Alfred Hitchcock Presents (TV Series) The Glass Eye (1957) User Reviews

I guessed the twist...but it's still a good twist.

[planktonrules · 8/10 · 8 March 2021]

When the story begins, a young man (William Shatner) and his wife are going through his aunt's possessions. Jim then tells her the story about the glass eye they found among her things.

It seems that Aunt Julia (Jessica Tandy) was a spinster and lived a quiet life of desperation. However, one day she saw a ventriloquist, Max Collodi (Tom Conway), performed...and she was instantly smitten. Soon, she followed him from city to city and wrote to him about her devotion to him. Eventually, the very secretive Max agreed to meet her...but the meeting went poorly. Why? See the story.

This episode has a nice twist and is very good. It is interesting, however, that Shatner and his narration are not 100% necessary...it worked but probably would have worked just as well as a straight story without narration. Regardless, this one is less scary...more just sad...very, very sad.

"That was a heartwarming little story, wasn't it?"

[classicsoncall · 8/10 · 1 September 2021]

William Shatner appeared in two of the more memorable episodes of 'The Twilight Zone' (Nightmare at Twenty Thousand Feet, Nick of Time) as well as two of the better 'Thriller' programs (The Hungry Glass, The Grim Reaper). When he showed up in this one I expected another bizarre performance with an unusual twist. Well, we got the twist, but Shatner only appeared as the narrator of the story about Julia Lester (Jessica Tandy), a lonely woman getting on in years who longs for a husband and family. I can't say that the finale was totally unanticipated because this was the kind of series that made you expect the unexpected. The feeling one gets at the ending is one of profound sorrow for the poor woman who invested all her hope in finally meeting the one person she admired so much and who she felt might contribute to her future happiness. These Hitchcock stories usually didn't leave a woman in the lurch, but this time the tables were turned on Miss Lester along with the viewer. For Shatner, he came out of the episode just fine, unlike his pair of forays into the 'Thriller' universe where he went 0 for 2.

Something is missing

[searchanddestroy-1 · 9/10 · 22 July 2019]

I love this so atmospheric tale, that could have been made for TWILIGHT ZONE series. Or any other anthology shows, not necessarily AH PRESENTS ones. That said,the ending, though being excellent, misses one point: What happened to our lead character, played here by the excellent Jessica Tandy, this so moving, poignant character.?...What happened to her after what she saw? Hitchock could have told us during his final closing speech...

One of the Very Best

[Hitchcoc · 10/10 · 19 June 2013]

I was completely taken in by this episode. William Shatner, who appeared in a few Twilight Zones, provides narration for one of the most interesting stories of the Hitchcock canon. He tells of a spinster, played by the wonderful Jessica Tandy, who realizes that life and romance have passed her by. While at a variety show, she sees a ventriloquist act. She is immediately smitten by the performer and spends the remainder of her days writing him letters, and trying to find a way to meet him. Tandy's portrayal is touching. She is sad and patient and, hence, really believable. Of course, we know that at some point they will meet and the result of that meeting will be what we have waited for. This is a horror story, a love story, a mystery, and is sure to please.

Creepy Classic Hitch

[Gerardrobertson61 · 10/10 · 2 October 2019]

This episode threw me for a 6, it surprising ending was something I did not see coming and I was totally taken back by it. One of the best, worth watching and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

My Favourite Short from 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents'.

[Amyth47 · 10/10 · 8 February 2019]

My Rating : 10/10 ♠ MASTERPIECE ♠

This was an extremely interesting and entertaining short from the TV show 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' though not directed by Hitchcock. He hosted the show (directed 17 of the 267 episodes) and had some input as to its contents.

'The Glass Eye' is sure to impress with its plot and sense of poignancy : A horror story, a love story, a mystery drama. I give it 10 out of 10.

Other interesting episodes from the show as follows: Breakdown (1955), Lamb to the Slaughter (1958), The Right Kind of House (1958), Road Hog (1959) Man from the South (1960)

FANTASTIC SHOW FOR MYSTERY LOVERS.

