CLIMAX!-DR.JEKYLL & MR. HYDE-1955-This was a live TV broadcast (sponsored by Chrysler) with the adaptation by Gore Vidal based on Robert Louis Stevenson's classic story.
Michael Rennie stars as Dr. Jekyll who wants to find man's soul and thinks he can produce a "angel or devil" from the same person.
The story begins with Jekyll's best friend Mr. Utterson (Cedric Hardwicke) killing the notorious Mr. Hyde in Jekyll's lab. Utterson then finds the doctor's journal (left casually on a table to be read after his death) and the rest of the story is told in flashback showing how Jeykll's ceaseless experimenting produces "the devil" Hyde and begins his dual personality, dedicated doctor by day, evil deviant by night. Rennie pulls off the dual role very well and time elapsed footage is used during most of the transformation scenes (not bad considering the drawbacks). Like most early TV productions it suffers from bad lighting and sparse production values (look for a hand that mysteriously appears near a curtain) but has some cool camera angles.
Mary Sinclair (a popular TV actress at the time) is "the girl" Hyde takes a fancy to. John Hoyt (with
an English accent) is Jekyll's servant Poole and Lowell Gilmore is his friend Lanyon who says "Where's my tea? I came here for tea not a black mass".
Director Allen Reisner did 19 other epsiodes of CLIMAX! and became very proflific in TV. Rennie starredin 8 other episodes and Hardwicke 5 others. The version I saw had the original commercials with
host William Lunigan hawking Chrysler cars.
Thanks for reading!
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