NIKKI AND NORA. Unaired TV pilot, UPN, 2004. Christina Cox (Nora Delaney), Liz Vassey (Nikki Beaumont). Director: John David Coles.

   It didn’t make the new season for the UPN television network, but from all I’ve read, this busted TV pilot has become a cult favorite in many quarters. You can watch it in its entirely on YouTube, broken up into seven parts, starting here. Warning: The picture quality leaves something (a lot) to be desired.

   Nikki and Nora are cops. That’s nothing new, not even if they’re young and good-looking. Pepper Anderson was not the first lady policewoman on TV, but she was one of the first whose good looks were emphasized. In fact, for many undercover situations she usually found herself in, her good looks were most definitely a positive plus for the job.

   It’s not that Nikki and Nora are partners and both female. Cagney and Lacey covered that territory a while ago also. Here’s the thing – in case you didn’t know where all this is leading. Unknown to the New Orleans Police Department, Nikki and Nora are lovers.

   There has been at least one TV series featuring two law enforcement officers having an affair: a show called Standoff that starred Ron Livingston and Rosemarie DeWitt as top-notch hostage negotiators for the FBI. The program lasted about 18 weeks a couple of years ago. It wasn’t bad, but there are only so many hostage crises you can see before you decide you don’t want to see any more.

   The brunette is Nikki, the honey blonde is Nora. Nora’s family doesn’t know, except for her brother, who’s also on the force. Nikki comes from a wealthy family which gives her an “in” in certain (wealthy) neighborhoods. Her daddy is a suave southern gentleman fond of the local cuisine.

   The story itself is standard enough. A young girl, a member of one those wealthy families I just mentioned, is raped and murdered in her own home. Before she died, though, she was able to call 911.

   After one false trail, a (snoopy) eye witness is able to send Nikki and Nora in the right direction. I could say more, but you may want to watch this for yourself. The acting is adequate, most of the time, and the two female stars seem to do most of the action scenes themselves. The scenes with the two of them together at home are toned down, I’m sure, from how they might have played out on cable TV.

   Some additional background might help you place the two stars: Christina Cox played ex-cop turned PI Vicki Nelson in a series called Blood Ties not too long ago. (She specialized in paranormal cases: vampires, werewolves and the like.) Liz Vassey has been on several series. Most recently she’s been Wendy Simms on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation.

   Neither of these two shows means much to me, I’m sorry to say. I’ve never seen an episode of either series, but the first one sounds tempting. I tend to stay away from crime scenes and autopsy labs. (I was going to say I ought to get out more, but that’s not the problem.)

MURDER 101: NEW AGE. Hallmark, 2008; aka MURDER 101: LOCKED ROOM. Dick Van Dyke, Barry Van Dyke, Carey Van Dyke, Shane Van Dyke, Susan Blakely, Wendy Glenn. Director: David S. Cass Sr.

   On August 2, 2008, Hallmark Channel premeiered a two-hour film in its Murder 101 series, which stars Dick Van Dyke as Prof. Jonathan Maxwell, a university criminology instructor.

   In this one, a New Age guru is found shot dead in a locked meditation room along with four other people. Trouble is, they’re all in deep meditative trances when the crime is discovered. Even when the sheriff fires off a blank, they still remain in the trance state.

   Of course, when they do come ’round none of them remembers seeing the crime occur. A further complication is that no one heard the fatal shot, yet a test later proves that a firearms discharge would be heard outside.

   The gun itself, found next to the victim, had no silencer attached, and since there is no GSR [Gun Shot Residue] on the dead man, it is very unlikely he committed suicide. But a note, which many construe as indicating the victim contemplated killing himself, is found in his room.

   GSR is soon discovered on one of the four who were in the room at the time, but shortly after this person is arrested he lapses into a near-death state: “Suicide by coma; that’s a new one.”

   Meanwhile, someone tries to run over an associate of the dead guru in the hospital parking lot and later tries to tidy up the loose ends of the crime by cremating Jonathan — while he’s still alive ….