One glass eye to be aware of

[TheLittleSongbird · 9/10 · 24 August 2022]

'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' may not have been a consistently great series, with some misses in all the seasons, but when it was at its best it was absolutely brilliant. Had no doubt that "The Glass Eye" would work. While Robert Stevens was not always consistent in his output for the series, he did do some great work. Jessica Tandy and Tom Conway were both fine actors in their own way. Absolutely loved the premise for this episode, which is one worthy of Hitchcock himself.

"The Glass Eye" turned out to be absolutely wonderful. One thing stops it from being perfection, and goodness wasn't it close to being that, but that doesn't stop it from being one of the best of the series' season openers (maybe a contender for the best). As well as one of Stevens' crowning jewels, and up there with the best 'Alfred Hitchcock Presents' episodes, when talking of the previous episodes it is very much up there with "Breakdown", "And So Died Riabouchinska", "The Creeper" and "One More Mile to Go".

My only issue is William Shatner's narration, which did over explain at times and actually the episode would have worked very well without narration.

Everything else is absolutely splendid. Especially the acting, with Tandy giving one of my favourite performances of the series in one emotionally powerful performance that really did stay with me. Conway is suitably suave, something that he always did so well (every bit as much as his younger brother George Sanders). Stevens' direction is some of his most accomplished and inspired, in full control of the material and with full understanding of it.

It helps too that the material is so good. The dialogue is thoughtful and haunting, not coming over as too rambling and it doesn't come over as melodramatic. The story is both poignant and creepy, and while the ending was not a shocker it was still pack a punch worthy and still unsettled. Can't fault Hitchcock's typically droll bookending. It is a well made episode, with some very stylish and haunting close ups standing out. It is suitably eerie audibly too and "Funeral March of a Marionette" continues to be an inspired choice for theme music.

Concluding, wonderful. 9/10.

A poignant warning: flee loneliness

[Morganalee · 8/10 · 25 April 2007]

Spinsterhood is a gold mine for the horror genre, and the anthology series "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" employed a reliable stable of actors who appeared again and again on the show. When the script called for a scheming, calculating old maid who cared for nothing but money and was willing to kill to secure it, Carmen Mathews was the choice. When the storyline told of a faded beauty who had somehow missed out on the love she continued to crave, Jessica Tandy was the one. Thirty years before she won an Oscar for "Driving Miss Daisy," she appears in these old black-and-whites as a fragile, delicate thing whose unfulfilled desires have her teetering on the edge of madness. To my mind, the "Toby" episode does only a so-so job of conveying this; "The Glass Eye" does it so well that it functions as a cautionary tale against aloneness and isolation. Tandy's character makes a sad last bid for love, and I disagree that a plain woman would have been more realistic in the role. In her character's time (the 1890s), a woman who had "missed her market" (hadn't married by her mid-twenties or so) could expect to finish her life as a spinster, no matter how pretty she was, and Tandy's luminous prettiness (she was in her late forties, playing a woman "still in her thirties") just makes her character's predicament all the more poignant. She falls in love as only a woman with naught but a fantasy life would: from the audience, with a man whom she has never met, a handsome ventriloquist named Max Collodi. There are holes in the plot. Spoiler alert: I can't buy that a figure made of wood and plaster would have looked so lifelike, even from the stage, let alone from the other side of even a darkened room, that it would have appeared he was a living, strikingly handsome man. Of course, a man of flesh and blood, Tom Conway, plays the role until the crucial moment; the show was cheating there. No matter. When Tandy's character, granted a meeting with Max after a year's pursuit, impulsively grabs Max's hand and he clatters to the floor, she cradles him, so shocked that for the moment she doesn't realize that what she's holding is no man at all. Then the ventriloquist's dummy rises from his chair. He calls to her, "Madame!," and she looks up to see the "dummy" slowly stand upon the table. The dwarf's face is covered by his grotesque mask, so we cannot read his thoughts. What is he appealing for, then? Is he silently imploring, "I overlooked your small deception, about your age; can you not overlook my large deception, and the two of us undertake to find what happiness we can together?" But then "Max's" head slips off its spike and falls to the floor, Tandy's character comprehends what she sees, and all her loathing is contained in her cry to the dwarf, "YOU are Max Collodi!" The dwarf orders her from the room, his feet rattling horridly on the table top as he stamps them in rage, and Tandy's character flees. Alone, the dwarf pulls off his mask and swings down to the floor beside his fallen dummy. It is then that he sees that one of the head's bright glass eyes is missing...It's a great scene, and the reason I still appreciate this episode twenty years after I first saw it.

