Always a fan of Mr Rebhorn, I thought his work in this episode was among his finest performances, if not his best. Great in many, he was also exceptional in Lorenzo's Oil.
He passed away on Friday, March 21st.
Amen...RIP
"We pruned the hedges of many small villages" (the three amigos)
Fully in agreement here. He fully humanized a character, aerospace exec Harrison Storms [a Rockwell VP], fleshing out a role that could have easily been the typical businessman archetype. Granted, he had fine material on which to base his performance, but he makes Storm the emotional center of this episode, undeniably the most touching of the series. His reaction to the Apollo 1 tragedy is the first we fully witness, while those of the NASA corps, notably Joe Shea, Deke Slayton and Frank Borman are more gradually extended throughout the episode, perhaps befitting the agency mentality, as opposed to that of the relative outsider Storms.
The pivotal scene is that of his son returning home for the weekend from college, about to enter his father's study to catch up. The mother stops him at the doorway, saying that there was an accident at the Cape, and she draws the son away. The camera then peers in at Rebhorn, this iron-rod of a man, wretchedly weeping in uncontrollable anguish. A powerful image, particularly when one recalls the man's world ethos of the time. The memory of this scene deepens as we watch the flashbacks with Storms and Shea meeting with the crew and see the compromises made (and corners cut?), and we can feel the guilt that filled this character that Rebhorn evoked so well.