Erica. You're a New Yorker, I am you are. Forget about it.
I'm walking here perfect exactly. There is sometimes in New York a car
will drive by and that car will be blasting music. Right, yeah,
happens, part of the experience, part of part of the fabric that makes
up this great melting pot. I'm mixing metaphors. That is our set.
Right. If you live in Washington Heights, that's basically the soundtrack of your
life is a car blasting Salcea music. Yeah. So I'm walking down the
street yesterday and I hear a car coming that's blasting music. And this doesn't
really bother me because I've just lived here for so long I don't don't even
notice it. And then I realize in my life there has been hot aching
pain. Oh my god, oh my god. Yes, that's right.
Foreigner is blaring out of these windows. And I just had to turn around
and there is a i'm gonna say, a sixty year old black man in
a pickup truck. He has a gray beard and he is getting his life
to Foreigner. And then the chorus hits and he just full voice. Yes,
I want to know what love is. I know you can show me.
I stopped. I clapped, sir, get your life, get your
life, slay the house down, boots. Also, please move to Washington
Heights. Hey, I'm Paul and I'm America, and this is that aged
well yesterday's pop culture. Today Erica, I have a hot off the presses
thing we need to talk about. Oh okay, this is a message for
a listener. That listener's name is Brian. I believe Brian is from New
Jersey. Should be a preemptively apologize to Brian from New Jersey for I'm sure
something we've said about New Jersey. You know, a couple of weeks ago,
you said something about, oh, well, your nephew's growing up in
New Jersey, so it's it's good that he's fighting the good fight. And
someone immediately wrote in it was like, I'm from New Jersey and I agree.
So weren't good there. Ah. But if you're a listener and your
name is Brian and you might be from New Jersey and you emailed me about
the matrix and the sixth sense and mimeograph machines, I responded to your email,
but I'm getting I'm getting blocked as spam, so I did not ignore
your email. I tried to respond to you, and I can't if what
if Gmail is just like this is too nerdy. I refuse. I'm not
enabling you enough enough. Okay, Google itself is telling you no, absolutely
not, stop it. Stop it with your Mimeo grasps. It got the
bounce back, and I got so because I really do try to respond to
everything that we get as much as I can. And I love you,
Paul. You're so good. I wrote like he wrote, like a really
nice email, and then I responded bounce back, and I was like,
he's gonna think I ignored him. I didn't ignore you. I tried.
You, guys a little little window into Paul. He is the fucking best.
Uh Erica. We are in March. We're doing murder Mystery March Do
Do Do? I don't know why did that sound, but that felt like
the seventies. Something happened in the Murder Mystery chime that you like, this
is a clue? Yeah? Oh? Why why is the Grandfather clock broken?
You know there were two keys to this door? Do Do do?
Yeah? Yeah? But first before we get to our murder mystery for the
day, we do have a five star Apple Podcast review would you like me
to read or shall you read? I'll read it, okay. Today's review
comes from Podfan nineteen seventy five. Good year that one, hey bus,
love this so much. This is my absolute favorite new podcast that I'm listening
to. I heard Erica the original cast podcast, Hey Hey, where we
discussed Cabaret and we talked about Nazis for so long you do so much longer
than you think you're gonna talk about Nazis, and immediately knew that I needed
to listen to that. Aged well, I'm binging it like crazy. The
chemistry is amazing, the content fantastic. It's like comfort food for the soul.
Keep producing amazing work. Oh well, you pod fan, Thank you,
pod Fan nineteen seventy five. That's so nice. It's so nice to
hear when when a guest Spot of Hours inspires someone to come listen to us.
Yeah right. Also, while we're there, go listen to the original
cast podcast. It's pretty great. Paul and I have both done episodes.
Mine was on Cabaret, yours was on Kimberly Akimbo. That's right. We
talked a lot about musical theater. You think we talk a lot about musical
theater here. Just you wait till you put us on a podcast about musical
theater. Oh boy, you think we talk a lot about Nazis here,
wait till we talk with someone else about Nazis. Yeah, all right,
pod Fan nineteen seventy five. Thank you so much for the review. If
you would like a that age, well, tope bag. All you needs
must do is email me or dm me on Instagram and let me know this
is you. I will send it off for you. Erica, what is
the murder mystery that we're talking about today? Oh? Well, Paul,
today is murder mystery? Uh is? Uh? Hang on, let me
look at my notes. Just one more thing, one more thing, hang
on, one more thing. It's the iconic television program Colombo. That's right.
Colombo was requested by no one. No one requested Columbo. And I
went rogue. We went rogue. I said, I've heard that Colombo is
bunkers, and I think we should do a Colombo because some people requested murder,
she wrote, But we had done a murder she wrote already, yeah,
And I was like, we don't need to be repeating things yet,
Like there's a lot out there. Let's do a Colombo, and I went
onto IMDb and I looked, because there's only like forty or fifty episodes of
Columbo. I looked at every single one, and I found the one that
I thought would speak most to mine Erica's soul because it stars one of Erica's
favorite performers of all time. We'll get to it. Oh, and has
a cameo for the Gods. That's right, all right, so we are
specifically discussing Colombo's season two, episode five, Requiem for a Falling Star.
Colombo was created by Richard Levinson and William Link. Requiem for a Falling Star
was written by Jackson Gillis and directed by Richard I'm gonna say quinn Quine.
I don't know, probably quine Quine. It's stars Peter falk and Baxter,
Frank Converse, Pipa Scott, Kevin McCarthy the actor, not the disgraced former
House Republican, and Mel Ferrer. We could just tell them now it's Anne
Baxter. We're here for Anne Baxter. I ironically love Anne Baxter because she
is both imminently watchable but terrible as an actor. Like just she's two things
at once. And I'm here for her. Colombo is credited with popularized the
inverted detective story quote unquote, also referred to as how Ketchum, in which
and the audience is fully of where who the criminal is and the story at
tension arises and how the hero will expose the crimes. They're doing that now
on poker Face. That's right. You don't need a palicuns for this,
But that was what I was going to tell people to go watch if they
had it, if they like this, this is what how Ketchum is,
what poker Face is doing. And what's so funny is because I've more recently
watched poker Face than Colombo, I thought she was doing a straight up Columbo
impersonation, but actually what's funny is Natasha Leone is actually, i think bigger
than Peter falk Is in terms of the performance. Like she's doing like what
you think you remember Colombo is like she's not actually doing Colombo, and it's
it's wonderful, Like she's so good on that show, all right. The
character of Colombo first appeared in a short story by Levinson and Link. This
led to an appearance in a TV anthology series and then to a stage play
Prescription murder. Levinson has said that the catchphrase, oh what more thing was
born by accident in the stage play when they had a scene that was too
short, and rather than retype the whole scene, they just had to turn
around and come back in and say, oh, just one more thing,
which is amazing. Talk about how typewriters, how computers changed, Hollywood.
We don't want to retype this. That's a lot of work. That's a
lot of work. My fingers are tired. I don't have enough white out
in case I make a mistake. That's right, we're gonna need We're gonna
need what Oh shit, I forgot what those were called. The paper you
put in the back of the paper to copy the paper, so as you
were typing something, it like made a copy. Ah. The older listeners
are screaming at their computers right now, screaming. They know what I'm talking.
This is the mimiograph machine from all over again from Not Daisy Can if
you fast times at Richmond High. That's what Brian was emailing us about carbon
paper. I remember it's carbon paper. Good for carbon paper between the two
pieces and then you type, and then you have the origin and a copy.
Because of the carbon paper. People under the age of thirty are like,
please please put fuck it. People under the age of forty right now
are like, put these two out to pasture. Is she having an episode?
Is just what is she talking about? You know? That reminds me
remember those those old credit card machines or you give them your credit card and
they do that incredibly satisfying, like shrunk drunk. Yes, I want to
open a small bookshop and only do credit cards like that. Aha, it's
still so satisfying. You see it every once in a while in the wild
and you're like, I want one of those. I need a credit card
machine. There's got to be an ASMR video with that noise in it,
right, I mean, honestly, we should open a bookshop do like normal
transactions, but on top of the normal transaction, do a credit card carbon
copy machine. Yeah, if you want to donate a dollar to the bookstore
to celebrate, like like like brick and mortar bookstores, We'll let you put
your credit card machine and make that. I would pay a dollar to do
that every time I went in. We could also have a typewriter in the
corner with carbon paper. Well to type. What's like a little letter gold
mine. Holy okay, guys randing the podcast right now, we're gonna go
open this book to open a bookstore. So I was very disappointed that this
catchphrase does not appear in this episode of Colombo. He doesn't say one more
thing. He doesn't just one more thing. I really thought he did in
my brain he did. If you told ask me, if you if you
quizzed me on this, I would have been like, yeah he did,
obviously, Yeah, of course. Yeah. Paul Colombo has a ninety percent
critical rating on Rotten Tomatoes and a seventy nine percent audience score. I'm shocked
by that. Heathens, Philistine's Monsters, Neanderthals. Is it possible someone's cat
got on the computer by accident and gave Colombo a zero? And it's dragging
everyone down? Is it dragging all the other one hundred percent perfect reviews down?
Every single time I'm editing this podcast, Oliver climbs across the computer and
I am terrified that he is going to accidentally delete a file. I save
every three minute because I'm fraid, like just half an episode, and then
you hear like, stomp, stomp, stomping. It's just the cat.
Yeah, pretty much. I can't believe the seven ninety percent is fine.
I can't believe the seventy nine percent audience score. I mean either that is
shocking. Okay, first of all, what did you think you were watching?
Right? This show? This show crew was was created before Paul and
I were born. That's okay. So it is older than fuck, it
is older than people who know what carbon paper is. That is how old
this show is. Carbon paper was an innovation to this show. Okay,
not only do we know what carbon paper is, we've both used it.
That's how old we are. So like, I cannot believe someone came to
this and was like, ugh, this is so boring or this is so
old timey, or he doesn't seem to know anything, or why do they
tell us who the killer was at the beginning? Like why is he wearing
that trench coat? What's going on? You forever? If that's you,
fuck you forever. Frankly, this should have one hundred percent audience score audience
score, but I'm with you. Ninety percent seems fine. I'm fine with
that. This show is so like iconic. Yeah, I had never seen
it before, and it is a comfort watch. That is how Daddy Peter
fawk Is. He's not even daddy, He's fucking Grandpa from like he really
is Grandpa. He's he's he's Hal Wholebrook. Yes, yeah, yes,
yeah, which reminds me, Paul, when did you first see Colombo?
I saw it yesterday for the first time. I watched this episode totally cold.