Trivia on the episode "The Glass Eye"

[rcrckwd · 14 January 2012]

Please watch the episode before you read this.

The real Max Collodi was portrayed by Billy Barty. Ironically Billy really had a glass. I was a member of the Little People of America, which Billy founded and knew him casually before he passed away. I read the shot story this episode was based on years before seeing it on late night TV or joining Little People of America and I was surprised when I saw it that it was from the story I had read. Billy was a good actor and his performance gives this story a strange sense of believability. I think Billy told me he lost his eye as a child when he was hit in the eye by a baseball. It is one of the best episodes of the series, but people should know that this and most episodes were not directed by Hitchcock. He hosted the show and had some input as to its contents.

creepy doll film

[jl_mcknight · 8/10 · 26 February 2014]

This is one of my favorites from Alfred Hitchcock, and it's also one that I don't go back and watch often. Solely because as much as I love these films, this one gives me the creeps. The story of this sad lonely woman who truly believes herself to be in love with a man she's never met makes you feel protective of her. You actually hope that she finds happiness with him in the end, as she has spent many years following his shows and writing him. The set up is great and you expect that once they meet, he will show no interest in her. After all, he's famous and has lots of female admirers, but of course, there's a plot twist. The ending will give you nightmares.

The Eyes Have It, Or The Other Way Round.

[rmax304823 · 7/10 · 16 April 2012]

I notice that the summary of this episode gives the game away but it doesn't make much difference. The viewer can see the Big Reveal coming from miles away.

The story, told in flashback by William Shatner, has Jessica Tandy as a middle-aged spinster who one day visits a music hall and sees a performance by the ventriloquist, Tom Conway, and his wooden dummy George. The jokes are cornball and, in fact, Conway is pretty wooden himself except for his suave and debonair voice.

That doesn't stop Tandy from being in his thrall. She quits her job and follows him around the Continent. Her letters are constantly rejected until one day he agrees to meet her in a dark room.

Guess what? Jessica Tandy looks pretty good for the role she's playing, all wide eyed and full lipped. She was ten years away from her Broadway triumph as Blanche in "A Streetcar Named Desire." Tom Conway by this time was probably lucky to get work, having become such an alcoholic that even his caddish brother, George Sanders, would have nothing to do with him.

Shatner restrains himself in this performance. In later roles he would turn into an outrageous and thoroughly enjoyable ham. Somewhere there is a delightful video clip of Alfred Hitchcock directing William Shatner in a scene -- not from this show -- and instructing him on little bits of business to be performed while seated at a table.

In any case, this episode has overtones of horror. Edgar Allan Poe might have written it. In fact he wrote one a little like it, "The Man Who Was Used Up." With only a few deft tweaks it could have been an episode of "The Twilight Zone."

Eye Catching

[redryan64 · 10/10 · 12 June 2016]

HAVING SEEN THIS half-hour Hitchcock in its broadcast TV premier, we must say that it certainly did live up to everything that our memory had stored about it. We just viewed it today,. having recorded it off of the Antenna TV Channel. Our initial contact was some 59 years ago with that first showing.

WE REALLY DON'T know what else to say, without getting into too much of the story. We shouldn't wish to introduce any sort of "spoiler"; whether or not that we included the checking bf the box. Suffice it to say that this little gem of a Mystery/Shocker/Noir would be well used as a study for any film students, regardless of at what level they were.

MAYBE IT IS in the method used of putting it all together is what is at the heart of the production. Thus, such disparate elements as the mulling over of the now deceased woman's effects, the flashback narrative, her very lonely existence and finally the discovery of the ventriloquist in the English Music Hall, all make the story a case where the sum is far more than the total of he parts.

