5. Fountain of Youth
Aired: 9/16/1958
A newly married woman receives as a wedding gift from her vengeful scientist ex-boyfriend a vial containing a potion that can provide a person with 200 years of youthful vigor and good looks — but there is only enough potion in the vial for one person, leading to conflict as she ponders whether to take the potion herself or give it to her new husband.
(Note: Written, directed, narrated, designed, and produced by Orson Welles, this episode won a 1958 Peabody Award and is widely regarded as one of the most important works of early television experimentation. It is considered a foundational example of Welles’s essay-film style, directly anticipating later works such as F for Fake, and remains the most critically significant and historically influential episode of Colgate Theatre.)