I knew Peter falk from we did Princess Bride Murdered by Death and The
Princess Bride of course. I mean, look, Peter Faulk is in the
pantheon. If you don't what I'm talking about joining the Patreon hey, hey,
but he he is so comforting to watch. Yeah. Maybe it's just
because he was on in the background when we were growing up, and I
don't even remember it, like because the show ended I think before we were
born, and then it did like he did like some movies and stuff.
But he might it must have been on and like when he walked on screen,
it was just immediately like, Okay, everything's good, everything's good in
the world. Yeah, what an incredible power that is. So he also
has such a distinct face. Are you watching that Feud show on FX?
I did watch? I did, Okay, Okay, So in the pilot
episode. In the first episode, we see Truman Capoti on the set of
Murder by Death. None of the other actors are talking, but you can
like it's the cast of Murder by Death and the person they cast to play
Peter Falk, who again doesn't even speak. The second I saw him,
I was like, that's the Peter fall guy. That's to be all right,
Erica, when did you first see Colombo? Interestingly, this might be
the first time I've seen a full episode from beginning to end. Okay,
which would have been yesterday. That was the first time I saw a full
episode from beginning to end. I have seen five to twenty five minutes of
every single episode of Colombo. Okay, because my mother not only does she
like it's her favorite show, is she's seen all of them. She's seen
all of them like fifteen times. Okay, she is She is like every
moment of Columbo memorized to the point where she was like, which one are
you doing? And I said the one was Anne Baxter and She's like,
oh, recom for a falling Star, and I'm like, holy shit.
So Colombo was a constant in my household growing up. It's it's again why
I associate it with comfort. I just pictured my mom like on the couch
watching Colombo and was like gently falling asleep to it, you know, like
after school special kind of thing, and I it was so it was just
like a constant, ubiquitous sound in the background. I don't know why it
took me this long to actually watch a full episode. I think I think
because I was just like happy only seeing fifteen minutes at a time, and
was just like associated it with like my mom so much. I don't know
it. But anyway, yesterday it was the first time I'd seen a whole
episode. I'm so glad you picked this one, Paul. I. About
halfway through, I was like this, I was correct, this is I
was right. Yeah, I did well. Also, I like that it's
a second season episode, so it's like the show knows what it is by
now, but it's not so it's not so later, much much later in
the run, like when we get into the eighties and the nineties, even
they made it specials well into the nineties even yeah, well I don't know
about well into but into the nineties, Peter Falk had just become such a
like a parody of himself from these early episodes that when I saw like his
performance in this, I was like, oh, okay, he's still kind
of being naturalistic. Yeah, he's still kind of being a human being.
Later, if you watch one from like nineteen eighty nine, he is like
a muppet. It is a muppet. It's one hundred percent just a muppet
on like talking to like William Shatner. All right, Erica. The tagline
for Columbo was we all say it with me, one more thing, one
more thing. That's one more thing. We all know it. It's perfect,
no no ites. Shall I read the iTunes synopsies? Yes? Please?
Okay? Anne Baxter and Mel Ferrer star as a fading actress and a
Hollywood gossip columnist whose hatred of each other culminates in murder. Yes, yes,
I love it. That's the level of drama everyone is bringing to this
at all times. Yeah. And can I say Anne Baxter is such a
perfect casting choice too for this, Like if they couldn't get Joan Crawford,
I'm glad they got Anne Baxter, you know what I mean. Like it's
that level of like we need someone who is from the old, old vanguard
of Hollywood. If Gloria Swanson didn't want to do a parody of herself in
Sunset Boulevard. Yeah, we'll get Anne Baxter. We'll just get Anne Baxter
to do it. Do you have an actual synopsis for this episode of Colombo?
It's terrible. Yeah, but my actual synopsis is which one is it?
I think it's the right one. No, it's the left one.
No, No, it's the right one. He didn't squint when he looked
at the sun with the right one. It's the right one. I'm pretty
sure. It's hard to tell. Move if you don't know what I'm talking
about. Lea's Google Peter Fault. Can I can I offer I just I
just thought of my own actual synopsis? Can I offer one for it?
Where are the Turbans? I expected Turbans in this episode? This episode is
turbineless On and Baxter. Oh, it was waiting for the Turbans. All
right, So everyone stick around. We're gonna come right back. We're going
to take you through Columbo Season two, episode five, Requiem for a Falling
Star right after these messages, Unless you are, of course, a Patreon.
A Patreon subscriber can listen to this episode with no commercials, So get
the to Patreon sign up. You don't want to hear some I keep getting
ones for the state of Florida, and I don't know if it's because they
know I'm here. They do. It's randomly getting commercial, But why would
you give it? Why would you send a commercial for someone who's in Florida
about Florida. That doesn't make that's almost Florida thing ever. Actually I think
about it, Florida is like this spending your tax money. And I'm like,
but I've already here. What do I do while I'm here? And
they're like, I don't know. Come to Florida find out, and we're
back. We open on a grand mansion. We're inside this enormous house.
It's perhaps reminiscent of the mansion and clue. Big rooms, high ceilings,
chandeliers, a big house on a dark and stormy night. A portentous piano
plays as we watch a woman grab a pistol from her desk drawer. She
walks from the grandiose carpeted den into a grandiose carpeted living room. There's an
enormous set of double doors there. She throws the double doors open to reveal
a bathroom. Steamy. There's a man showering. He's wearing white boxer shorts
in the shower. While he showers, she raises the pistol. She fires
once, twice, thrice, force fifees and sights. She fires the pistol
sixfold times. Okay, there's no blood spatter. The man just stands there
and takes it. The glass breaks as she fires, and he just falls
there. She keeps breaking. I'm like, shouldn't they just break one time?
It's like break, break, break, break, I'm like, what
is this glass made out of? The woman turns around and says, don
missed him, and she bursts into laughter, and we pull back and reveal
a cast and crew yucking it up with her. It was all part of
a movie. He's not really dead, No, he's just an extra wearing
boxer shorts in the seven. He's a never nude. He's a never new
the first instance of a never nut in pop culture, possibly a So this
is n Baxter. Obviously, this dress that she's wearing the scene, it's
very chic, it's beautiful, But is it not a tad reminiscent of like
a high end airline attendant. Oh, but that's what the airlines were going
for socialites, but in the air Yeah, no, she wears it a
lot because we keep cutting back to the set of this movie that she's thinking
and she's wearing the outfit in a few scenes. She's also one of those
people who really can pull most things off. Oh yeah, there's some stuff
she wears that is ludicrous in this episode, and I'm like, damn it,
she is pulling that off. The crew breaks to set up the next
shot, and the woman Norah Chandler. Of course, her name is Nora
Chandler, played by the Great and Good and also somewhat Terrible, and Baxter
immediately calls out Jane. Before we can meet Jean, another crew member takes
her outside and shows her a powder blue sports car that she immediately appears to
recognize, and she does not seem happy. No, the crew member,
I don't know if you noticed Paul, but his name was Paul. I
didn't, And he was wearing the highest waisted pants and empress waist pants.
They were their umpire waist pants. Yeah, they would have been perfectly in
place in Jane off sinsera. Yeah, I was like, why why are
his pants coming up to a sternum I don't understand the seventies. I don't
understand how that could have been comfortable for anything in his crotch. There's a
lot of stuff in his and none of it is happy right now. I
mean, it's all been squished, a submission done. It's just over and
done with, or just moved to one side, I guess. I mean,
but talk about a self wedgie is what we're looking at here. I
mean, those pants are just like a torture device. I don't know how
a man does it, but I don't know how all the men did it
because they're all wearing high waisted pants. It's correct, it's the era of
the high waisted pant line. So the crew member confirms that quote unquote.
They're inside, and Norah's face hardens. She thanks him and stalks across the
lot too. I mean, is it her house or is it it is
her house? House? Right? Is where she lives? She says in
this show that she lives here while she's shooting, which implies that she does
have another house. The reason I'm bringing this up, ladies and gentlemen and
everyone else is that, like the woman walks across, what you would think
about when you think of like the Warner Brothers law the Paramo and into a
fucking giant house, almost mansion size house. Yeah, they call it a
bungalow in a cottage, and I'm like, that's a month's okay, that's
a month indeed. Well, but also I think this was a thing.
This was what used to happen in like the old like old old old Hollywood.
Is they give the biggest stars what like a dressing room that was actually
a fucking giant house. Yeah, it is stunning to see one in real
life or like a recreation of one, I should say, because like I
feel like this is something that was lost to time and I would love to
see more images of what those like what was Shirley Temple's right dressing room?
Like, like, was it a giant fucking fun house for this kid who've
like built the studio because she made so much money. This is somewhat based
on that, because they say and like like Norah Chandler was a child star.
Yeah, came up through the studio system and was part of the studio,
this unnamed studio becoming successful, like she is in the fabric of this
studio and she at one point was married to the head of the studio and
all that stuff. So like she's a big deal on this lot. Yeah,
she's norma Shearer, a plus level Hollywood. I'm so this is so
fascinating to me. Honestly, I could have paused here and just like stared
at the house for five minutes. But we're moving on. So she walks
to her mom's and we cut inside to find Jeene Davis played by Pippa Scott,
Norah's longtime assistant, passionately making out with Jerry Parks mel Ferrer. I
don't want to be mean, Paul, but mean, how did mel Ferrer
bag Audrey? Hepburn? Seriously that guy, he's goofy looking. He's goofy
that guy. I like. Audrey clearly liked a sense of humor. Maybe
she liked a little geeky guy. Right now, he would be Jim Parsons
on Big Bang Theory. That is the that is the modern better looking than
melf Like. He's Johnny Galicki not Jim Parsons, which, to be fair,
Johnny Gleckey did date the girl and that kill you know what. Women?
Women like cork, Women enjoy cork. But because I was watching Jeene
Davis making out with mel Ferrer, or not Geene Davis Pipa Scott the actress
and making out with Melfrer, and I was like, ooh, miss,
you earned your paycheck my friends, all right, So Jerry parks. Mal
Ferrer's character is a gossip columnist, a famed gossip columnist. Nora slips in
and she overhears Gene reminding Jerry of his commitment at a local bookstore every night
that week. You have to go to this book signing. It's important.
But she says she can't wait for him to get home so they can celebrate
his birthday. Jerry warns her not to let quote unquote the Wicked Witch ruin
her night off. What if Margaret Hamilton had played Nora Chandler in full Alphaba
like makeup. I realized this is forty years later, so she'd had been
quite old at this point. But yeah, I think it's possibly dead.
She made god, But what if I could have done that? If we
Necroman served Margaret Aimal takes just a mind exercise, It's the thought experiment.
