While there is effective NYC location shooting (a series hallmark)in this episode, it's not the Gotham-specific police procedural standard for this series, but more a duel of wits and consciences that would have been at home in ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS. One comes away from this episode unsure as who was a villain and who was a victim, and that is another hallmark of this series: at its best, the stories it tells are about complex humans, and not mere cops and crooks. I was initially stunned to see Charles Beaumont (most often associated with fantasy, including THE TWILIGHT ZONE)credited as the writer. However, Ivar's fascination with instilling fear as a kind of moral education, and his use of it to reveal Garry's guilt, bears Beaumont's brand. Persoff was exceptional in portraying the smiling sinister Evar, balancing his performance on a knife's edge between sadist and righteous avenger. Nielsen was less successful, if only because his character has less shading: Garry is shallow and callow from the start, and even if he truly believes his protestations of innocence, it simply never convinces. The fun house climax looks convincingly dangerous, and I'd wager actors today would insist on CGI fire--and I wouldn't fault them.
5 Reviews
Max Ever was WAY ahead of his time !
ronnybee211214 September 2021
Naked City jumps the shark
lor_4 February 2024
That Herb Leonard intro voice-over about his show being shot on location, not in a studio, is gone, and for good reason. This episode written by horror specialist Charles Beaumont seems to have strayed from Boris Karloff's "Thriller" series, as it's all about terror, as Nehemiah Persoff, with a smug smile, persecutes poor ad man Leslie Nielsen for the hour, blaming him for the arson death of his wife & kid.
I found zero suspense, especially as Paul Burke's dialogue kept pointing throughout to the solution of the "mystery". Persoff, fresh out of a nuthouse, runs a family-tradition Fun House, where the lengthy climax has Burke watching Nielsen being frightened by the exhibits, presaging the awful horror-porn of crap like the "Saw" series several decades later.
Sure, the streets of Manhattan are shown, but this is as artificial looking a show as any backlot series on another network. Paul Wendkos, who directed a wonderful horror effort "The Mephisto Waltz" a decade later does an okay job, but I'd rather watch Nielsen doing comedy than this extended, extremely overacted "dramatic" performance.
I found zero suspense, especially as Paul Burke's dialogue kept pointing throughout to the solution of the "mystery". Persoff, fresh out of a nuthouse, runs a family-tradition Fun House, where the lengthy climax has Burke watching Nielsen being frightened by the exhibits, presaging the awful horror-porn of crap like the "Saw" series several decades later.
Sure, the streets of Manhattan are shown, but this is as artificial looking a show as any backlot series on another network. Paul Wendkos, who directed a wonderful horror effort "The Mephisto Waltz" a decade later does an okay job, but I'd rather watch Nielsen doing comedy than this extended, extremely overacted "dramatic" performance.
One of the best so far
searchanddestroy-121 February 2018
Warning: Spoilers
This is really an amazing series. This episode was not wrtiiten by the great Stirling Siliphant, but he was only as a consulktant, advisor. This is a terrific scheme here, when you don't know who the good guy is, or you realize ONLY in the end. Terrific, in the line of AH PRESENTS, as the other user told.
I want to stake my claim for this body before rigor mortise sets in
kapelusznik184 April 2014
***SPOILERS*** Just released from the Cogswell Sanitarium after recovering from a nervous breakdown fun house operator Max Evar, Nehemiah Persoff, is determined to make advertising executive Norman "Norm" Garry's, Leslie Nielson, life anything but normal. Evar hounding the poor man unrelentingly in his responsibility in the deaths of Evar's wife & daughter in a fire that he, In Evar's mind, set to his printing business, to collect insurance money, adjacent to the Evar house. Going to the police to get protection from this lunatic all Garry is told is there's nothing they can do until he Evar does something criminal or illegal like murdering him as he's planning to do.
It's the kind sensitive and feeling for all living creatures Det. Adam Flint, Paul Burke, who takes on the case in trying to get both Garry & Evar to bury the hatchet and forget the past by going out to a local bar and having a couple of drinks together. Of course Det. Flint's plan backfired with Evar getting so under Garry's skin that he, as well as Det. Flint, fell right into his trap:The fun house that he manages across the river in New Jersey!
***SPOILERS*** As it soon turned out Norman Garry was the firebug that Evar accused him of in setting fire to his printing plant that killed his wife & daughter by setting Evar's fun house on fire as well. With his conciseness finally getting to him in the fun house Garry freaked out and went bananas wrecking and shooting up the joint and setting it on fire to cover his tracks. Det. Flint, good man as he is, completely underestimated Garry's motives and almost ended up getting fried himself together with Evar, whom Garry knocked out, as the fire that Garry set consumed the entire fun house. As for Garry the flames that he in fact started ended up finishing him off as he flew, in flames, out the the fun house window landing on his head and cracking it!
It's the kind sensitive and feeling for all living creatures Det. Adam Flint, Paul Burke, who takes on the case in trying to get both Garry & Evar to bury the hatchet and forget the past by going out to a local bar and having a couple of drinks together. Of course Det. Flint's plan backfired with Evar getting so under Garry's skin that he, as well as Det. Flint, fell right into his trap:The fun house that he manages across the river in New Jersey!
***SPOILERS*** As it soon turned out Norman Garry was the firebug that Evar accused him of in setting fire to his printing plant that killed his wife & daughter by setting Evar's fun house on fire as well. With his conciseness finally getting to him in the fun house Garry freaked out and went bananas wrecking and shooting up the joint and setting it on fire to cover his tracks. Det. Flint, good man as he is, completely underestimated Garry's motives and almost ended up getting fried himself together with Evar, whom Garry knocked out, as the fire that Garry set consumed the entire fun house. As for Garry the flames that he in fact started ended up finishing him off as he flew, in flames, out the the fun house window landing on his head and cracking it!
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