John Brahm (director of feature film classics THE LODGER and HANGOVER SQUARE), directed this "Twilight Zone" episode starring MARTIN BALSAM, giving it the sort of Gothic touches he gave his full-length feature films. This one is about a wax museum curator who delights in taking the customers on a tour of "Murder's Row", including lifelike wax figures of infamous criminals like Jack the Ripper. Balsam is so obsessed with these figures that he's soon a good candidate for "the twilight zone" himself.
When told that the museum will have to be demolished to make way for a supermarket, Balsam sees his thirty-year career as a curator coming to an end. The owner explains that "People aren't interested in wax figures any more" when Balsam suggests opening another museum. He shows Balsam the waning cash receipts, but Balsam is obsessed with preserving the five wax figures of murderers in his basement.
What happens next, makes for a very intriguing episode of "The Twilight Zone" called THE NEW EXHIBIT under the expert guidance of John Brahm.
Balsam is excellent as the caretaker who talks to the figures as though they were real. The story takes a sharp turn into high suspense when his wife enters the cellar with every intention of turning off the air-conditioner that keeps the figures from melting. The suspense is even further heightened when her brother becomes suspicious of her eventual disappearance as well as when the museum owner arrives with the news that the figures have been sold to another museum, but has to take their measurements first. What happens can only be described as something that can only occur in "The Twilight Zone".
Well done, it's a special treat for fright fans.