What if ABO had to deal with her in that outfit like the whole time,
and like was like I wonder who the killer is, and she's throwing
fireballs at him. She's murdering dogs in the corner. Jesus, only I
could figure out who the killer is here? Hello again, Colombo? All
right? So Nora has heard enough. She walks in and she pretends to
be surprised that Jerry is there before dismissing Gene on an errand. And once
Gene is gone, Norah drops the hostess act and asks Jerry, what are
you doing here? She's pouring herself a drink from her enormous wet bar.
I have to say, if I if I had a wet bar in my
house, I wouldn't put it on. Carpeting. There's too much carpeting in
the seventies. That's how you know people are rich. Ye, just carpeting,
Paul, it's white carpeting. It's white carpeting there stepping on in their
shoes. Harpending gets replaced once a month. The whole house just in a
constant state of getting recarpeted. Yeah, it's it's just a rotation. A
So Jerry smirks and he comments that, well, you know, I've been
doing some research and I noticed that, you know, you made that movie
in Italy that bombed, only somehow you didn't lose a dime and the studio
lost two million dollars. And Nora kind of takes a sip of her drink
and she says, Oh, I'm too tired to talk. Why don't you
go out. We'll talk about this later. And Jerry, he will not
be he will not be deterred. He mentions, how, oh, isn't
there a big studio executive meeting happening and the big head of the studio,
Frank Simmons, is arriving tonight for a meeting, and why did he be
interested? Wouldn't you be interested in Nora? And how it has been movie
stars swindled him out of his money, right, so this is all set
up. Nora, who is a producer on her own movies, somehow fixed
it. So all the loss went to the studio, none to her,
got it Which doesn't seem like corruption at all. It just seems a good
business sense. It seems like she covered her ass in the studio, didn't
just shows whatever she did illegal. That seems like just absolutely good business practices.
Yeah, Nora now provides an important PSA for everybody listening. She demonstrates
how not to slap someone in the face, or how to slap someone in
the face. Anne Baxter. Let's let's let's not give this to Nora.
This is Anne Baxter, Anne Baxter and Baxter so hard she winds up.
She gives them like a forty five second head start before she slaps him.
It is so good. She is winding up like a picture on the mound
in the World Series bottom of the ninth that bases loaded the full count up
against the cleanup hitter like this is. She leans back. His hand is
ready to catch her hand before her head gets there. Yeah, she's doing
a full fucking aria before she she slaps him. I've seen Anne Baxter slap
people before. This is how she does it. This is how she understands
slapping should happen. This is what she thinks a slap is. And no
one has disabused her of this notion. Not no one, not will,
not cecil b de mil not menka Witz. No. Everyone was like,
just let her do it, just let her do it. She's not listening.
She it will only take longer if we try to interfere her. I
saw a slap once when I was a child, this is what it looks
like. No, no, that's sir. So Nora goes to slap him,
but Jerry easily catches her wrist. He assures her, Nora, I'm
on your side. I just need a totally reasonable amount of money to compensate
me for my time in research. So he's trying to blackmail her. Essentially,
he's trying to blackmail her with this information. She agrees, and he
kisses her on the cheek before heading out. I have a makeup question for
you. I don't wear makeup generally speaking. I wish I wore more me
either, So blind leaving them blind here, but go for it. Her
eyeliner is this like the dramatic Sophia Lorenz eyeliner that Jennifer Coolidge was talking about
in Best in Show, because it, like the bottom line of it actually
like departs from her eye and kind of goes down a little bit to make
her eyes seem even wider. I guess I cannot say that I remember what
it looks like. I wasn't paying attention. I think I was too busy
still on the slap you were laughing? Slap who was laughing at the flap?
I was slapping I possibly from what you describe, that's not the Sophia
Laurn like closes right, that's it was like a Cleopatra thing. That's like
yes, so perhaps perhaps, But the seventies were also they were not as
make up forward as the eighties were, but we were getting there. Yeah,
listeners who know about makeup, let me know if that's it, if
that's a thing, or if that's just Anne Baxter like doing a bad job
in her own eyeliner. I don't know. I'm just curious, Oh,
Paul, Anne Baxter's never done her own eyeliner. Nora then after after Jerry
leaves, gets a canny look on her face and she starts to write a
list. Gene returns. Gene remembers that Nora's beleaguered assistant, Norah, immediately
accuses her of leaking information to Jerry. Jane vehemently denies this, but also
reveals that Jerry has asked to marry him. Okay, so the guy who
is blackmailing Maura is also like trying to marry her assistant who's like been her
assistant for twenty years. Nora is not wrong to be hello suspicious here?
Did you notice that he also she also says he asked me to marry him
in a letter. In a letter. In a letter, he because someone
was traveling. He was traveling, they were traveling or whatever, and he
wrote, he wrote her a letter to propose to her. You know what,
I'm gonna land on the side of romantic. Actually, as long as
he included a dick pic right, well, they didn't have like maybe unless
they had a polaroid. So it was a drawing of you know how you
used to make those turkeys out of your hand in elementary school. As long
as you lay your dick on it, and like, look, I drew
Florida, you know, you know, Paul, he took his dick to
a caricature artist and had them do it. So his dick is like on
the Eiffel Tower with it with a French mustache and a ballet. His dick
is enjoying a nice sunny beach vacation. That's right, that's right. So
Noraa is shocked and unappalled by all of this. She mocks Gene, come
on, you idiot, he's not really into you. He's just a smut
peddler who could never have real feelings. He's using you to get to me.
Gene assures her, look, I love him, he loves me.
He's never once asked me for anything about you ever, and then she apologizes
for upsetting her. You know what, when I was watching it, I
was on Jeane side, But now that I'm talking it over out loud,
I'm like everything Noura does makes a lot of sense. Norah immediately switches gears
and she starts to cry, and she apologizes for shitting all of her Jean's
engagement by letters news like, I'm sorry I ever doing this for you.
Before you know it, she and her crocodile tears have convinced Jane to let
it all pass, okay, don't worry about it, and she hands Jeane
this like long, long list of errands that will take hours for her to
run, despite Jeane's plans that she knows about with Jerry that evening. So
we cut to that evening and to the bookstore where Jerry is signing autographs.
We see Jane pull up, and we cut to Nora and her I'm gonna
do some crimes outfit right she's wearing. She's wearing a brown trench coat and
wide legged tweed trousers in this beautiful like bronze and turquoise and brown headscarf and
sunglasses. Despite it being fully nighttime. She looks incredible. She looks incredible
in every scene. It's so good safe for this episode. Dress up for
your crimes. Don't just commit your crimes in sweatpants, like, have some
self respects. I always commit crimes in a three piece suit. Buy a
very expensive trench coat in which to commit your crimes in. Make it an
event, make it special exactly that way, you'll remember it and you'll be
memorable to all the witnesses. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So Jeane rushes
into the bookstore to explain what's going on to Jerry, and Norah slips out
of her car and we don't see what happens, but it appears like she
does something to Jeane's car, but we don't know what it is. Yeah.
Then she rushes back to her car. She drives off into the night,
and we cut to her on the patio of a house, dumping a
trail of gasoline from the driveway to around the corner of the house. She
hears a car coming. She quickly finishes the job, and Jerry's powder blue
sports car pulls up right onto the pool of gasoline that Nora has planted.
She strikes a match the gasolining knights and boom California Fried Gossip columnist ha ha,
How does she not wreak of gasoline? After this? We are later
going to find out that she just takes this very very obvious evidence and just
kind of like throws it down the hill behind this house. What was crime
scene investigation in nineteen seventy three? She spent too long picking out her i'm
adu crime outfit and not long enough thinking about very basic things like don't leave
the murder weapon if you can help it. Also, it's such an obvious
arson, it's not even like this. Yes, there's no like she didn't
cut the on the car, so that would like go off a cliff or
something else. She's like, she may as well have spelled her name out
in the gasoline, but like Nora was here, wu z. We cut
to Nora later that evening at dinner with two executives, Frank Simmons played by
Kevin McCarthy and Fallon Just Fallen, Just Fallen played by Frank Converse. I
this she looks so good in this scene. She's dressed She's all gussied up
for dinner with like the like the boss and the boss's boss, and she
just looks so good. They're at like Chasin's or some like glamorous Hollywood night
spot. Right, it seems that mister Simmons has recently bought the studio from
Fallon, though Fallon still works there. Fallon is way too young to have
owned a movie studio, Am I right? He's so young that they actually
point out how young he is in it like Columbo's like, wouldn't have expected
you to on a movie studio, you're twenty four? What? Like?
Why cast him? If I have no idea? Why not switch these two
men or something? I don't know. Anyway, it's weird. It is
a little weird. So she's charming them. She's doing her movie star thing.
When the waiter arrives and tells Noura there's a man outside to see you.
He says it's urgent. It's like, oh, it's probably just a
fan, and she gets up. She leaves the table. At the front
of the restaurant, a policeman tells her that there was an explosion at Jerry
Parks's house, and she's like, I don't understand why I'm being told though,
I mean, he and I barely even know each other. And suddenly
Jerry walks in and she goes, Jerry, you're alive, and Jerry tells
her it wasn't me who was killed. It was Gene. She was alone
in my car and an explosion killed her. No, Nora faints dead away
and again this is why he casts Anne Baxter, the fucking elegance, the
class. The seventeen steps it takes for her to faint, Everything about this
is perfect, the eyes rolling back in her head like like it is the
most It is a scarlet O'Hara faint. Oh, it is a fate for
the gods. It is a faint that like can be seen at the Palladium
Theater in the back fucking world. Right yep. And now we cut to
Lieutenant Frank Colombo played by Peter Falk as he drives up to the studio the
following day in his rundown car. He arrives at Nora's. They call it
a bungalow, but again, this is a mansion. It is a mansion.
Sitting down in the middle of the studio a lot, and he realized
kind of outside, he's like, oh God, about to meet Norah Chandler.
And he starts to clean his nails a little bit because he's, you
know, he's unkempt. It's kind of a hallmark of the character. Knocks
on the door and he's greeted by Simmons. That's the new studiohead the studio.
Who is the studiohead who has just bought the studio. By the way,
This guy Javan McCarthy. He's weird and that he's I don't know what
the acting thing he's doing is, but it's like I'm going to lean forward
and talk like this all the time. You understand, I'm gonna hold you
responsible. Then that's it. That's his only tone. He is the same
actor in that Golden Girls episode, right, the one where Dorothy and Blanche
fight over the doctor. No, no, you know he was on the
Golden Girls though he was he was he like asked Blanche to marry him,
but he had kids or something. Wasn't that him? Yes? Okay,
yes, yes, yes, he's he's a rich guy that Blanche almost marries,
but she she realizes that he only wants her to like raise his kids.
