- "Does Doctor Xenon really exist? I don't know. For that matter, do we three standing in this room really exist? Who knows? The real and the unreal. Where does one stop and the other begin. Maybe we're just a figment or product of someone else's fevered imagination. Someone from another world perhaps."
- ―Doctor Bob Tyrell
| "The Seeing-Eye Surgeon" | |
|---|---|
| Series Tales of Tomorrow Season 2, Episode 1 | |
| |
| Air date | September 5th, 1952 |
| Writers | Michael Blair; Ed Dooley |
| Director | Don Medford |
| Producers | Mort Abrahams |
| Starring | Bruce Cabot; Constance Towers; Edwin Jerome |
| Episode guide | |
| Previous "A Bird in Hand" |
Next "The Cocoon" |
"The Seeing-Eye Surgeon" is the first episode of season two of the science fiction anthology series Tales of Tomorrow. Written by Michael Blair and Ed Dooley, it first aired on the ABC network on Friday, September 5th, 1952. In this episode, a neurosurgeon named Doctor Bob Tyrell is assigned to perform a high-risk operation on a very important patient. A mysterious visitor comes to him and offer to help by lending him a pair of special eye glasses that will allow him to see things on the cellular level.
Synopsis[]
Two neurosurgeons named Doctor Foyle and Bob Tyrell come out of surgery and into Foyle's office. Foyle is upset with Doctor Terrell for undermining his authority during the surgery. After admonishing him at great length, he leaves the room. His assistant, Martha Larson tries to give Doctor Terrell some reassurance, but he is agitated by Foyle's lack of faith in him. The team has a high-profile surgery to prepare for and the patient is a famed nuclear physicist named Professor Ross.
A short time later, a strange man named Doctor Xenon comes to Tyrell's office. Xenon is a graduate of Reisberg University in Europe. He knows of the pending surgery to take place on Professor Ross and emphasizes the importance of making sure that Ross survives the procedure. To facilitate this objective, he lends Doctor Tyrell a pair of special eye glasses and a cleaning solution. He indicates that these spectacles will most assuredly aid him during the surgery. Tyrell is skeptical and tells Xenon that it is Doctor Foyle who will be performing the operation, but the strange man tells him it will in fact be he who conducts the surgery. After leaving him the glasses, Xenon leaves.
Doctor Tyrell takes a nap and Martha awakens him a few hours later. She hands him a file containing data on Professor Ross' surgery and tells him that Doctor Foyle has taken sick and will be unable to perform the operation. As Xenon predicted, Doctor Tyrell is now slated to take over. He tells Martha about his encounter with Doctor Xenon and asks her to check up on his background. He suspects that Doctor Foyle might be deliberately passing up the surgery so that should anything go wrong, it would be Doctor Tyrell who ends up shouldering the blame.
The following day, Doctor Tyrell and his team perform the surgery. The process proves difficult and Tyrell is nervous about continuing the procedure. He hears Doctor Xenon's voice in his head telling him, "You must perform the surgery". He asks Martha to get him Doctor Xenon's glasses. When he puts them on, he finds that he can see things on a cellular level now. This type of acute perception enables him to continue with the process and the operation proves to be a success.
The following day, Doctor Foyle reads the report concerning the surgery and cannot believe his eyes. He arranges to meet with Doctor Tyrell immediately and tells him how shocked he was to hear that he stopped to get a pair of glasses during the middle of the operation. Tyrell tells him about his meeting with Doctor Xenon. Foyle scoffs at the story, citing that the character of Doctor Xenon is nothing more than an urban legend that circulated around medical schools in Europe. He demands to see the pair of glasses that Tyrell wore during the operation. He has Martha retrieve them, but the lenses are missing. Tyrell and Foyle have no idea what to make of the situation and Tyrell wonders if Doctor Xenon ever really existed at all.
Cast[]
| Actor | Role |
|---|---|
| Bruce Cabot | Bob Tyrell |
| Constance Towers | Martha Larson |
| Edwin Jerome | Doctor Foyle |
| Joseph Holland | Doctor Xenon |
Notes & Trivia[]
- Episode is sponsored by C.H. Maslund and Sons.
- Actor Bruce Cabot also played the role of Sam Thorne in the fifteenth episode of season one, "The Dune Roller".
- Actress Constance Towers has also made appearances in episodes of The Outer Limits, The 4400 and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.
- Only known science fiction credits for co-writers Michael Blair and Ed Dooley.
- This is Edwin Jerome's only appearance in a science fiction program.
- In the scene where Doctor Foyle leaves the office to get the nurse, a camera can be seen on the right side of the screen.
See also[]
- Tales of Tomorrow
- Tales of Tomorrow episodes
- Tales of Tomorrow cast & crew
- Tales of Tomorrow image gallery
External Links[]
- "The Seeing-Eye Surgeon" at IMDB
- "The Seeing-Eye Surgeon" at TV.com
- "The Seeing-Eye Surgeon" at TV Rage.com