   This one reminded me of a first- or second-season Murder, She Wrote episode in which a group of people are in a hypnotic trance when a murder takes place right before them, but the similarity ends there.

   The violence content is quite low, with the script concentrating more on WHO, WHY, and HOW, a refreshing change of pace from the usual “crime drama.”

   I didn’t think this was the best possible treatment of the locked room theme — the impossible crime motif is by far my favorite — but it wasn’t all that gosh-awful either.

      Filmography:

Murder 101. 01-07-06. A successful executive is murdered in an explosion at his mansion, and an attractive female investigative reporter is suspected; she had been working undercover on a story about corporate scandal.

Murder 101: College Can Be Murder. 01-06-07. When Dr. Maxwell does not believe that Professor Archer Coe died of a heart attack, he hires his friend, PI Mike Bryant (Barry Van Dyke), to investigate.

Murder 101: If Wishes Were Horses. 08-18-07. A horse is stolen, and the owners receive a $100 million ransom demand; the trainer is later found dead.

Murder 101: New Age. 08-02-08.

THE MURDER OF ROGER ACKROYD. TV movie/episode of Agatha Christie: Poirot. First shown in the UK on 2 January 2000 [Season 7, Episode 1]. David Suchet, Philip Jackson, Oliver Ford Davies, Selina Cadell, Roger Frost, Malcolm Terris, Nigel Cooke, Daisy Beaumont, Flora Montgomery. Based on Agatha Christie’s novel of the same name. Screenwriter: Andrew Grieve. Director: Clive Exton.

   It’s been a long time since I first read the book — something like 55 years ago — and it was also the last time. This is one of only two detective novels for which I remember the ending and who did it, and the other was by Agatha Christie also.

   Which is why the book has been only a one-time affair for me. The details I don’t remember, but I do remember Hercule Poirot — it was probably my introduction to him, but I couldn’t swear to that — and once you’ve read a novel he’s in, if you’re a detective story fan of any kind, he’s a character you’ll also never forget.

   Confession time. I’ve never seen David Suchet as Poirot until now. Pure negligence on my part, or a certain lack of resolve, whatever. Right now, at the moment, I am typing this, I’m a convert. 100 percent. Suchet is Hercule Poirot, to the ultimate and finest detail.

   If you know the story about Roger Ackroyd’s murder, and without my saying more, I am assuming that you do, you might wonder how it could be filmed. If it were up to me, I’d do as direct an adaptation as I could, but Andrew Grieve goes at it sort of sideways and this misses the point of the tale entirely. (At the beginning of the film Poirot is reading from the killer’s diary.)

   The characters in this film are among those that are also in the book, but some research into other reviewers’ commentaries say that not all of the characters in the book are in the movie, present and accounted for.

   There is also an extra murder that is not in the book (or again, so I’m told). And on my own, with no help from others, I certainly did not recognize the shootout in the chemical factory between the killer on one side at the end, and Poirot and Inspector Japp (Philip Jackson) on the other. Good grief. What were they thinking?

   I also wondered about the scene in Poirot’s old semi-abandoned city apartment (the movie begins as he’s “enjoying” his retirement far out in the country). Poirot seems choked up about the place, the furniture covered in sheets, with bad memories flooding his mind. What was that all about? (Perhaps it has to do something with the fact that I started watching the Suchet series with Season 7?)

   All in all, I suppose one could easily enjoy this made-for-TV movie if one did not know the story, nor the character, ahead of time. I can usually tune things out so that I can watch the film the screenwriter and director want to tell while I’m watching, which I did just fine. But why on earth did they want to tell this one?

   I exclude David Suchet from blame. Even if he had something to say about the story, I’m going to say he didn’t, and I’m looking forward to his next outing in the boxed set I just bought myself as an early Christmas present.

JOHNNY RYAN. Made for TV. 1990. Clancy Brown, Julia Campbell, Jason Beghe, Robert Rossilli, J. Kenneth Campbell, Teri Austin, Robert Prosky. Director: Robert E. Collins.