Basically, like he likes her a whole lot, but he wants Blanche
is not the woman I would choose to raise children. No, certainly not.
I think her own kids would pack me up on that one. Yeah,
oh yeah, I knew I'd seen him on Golden Girls, though.
As soon as I thought him, I was like, he's on Golden Girls.
He looks like a Golden Girl's boyfriend. He absolutely does, all right,
So Simmons starts expounding about how upset Nora is now Columbo needs to be
gentle with her, and Colombo assures him that I'll be quick, mister Simons,
I'll be quick. Don't worry, don't worry, don't worry. He
also Simmons also mentions here that Jean has been Nora's secretary and constant companion for
eighteen years. She's, oh, well, I us know, she's probably
like forty. I would say, yeah, yeah, okay, I'm I'm
trying to remember what she looked like. Yeah, yeah, because I did
not catch the eighteen years part. I'm like, Jesus christeen years. Eighteen
years. Can you imagine working for any actor? I don't care if it's
the nicest one. Yeah, still gonna be fucking weird, even if you're
working for like Kevin Bacon and Kira Sedgwick, it's still weird the moments of
your day where you're like, so, a goat farm. Huh yeah,
so we're doing the goat farm thing today. Okay, So so my job
is to go get your dry cleaning again. Okay, Okay, I'm I'm
an adult person and my job is to do that. Okay, just check
it. You want me to film you while you've played the guitar, okay,
okay, no, no, no, it's never a guitar. It's
like a fucking ukulele and it's playing it with some goats or something, and
I love it so much every time. I love it too, Don't get
me wrong. That's why I picked them, because they seem like, if
you're gonna work for some Hollywood couple, that's the couple you want to ask,
the one you want. Yeah, that's the normalist Hollywood couples you definitely
don't want. Nick Jonas and Prianca Chopra. Those two are awful, I'm
sure. Actually, I don't know. Do we know tea is their teeth?
We know Prianka Chopra is a terrible person. I think I've heard a
lot of stories about that. I don't know anything about them. No,
I am picturing some beleaguer assistant having to film having to do twelve takes of
Kevin Bacon with his ukulele, singing like My Sharona to his goats? Do
you an acoustic cover of Footloose to his goats at his ukulele? Yeah?
So Colombo heads in. He's greeted by Nora in full hostess mode. She
is wearing eight Is that a tattered lace business suit? Is that correct?
Is Paul? Yeah? Yeah? Colombo is himself a bit starstruck. He
admits Miss Chim, I've been love with you my whole life, and Nora
graciously says, I know you never expected to meet a legend. I love
her so much? Is it wrong? How much I'm on her? I
think it's fine because me also she says it like this, Paul, She
goes, I know you never expected to meet a legend like she just full
throats it. I love her, she says it with her full chest as
the kids. Yeah, Colombo leads Nora through this whole bit about Nora calling
his wife to say hello. Nora plays along, By the way, I
apparently we never meet Columbo's wife. This is this is Norm's wife from Cheers,
right. This makes my mother happy every time it happens on an episode
of Columbo when they mentioned the wife and how you just missed her. Nora
is happy to play along, to be the grand dome that she is.
She eventually and here's another golden girl's connection leads him to the lnai, only
the second use of lenai I've ever seen in popular culture. Yeah. When
I was doing my notes, I called the silarium because I missed her calling
it illania for the first time the first time. I was like, oh
no, it's a llnaia. Apparently it's a llnai. It's an indoor lenai
though, right? Or is it indoor leni? It's in closed lenih okay,
So now what is a lani? Then? I thought it was a
b I thought maybe it's a partial enclosure. I don't know, a sun
room. Yeah. Colombo then explains to Nora that Jean's death is being investigated
as a murder, and of course Norah's like, oh god, no,
who would want to murder Jane? Gee? Everyone loved Jean. Everyone loved
Jean. Why would anyone want to burn her? To a christmin A car.
Why would anyone want to Kentucky Fried Chicken Jean, by the way,
very much like Norma Desmond. This house is covered in pictures of Nora Chandler.
Yeah, covered in pictures of Van Baxter. Right. So he looks
at the walls and he noticed is a photo of her and her ex husband,
who was the former head of the studio, who had died years earlier,
right, m hm. And he comments in surprise that her ex was
quite short, essentially the same height as Nora, Like, there's this,
there's a picture of them, And he's like, you know what, I
always thought you'd be taller too. I guess I just assume all movie people
are going to be really really tall, because I see them on the screen.
And she laughs and she's she's playing kating him, she's playing along and
she's letting him fall in over her. He also notices that her ex husband
wore a shriner's ring. Right, that's going to come back later, just
put a pin in them. What is a shiner? Is it like an
elk, like the Elk's law? I think so. I think it's like
like the Illuminati, but less posh. Okay, okay, working class Illuminati.
It's the bargain basement Illuminati got market bace of Illuminati. Actually, no,
I think the Shriners is a big thing. I used to see commercials
for a Shriner's hospital. I'm not exaggerating. It's on this channel called Cozy
TV. I don't know if anyone else has it, but they show free
reds of Frasier, which is why I've watched it, And that channel has
a bunch of Shiner's commercials about a Shriner's hospital that they started for kids with
very specific diseases, which is a great thing to do, it's a good
thing money. But they always cut to like a man wearing a fez hat,
like a white man, an old white man wearing a fez hat,
and like handing a check to a sick child, And I'm like, what
even is America? What are you doing here? I mostly know them from
the Shriner's Ballet from Cheea Rivera's dance to the Shiner's Ballet from Bye Bye Bertie.
By the way, r I p Cheetah And if you'd like to see
her dance that you can find it on YouTube. Shiner's Ballet Cheater rivera incredible,
incredible but again, the Shriners are a real thing. They donate money
to hospitals. I think they're very working classes. I think, moving on
anyway, way off topic. But then what are elks are elk like higher
class or lower? I think maybe elks are the lower. Maybe elks are
lower than shiners. Maybe it's elks Shiner's scholar. And then on top of
all of them, obviously the Babysitters Club, and then the Babysitters Club,
and then Swift and then Taylor Swift, then Swifties, and then and then
K pop fans. So a phone call comes in for Colombo. He apologizes
to Nora and asks if she'll take a ride with him to the police headquarters.
Before they leave, though, he goes, oh, I see you
have a beautiful garden in your backyard of your studio house, and he's like,
my wife is such a fan and she collects clippings. You mind if
I take a rose out of your garden for my wife, And she goes,
of course, Lieutenant Colombo, you may take whatever you wish for I
am a legend. He pulls a flower from the base of a large decorative
fountain, which is currently dry, and he's like, oh, there's no
water in that fountain. She goes. Actually, funny story. That was
from a movie I made once when I was a child. It's a prop
fountain. Yeah. Colombo brings Nora to the police station's parking garage. By
the way, all these cars are parked neatly. He just pulls up in
like parks in the middle of the road, just gets out of the car.
No respect. Never change, Colombo, Never change. Nora is almost
overcome at the sight of the burned out husk of Jerry's car. Oh my
god, Oh my god, that gene. Oh my god. They explain
that Jerry and Jean swapped cars because his Jeans had a flat tire, which
might imply this wasn't a horrible mistake, and that Jerry was the target of
a murderer. Nor Oh my god, She's overcome. I want to go
home. I want to go home, she tells. In his arms,
she collapses and he has to hold her. No, I can't, combo,
I simply cannot. This is from a time when a car exploding would
lead to a police investigation and not just be assumed to be a manufacturers defect
like it is now. Old times, you know what if you really,
if you wanted to murder someone right now, buy them a tesla, buy
them a tesla and just cross your fingers and blow it up and no one
will look at it, no one even thinks anything of it. So she
said, I want to go home, and Columbo tells her, no,
we need your help now, miss Chandler. We need you all help because
we got to figure out who want to murder Jerry Parks. I don't know
why she is supposed to help them do that. I mean, I think
the implication is that Colombo just wants to keep her involved in the case because
he's not convinced of any of this, right, But exactly the idea that
he's like, no, you're who we need to talk to to figure out
who hates Jerry Parks is it's a it's a thin it's a thin a frinsh.
Yeah. Yeah. I actually wonder about this because I feel like this
happens a lot in these episodes because he plays it so cool. I wonder
if maybe other people who watch more Colombo than I have could tell you could
tell us, But like, is it is it ever clear when he figures
it out or does he always just kind of hang on to people until he
stumbles on something like yeah, he doesn't quite let anyone else, like,
let like let anyone off the hook until he knows what the hook is.
Basically I do, I can't tell because you're right. At this point,
he should have been like, well, thank you for your help with this
investigation. We'll call you when we know something see you later. But instead
he keeps visiting her every day, and like he does this in every episode,
so it's not just because she's a movie star that he wants to like
fall over, Like, yeah, he does this with everyone, And I'm
like, did you know before this started who the killer was? And you
just fucking with all of us. We cut to Columbo at Jerry's house.
He's investigating the scene of the crime, and he's interrogating Jerry, who,
by the way, does not seem all that broken up about Jeane's. Yes,
I have never I have been more upset about somebody dying who white literally
did not know. Yes, He's like, yeah, well she's dead.
Oh well and my car is gone too. That sucks, right. So
Colombo is like, so who might want to murder you? And Jerry's like,
well, I'm a famed gossip columnist in Hollywood, so literally everyone everyone
I've ever met. They quickly discover the two giant empty gasoline cans that Nora
just tossed into the bushes after the explosion. Ah, so they're thinking this
is probably at very least Arson Colombo, I think, is also picking up
what we're putting down about him being awfully blase about Jean's murder, and he
starts to kind of like tap around the idea that hey, maybe you weren't
with Jeane for honorable reasons. Maybe you really were with Jane to get gossip
about Nora, and Jerry is like, appso absolutely not. I love John
Jean, Jean, dammit Jean, damn it. Yeah right, Gene,
I loved Jane. Gee fuck, why do I keep doing that? And
He's like, you know what, mister Colombo, I'm more than happy to
let you see my entire file on Nora. The dark secret fights with the
husband, the ex husband, right the dead one, her husband's casting couch,
and the evening that her husband died on a fishing trip, all this
stuff. Columbo says, it's all a matter of public record anyway, and
Jerry can just keep his files, yeh. Look, He's like, look,
I haven't written anything on Nora in years. She's old news. We're
just old friends. Right then the phone rings, and while we can see
that it's Nora on the line, Jerry plays it off as the wrong number
in front of Colombo. He doesn't want Columbo to know they're they're in cahoots.
