What I watched: A second- season episode of Suspense, an anthology drama series created by Robert Stevens. “I’m No Hero” starred Hume Cronyn, Cara Williams and Mark Roberts. It was directed by Stevens and written by Charles Robinson. This episode aired on CBS at 9:30 PM on Tuesday, June 20, 1950, and is available to watch on YouTube.
What happened: A young doctor named Joe wakes up during a thunderstorm. His room is fully lit, which may be the issue. His wife Ellen tells him that he needs to be at the hospital early to see to patients, and he sits down on her single bed, which is indecent. He had a disturbing dream about a home invader. Their daughter Cathy also had a bad dream. Ellen tells her to “dream about the Sandman”, although it’s not clear whether she’s talking about the supervillain, the alternative comic book, or the wrestler.
Just as Joe’s settling down to sleep, the doorbell buzzes. The man at the door is Sig (Cronyn), a full head or two shorter, says there’s an emergency — and pulls a gun on him. Our doc says he’ll co-operate, uttering the title line. A flashy dame (Williams, identified in the credits only as “Babe”) then pulls in an injured man. He obviously has a gut wound, and Sig insists that Joe operate right in his home. Ellen comes down, and it turns out that she’s a nurse, and gets pulled into the impromptu surgery.
It turns out that the injured man is Sig’s little brother. The woman blames him for the brother turning to a life of crime. Just to add to the moral stakes a little, Cathy comes down. Sig declares that he’s going to “look after her” while Joe treats his brother Vince. Fortunately, they have an examining room in their house, which provides a place to do the surgery.
The presumably gory surgery takes place during the break. Joe and Ellen both re-iterate that the surgery has a 1 in 100 chance of succeeding. Sig admits that he’s having fun holding hostages, and Joe responds by calling him short. He says that he’s the brain to Vince’s muscle. Sig starts getting impatient, and wants to leave with Vince now. Joe explains the concept of a hemorrhage to him, but Sig just thinks he’s trying to pull a fast one.
The doorbell rings again. Busy night. It turns out to be the friendly neighbourhood policeman Grady. He inadvertently fills Joe in on the crime: a hold-up in which a night watchmen was killed. Sig acts suspicious as hell, then kills the cop when he turns around.
Around this time Vince dies on the operating table, marking perhaps the first time in television that a 1-in-100 shot doesn’t happen. Babe sees and starts freaking out, blaming Joe. Sig goes to check on him. He decides to leave with Cathy so that the couple won’t call. Joe reacts by throwing the corpse at him. Babe shoots Sig and leaves. Our family, all alive but traumatized, huddle together as they call the police. A happy ending? Conrad Janis gives us a brief preview of next week’s episode, “Wisteria Cottage.”
What I thought: Perhaps one of the most central fears of crime TV is that the world of crime might unexpectedly swallow middle-class professionals, the medium’s main audience. The Sopranos and Breaking Bad both sold themselves on this dynamic from different directions. More common, however, is stories like “I’m No Hero”, where the professional is the hapless victim of the criminal underworld.
The title doesn’t lie: while Joe has his moments of resistance, he ultimately goes along with what Sig wants. If there is a hero in this story, it’s “Babe”, who spends the whole episode gradually working up her courage and eventually strikes back against the man who’s caused her so much grief. Indeed, about halfway through the doctor and his family fade to the background and the drama becomes one of moral accusation and defense between Sig and Babe.
The episode’s saving grace is that this conflict is actually well-drawn. A large part of the credit goes to Hume Cronyn, who Suspense deservedly gives top billing. Cronyn, who previously appeared in “Dr. Violet”, manages to menace here despite his short stature. He had appeared in some of Hitchcock’s early movies, and brings that kind of suspicious mania to this performance.
Robinson’s script helps too, developing Sig as an actual three-dimensional character with internal psychology. “I’m No Hero” is almost at pains to detail how Sig’s inferiority complex drives his psychopathic aggression, and how tortured his relationship with his dying brother must have been. The result is an episode where the nominal protagonists seem like stock characters, even with an endangered child hanging over proceedings, while the villains come from a rich and detailed world.
The end result is an odd but enjoyable half-hour of television. There’s a strange realism to it: the hero isn’t able to pull off the medical miracle, and ultimately isn’t even much of a hero. It’s far from gritty realism — the world of crime still seems somewhat costume-driven — but even the pat ending can’t dispel the atmosphere of quiet despair and failure.
Coming up next: Our wrestling journey introduces us to a man synonymous with technical greatness.
The Eternal Couch Potato 