EVEN THOUGH THIS is only a half-hour, the assembled cast is both extensive and outstandingly well cast. We have Jessica Tandy (Julia Lester) and Tom Conway (Max Collodi) in the main roles. They are supported by Rosemary Harris, William Shatner, Patricia Hitchcock, Arthur Gould-Porter, Billy Barty, Nelson Welch, Colin Campbell and Paul Playton.

AND IN THE psychological analysis department, we offer the following: The story involves a stage ventriloquist. Ventriloquism is a form of puppetry. Therefore, the name of the ventriloquist is "Max Collodi." Is it just a coincidence or intended that it was Italian writer, Carlo Collodi, who wrote THE ADVENTURES OF PINOCHIO (1883)?

Star shine

[ctomvelu1 · 7/10 · 6 January 2013]

Jessica Tandy stars as a lonely woman who falls in love with a ventriloquist (Conway) and leaves her drab life behind to follow him around the country and attend all his performances. She begins to write him, and after a time he agrees to meet with her. It is at this meeting that she discovers a terrible secret, and once you witness it, the episode's title will make sense. A young William Shatner in suitable toupee narrates the tale, as the woman's nephew. This framing device occurs when the nephew and his wife are sorting his late aunt's possessions, including a glass eye the wife finds in a jewelry box. Tandy is unforgettable as the naive spinster.

Dreadful

[bmesser · 3/10 · 2 July 2022]

Dreadful story nicely acted. The punch line if you can call it that was like a poke in the eye with a sharp stick. Why do so many people think it's the best episode of the series beats me. Like most of the AHP stories very poor. If TV & Netflix weren't so bad this box set would still be in the attic with the glass eye.

What appears to be, Eye Guess?

[thejcowboy22 · 8/10 · 1 June 2017]

In eighth grade I went a field trip with some trepidation. It was play called the Fantasticks. An off-Broadway romance play. The theater was located on Sullivan Street in the heart of Greenwich Village for which the playhouse was named. I was seated with my classmates along the first row of seats in this intimate 150 seat locale. The music was provided by a lone pianist and the scenery was basically a bed sheet and a bench. I thought I was in for a long afternoon of song and dialogue. The play began with the players coming out one by one. Then out comes a shapely red haired woman in a ballerina type outfit. I was smitten with lust. She was so lovely I couldn't take my eyes off her. At the end of the performance I waited backstage to catch a glimpse of the leading lady. Mr. Gottlieb had other plans telling me to get my self back on the bus headed back to Long Island. I couldn't stop thinking about the lady in the play. I wanted to go back to the village and see her again and again. Alfred Hitchcock Presents exemplifies screen writing excellence for those early days of Television. Jim Whitley (William Shatner) is cleaning out his dead Sister's apartment and comes across a glass eye. Jim goes on and tells his Wife of how his Sister acquired the Glass eye. It all started when his Spinster Sister Julia (Jessica Tandy) who happened to catch a performance of the great ventriloquist Max Collodi at the local hippodrome. Jessica was so taken in by the debonair headliner she saw all his performances and was so bold as to send Max letters to meet him. Max agreed and what was to follow was lets just say only a Hitchcock Television show could present. One of the best screen plays for television with over the top shock value written by Stirling Silliphant. At the young age of fourteen, I wanted to catch every performance of that lovely leading lady. I visioned taking the bus and train down to the small venue and watch my starlet perform night after night. Unfortunately I couldn't afford to do such a thing. There is a silver lining in this story as I kept the Playbill and years later I became Facebook Friends with the introductory woman. Just an Eye opening experience.