Can we talk about the insert shot of Anne Baxter? We certainly can
pall. She doesn't speak, it's just a cut to her, so we
know that, so the audience knows that's who was on the line. She's
wearing like one of those fabulous seventies kind of like flowing gowns with like the
splotches of color. Yes, and she looks like someone just shot her in
the chest. And that leads to her final moments of life. The expression
out her face is so over the top. YA probably told Anne Baxter to
be as small as she can and she got it. Got it subtle,
as subtle as you possibly can, Ann, And she's like, got it
a subtle legend? I understand, Anne. Remember, we need you to
be realistic like a human being would in this scene. And she's like,
I've seen many human beings, don't worry. I'm an Baxter, Paul.
Is this your first time seeing Anne Baxter in something? I know you've seen
all about it, but you don't quite remember it. Yeah, I think
that would be the well, and I've seen the Ten Commandments. Probably also
don't remember that. So I've seen her in things, but not like recently
where I I don't know that you've ever clocked how amazing she is because it
takes a minute. It takes a few viewings to be like, she is
horrible in the best possible way. In the best way. She is like
ten people in the body of one person. She's acting for ten, all
right. So Colombo kind of gives Jerry a wonky look and then he's like,
okay, I believe you that that was a wrong number. That was
a woman though, right. I like the way you talk to her that
I could tell that the person. I could tell you were talking to a
woman. And Jerry's like, what are you talking about? And he's like,
your phone manner was very polite, much much more polite than you would
be for a man. And Jerry's wigged out. Clumb was like, you
know what, never mind, I gotta go buy and he leaves Jerry as
soon as Columba leaves, immediately calls Nora back. We cut to a country
club. Nora pulls up. Now she's wearing this very fabulous like tweed coat.
Yes, this is my favorite outfit of the show. But like red
hose and matching red shoes at the hose. But then these sunglasses that are
like, I don't know, hexagga. I can't say the word hexagonal,
hexagonal. It's a hexagon in gold with black dark shades sunglasses. It is
the most fucking excellent thing I've ever seen. It is so cool. So
Nora and Jerry head into the club as we see Columbo arrive and he notices
Nora's car and kind of starts looking at the car. Jerry immediately implies to
Nora, Okay, I know that you tried to kill me. There's not
even any question in his mind what happened last night. She denies. He's
not convinced, and he's like, it's not a problem. We're old friends.
Just pay me ten times the amount of blackmail you owed me yesterday and
we can just forget this little murder attempt ever happened again. Not super upset
about Gene, not really even super upset about almost being murdered. No,
take takes one on the chin on that pretty easily. I will say that.
Oh oh, Jerry knows a thing or two about blackmail and murder.
Yeah. Yeah, He's like, look, we've all been there. Okay,
you took a shot and you missed. Nora throws it right back at
him. She's admitting nothing. She tells him she's been copying all of his
letters to Jane, so she knows that Jerry was borrowing money from Gene to
keep himself afloat. Do you think she was copying them onto carbon paper?
Of course she was, Paul. How else would someone copy something in the
seventies. The only way to make copies with carbon paper. So Nora goes
on to say, maybe Jeane figured out that the only reason you were with
her is to borrow money from her, and she threatened to leave you,
and you killed her. That's a great motive for me to take the police.
Why don't you shut your full mouth, Jerry, ha ha ha ha.
The two of them start to part, and just as they split up,
Columbo arrives and they start to stammer suspiciously about why they're together and Columbo
tells them that last night and Nate noticed a cost beeding away from the scene
of the crime. You know, and I was hoping maybe the two of
you were getting together to figure out who might I just want to kill Jerry
right sad le Nora tells him that you're just reminiscing about Jane. But I
must go. I have a meeting. All of Hollywood is in trouble,
and I have to go save it and Jerry, as she leaves, launches
another barb about how her husband would be spinning in his grave over the state
of Hollywood, that is, if he had one. Well, it was
a fishing accident. Is not the ocean his grave. How does someone die
in a fishing accident? Do you accidentally get hooked in the eye by another
fisherman and then launched overboard and then the other fisherman. I'm going with one
of those things where you pull up a fish right, and you get it
up, but then a much bigger fish comes up and swallows you and your
whole fishing line. Yeah, like a whale shark comes in and just goes
like a switcheroo kind of situation, Like just in your moment of triumph.
Oh no, I've been eaten by a giant squid ah or struck by lightning.
Just struck by lightning. Guys to go fishing in a lightning storm.
What's your problem? How are you doing? Maybe it's the kind of thing
where he went he went to cast the line back, and somehow the wind
took the line and he got the line wrapped itself wildly around his neck and
it throttled him. Oh, dear, you know what, that is a
lot more common than you'd think it is. Be careful. There fishens at
least forty times a day, and fisher women and fisher people, fisher people.
Let's be inclusive here, Paul, for god's sake, what are we
doing here if we're not being inclusive? We cut to Nora back on set,
where her character is defending herself from accusations of murder. It is exactly
what you think the scene is like. She's distracted, she's frustrated with the
script though she can't seem to get her lines right. Columbo sneaks on set
and he starts to watch, but of course he almost immediately like pumps into
a ladder and makes a loud noise and they have to stop the scene.
Nora says she needs a walk, so she goes to walk, and he
intercepts her. He points out that no one will talk about Jerry even though
no one seems to like him. Huh weird. Could Jerry be a blackmailer?
Nora goes, blackmailer, that's a guess, even walkmail anyway, I
gotta go, it's African American mail. By the way, that's what we're
saying now, So I don't know what you're talking about. Blackmail. That's
funny, Detective, that's really your You should write movies. Is Harpa Marks
still alive? You can write for Harpo Marks. That is a direct quote
to everyone listening exactly what she says. Yes. Yeah. Colombo then goes
on to say that they can't figure out how Jean's tire went flat, and
that the cars speeding from the scene of the crime matches a description of all
the studio cars, right, Like, is that weird? All the studio
cars look like this, Win And Nora's like, ah, anyway, studio
cars. That's funny, like a like a car n a studio that's like,
you know, what's great? Studio apartments? They don't talk about that
enough, how small they are, but also how very very livable studio apartments
are. Anyway, I have to get back to work because I'm an actor
and I'm in a scene, and if I don't do my job, the
crew doesn't get paid. And one hundreds of people work on this movie.
Studio cars. Oh, detective again, an exact quote, exactly xactly,
It's exactly what happened. Yeah, yeah, yeah, So Nora goes to
get her makeup redone. We hear in the distance someone's like, Wow,
you're sweating a lot. This is that same high waisted crew man from before,
and I'm moving for him. I loved him. And Colombo notices fallin
the curiously young former head of the studio, right. He goes up to
talk to him, and we get more of Nora's backstory fallon. Let's let's
Columbo and the audience know that she inherited a large share of the studio from
her late husband, who died in that fishing accident, which was, of
course what happened when he tripped in the boat, fell backwards and cracked his
head open on one of the oarlocks, which actually feels like something that could
happen. That one feels too real. How about he started eating a fish
on deck because he was too hungry and couldn't wait, and he choked on
a bone and died there it is, Yeah, that makes sense. Yep,
yep. I think what happened is he tripped and he actually accidentally got
his hand stuck in all the bait, and he was so disgusted he just
decided to end it. I'm forever unclean now. It's all disgusting, okay.
Valin tells us that most of her money has gone into financing her own
films, basically all of which have bombed. Her cottage was given to her
by her husband, and she refuses to sell it, even though the studio
is in financial trouble. They want to buy the land, they want to
subdivide it, they want to know, repurpose it, all that stuff,
And he says she won't even sell her backyard, which she never uses.
It's not fair. It's not fair. Give you give us our land.
Norah Chandler, Yes, I'm really glad the show brought that up. The
insanity of that house in the middle of the lot. I was like,
that is so odd that that's a thing and now it makes a total a
ton of sense. She owns this huge amount of acreage I guess in the
middle of the most valuable land in all of California, which is a movie
studio land, and she won't sell it to them. Yeah. Colombo is
talking to the head of the props department and complementing him on his record keeping.
He's like, Wow, if the if only the LAPD kept records as
well as you people do, we would we would solve every crime. And
I was like, oh gosh, how do you need to put my head
between my knees or Second, Nora sends word that she wants to meet with
him in Edith Head's office, and Erica has a tiny, tiny orgasm and
goes, oh my Godhead and this Edith Heads in the head is okay,
be cool, be cool. You get to see Edith Head be cool.
Were you cool? I was not? I was I was not cool.
Not cool. So first of all, they walk up to just the most
enormous, giant, glossy red doors and I'm like, what is this?
And then the door's open and you you're entered into like the Edith Head's costume
department. And I was just like this is this is so much better than
I would have paid money to see this. Oh yeah, So Lieutenant Columbo
walks in. He sees women in law er everywhere because I guess Edith is
costuming some sort of just costuming a folly's yes, also film, and he's
like ogling the ladies. He can't, he doesn't know where to look.
He's like, oh, I feel uncomfortable. Yura sticks her head out of
Edith's office and goes, Lieutenant, come in here, quit ogling the models.
Joking with him. He walks in there, she flirts with him.
She tells him, Okay, I have to admit I've been lying to you.
She says, Jerry's been blackmailing me. He has stuff on me.
I didn't want to tell you because I knew that would make me look suspicious.
And then she suggests that Columbo get Jerry's file on her. She's like,
I want you to read the file so you know everything he has on
me. That way, the suspicion will no longer be on me. Like,
clearly, I don't care. Do you know those are actually Edith Head's
oscars that are on the desk in this shot? Yes? I did,
like it's clearly her office, right, I don't I don't know that she
had her oscars on her desk that way. I think she had them on
a shelf. I've seen pictures four, but they lined them up on the
front of her desk, so that like when Lieutenant Colombo comes inside and his
head comes out and bless her. She's not an actress, that's not what
she's here for. She's just playing in her head. So she just shows
like some sketches to Nora, and she's like, how about this outfit with
this, you know, with the chiffon, and they're they're discussing outfits,
and then she's she leaves right, So she's only in the scene for like
fifteen seconds, and then he goes, is that who I always see at
the Academy awards? That lady? And she's like, yes, that's Edith
Head. She's won all those oscars, all right. So we cut to
Jerry's office at Nora's request. It's a point that we haven't quite made though
that Nora you would expect her to be perhaps a diva, but she appears
to be very well liked except for the except for the one execute who's mad
that she won't sell him her land like. She seems basically pretty polite on
set. She's not nasty to people. She's a little bit high strung,
but she is an actress. The crew seems to genuinely like her. Even
Kevin Bacon and Kira Sedgwick are weird. Everyone's a little weird. Yeah in
Hollywood. Yeah, I agree that that's a very good point. She's she
seems very professional. So we're in Jerry's office. Colombo is there with Nora,
Simmons and Jerry all gathered, and Columbo can't find anything new in Jerry's
file. It's exactly what Jerry told him it was earlier. It's just you
know, the stuff about her husband dying, you know, blah blah blah,
blah blah. And Nora walks over to Jerry and she says, where's
the new stuff? And Jerry says, what are you talking about? She
goes the Italian film. She declares she doesn't care what happens to her.
