A Night at the Ballet

A Night at the Ballet begins as a security job and turns into an escape story. CBS is guarding the Theatre Royal for a charity gala, and one of the dancers, Jan Melzer, is plainly terrified of her agent, Eckford, and of Kelp, the thug who works for him. At the party after the performance she tells Laura that she and another dancer, Peter Sorreno, need help to get away.

Harry meanwhile has fallen for Enrica Montanini, an opera singer at the gala, and persuades her to sing an impromptu piece at the party so that Eckford is distracted. Rocky and Laura dress as Peter and Jan to act as decoys, and Eckford chases them through the empty auditorium while the real dancers slip away to Ken's boat.

Jan tells Ken that Eckford is threatening to reveal that Peter was once arrested on drugs charges unless she does as she is told. Her only hope is an uncle, Tony Margiotta, who left America after a family quarrel. Ken traces him to a theological college. When Ken approaches, Tony panics and runs away shouting "don't shoot", taking Ken for a hired killer. It emerges that Tony had an import-export business in America, fell foul of Eckford, and saw his business partner murdered.

Then comes a betrayal. Jan confesses to Peter that Eckford has been using her to lead him to her uncle. Eckford and Kelp follow the pair to the boat and kidnap them, keeping them in their hotel rooms. Ken manages to get a message to Peter, who tries clumsily to pass it to Jan; Eckford intercepts the note, in which Tony says he will meet Jan at the Robin Hood dark-ride exhibition.

It is a set-up. Eckford and Kelp scramble among the models of Robin Hood, waiting to shoot Tony, and find only Ken sitting in a ride car and the police waiting outside.

Peter Mann wrote the episode from a story by Bernard McKenna, and Robert Chetwyn directs. Eleanor Bron plays the diva, Harry Ditson plays Eckford, Mac McDonald plays Kelp, and Joanna Roth and Marcus D'Amico play the dancers.

The dark ride is the best idea. A children's attraction with painted outlaws makes an unlikely place for a killing, and the sight of two armed men searching its figures for a victim who is not there gives the plot a comic cruelty. Harry's pursuit of the singer is a pleasant diversion that also pays off in the escape.

The weakness is that the emotional centre, Jan's betrayal of her uncle, is told in a confession rather than shown, so the audience has to take the dancers' fear on trust.