About this season
Playhouse 90 is an American television anthology series that was telecast on CBS from 1956 to 1960 for a total of 133 episodes. It originated from CBS Television City in Los Angeles, California. Since live anthology drama series of the mid-1950s were usually hour-long shows, the title highlighted the network's intention to present something unusual, a weekly series of hour-and-a-half dramas rather than 60-minute plays. Playhouse 90 began as a pitch by Frank Stanton—the formidable, forward-thinking right-hand man to CBS chairman William S. Paley—during a brainstorming session for program ideas. The project was ultimately developed by Hubbell Robinson, a CBS vice president who received no screen credit on Playhouse 90 but is often described as its creator.
Episodes (38)
1. The Plot to Kill Stalin
Aired 25 September 1958 • 90 min
In late 1952, an aging and increasingly paranoid Stalin puts in motion a purge against his doctors, with anti-Semitic overtones. His lackeys, including Khrushchev, Molotov and Beria, fear it will spread to the Politburo, and plan to strike first.
2. Days of Wine and Roses
Aired 2 October 1958 • 90 min
An alcoholic falls in love with and gets married to a young woman, whom he systematically addicts to booze so they can share his "passion" together.
3. The Time of Your Life
Aired 9 October 1958 • 90 min
William Saroyan's Pulitzer Prize-winning play revolves around the denizens of a San Francisco bar in 1939. Lonely, lovelorn, weary or cynical, the characters drift in and out of the bar and each other's lives, giving voice to Saroyan's philosophies as they randomly comment about the impending world war, the beauty of art, and traditional notions of good and evil.
4. The Long March
Aired 16 October 1958 • 90 min
5. Shadows Tremble
Aired 23 October 1958 • 90 min
An elderly immigrant tries to buy an old house in New England and is opposed by snobbish locals.
6. Word from a Sealed-Off Box
Aired 30 October 1958 • 90 min
A courier for the Dutch Resistance is captured by the Nazis.
7. Heart of Darkness
Aired 6 November 1958 • 90 min
A trading company manager travels up an African river to find a missing outpost head and discovers the depth of evil in humanity's soul.
8. Old Man
Aired 20 November 1958 • 90 min
To fight a Mississippi flood in 1927, a prison farm releases some convicts.
9. The Return of Ansel Gibbs
Aired 27 November 1958 • 90 min
After years in retirement, Ansel Gibbs is asked to return to government service.
10. Free Weekend
Aired 4 December 1958 • 90 min
11. Seven Against the Wall
Aired 11 December 1958 • 90 min
The story of the infamous St. Valentine's Day Massacre of 1929.
12. The Nutcracker
Aired 25 December 1958 • 90 min
This telecast of George Balanchine's famous production was broadcast only four years after it was premiered by the New York City Ballet. This was the only episode of the series televised in color.
13. Face of a Hero
Aired 1 January 1959 • 90 min
14. The Wings of the Dove
Aired 8 January 1959 • 90 min
An impoverished woman who has been forced to choose between a privileged life with her wealthy aunt and her journalist lover, befriends an American heiress. When she discovers the heiress is attracted to her own lover and is dying, she sees a chance to have both the privileged life she cannot give up and the lover she cannot live without.
15. The Blue Men
Aired 15 January 1959 • 90 min
16. The Velvet Alley
Aired 22 January 1959 • 90 min
Ernie Pandish has tried to be a writer for years and has never made much money out of it. But now he seems likely to hit the big-time.
17. A Quiet Game of Cards
Aired 29 January 1959 • 90 min
A few friends meet each weekend for a quiet game of cards. But they're bored with poker and, in trying to find another diversion, gradually find themselves plotting a hypothetical murder. It is hypothetical, isn't it?
18. Child of Our Time
Aired 5 February 1959 • 90 min
War deprives Tanguy of his childhood. When his mother returns to Spain to oppose the Franco regime, he is left in Nazi-occupied Marseilles, France.
19. The Second Man
Aired 12 February 1959 • 90 min
20. The Raider
Aired 19 February 1959 • 90 min
A corporate raider plans a hostile takeover. To stall him, pressure is put on a scientist to rush through a new type of engine before all necessary tests have been completed.
21. The Ding-A-Ling Girl
Aired 26 February 1959 • 90 min
A housewife is offered a Hollywood contract. She'd rather stay home, but her husband has ambitions for her.
22. Made in Japan
Aired 5 March 1959 • 90 min
A young soldier in occupied Japan after World War II falls in love with a lovely Japanese girl, but is horrified about what his prejudiced family in Philadelphia will think if he takes her home with him.
23. For Whom the Bell Tolls: Part 1
Aired 12 March 1959 • 90 min
During the Spanish Civil War, an American allied with the Republicans finds romance during a desperate mission to blow up a strategically important bridge.
24. For Whom the Bell Tolls: Part 2
Aired 19 March 1959 • 90 min
The completion of the mission has tragic consequences.
25. A Trip to Paradise
Aired 26 March 1959 • 90 min
26. In Lonely Expectation
Aired 2 April 1959 • 90 min
27. The Day Before Atlanta
Aired 9 April 1959 • 90 min
28. Judgment at Nuremberg
Aired 16 April 1959 • 90 min
In the later stages of the Nuremberg Trials, four German judges are accused of perverting the course of justice.
29. A Corner of the Garden
Aired 23 April 1959 • 90 min
30. Dark December
Aired 30 April 1959 • 90 min
During World War II, an army doctor struggles to convert a Franciscan monastery into a field hospital.
31. Diary of a Nurse
Aired 7 May 1959 • 90 min
The daily emergencies and stresses of a major city's hospital ward as seen through the eyes of nurse Gail Lucas.
32. A Marriage of Strangers
Aired 14 May 1959 • 90 min
Marry in haste, repent at leisure? Well, maybe.
33. Out of Dust
Aired 21 May 1959 • 90 min
On a cattle drive across the prairie, the sons of a wealthy cattle baron plot his death.
34. The Rank and File
9.0Aired 28 May 1959 • 90 min
A powerful union leader is interrogated by a Senate committee. Testifying before a Senate, William Kilcoyne tells the story of his career. He began as a factory worker and his shrewdness and ambition carried him up through the ranks to his present position as head of a large union.
35. The Killers of Mussolini
Aired 4 June 1959 • 90 min
As the Salo Republic crumbles around him, Mussolini, along with his mistress and several of his ministers flee with retreating Nazi soldiers, but are caught at the town of Dongo by red partisans. All are brutally executed without trial.
36. Project Immortality
Aired 11 June 1959 • 90 min
Key defense scientist Doner has cancer. Schramm is assigned to code Doner's thinking into a computer. He gets to know him as a friend, a husband and father. The project is successful, but he now knows identity is not programmable.
37. Dark as the Night
Aired 18 June 1959 • 90 min
A British politician finds himself open to blackmail because of the indiscretion of his American wife.
38. The Second Happiest Day
Aired 25 June 1959 • 90 min
A man about to be married recalls the day his life changed permanently.