She just wants to find Jean's killer. And Jerry rolls his eyes and takes
out the proof, and Nora confesses to everything about the Italian swindle right,
and Colombo is confused. As to why she would do this. He goes,
miss Chanler, do you understand what this is? Gonna do? This
is? And she goes, yes, I know, Please give it to
Simmons. So Simmons takes it, and he happily tears up the evidence and
says he doesn't care. Norah told him all about this ten days prior,
long before the attempt on Jerry's life, and they have reached an arrangement,
which, by the way, the TV show will never elaborate on. What
is the arrangement? Is she gonna pay them back? No, But doesn't
it seem like he and she are an item? Yeah, I think she's
paying him back in flesh in flesh. Flesh in fleshly favors, to be
clear, Like he seems genuinely, very very smitten with her. This is
not a sordid casting couch situation on his end anyway. Like he's He's like,
yeah, I love her. I'm going to forgive her anything she does
because I love her. There's no moment in the film, even when she's
doing bad things that she's not kind of charming, like, she seems to
genuinely be a fairly nice person. Yeah, And by the way like n
Baxter is fifty when she made this, which I know in nineteen seventy three,
made you a crone, But she's gorgeous, like absolutely stunningly beautiful.
So just to be clear, what this is saying is that even if Jerry
did try to blackmail Nora with this information, she wouldn't have been scared by
it because Simmons already knew about it, so she would have had no reason
to try to kill Jerry. This is clearing her name from that attempted murder.
Jerry smugly claims to still have more on Nora, but Nora calls him
a bore and leaves Simmons in her wake. Very strong neckerchief game from Mel
Ferrara in the scene. Did you notice that? I noticed that too.
He's wearing like a denim shirt but like a really like a kerchief. It's
not an ascot, it's a kerchief. It's a kerchief. It is a
neckerchief. Some of the dandier looks I do enjoy in the seventies, like
the men's looks had like two waves, like really unappealing and weird and boxy
or dandy ish, and the dandy looks were fantastic, we love this,
We love a Dandy. We cut to Norah's where has Paul writes here her
gay man servant answers the door to admit Colombo. Am I wrong? That
guy is okay? So the man servant you're talking about is the costume assistant,
right, the one who's helping her put on her Yeah, yeah,
oh yeah yeah, the full Poland. I love it because, like it's
obviously not set out loud, but it's very clear what is happening here.
He is using his wrists to act. Let's put it that way. He's
like, oh my god, hello, detect him. The risk acting was
very important for gay representation in the sixties and seventies and eighties. It really
was all about the risk. He was doing the full John Waters. It
is so the gay manservant, Paul rights, I think he's someone from the
studio. I think he's like a costume associate from the studio. He worked
with Edith. He admits Columbo, and Nora tells him to make himself at
home while she gets out of the costumes that she's been trying on. Right,
So Colombo makes himself at home. He goes to a TV in the
Lunai, I think, and turns it on and look at lo and behold
there's an old Nora Chandler movie on TV that he's actually never seen before.
And he's so shocked. He's like, I'm with Nora Chandler and there's a
Noura Chandler movie on TV. So he starts to watch it, and on
screen, Nora in this like full on, hard nosed detective drag right,
like she's playing Sam Spade in a movie exactly yeah, places a phone call
and explains that she put on in the sky so that anyone who saw her
would think she was a man. Columbo looks up at photos of Nora and
her late husband. He seems to have a realization. Oh yeah, okay,
I think I figured something out here. Doesn't let us in on it,
but he's got something. But he's got something. Nora then appears.
She's in a fabulous split leg and I understand the words I just said were
fabulous and split leg. I know that sounds incongruous, but it's not.
It is fabulous. It is a midnight blue pants suit with magenta lining that
has been paired with a thick gold metal belt that Paul says, looks more
like a headdress. The belt. It's one of those I don't know what
it would be called. It's like it's like chains and it's gathered into a
big thing in the c Yes, you remember it. I love it.
I think it's so fabulously seventies. It's the seventies, man. You gotta
have glitter, gold, gild. It's got to be otherwise seventies more.
They head out and Columbo explains that he's heard some more about that flat tire.
He says there was nothing wrong with it, which means that the tire
was intentionally flattened by someone, which means that Gene was actually the target of
the murder and not Jerry. So somebody knew Gene would then borrow Jerry's car
and drive it to Jerry's house, right right. Nora insists that Jeane's death
has to be a mistake. Look literally, no one hated Gene. It's
impossible. And yet and everyone hated Jerry. He is obviously the target.
And now I have to go and do my press, So if you'll excuse
me, I said good day, I said good day. We cut back
to Nora on set. She's filming a scene where she's being chased by the
police because subtlety wasn't really a thing. I didn't really worry about that.
After the scene, she rushes off set and she heads to the bookstore where
Jerry is signing autographs that night. Remember in the beginning, Jane told us
Jerry had to be at that bookstore every single night that week. Jerry walks
out of the bookstore and Nora hits the gas. She tries to run him
down in the parking lot. It's a great moment here where like the car
is speeding and it's obviously just two different pieces of film mashed together because Jerry
just kind of disappears like a ghosts as the car goes by. Aha.
He is also standing like a good two feet away from the car, like
it's not even closed. Yeh. Look, she takes a while to wind
up for a slap, and she gives people at a wide berth when she's
bearing down on them in the car. Okay, so she does it.
Yeah. Colombo was called to the scene of the crime, and we hear
that Jerry is fine, a little scratched up, Like the implications he like
threw himself out of the way of the car, and Columbo seems to have
another realization. He's having realizations on top of realizations now and yes, he
says, do you are you a shrine? Did have a shriness ring?
And did you find a shriness ring? Okay? Audience, Like, what
what would be the equivalent today if someone if you were like, are you
are you a shiner? Is anyone in here a shriner? Like? Is
anyone in here an influencer? I need an influencer? Does anyone here I
need someone with over two hundred thousand Instagram followers? Is anyone in here an
influencer? I feel way more comfortable with over five hundred k. But if
you over two hundred k, we can talk. Okay. We cut to
Colombo interrupting Nora, who's shooting yet another scene in her movie. She is
now in the costume that she will end the movie in, which is a
brown two piece Maxi dress that kind of has the pattern similar to that of
a traditional bandana on it. I would say this is perhaps the worst outfit
in the film. I agree, I agree, this is It's unfortunate that
Anne Baxter has to end on this note. I wish they'd given her something
a little bit it makes her look old in a way that nothing else has
made her look. You know what it is, it's not old, is
matronly. She looks matronly. She looks rich and old, which is better
than old. But she looks like it's it's not a good look. So
Columbo interrupts the scene. He tells her about Jerry's accident, and she goes,
oh my god, I'm so taugh, I'm so worried. That's awful.
And he tells her, well, you know, he's unconscious, so
we can't even ask him if he saw who tried to hit him. He's
severely hurt. And she goes, what and he goes, yeah, well
you know, we can't. We can't ask and and she goes, god,
I guess this means that Jean's death was an accident. After all.
She just can't help herself, right, she asked to she has to lead
the detective where she wants him to go. Colombo says, all right,
we need some privacy, and he sends everyone else away. He tells Nora
that, look, Jerry contacted me. He said he was onto something new.
He says, he wanted to meet me to tell me about it.
When he was struck by the car, and Columbo tells Nora that an envelope
marked NC was found in Jerry's pocket, and he shows her what was inside,
a shriner's ring. Nora shits her pants. She doesn't actually, but
that is what her face tells us. She does. My Aunt Baxter really
does do a perfect shitting my pants face. It is the set of an
Activita commercial up in there, right, Like she has like one eye twitching
in the other, and like there's a vain bulging from her forehead. The
animal instinct is taken over of like I have to get out of here before
anyone smells the fact that I just shit my pants, right ah, Which,
honestly, if you are going to shit your pants, that is the
perfect outfit in which to shit your pants in. It is it is canonically
poop brown. No one will see it. They might smell it, they
might catch a whiff before they see it, but no one will see a
damning Nora tells him, well, she has no idea what that would possibly
be about, and Colombo excuses himself, apologizing for interrupting her shooting. I'm
so sorry, miss Chandler, I'm so sorry. This is awful oh,
the whole thing is awful. Nora says, I'm sorry, Detective Columbo,
but I'm not feeling well. I need to head home. If anyone heard
something, that was Erica slapping her palm to her to her forehead like a
Scarlett Harra in a scarlettle haraw moment she was in the moment she was feeling
it. I got the vapors sometimes just I do it just for you.
I perform just for you. The thing I love on Anne Baxter is that
she she speaks every sentence like she supposed to run out of brook Yeah,
hello, Paul, I'm so happy to be here, So the last word
is always truncated, especially when she's pretending to be upset, like I'm sorry,
Detective simply not relieve very well. She runs out of the studio.
She heads all the way back to her cottage, right her tiny little fourteen
bedroom cottage on the lot. She bursts in. She rushes all the way
to the doors of her lenai overlooking the garden. You will remember. She
opens the doors of her garden just as the lights to her house are turned
on. She spins around, looking like a teenager cop masturbating. She finds
Colombo, there, Detective Candon, woman run around in the dark in your
own house anymore without being followed by the police. Can a woman sprint off
set in costume without being suspicious? Cant a woman just open French doors out
into her lunai without anyone looking at her like she's crazy. Colombo says that
he knows that she killed Jean Davis, and he's there to arrest her for
it. You know what I can, I take it back and do my
best Colombo, Okay, and you're like, oh good, I'm glad.
I'm glad we got to have this. It's great. There's nothing I like
more than you're doing an impression of someone that that you're like. You like
half tribe also half just turned it into some kind of like cookie Monster voice
a performance art piece. Yes, ah now no, I'm in my head,
damn it, poop. I just pictured Cookie Monster in a jacket like
Colombo. That would be fucking amazing. I'm sorry, I think you killed
the lady. I think you ate the cookies. She asked him what he's
doing there, and Columbo says, I know you killed Jean Davis, and
I'm here to arrest you for it. Has that a decent Colombo, decent
Columbus. Ha ha, it's a little cookie Monster. It's a little Colombo
by way of cookie monsters. Sprig of cookie monsters. There Ah Cookie saying
you bort Lady Christ. She tries to brazen her way through me. Killed
Jean, but I loved Jean. Jeane was my assistant. She was my
assistant for she was my faithful friend. And he bears down on her.
