Season 5 opened on September 14th, 1975 with a really rich episode, an interesting story, a new gotcha, and some good performances. Forgotten Lady starred Janet Leigh (who was only 48 years old when she made this, though she was played somewhat older) as an aging dancer trying to revive her career. When her retired doctor husband, played by Sam Jaffee (who in real life was 36 years older than Leigh) refuses to finance her comeback she kills him and makes it look like a suicide.
What to watch for
Here are a few things I noticed during the episode.
Not so spontaneous
Feeding perhaps into the controversial ending is the fact that she planned this killing. It wasn't a spontaneous reaction. She gets the extra sleeping pill BEFORE she and Dr. Willis argue about his funding her comeback.
And she's already wearing the black leotard under her white housedress. She's cool as a cucumber when she sneaks out to the garage to get the gun.
She even has black gloves to do the deed and she burns the scrap bit of film (after she repairs the film) in her ashtray because she has the presence of mind to recognize it could be evidence.
Speaking of getting the gun...
She might have been wiser to take off the white housedress before she ran across the yard in the dark if she wanted to remain unnoticed. Lucky for her nobody spots her.
Likewise it's interesting that she didn't choose any kind of hat or scarf to cover her almost white blond hair.
May-December? More like Jan-December
Sam Jaffee may have been 36 years older than Janet Leigh but that wasn't the biggest gap in this movie. Maurice Evans (Raymond) is 42 years older than Linda Gaye Scott who plays his wife Alma.
That always seemed an odd choice to me. There's no reason Alma has to be played by a 32-year-old. They could easily have cast an older woman for the part. Instead they chose an actress who could have been Maurice Evans' granddaughter.
Or, alternatively, there's no reason she had to be his wife. She could have been his daughter, or even just "the Maid". Her being his wife isn't particularly important to the story.
The book is a prop
A key piece of evidence in this one is the book Dr. Willis is reading: "The Transformation of Mrs. McTwig." That book is just a prop, it doesn't actually exist.
Rosie isn't
Walking My Baby Back Home is a real movie from 1953 starring...yep...a 26-year-old Janet Leigh.
Neither is "Cadaveric spasm"
Anderson, the coroner, says that Willis suffered from "Cadaveric spasm". I wasn't sure if it was real, so I looked it up. Turns out it's real and appropriate to this case. Cadaveric spasm may affect all muscles in the body, but typically only groups, such as the forearms, or hands. It often crystallizes the last activity one did before death and is therefore significant in forensic investigations. For example, it's seen in cases of drowning victims when grass, weeds, roots, or other materials are clutched, providing evidence the victim was alive at the time of entry into the water.The Pistol Range
A completely irrelevent side plot is Columbo's failing to go to the pistol range to qualify. On the one hand it fills a few minutes of time, but it also was a charming glimpse at the Lieutenant (reinforcing that he doesn't even carry a gun) and provided some of the more entertaining bits in the episode.
Sgt. Lefkowitz: "You know, I'm down at the homicide office at least once a week. I don't think I've ever seen you there."
Columbo: "Well, I don't get down there too much. None of the murders take place there, you know."
If you're looking for clues as to how long Columbo has been on the force, the other Lieutenant who comes to see him about qualifying on the pistol range says it's been 10 years since he's been there to shoot. If you take the time as real time, that episode aired in 1975 which means he's been on the force since at least 1965.
Good neighbors?
Grace and Henry live in a lavish mansion, the few exteriors seem to confirm that. But in the background of a shot with Columbo and Grace on Henry's balcony there seems to be an apartment buiding next door?
Hello again Danny Wells
Danny Wells plays the bookstore clerk that Columbo talks to about Dr. Willis' book. If he looks familiar that's because he had a small role in the previous episode - A Deadly State of Mind - as one of Dr. Collier's friends at the dinner party.
A semi-satisfying finish
Ned's heroic maneuver - the fake confession to spare Grace - was a powerful gesture. And Columbo's accepting of his maneuver is equally compassionate.
But...whatever her obvious deteriorating medical condition, she was (as noted above) pretty sharp and deliberate when she committed the crime. Of course, the implication is that if her condition is as bad as it appears she probably wouldn't have survived to the end of the trial anyhow.
But still...not everybody is happy that Columbo let this killer "get away".
Just the second time...
It's only the second time that Columbo let one of the killers go. The other was in "It's All in the Game" from Season 12, when the mother-daughter team kill their lover. Columbo lets the daughter go in exchange for a confession from Faye Dunaway, who plays the mother.
Just a few more things
- The legendary Michael Lally makes an appearance as a party guest at Ned and Grace's party.
- Scott Salmon is Fred, the young dancer Ned hires to dance with Grace in the show. He was normally a choreographer, this was his only acting credit. He died in a car crash in 1993.
- There's a lot of filler in this episode - a minute or three is also consumed by "Dog" who is also pretty unnecessary to the story.
- Columbo murders are notoriously clean. No blood, no fuss. But if you look closely at Dr. Willis laying in his bed when Columbo and the coroners are investigating you can see some blood on his face. Unusual for Columbo.
Plot Holes
I have one small quibble with the gotcha, and it's something my wife pointed out right away when she first watched the episode. Columbo's argument hinges, in large part, from the 11 missing minutes in the movie - proving that Grace wasn't in the movie room at the time.
Couldn't she have gone to the bathroom, spent 11ish minutes on that, then returned to find the film broken and had to fix it?
What did you think of this episode? Let us know in the comments below.
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