"The Glass Eye" is one of the strangest Hitchcock episodes

[chuck-reilly · 9/10 · 26 August 2013]

Once in a while, Alfred Hitchcock opted for a story that was just plain creepy. This is certainly one of them. Jessica Tandy plays a lonely spinster in "The Glass Eye" although the glass eye itself has little to do with the plot, serving more as a diversion. Tandy was in her mid-40s at the time of the filming of this episode, but she hardly looked the spinster type. Despite the makeup to make her appear like a "Plain Jane," she was still very attractive. At the beginning of the story, she has already died and her tragic tale is told in flashbacks by her younger brother (William Shatner) as he relates it to his wife (Rosemary Harris). While living a staid and simple existence, one day Jessica was intrigued enough to attend a show by a popular ventriloquist named Max Collodi. Max's dummy is grotesque but gets all the laughs (and that fact will figure large as the tale unfolds). Within minutes of his performance, Ms. Tandy completely falls head over heels for Collodi, despite the fact that she can't really get a good look at him from her seat in the balcony. His masculine voice and exotic appearance (at least from afar) entrances her like never before. You might say that Max has "aroused" her interest. She decides to follow his stage act around England and then the continent, leaving her boring job and her drab apartment behind. Apparently living as a spinster has provided enough money for her to spend months at a time on the road watching Collodi's act over and over. All the while, she never gets a real good front-row seat. After some trepidation, she eventually writes him an earnest letter and requests an audience with him. He finally agrees to see her and Jessica is ecstatic when she hears the news. Putting on her best outfit and some lipstick, she enters his apartment only to find the lights dimmed low and Collodi in a corner with his dummy by his side. But when Jessica tries to get closer to the object of her affections the real nightmare begins. She reaches out to touch the love of her life, BUT....he's really THE dummy. The lifeless body falls to the floor with a thud and its head flies off. To Jessica's horror, Max's dummy is actually a real midget (Billy Barty) and he's in no mood for pleasantries after being exposed. He jumps on a nearby table screaming at her at the top of his lungs. Somehow Jessica is cognizant enough to grab one of the dummy's glass eyes as she runs out the door. As Shatner closes the story, he sorrowfully tells his wife that the glass eye (stored in a small jewelry box) is all that's left of his sister's fated romance with one Max Collodi. Host Hitchcock returns with a mournful look and pounding his heart he says to the audience, "Didn't that story just get to you right there." Old Alfred had a very strange sense of humor. Ms. Tandy won her well-earned Oscar for Best Actress many years later. As everyone knows, Mr. Shatner and Ms. Harris are still very much active in their craft and can be seen regularly in movies and television.

Beware the Glass Eye

[dougdoepke · 11 June 2006]

What's the story behind the glass eye? In fact, it's an entertaining one that blends a poignant human theme with a couple moments of outright horror. Jessica Tandy gives an ace performance as a lonely spinster who becomes something of a 19th century groupie, following the handsome ventriloquist Tom Conway on his theatrical tours. However, she gets more than she bargained for. The entry would have been more memorable had the producers been willing to cast a genuinely plain-faced woman in the role, instead of the attractive Miss Tandy. Nonetheless, the episode is really distinguished by a touching script from up-and-coming TV writer Stirling Silliphant, who would later win an Emmy and make his mark with the ground-breaking series Route 66. Solid Hitchcock entry.

Eye like it

[hte-trasme · 8/10 · 23 May 2010]

"The Glass Eye" is an "Alfred Hitchcock" episode whose memorable success comes, I think, from its effective juxtaposition of its bizarre and almost surreal conclusion, in which the ventriloquist object of the protagonist's love turns out to be a realistic dummy whose head comes off when it gets knocked over, with an unrelentingly sad and tragic atmosphere.

A young William Shatner, his character telling the story in flashback form, very much sets the tone with an extremely sombre and serious performance (he is supposed to be mourning a dead relative) that carries into his voice-over narration of events. This couples with Jessica Tandy's earnest and subtle performance in the lead role to make this story a middle-aged woman obsessed with following a stage ventriloquist almost as painfully pitiable to watch as it actually would be. It also means that Tom Conway can put in a performance that is believable when seen either as wooden dummy or as an eccentric and mannered Vaudeville showman who would match rather well the tone of the piece.

The twist is a nice one, though guessable once one first sees Julia meeting Collodi, and, in a neat trick, what could easily seem tawdry or silly is carried over into poignancy by the deadly-seriousness with which the rest is played.

How does Jim know ALL the details?