When Jerry said he had more on her, Colombo thought he was bluffing,
but her body language suggested that there might be more to it. Right,
So he's like, I could tell by the way you were sorry, we
do my Columbo ready, I could tell by the way you are looking that
you there has to be an episode of Sesame Street at some point where Cookie
Monster and Peter Falk solve a crime. Right, that has to be a
thing. We have failed as a society if that is not a thing.
Yeah, if we did not, now it's too late. We can't go
back. Well, Cookie still with us, though, if we could get
Cookie Monster doing Colombo. So Colombo is like, listen, I guess there
might be more to the blackmail. I think you might have had a secret
that Jane might have known about, and that's why you killed Jane, to
stop her from revealing whatever secret that was to Jerry. And then the fountain
when I noticed it wasn't running before, remember, And then she's like,
I've told you, Detective, it's a prop. It's a prop from a
film. And he's like, yeah, but I talk to my friend at
the Props apartment and I found out that you had ordered it the day after
your husband's death. Right, what a weird fucking thing to do. My
husband's dead. We write to you know, Joe at the apartment and be
like, remember that fountain from that movie I was in forty five years ago?
Can you bring it over my bungalow? Please? Can? I?
Can I tell you my favorite Anne Baxter line reading of the entire entire episode,
please do so. Columbo is like, you know that the fountain.
It bothered me because there was no water. You know, most people like
the sound of water running, and there wasn't any water running, and most
people like that sound. And it cuts to and Baxter and she goes,
well, I don't this maniacal expression on her face like, ah, he's
handed me all I need to prove that I am not the killer. So
now he says he knows why the fountain doesn't run. In order to lay
the water line, someone, someone would have had to dig up the lawn.
That's the best I could do. That is the very good. It's
solid. It's solid with the audience can't tell. The listeners can't tell as
I'm doing a hunched over. I'm doing that the body perfectly. It's just
a voice that is failing me. Your impersonations are more physical than vocal.
Sometimes you really you throw yourself fully into it. I can't you feel the
moment they have to be because I can't do any voices. It's not true,
all right. Norah's face falls. She knows she's done. She heads
to the bar. She pours herself a drink. She offers Columbo one as
well, and he explains, I was just playing hunches that managed to bluff
you with the story about the Shrins ring. But you know, it occurred
to him while he was watching her movie that she was dressed as a man,
and the night her husband died, someone had claimed to have seen her
husband get in a fishing boat, but in the dark from a distance,
it it been Nora herself and Nora says it was it was detective. It
was that fateful night her husband, who constantly cheated on her, brought a
gumad into her house. You'll bring a guman into my house, into this
house we share, into my bed. They had a huge fight. She
hit him on the head with a bottle, seemingly accidentally killing him. It
was not a premeditated murder. It was a murder and a fit of passion
and rage. She buried him in the backyard, and Jane knew about it,
dying to know how these two women, who combined might weigh two hundred
and ten pounds, dug up the backyard to bury a fully grown man into
it in there and covered it back up and resotted the whole thing by Dawn.
I presume Gene help. It has to be how Gene knows right that,
yeah, Jane helped to bury the body or something, which would imply
that she also has some skin in the game as far as keeping it covered.
Yeah, some culpability or even her interpretation. Nora in a fit of
rage just like had that rage strength and did it all herself. And then
the next day was like, so we're not gonna talk about Gerald anymore,
and she's like, and Jean's like, what do you mean? Where did
Gerald go? And she's like, Gerald went to a farm upstate where he
could play with other Geralds all day, if you get my meaning. She
just tears up the lawn with their bare hands, like the Hulk rows the
body like John Crawford and mommy dearest, just pulling up, pulling up roses.
I'm not mad at you, garden, I'm mad at my husband.
So Jeane very calmly says, I'll get a coat and we'll go, and
Columbo leads her out in a wide shot as the garden fountain slash grave marker
is in the foreground, and the credits play the crime is solved. What
a fun show? What a fun fucking show? Can I tell you too?
Maybe I wasn't giving the show enough credit for like going deep on the
crimes, but I was genuinely shocked at the reveal. Not the reveal that
she killed her husband, because I kind of figured that out earlier, but
like the reveal that Jane knew she killed her husband and that was the actual
motive for killing Jean, because I I think I had just written it off
as like Jene probably knew about other like financial stuff like da da da.
It never occurred to me, and that's probably stupid. It probably was much
more obvious to other people that like, oh, that's why she killed Jean.
That's a legit fucking reason to kill someone. Yeah, no, I
didn't. I didn't catch it either. Like the show, and there's there's
like little red herrings in the show, and there's little clues that I just
cut out just for ease of like retelling, but like it's genuinely a show
where there's not a wasted word, Like everything actually means something. And I'm
sure like a more seasoned, like learned Columbo viewer would be like, oh,
that fountain, that fountain, that that fountain something like. But I
actually wasn't. It just like flew right by me the first time, and
then at the end when it came back, I was like, oh dang,
yeah yeah, And like obviously that's why, even though she's in financial
streets, she's not going to sell that house because her fucking dead husband is
under it, so she can't sell it. So she has to pretend like
she's super into that house and like can't sell it back to anyone for sentimental
reasons. All right, so stick around. We will be right back with
our random observations and final rankings for Requiem for a Falling Star after these messages
for all you non patrons out there, and we're back Erica, do you
have any Do you have just a couple more things? Just just just one
more thingful? So there's a few shots in this where she has like she
picks up a phone and makes a dramatic phone call, right, and like
everything Anne Baxter does is like ten out of ten. And but there's the
the phone in her wet bar is one of those elegant old tiny ones that
have like an ivory handle, and like delicately, I just miss landlines so
much. They are so elegant. It looks like a phone you should be
talking on while in like a like like a like a silk penoir with with
marabou feathers, Yes, lounging in your bed eating bonbonds. Yes, it's
so elegant. I like the way she like just gently places it on the
receiver. Everything about that phone and landlines in general, I am showing my
whole ass today. Between the carbon paper and the landlines, I'm gonna get
an AARP notice in the mail today. We just waxed podic about landlines last
week for how did ops I married an ex murderer? Did wait? I
forgot I'd forgotten that because I'm old. I'm so old, I don't know
what we talked about last week. We are on one about landlines. Uh
did you notice in this so there's two cars that feature very prominently. There's
Jean's car and there's Jerry's car, and they're both so tiny and low to
the ground. Like. I don't like being in cars. It's It's part
of the reason I live in New York. I like to be not in
cars as often as I can be. But those little roadster death traps.
Every time they got in one, I was like, Ooh, I don't
like this. It makes me nervous. Well, also, mel Ferrara is
pretty tall and so like, yeah, we don't see him getting in or
out of that car, but we see Jeane getting in and I was I
literally the whole time was thinking like, how does mel Ferrera even fit in
a car that side? Because that woman, who's like a good six inches
shorter than him, is like hitting her head against the ceiling of it.
Reminded me of that Rock Hudson moment and that in Yes, Yes, where
they get into the car and he can't fit in it. Yeah. A
couple of lines that I love and they both come from fallon the suspiciously Young
former studio head. Yeah. One is this is all in the same scene.
He's talking to Colombo and he goes, take my advice, stay away
from actors. They'll kill you. Excellent, very good. And the other
thing he says to him after the detective says something like I wouldn't have typecasted
her as a killer, and he he turns to the detective and he goes,
well, I would never type test you as a detective. The shade
girl. What is this? Oh, it's my gauntlet, Let me throw
it. Can I share two Nora Chandler lines that I like because she has
some good birds in this episode. Okay, So the first one is when
they're in Jerry's office and she's demanding that he show all the evidence and you
know, she's pulling the fast one, and he says, no, I
still know something. He leans forward and he taps his forehead and he goes,
you can't get a search warrant for what's in here? And she says,
you can't get bus fair for what's in there, very solid. And
the other one is in Edith's head's office when rumpled Columbo comes in with all
of his clothes. It don't fit, and she says, why don't you
have your wife take you shopping for your anniversary? Take a look at suits,
shirts, slacks, socks, shoes, right down the list. Have
you considered an investment in personal hygiene products? A hair brush, mike,
for god's sake, met a razor? What else can you get? What
if she just kept talking? Belts, buckle spats, perchips, don't forget
the kerchiefs, detective, for god's sake, man, get a kerchief,
please, detective, Never forget a kerchief. There's a whole bit at the
end where Colombo knows she's getting nervous because she's drinking on set. That same
high waisted man Paul gives her, gives her like a drink on set and
calms her down. And so he goes and talks to him because Colombo does,
and he's like, does she usually drink on the job? And he
goes, Never, she is a consummate professional. She never drinks on the
job unless she has to, unless she's under pressure. And I'm like,
so, like all the time then, right, all the time? Then
all the time? Like, yeah, so she's an alcoholic. Right.
It was the weirdest nineteen seventy three logic of like, she's definitely not an
alcoholic. She does drink at work though, yes, during the day of
the time. Anytime she feels the slightest bit of pressure, she takes a
show like anyone would. Yeah, like everyone in nineteen seventy three does.
That is the most normal thing in the world. I don't even know why
we're still talking about this. Frankly, one very minor thing. When Columbo
drives onto the lot, do you notice the man in full indigenous costume?
Yeah, I biking. I always love when, like movies and TV shows
do this when they show like the background of a studio lot and it's like
like a person dresses Abraham Lincoln in the background. Excellent. I just have
one And this is just one more thing, Just one more thing. What
just d cookie have one more? And that is that the music at the
very very end of the show is far too jaunty for what we're looking at.
It is, as you remember it ends on a slow fade out of
like her ex husband's grave essentially her backyard with the fountain in it. But
the music is like, dude, do do do dude? Whoa you can
get a grave here? Calm the fuck down music, learn get a cold
case finally being solved, I think twelve years after it. Yeah, killed,
like definitely decomposed corpse under her fountain. Can music not be like la
la la la la la la la la la la sounds like the sounds like
the smurfser singing Paul, how shall we rank this glorious episode of Columbo Requiem
for a Falling Star? One to ten sheets of carbon paper the only way
to copy AA. One to ten men in high waisted pants, pants so
high waisted I could see their balls in their mouth, pants so high wasted
that you don't need suspenders, just need a pair rubber bands. I'll do
it. One to ten master classes in slapping, what you God want to
do is do a full forty five second wind up. You want to get
You want to give a lot of air. You want to just get as
much air as possible between you in the face before you what you have in
the master class on slapping is you have four You have four units. First
is the wind up, ah, Second is the contact uh huh, third
is the is the is the rebound, and fourth is the bon. You
have to say something after slapping the person, you know, Yeah, you
need to follow through though. It's like a good golf swing. You have
to follow all the way through. Otherwise it's it's barely a slap. It's
barely it's a tap. Then it's a left tap. Frankly, how about
one to ten? You never expected to meet a legend raising your arms like
a Vita on the balcony, ha ha ha. I think for all the
Anne Baxter has done for us, we should do this for her, because
I do now you do, never expecting me to legend, She's not wrong.
