Way Out — Season 1, Episode 9: Death Wish
Drama, Sci-Fi & Fantasy • 25 min • 1 season, 14 episodes • ★ 7.0/10
Episode synopsis
This episode starts out with the Narrator saying, ""Most men want to kill their wives."" (did I mention ""Way Out"" is a misogynistic series?) And we meet yet another married couple that can't stand each other: George and Hazel Atterbury. They attend a funeral for one of George's coworkers. That night, TV-addict Hazel is talking to her hubby, telling him all about her favorite TV shows, for example, ""The one where they're all gangsters, except the hero... it's very authentic, it's based on official files."" (sounds like ""The Untouchables"".) George goes for a walk instead. George walks to the Petard mortuary that handled the funeral. George decides to kill his wife. Just as we hear his thoughts-- ""What do you do with the body?""-- Mr. Petard puts a sign in the window: ""Let us dispose of the body."" Inside, George talks to Mr. Petard, who is an eloquent elderly gentleman who has a giant, bald-headed assistant named Charon* (think: Tor Johnson). When George finds out they killed Mrs. H
About Way Out
Way Out was a 1961 fantasy and science fiction television anthology series hosted by writer Roald Dahl. The macabre 25-minute shows were introduced by Dahl's dry delivery of a brief introductory monologue, sometimes explaining a method of murdering a spouse without getting caught. The taped series began because CBS suddenly needed a replacement for a Jackie Gleason talk show that network executives were about to cancel, and producer David Susskind contacted Dahl to help mount a show quickly. The series was paired by the network with the similar The Twilight Zone for Friday evening broadcasts, running from March through July 1961 at 9:30 p.m. Eastern time, under the primary sponsorship of Liggett & Myers. Writers included Philip H. Reisman, Jr. and Sumner Locke Elliott. The premiere episode, "William and Mary", adapted from a Roald Dahl short story, told of a wife getting revenge on her husband. In "Dissolve to Black", an actress cast as a murder victim at a television studio goes through a rehearsal, but the drama merges with reality as she finds herself trapped on the show's near-deserted set. Other dramas offered startling imagery: a snake slithering up a carpeted staircase inside a suburban home, a disembodied brain in a jar, a headless woman strapped to an electric chair, with a light bulb in place of her head and half of a man's face erased.