   So far my research hasn’t turned up which network or cable channel first telecast this very much retro-1940s cops-against-organized-crime show, but IMDB says the date was 29 July 1990. My copy came from Encore’s Mystery Channel some time later on, but that’s no help.

   IMDB also says the story takes place in 1949. Could be, but it felt more like 1946 to me, just after the war, when old Model T’s were still on the road and little else but old coupes and boxy sedans were available.

   As far as the cast is concerned, they’re all pretty much unknown to me. Clancy Brown plays Johnny Ryan, the stalwart new head of a special task force against the mob in Manhattan, very much in the Robert Stack mode, complete with pulled down brim.

   His broad features (but still good-looking) and Bronxish accent (at least in this film) hardly made for very many other leading roles. Most of his subsequent career has been as a voice artist for superhero cartoons.

   The picture you see of him here is not from this TV movie, I’m sorry to say, but it’s from the same time period. I also apologize that it’s in black and white. The film’s in color.

   Johnny’s job in the movie is to break the stories of the two cops supposedly watching an important witness in a hotel room. (The witness is thrown from the window when their backs are turned.)

   Night club owner Steve Lombardi (either Jason Beghe or Robert Rosilli – IMDB lists them both) is in on the killing. When Johnny tries to find a way to get at him, he uses Lombardi’s girl friend and club entertainer Eve Manion (Julia Campbell), not expecting the next obvious plot twist, but the avid viewer of movies of this type certainly will. (The photo here of Julia Campbell is not in 1940s mode, but it’ll give you an idea.)

   There are a few other plot twists, but none of them are particularly earth-shattering, or even bending. Well, maybe bending. I certainly didn’t mind the 95 minutes or so it took to watch this movie. If it happened to be a pilot for a projected series, which is a strong possibility, I’d have wanted to see more, but I’m a sucker for this kind of stuff. Maybe nobody else is.

ETHEL LINA WHITE – The Spiral Staircase.  Ward Lock, UK, hc, 1933; Harper & Row, US, hc, both as Some Must Watch. Harper & Brothers, 1941. Published as The Spiral Staircase. World, 1946 as a movie tie-in to the film of that title: RKO, 1946 (Dorothy McGuire, George Brent, Ethel Barrymore). Remade: Raven Films, 1975 (Jacqueline Bisset, Christopher Plummer, John Phillip Law); and as a TV movie: Fox, 2000 (Nicollette Sheridan, Judd Nelson, Alex McArthur). Paperback reprint, as The Spiral Staircase, Popular Library #120, 1946; and as #60-2381, late 1960s?

   It is a dark and very stormy night as the novel opens, for a terrible gale howls around Professor Sebastian’s rambling but solidly built house, twelve miles from the nearest village. The entire countryside is gripped in terror after five local girls have been murdered, and once darkness falls few people venture abroad.

   Protagonist Helen Capel works as “lady-help” to the scholarly professor; his chilly sister Blanche, who is firmly under the thumb of their invalid mother Lady Warren, who may or may have killed her husband “by accident” years before; and sinister, mannish Nurse Barker. There is also the professor’s son Newton, married to and insanely jealous of his flirtatious wife Simone, who has her eye on a fling with the professor’s resident pupil Stephen Rice.

   Mr and Mrs Oates, faithful servants, round out the residents of the house, one of those rambling edifices with a warren of cellars, many rooms, and two staircases — and not all of it fitted with electric light.

   After learning of another murder committed not far from the house, Professor Warren announces that as a matter of safety everyone must stay inside and nobody is to be admitted under any circumstances that night. But just as he gives this order, there is a thunderous knocking at the front door….

My verdict: The Spiral Staircase was originally published as Some Must Watch, a much better title given the plot hinges on efforts by the nine people locked in the house to protect themselves and each other during a long and extremely stressful night.

   The manner in which one by one they fail in the task is extremely clever, for the reader cannot be certain if events come about naturally or if someone is pulling strings to arrange matters. I cannot say more for fear of spoiling an excellent work in which tension increases every chapter, characters are not always what they seem, and expectations based on behaviour turn out to be completely false.

