Death in the Family/The Merciful/Class of '99/Witches' Feast

E. G. Marshall stars in "Death in the Family." No, not the James Agee classic but the story of a funeral director who doesn't want to let his clients go. He invites them to a party. He has an entire family set up at a table, to celebrate a birthday. Apparently, empty caskets are being put in the ground (they are the poor and dissolute) and he keeps the bodies. There is no mention of taxidermy, but they seem quite well preserved. Along comes Desi Arnaz, Jr., a murderer who has been shot and is being pursued by the police. He realizes his wound may be fatal. Marshall invites him in and takes care of him. Anyway, we can see it coming. This is quite a unique episode.

"The Merciful" is a new version of Poe's "A Cask of Amontillado." Enough said about that.

"The Class of '99" features a final oral exam for a group of attractive graduate students. They are asked extremely hard questions and answer them flawlessly. Well, almost. One is only able to give three of four answers and is maligned for it. The teacher is Vincent Price and he holds forth with an ugly disdain and absolute power over them. Part of their exam is to deal with issues of bigotry and hate and act "appropriately" when confronting these things. It gets really ugly at times. The conclusion explains what is at issue here. For me, this was the best of the three.

Finally, "Satisfaction Guaranteed" (which doesn't appear at the top of this page but is definitely in this collection) is about an overweight man, played by Victor Buono, who is at a secretarial agency, trying to choose an employee. The company guarantees satisfaction. so? Anyway, it probably ranks as one of the silliest episodes. But watching Buono was always a great treat.

A Death in the Family sees Mr. Soames (E. G. Marshall), owner of a funeral parlour, resolving his loneliness by creating a 'family' of corpses to keep him company. The latest addition to his family is to be fatally wounded criminal Doran (Desi Arnaz Jr.) who breaks into the funeral home. It's a macabre but touching tale -- kinda like if Ed Gein was well-meaning and misunderstood -- and the sight of cadavers assembled around a table wearing party hats is wonderfully ghoulish (and would be repeated for the 1981 slasher film Happy Birthday To Me).

The Merciful is one of those pointless, supposedly amusing horror shorts that are used to pad out an episode. A woman bricks up her husband in the basement, or does she? It's predictable stuff.

Class of '99 stars Vincent Price as an examiner, grading students on their knowledge and ability to react to situations in the approved manner. It's not exactly thrilling stuff, that not even Price can save, but it's always fun to see an inaccurate 'futuristic' prediction of a year that has since passed.

Satisfaction Guaranteed doesn't satisfy. Victor Buono plays a wealthy man looking for a secretary, but she must meet his very exacting criteria. Another black comedy short, this one is plain daft.

"A Death in the Family" Starring EG Marshall as a funeral home proprietor and Desi Arnez Jr. as an escaped convict really brings home why I love 'Night Gallery' so much. It really encapsulates the best of the series, along with several other stories, the great mood that good horror writing has. To paraphrase an author whose name escapes me, "Horror is the realization" In other words, its not th blood and guts that makes horror so good, its the full realization of what is really happening. This episode fills that bill perfectly as we see what is REALLY going on in the Soames home for funerals. Not easily forgotten, this episode.

Let me say right from the jump that E.G. Marshall is terrific as Mr. Soames, a funeral director who takes his job rather seriously, even to the extent of helping an escaped prisoner, played decently enough by a young Desi Arnaz Jr, who's on the run from the authorities. The funeral parlor and house are very creepy looking on both inside and out and makes for a fine setting; this show is known for the old mansions which appear in many episodes. Marshall is very convincing as the lonely director, whose work appears to be his life, although he could use some singing lessons. After being stopped by the police near his home and questioned about seeing the loose convict, they let him go back home; soon after, the escaped, injured, and very wet convict(Arnaz Jr.)breaks through a window carrying a gun and requests to be able to lay down on the sofa to rest. Soames is more than happy to have the young man stay, and you sense that he is fattening him up for the kill. It turns out that the director has a newly dead family propped up on a dinner table, and I wish they would've used dummies or something other than real people just staring into the camera. Soames and the convict neither had a family of their own, so the director wants to add to his make believe family, although against the young man's wishes. Other than this downer, this is still a solid episode of the best season of Night Gallery and has a fine atmosphere.

'A Death In The Family' - A fugitive young man with a bullet wound finds sanctuary in a funeral parlor run by a lonely man who takes his job to heart... Small but effective tale is more sad than creepy.

'The Merciful' - One spouse walls up the other, but who is sealing up who? Mildly amusing short is all about the (visual) punch line.

'Class Of '99' - Vincent Price shines as a no-nonsense teacher in a "future" academy dealing with androids where not everything is as it seems... Best tale of the four hits a dramatic knockout.

'Witches' Feast' - Thought-lost tale should have stayed lost, as it's a perfectly dreadful example of all set-up with no payoff.