Yeah, for the absolute fucking queen, that is an Baxter. Do
you want to go first or shall I go first? I'll go first on
this one. I'm gonna rate it pretty high. I think it's fair like
it does fall down in some of the ways we normally care about. I
cannot recall a single person of color. There was extras. There was a
black woman and Eatith's head office walking out. Yeah. Yeah, that doesn't.
Yeah, it doesn't. That's great, that's not really great. I
know, it's nineteen seventy three, and so like what even what the fuck
even was the world in nineteen seventy three, But like it's a lot of
white people being white at each other. There is some decent female like roles.
I mean, obviously like Norah Chandler, excellent role, excellent role,
Gene. I would say, it's even a pretty good role until she dies.
Yeah, sadly she's the victim, so she only has about ten minutes
of time with the episode, yeah, or I think even less than that,
honestly. But they do talk about something other than Jerry. They talk
about They talk about like Nora and her career and Jean's career too. In
a way, there's Edith's Head. I mean, like, yeah, you
get to see the greatest of all time costume designer in her office with her
oscars being Edith Head. That gives it automatic points for me. Frankly,
I think gay representation. We have the we have the one, we have
the gay man Service, we have the Paul Lynde costume assistant. I'll let
you talk about him. I'm gonna go high. I'm going to give it
a six. Yeah, I'm gonna give it a six because again, there's
no people of color at all in this thing, which sucks. But like
I frankly wasn't expecting anything and I was not surprised. So but yeah,
I'm going to give it a six out of ten. Uh, you never
expected to meet a legend, That's right. I think it's so great that
you get to see Anne Baxter in this role, like, and she's she's
she is like an age Norma Desmond is in Sunset Boulevard and she is full
of freaking Norma desmonding it and I just love her so much. So yeah,
six out of ten. You never expect to meet a legends, how
about you, Paul? Uh? Yeah, I agree. Like, by
the way, I don't think I wrote in the this is nineteen seventy three.
I don't think we ever said that in the beginnings, which is on
me. That's on me. I'll take I'll take the l on that nineteen
seventy three this came out, so it's pretty far before our usual timeline,
right, we usually start in nineteen eighty, so it's you know, so,
yeah, like you said, I was not expecting there to be a
large number of people of color with significant roles. There are actually fewer roles
in it than I expected in a murder mystery, But I think that's because
it's not a who done it, so they don't have to present you with
a bunch of potential suspects. It's just Columbo working his way through it,
which kind of like takes that, Yeah, that's true. I never thought
about that. There's very few people in it really yeah, so I think
it ages really well for something from nineteen seventy three. I mean, these
are sins of omission, not sins of like horrible representation or horrible stereotypes or
anything. Right. The gay answer I loved. I mean, I don't
know if that guy just was gay and couldn't keep it in the tank,
or if he was an actor that was hired and decided to make a choice.
Who knows, but the wrist acting was fabulous. I loved it.
I actually tried to look up his name, and I don't think he's listed
on IMDb, which makes me think like everything was a lot looser back then,
that it was just just like Anne Baxter's dresser, that they were like,
can you just come in here? And say this real quick just wasn't
a thing maybe, I mean, yeah, it's feel a little inside baseball,
right because they have Edith hid in it, so it could be something
who works in the costume department for real, and like I used to be
an actor? Can I do it? And they're like, okay, sure
charge, yeah, sure, go do it. Yeah. Uh but yeah,
and you're right, like Nora Chandler is a great a great role.
Like part of the thing with Colombo is that he often doesn't enter until after
the first act of the the episode they're doing. So Norah Chandler probably has
as much, if not more screen time than Colombo in this. She has
more screen time than he does. Yeah, she's in the in the whole
thing, and she's serving the entire time, the entire time. Yes,
indeed, so you said six, Yeah, I'm gonna agree with you.
I'm going to say a six out of ten. And then he never expected
to meet a legend except she runs out of stead before she gets to the
end. You never expect. I think that was just the seven packs a
day they were all smoking back bench. Colombo just seems like a great comfort
watch if if you're into it, I mean I might watch another one,
one or two. I mean there's one with Donald Pleasants that's supposed to be
amazing. It's apparently considered to be like the best Columbo episode ever produced about
like a like a wine maker or something, and Donald Pleasance is in it.
So I don't know. Maybe I'll watch them this weekend with my mom.
That seems a good, like lovely weekend to have. It sounds like
she would make her very happy. I have a question for you, obviously,
like the we knew who did it kind of from the jump, but
did you still think this was a good murder mystery? Yeah? I like
the how catchum aspect of it. The show did a good job of planting
a lot of clues that I, again, as a not seasoned columb you
er did let go by. But then when in doing the recap, I
was like, oh no, they actually planted that, like the fact that
she killed her husband, and like the fact that at the end the shriner's
ring makes her concerned. Oh no, he discovered my husband's body. That's
that's the thing. And it's all like it's guessing on Columbo's part, but
it's educated guessing. It's smart guessing and like they let the character be intelligent,
but it doesn't feel like they pulled a rabbit out of the hat at
the end and there was no possible way you could have come up with it.
Yeah, right, Like there's obviously some leaps, I don't think.
I don't think the first time anyone watches this, no one is thinking she
definitely killed her husband and underneath that fountain, Yeah, yeah, like there's
a lot there, but like there is a permission structure within it that makes
sense and you can understand how this super genius detective did figure it out right,
It's true, I will say I still I was surprised that I was
surprised by the ending, the fact that like the tiny last piece of the
puzzle that Jean knew she killed her husband and that's why she killed Jean.
I was, I actually out loud one ooh. That's why I agree.
It's totally fun. It's a total fun watch. It's it's decent, you
know, decent murder mystery. I can't wait to get to more like authentically
murdery mystery things later this month, Yes, because I feel like the first
two have been sort of softball murder mystery been softer. Next two I think
we have are hard boiled, hard boiled mysteries. Speaking of I am going
to give a palate cleanser. I think you were going to give the same
one. Right, It's poker Face, Yeah, I mean, look,
watch Colombo. They are all available on like multiple streaming services. You can
watch this on Amazon, you can watch this on TV or whatever. You
can watch it, watch it on Peacock, Peacock. Yeah, They're all
over the place, so you can watch it on any streaming service. But
Peacock also has poker Face, which is has only one season. It's got
an arc. But also every episode has a murder mystery or a mystery of
some sort that Natasha Leone solves and it is truly excellent. I think yeah,
definitely all right, So that is the end of our show. Everyone
listening can follow us on Instagram, they can follow us on Twitter, you
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The tote bag will also have evidence of a murder inside and you get
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guys couldn't see it, but he did some risk acting just now. It
was a risk acting. Yeah. If you want to suggest films TV for
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We did go rogue today. Yeah, but we did pick a lot of
stuff from Instagram this month for Murder Mystery March. If you want to vote
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aged Well podcast to find out more. And speaking of which, some tears
on our Patreon come with thanks from a podcast character, and today we're hearing
from the great great great grandfather of Peter Falk, mister Harvey Firestem. Oh
Hello, hello, Hello. How did you know about me and Peter being
related? That's not usually known. You're smartie. It's so lovely to see
you again. And on the day you're doing Colombo, you little twinkies.
Now. I once pitched Showtime on an all gay reboot of Colombo with me
and the lead. I called it Colombo Homo Side Division. Yeah. Yeah,
you thought you were the first person who heard Bill Holden say Homo side
You weren't you? Weren't your little your little hoo cupcakes. Okay, Showtime
bought it, you know, but you know they fired me and after they
were done with it, it became Homeland. But anyway, I'm here to
thank Sunshine, Sunshine, thank you for being a patron of that aged Well
do you know that song from Pippin and if we all good, spread a
little Sunshine. They asked me to play Bertha in the last pip In revival,
but I took one look at the aerial act requiet and said, no,
thank you. You want to see Harvey Firesteine doing tricks while wrapped in
silk. You can hope for an invitation to my boudoir. So thank you,
Sunshine, keep shining, keep smiling, and knowing you can always count
on your uncle Horvey. He is, he is a font of theatrical stories
he does, he does. I would never I would listen to an entire
album of him singing Pippin. Yeah, so would I. I would not,
not that I have anything to do with it. Would not want to
be the one to have to produce the noises for an entire singing album.
Aha, No, no, no, we should do that. Hey everyone,
we should do that. Right, let's do that, Doug. Let's
get me to an E N T first and figure out what kind of things
we can put on my vocal course to protect them for whatever is happening back
there. All right, Erica? Any final thoughts on Colombo? Cookie would
like to know why murder weapon up the man's butt? Oh? They never
did that on Colombo? I don't think. No, what do you mean,
never put a murder weapon up a man's butt. I don't even know
what you're talking about, Detective. I would never do such a thing.
Why would I put an axe handle up a man's behind to kill him.
That's insane. That's absolutely insane. You know what else is insane? Cookie
crumbles. Those are delicious, aren't they? They drive me crazy? Anyway,
nice trench coat. I have to go why I have to pause the
podcast and tell you something. OKAYI die, remember dying? Okay, I
cannot wait. Please. I just had a snapshot of a dream that I
had. I don't know why, and I don't remember any context, So
just the snapshot is all you're gonna get because it's all I remember. And
on a beach somewhere, but it was like a nude beach, but all
the men had tucked, like deeply cuffed their penises, so you only saw
like the penis weirdly, I don't know why, from the back. Like
everyone's penis was so long it like actually came out through their butt their back
butt cheeks. So when I was looking at were butts with just tiny penis
heads poking out. That's a dream I had. Why was I on a
beach with is it a ken thing? Kend you wanted a vagina that's what
you were in. It wasn't even a thing. I noticed. I was
like Anyway, moving on, here we are again. Looks like they're turtle
heading with their dicks on Vangina Cove. I love my vacations to Vagina Cove.
The Grunnion are running on Nachina Cove. The Managina Cove Grunion Run is
not to be this just don't go on Spring Bridge