   I read this book in a few hours and regret I’m not just beginning it again! In fact, I name it without hesitation as my top read this month.

Etext: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300931.txt

[EDITORIAL UPDATE]  As you’ve probably already noted, there were three film versions of this book, all duly cited in Al Hubin’s Revised Crime Fiction IV or its online Addenda. While searching for possible additional details, I found a fourth: a 60-minute NBC production telecast on 4 October 1961 starring Edie Adams, Eddie Albert, Lillian Gish, Jeffrey Lynn, Hayley Mills, Elizabeth Montgomery and Gig Young.

   That’s quite an array of acting talent, but at the moment that’s all I know about the film. It seems to have been a special presentation, but it’s possible it was an episode of some other overall series, but which one, if any, I do not know.

   In any case, it will appear in the next installment of the Addenda.

[UPDATE] Later the same day.   I’ve found it — the overall series, I mean. Theatre ’62 does not have its own entry on IMDB, but BFI describes it as “a series of TV specials commemorating the films of producer David O. Selznick.”

   In this series, seven live adaptations of Selznick movies were presented:

      4 Oct 1961. The Spiral Staircase.
      19 Nov 1961. Intermezzo. Jean-Pierre Aumont, Ingrid Thulin.
      10 Dec 1961. Notorious. Joseph Cotten, Barbara Rush.
      14 Jan 1962. The Farmer’s Daughter. Lee Remick, Peter Lawford.
      11 Feb 1962. Spellbound. Hugh O’Brian, Maureen O’Hara.
      11 Mar 1962. The Paradine Case. Viveca Lindfors, Richard Basehart, Boris Karloff.
      8 Apr 1962. Rebecca. James Mason, Joan Hackett, Nina Foch.

   It’s doubtful if any of these exist, but wouldn’t it be nice?

   The George Harmon Coxe reviews and views and responses are fascinating. An author I’ve always been aware of yet, rather shamefully, one that I have not yet read. I am aware, however, of his big and small screen associations. (Which doesn’t mean that I have seen most of these either.)

   But if several of the following films and TV work were easily available, I’m sure there would be much pleasure to be had in the viewing (or at least, the experience). While one can respect and appreciate that viewing screen adaptations of any author’s work is not the same as experiencing the original art of the written word, there remains with me a certain fascination of how the literary concept is translated into a (albeit condensed) visual storytelling form. An art in itself, of course.

   Research shows that the following have Coxe credentials (in one form or another) and are worthy of further investigation. Well, some of them, perhaps!

Women Are Trouble (1936, d. Errol Taggart). With Stuart Erwin as Matt Casey, a newspaper reporter following up a series of robberies and murders. Screenplay by producer Michael Fessier, from story by GHC.

Murder With Pictures (1936, d. Charles Barton). Lew Ayres is Kent Murdock in a plot that kicks off with the murder of a gangland lawyer. Screenplay by John C. Moffitt and Sidney Salkow, from story by GHC.

The Shadow Strikes (1937, d. Lynn Shores). Based on the story “The Ghost of the Manor” by Maxwell Grant in The Shadow (15 June 1933). Rod La Rocque as Lamont Cranston. Screenplay by Al Martin, from adaptation by Martin, Rex Taylor and GHC. Intended by producer Colony Pictures to be the first of four “Shadow” films.

Here’s Flash Casey (1937, d. Lynn Shores). Based on the short story “Return Engagement” by GHC in Black Mask (March 1934). Eric Linden is Flash Casey. Screenplay by John Krafft.

Arsene Lupin Returns (1938, d. Geo. Fitzmaurice). Silky Melvyn Douglas was the silky Arsene Lupin. Based on characters created by Maurice Leblanc, the story and screenplay was by James Kevin McGuinness, Howard Emmett Rogers and GHC.

The Hidden Eye (1945, d. Richard Whorf). Based on the novel The Last Express (1937) by Baynard Kendrick. Screenplay by GHC, Harry Ruskin, from story by GHC. One of the two pleasing MGM Captain Duncan Maclain films starring Edward Arnold (the other being Eyes in the Night, 1942).