[glitterrose · 10/10 · 12 July 2022]

So we have a couple cleaning stuff out at the beginning of the episode. Jim is our narrator for this episode and they're cleaning out his aunt's things. No mention of how Aunt Julia died but Jim sure knows everything else about Julia. And he honestly seemed to take great pleasure in talking about Julia's sad life as a spinster. I'm not sure I'd go that far. But I guess it also depends on the time frame you're living in. I don't think life or even the world ends just because you're single. Are you happy? Do you do activities that you enjoy? Julia is seen out in public and she's reading. She's going through an entire list of books to read. It didn't really strike me as being an activity that bores you to tears but you're doing it anyway because you don't have anything else better to do.

Anyway, another activity Julia does is taking a bratty kid to a show. They end up seeing Max Collodi. He's a ventrilloquist and his dummy's name is George. Julia's pretty much instantly attracted to Max. She decides to put her own life on pause (she quits her job) and follow Max around from show to show. Julia begins to write Max and Max writes her back.

The idea of a meeting takes place and Julia's as thrilled as can be. She goes to a hat store and tells the shop keeper she's trying to look like how she did in an old photograph. She sent one to Max is why she mentioned that. Julia's a bundle of nerves. She's excited but I think there was a good deal of nervousness going on as well. Take note that Julia chose not to wear the hat she bought for the meeting with Max Collodi.

Julia's at her 5 minute meeting with Max when disaster strikes. Julia touches Max and he falls over! Julia's leaning over Max when a figure rises above her. Julia is horrified to see that who she thought was a man (Max) was actually the ventrilloquist dummy and vice versa. The real Max starts screaming at her to get out and Julia flees the room but ends up grabbing the ventrilloquist dummy's eye. Jim ends his narration talking about what happened to Max Collodi.

It's an interesting story but also kinda sad when you think about it. Just like Julia was insecure about how she looked, Max was also insecure with the way he looked. Perhaps Julia and Max wouldn't have had a great romance but maybe they could've been friends at least?

Some of Shatner's dialogue was unintentionally funny to me. Especially the way he talks about it being frightening. I still say a nephew wouldn't have known all these details about Julia's experience with Max. Most I could see would be Julia quitting her job and that having family member's tongues wagging. Although I sincerely question if Julia would explain why she's making those life choices instead of saying she quit her job so she can travel.

A lonely spinster falls in love with a ventriloquist

[lathbury · 9/10 · 21 September 2008]

I think this is the best episode of "Alfred Hitchcock Presents." It shows Hitchcock's mastery with lighting and staging. Unlike the previous reviewer, I did not find Jessica Tandy too attractive for the part of a lonely spinster. The ventriloquist, Tom Conway, is managed so that he becomes a plausible object onto which a lonely woman might project her romantic illusions. As the narrative builds, the point of view is quietly shifted to conceal the reversal on which the climax depends. The framed tale-within-a-tale tacitly contrasts to the bizarre love story in the main plot and unobtrusively negotiates the distance between the viewer and the upsetting revelation that effects the turn. My one quarrel is the facile attempt by voice over at pathos in the last scene, but this brief coda does not detract from the power of the main sequence.

Stevens Does It Again!

[TondaCoolwal · 9/10 · 30 November 2022]

Without even reading the credits I knew this one was directed by Robert Stevens. He has the Master's (Hitch) touch. The vague sense that something is not quite right. The slow build up of anticipatory suspense. Then - the final, shocking reveal.

Let's face it, any drama which features a ventriloquist's dummy is going to be creepy. So the audience is on edge for a start. Here we have lonely spinster Jessica Tandy falling in unrequited love with handsome vent Max Collodi who appears and leaves the stage in a puff of smoke, and always performs his act sitting down. Initially Collodi simply replies courteously to the spinster's letters, politely turning down her requests to meet him in person but, eventually he consents. They meet in his darkened hotel room. She is so excited she just has to reach out and touch him... I guarantee you won't be prepared for what happens next. I thought I had guessed the twist. But I hadn't. And it's a shocker! A wonderful half-hour's entertainment benefitting from the quality of actors, Tandy, Tom Conway and William Shatner, and a worthy entry in this quirky series.