credible performance, and if one didn't know he'd ever been a comedian, well, you'd never guess it from his work here. Comedians often make surprisingly good dramatic actors, and Berle is no exception.

Carol Lawrence, as the vengeful Hispanic woman he romances, doesn't quite do it for me as an actress. She comes across as too poised for the character she's portraying, her line readings are irritatingly one note, and despite her good looks she lacks charisma. Like Berle, Miss Lawrence was known for other things than acting, and she enjoyed a successful career as a singer and Broadway musical star. Alejandro Rey is much better as her shady boyfriend, but sadly, as was so often the case with this difficult to properly cast actor, he, or rather his character, is put upon from the get-go.