   For the home screen, there was Crime Photographer (CBS, 1951-52) featuring Richard Carlyle (brief stint, 1951) and Darren McGavin (1951-52) as Casey of The Morning Express.

    “The Category is Murder” (1957) for Kraft Television Theatre (NBC), about a TV quizmaster who drops dead of poisoning during a show. Betsy Palmer and Gene Lyons featured. And that’s about all I know about this one. GHC as teleplay or story source?

    “Focus on Murder”(1958, d. Bill Corrigan) for Kraft Television Theatre featured Si Oakland as Kent Murdock in a story about a Pulitzer Prize reporter found murdered in his apartment. Mel Goldberg adapted from novel by GHC.

    “Mission of Fear” (1963, d. Harvey Hart) for U.S. Steel Hour (CBS) involved the statuesque Salome Jens and Robert Horton in a blackmail story written by Richard F. Stockton [from story/source by GHC?].

   A list of credits without benefit of personal insight or opinion can be somewhat dreary, I know, but I have not been fortunate enough to view most of the above titles, especially the rare TV work. Perhaps others with more opportune moments of viewing access may offer a more satisfying sense of form and flavour.

   For my part, it is hoped that I have viewing pleasures to look forward to — one day.

   The following entries will appear shortly in the online Addenda to the Revised Crime Fiction IV, by Allen J. Hubin. The annotations, links and images have been provided by me (Steve) as usual. Note that the bulk of this post is taken up by novelizations and other tie-in’s connected with the BBC television series, Between the Lines.

GRANT, GRAEME. 1961- . Born in Aberdeen, Scotland; occupation: writer. Pseudonym: Tom McGregor, q.v. Under his own name, the author of three novels included in the Revised Crime Fiction IV, all novelizations of either a film or television series.

McGREGOR, TOM. Pseudonym of Graeme Grant, 1961- , q.v. Under this pen name, the author of 15 books cited in the Revised Crime Fiction IV, most of them novelizations of various television series, including Cracker, Due South, Kavanagh QC and two for the BBC-TV police drama series Between the Lines. Add/revise series characters in each of the latter two: Complaints Investigation Bureau (Tony Clark, Harry Naylor, Maureen Connell). [The C.I.B. is the department responsible for investigating other police officers.] See also author Diane Pascal for one other novelization of the series.
      The Chill Factor. Warner, UK, pb, 1994. Novelization of the “Between the Lines” BBC-TV series.
      Close Protection. Warner, UK, pb, 1994. Novelization of the “Between the Lines” BBC-TV series.

MANRING, E(RNEST?) H. 1931?-1998? Add as a new author entry.
      _Man Alone. Belmont Tower, pb, 1975. Retitled edition of Steve Douglas of Sleepy Cat Ranch (Belmont, 1971).

      Steve Douglas of Sleepy Cat Ranch. Belmont, pb, 1971. Reprinted as Man Alone (Belmont Tower, 1975). “Steve Douglas could have walked away and let the Mafia goons take over his ranch for their own dirty reasons, but this stubborn wild horse tamer … didn’t take kindly to having city trash telling them what [he] could and couldn’t do.”

PASCAL, DIANE.
   Between the Lines: Breaking Point. Warner, UK, pb, 1993. Setting: Liverpool. Novelization of the BBC-TV police drama series Between the Lines. Add series characters: Complaints Investigation Bureau (Tony Clark, Harry Naylor, Maureen Connell). [The C.I.B. is the department responsible for investigating other police officers.] See also author Tom McGregor for two other novelizations of the series.

NOTE: At the present time, the book below, another tie-in with the BBC-TV series Between the Lines will not be added to the Revised Crime Fiction IV unless supporting evidence in its favor can be found or is provided:

ZUKOWSKA, KRYSTYNA.
   Between the Lines: Tony Clark’s Dossier. Boxtree, UK, pb, 1994. According to a description provided on one website, this book purports to be “a collection of case reports assembled by Clark [a character in the TV series] while he was trying to work out who had been sending him death threats. There [is also] a collection of photographs from the first two seasons, pretending to be from his own photo album.”

