A retired construction firm executive seeks a respite from enforced idleness and oncoming old age. While waiting for a phone call that will confirm or deny his request for a job back at his old firm, Matthew Quade relives his past.

Phone Call for Matthew Quade

William Lundigan

Fear is the Hunter

A Trophy for Howard Davenport

Huck and Jim once again embark on their adventure-filled trek down the Mississippi .

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Cafeteria worker Rusty is cheated by stock swindlers and winds up in jail, but the crooks have to break him out in order to recover their loot, which was stashed in Rusty's safety deposit box.

Public Pigeon #1

A surgeon finds out about his wife's unfaithfulness and takes matters into his own hands.

Silent Decision

A mother watches her cruel and destructive husband continually expose their young son to all kinds of violence. Finally she feels she must take steps to save her son from this sinister influence.

Night of Execution

As Jack London's reputation as a writer grows, his fame causes conflicts with his sister Eliza and his wife Charmain.

Sailor on Horseback

An advertising executive's wife disappears during a summer vacation.

Thin Air

A woman keeps her elderly uncle locked up as a prisoner in his own home when a man decides to investigate the story himself.

House of Shadows

An ex-con returns to New York looking for the man responsible for the crime he did time for.

The Pink Cloud

An insurance underwriter and his secretary are both disgruntled over their dull, monotonous routine. They fall in love, and then discover a way to cash in on a $70,000 insurance claim.

Scheme to Defraud

At his wealthy aunt's insistence, a rising young London barrister submits to having his palm read. The prophecies come true with alarming accuracy.

A Promise to Murder

Art Shaddick, formerly a writer, now a writer's agent, sits in his gaudy, pretentious office, on the bookcase reposes an Oscar, won by Art for his last picture. That was in 1929. Since then he has gone steadily downhill, shouting all the way. When suddenly a young writer appears with a great script, it is just what Art needs, a golden opportunity to rise again to greatness.

Portrait in Celluloid

A cultured Englishman, living in Paris, becomes interested in art for purely mercenary reasons. He sponsors a young artist and goes to great lengths to keep his protege's canvases valuable.

A Man of Taste

An American correspondent, assigned to Europe shortly after World War II, is offered part of a fortune in confiscated gems in return for letting a former Nazi officer use his passport.

The Passport

While decorating a Christmas tree, narrator Joan Evans recalls the story of the Christmas of her ancestors during the 1860s in Wisconsin. A 12-year old boy becomes the head of his family when both parents die. On Christmas Eve he finds a way to provide homes for his five younger brothers and sisters.

The Day They Gave the Babies Away

Three men prepare to test the ejector seat of a jet bomber. As they wait for favorable weather conditions, each reacts differently.

Bailout at 43,000 Feet

A rancher's wife is bored with her monotonous life. One night when her husband is away, her mother-in-law inadvertently suggest the "perfect escape" .

The Prowler

One of the most despised men in the legal profession clings tenaciously to the belief that English law is infallible. Because of his fixation he even stands trial for a murder he did not commit.

The Hanging Judge

The son of a respected lawyer is involved in a case of homicide over the shooting of a schoolmate. Even though the father suspects his son's guilt, he tries to protect him. The entire town is indignant when charges are not brought against the boy immediately for lack of sufficient evidence.

The Secret of River Lane

A dedicated parole officer makes a daring effort to help a two-time loser who has violated the conditions of his parole.

Gamble on a Thief

Two sports-minded priests, off for a fishing holiday, become involved with thieves, a stolen car and stolen money!

The Fifth Wheel

The parents of a recently married young woman, whose husband claims she's taken a trip to New York, slowly become convinced she's been murdered.

Nightmare by Day

A priest becomes involved in murder when the killer confesses his crime to him.

The Sound of Silence

The Louella Parsons story, based on incidents in her autobiography ""The Gay Illiterate"", is a series of flashbacks. Teresa Wright portrays Miss Parson in the drama. As she speaks with the stars the cameras will re-create incidents in her long career. The time span is from the early twenties to 1948. We see Miss Parsons' early days as a newspaper reporter in Chicago. Here she loses her job and departs for New York. In New York she resumes her career, only to be stricken with tuberculosis. When she recovers from her illness, she meets the man who is to become her second husband, and her rise as Hollywood columnist begins. As a climax to tonight's drama, there will be a tribute from the stars of the movie industry.

