ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS--"Beta Delta Gamma"

 

I recently purchased Vinegar Syndrome's special edition 4K/Blu-ray release of the Italian Gothic THE HORRIBLE DR. HICHCOCK, starring Barbara Steele. I intend to write a blog post on this release, but one thing I learned from the extras on it is that Barbara Steele had a connection to Alfred Hitchcock. She appeared on an episode of ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS called "Beta Delta Gamma", which is available on the Roku and Peacock streaming channels. 

"Beta Delta Gamma" was first shown in 1961 during the seventh season of ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS, the year before the show transitioned to an hour-long format. The episode deals with a group of college students who are partying at their fraternity's beach house. The group appears to be led by Alan (Burt Brinckerhoff), who tries to get his buddy Mark (Duke Howard) to engage in a beer-drinking contest. Alan passes out, and the group, annoyed by Alan's behavior, decides to play a prank on him. Encouraged by Phyllis (Barbara Steele), the group sets it up so that it appears Mark has been killed by Alan. As expected, the prank works all too well. 

"Beta Delta Gamma" isn't one of the better ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS episodes. If you've watched enough of these 1960s TV anthology shows (as I certainly have), you can easily predict what will happen at the climax. The episode was directed by Alan Crosland Jr. and written by Calvin Clements, both longtime network TV veterans, and most of the story takes place in the beach house or on the beach itself, both generic-looking locations. 

Barbara Steele in "Beta Delta Gamma"

What hurts the episode is that the group of college students are not very interesting or sympathetic. They spend most of their time lounging around drunk, and the main reason they come up with the prank seems to be because they are bored. Barbara Steele by far has the most screen presence of the small cast, and there's the added benefit of seeing her in shorts. The viewer also gets to hear Steele's actual voice. 

The two lead actors in the story, Burt Brinckerhoff and Duke Howard, are rather bland, and I had not heard of any of them before. (Brinkerhoff actually went on to become a TV director/producer, while Howard didn't have a very long acting career.) One of the story elements of "Beta Delta Gamma" is that Phyllis is attracted to Alan, but it's hard to believe that Barbara Steele would have any interest in any of the characters in this tale--one wonders why she's even hanging out with this group in the first place. Severn Darden and Barbara Harris (who would later star in Hitchcock's FAMILY PLOT) are also in the group, but other than looking like a couple of beatniks, they don't get much to do. 

One thing that "Beta Delta Gamma" shows is that Barbara Steele could easily play a "normal" role in a contemporary story, and her actual voice was just fine for acting purposes. BLACK SUNDAY and THE PIT AND THE PENDULUM had already been released in the U.S. when the episode first aired, and it's surprising that the folks behind ALFRED HITCHCOCK PRESENTS didn't try and give Steele a much more flamboyant role in a much more flamboyant story. (She did at least get a "with Barbara Steele" special credit at the end of "Beta Delta Gamma".)

If Barbara Steele had stuck around in Hollywood, there's no doubt she would have had plenty of opportunities to appear on American network TV. But if she hadn't of gone back to Italy, she wouldn't have become the icon she is now.