Around the dial

Are you ready for more Space: 1999? You'd better be, because that's where we begin this week, as the 50th anniversary celebration continues at Captain Video. Instead of graphic adaptations, though, this time, it's a short story version of the pilot episode.

Back in the days when Hallmark made more than Christmasy romcom telemovies, Teri Garr appeared in the 1987 Hall of Fame adaptation of Pack of Lies, a British Cold War drama that makes for compelling viewing, according to Gill at RealWeegieMidget. Those were the days.

There's not much to add to this 1960 ad for RCA televisions at the Broadcast Archives, except this: I wish I looked this good while I was watching TV.

Hard for me to believe that Halloween is just a week away, but for those of you celebrating, at Classic Film & TV Cafe, Rick has an excellent list of the 25 greatest classic horror films. But why wait; if you feel like it, watch one of them tonight!

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More spooky favorites? Let's go over to Mavis Movie Madness, where Paul looks at the 1973 ABC Movie of the Week Dying Room Only, written by Richard Matheson, and starring Cloris Leachman, Ned B eatty, Ross Martin, and Dabney Coleman. Fine story, terrific cast.

John continues with his series on The Prisoner and Soviet-era Russia at Cult TV Blog. This week, it's "The Chimes of Big Ben," and how the episode suggests such Soviet concepts as social parsitism, the refusal to work, and how Number 2 mirrors Joseph Stalin. Fascinating stuff.

Completing our terrifying trio is Martin Grams's review of The Creeping Unknown, the 1956 movie better known, perhaps, as The Quatermass Experiment, based on the much-loved BBC TV series of the early 1950s (and its sequels), and written by the great Nigel Kneale.

Eventually, Roger will come to the end of A-Team episodes, and then we'll be searching for something else to link to; in the meantime, the show continues, and now we're up to the episode "In Plane Sight," a nice turn of phrase for a story of a pilot falsely accused of drug smuggling.

I'll admit I didn't remember the 1973 sitcom Thicker Than Water, starring Julie Harris and Richard Long; the last show I recalled Long from was Nanny and the Professor, and quite frankly, my attention back then was directed elsewhere. Remember it now with this commercial, at Television Obscurities. 

Samantha Eggar was one of those actresses I would describe as "handsome," a type of beauty that is in no way denigrated by the masculine suggestion. She was very lovely, if you prefer. She died last week, aged 86, and Terence has a tribute to her career at A Shroud of Thoughts. 

What's this? No Hadley self-promotion this week? Sorry, but you knew it had to be coming: my latest appearance with Dan Schneider is another two-fer, regarding two of the most prominent religious figures in television history, Billy Graham and Bishop Fulton J. Sheen. God Bless! TV

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