The Louella Parsons Story

A young woman lives in fear that a recurring dream foretells real tragedy. The premonition persists when she falls in love with a young soldier about to leave for overseas duty.

Pale Horse, Pale Rider

An 11-year old girl whose home has always been the slums, steals a packet of flower seeds from a playmate. In her search for a small bit of earth in which to grow flowers, she is befriended by a youthful gang leader.

An Episode of Sparrows

After gambling away the money her pilot husband gave her for the down payment on a plane, a woman takes a job as nurse to an alcoholic, who in a drunken stupor gives her $5,000 to recoup her losses and later reports to the police that the money was stolen.

Spin into Darkness

Baseball's ""Iron Horse,"" whose brilliant career was ended by a terminal illness, and who struggled valiantly against adversity.

The Lou Gehrig Story

A dinner party turns into a guest's nightmare as a murder plot is uncovered.

Sit Down with Death

When her husband disappears with their savings and their son, a woman fears for the child's life. But she can't convince her friends or the police that the man is a pathological liar and a menace.

The Empty Room Blues

Ten men are assigned to a drifting ice floe near the North Pole to test the effect of subzero weather on men supplied only with tents and meager rations. One of the men goes berserk from the strain and wrecks the group's radio so that no one can notify headquarters of their location.

Flame-Out on T-6

The unsuspecting girlfriend of a young man whose brother is the head of a Rome narcotics ring arrives from the United States with an investigator at her heels.

The Shadow of Evil

After agreeing to defend an irrational old man charged with murder, an attorney finds that his partner believes he took the case for publicity reasons.

Figures in Clay

A man suspected of a young woman's murder denies even knowing her and claims he's being framed.

Faceless Adversary

A wealthy young woman breaks down and is placed in a sanitarium after being thrown over by the man she loves. Her psychiatrist becomes suspicious when the man reappears and claims he wants to marry her.

To Scream at Midnight

A middle aged spinster decides to go to the country for the summer with her friend. They end up becoming involved in a murder mystery.

The Circular Staircase

A Babe Ruth League team is perpetually in last place, because its compassionate manager tends to pick youngsters no other team wants. When the team has a chance to place in the finals, he turns down a boy's plea to pitch in the big game, and the boy then runs away from home.

A young man comes to the town of Brewster, his car in need of repairs, and is ordered to leave at once. He soon learns that the ruthless man after whom the town is named looks on any stranger as his potential murderer.

When an atomic bomb mounted on a 200-foot-tall steel tower fails to detonate, a veteran nuclear physicist and his aides have to climb the rickety tower to disarm the bomb.

Fury at Dawn

A young sailor collapses on the estate of a wealthy Englishman in the Orient and, upon reviving, is offered a strange bargain in exchange for his life.

The Man Who Lost His Head

Child of the Wind

A starving author tests his theory about people who think they are above the law by killing a pawnbroker.

No Right to Kill

On a foggy afternoon just before a plane strikes the Empire State Building, a businessman recently gone blind is in one office dictating a suicide note to his wife, while in another office a young man is trying to persuade his fiancee to help him rob the firm she works for so they can be married.

The 78th Floor

A popular singer whose earnings are supporting his entire family returns to his home town for a visit and proceeds to make a play for the girlfriend of his twin brother, an aspiring concert pianist.

Throw Away the Cane

An extreme form of disassociative reaction to stress in which two or more separate personalities exist. The person may shift from one personality to another, which is often very different. Each personality has no memories of the other's thoughts and actions.

Dark Wall

Climax! is an American anthology series that aired on CBS from 1954 to 1958. The series was hosted by William Lundigan and later co-hosted by Mary Costa. It was one of the few CBS programs of that era to be broadcast in color. Many of the episodes were performed and broadcast live.

Phone Call for Matthew Quade

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Season 2 Episodes45

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