Q. E. D.   CBS, 1982. Cast listed below.

    “Q. E. D.” are the initials of Professor Quentin Everett Deverill (Sam Waterston) who, on a self-initiated exile from Harvard University in the year 1912, ends up in England, where he puts his scientific abilities to good use in having a fine time going on far-fetched adventures and solving crimes, and in the process, saving the world more than once.

   I only vaguely remember this series when it was on. It lasted only six weeks, although I’m sure more were planned. The sets and general ambiance, with the series filmed in the UK, are nicely (if not lavishly) done. The performances are doubly fine — I’ll get to the primary cast shortly — but the stories themselves are creaky and old, disconnected and disjointed, too short of material for the hour time slot, and frankly, rather dull.

   I’ve found a few photos to use here on the blog, and since I still don’t know how to embed videos here, you’ll have to follow the link to see a long clip from the first show, including the opening credits, complete with the light-hearted type of music that signifies that this is going to be a comedy as well as a serious adventure. (And how can you not look at Sam Waterston in the image above and not at least smile?)

   But when you watch too many episodes in as short a time as I did — just over a week — the music will also all but drive you up a wall, or into a moat, or some such more or less drastic means of trying to avoid it.

   Thankfully, though, Kilkiss’s role is dropped by the fourth episode, his name and face no longer appearing in the opening credits. There are, after all, only so many ways, someone can take over the world, even a diabolically clever genius.

   Having been kept from firing rockets at London in the first episode and the pilot for the series, there is only one way to go from there, and that’s down. Assassination plots and the winning of motor races simply do not compare, either in magnitude or innate possibilities.

   When I saw Deverill described by wikipedia as being a Sherlock Holmes type of mystery solver in Edwardian England, I jumped at the chance to obtain DVDs of the complete series, but alas! There is very little deduction, although the last two shows seemed be heading in that direction, but unfortunately, too late.

            Episode list:

      1. 03-23-82. Target: London.
      2. 03-30-82. The Great Motor Race.
      3. 04-06-82. Infernal Device.
      4. 04-13-82. The 4:10 to Zurich.
      5. 04-20-82. To Catch a Ghost.
      6. 04-27-82. The Limehouse Connection.

   In “To Catch a Ghost,” for example, Deverill and company are required to find the culprit behind the ghosts haunting Jenny’s aunt’s castle of a home, and perhaps it’s the best episode of the series. “The Limehouse Connection” is the grittiest of the six, taking place as it does in the opium dens of Limehouse, London’s original Chinatown, and the underground boxing matches of the era, but I’d also have to add that when you get down to details, the story itself doesn’t hold a lot of water.

   In spite of the weak plots that contained too much filler for this fellow — the uniformly favorable comments by others on IMDB are due to a rather common combination of nostalgia and faulty memories — I grew fond of the cast over the course of the six episodes and ten evenings, and believe it or not — faults and all — I would have willingly watched more of them if I could have.

THE D.A. TV mini-series. ABC, 2004. Cast listed below. James Duff, executive producer; Gil Garcetti, consulting producer.

   This was one of the best shows about the inner workings of the legal system of a large US city (Los Angeles) that viewers, for whatever reason, never saw. The ratings were bad, and any hope that this short term, pre-summer series would come back in the fall was nipped at once in the bud.

   Only four episodes were made, and all four were telecast. Thank goodness for small favors:

         19 March 2004. Episode 1: The People vs. Sergius Kovinsky

         26 March 2004. Episode 2: The People vs. Patricia Henry

         2 April 2004. Episode 3: The People vs. Oliver C. Handley

         9 April 2004. Episode 4: The People vs. Achmed Abbas

                  Cast:

         Steven Weber … Distrist Atty. David Franks

         Bruno Campos … Deputy Dist. Atty. Mark Camacho

         Sarah Paulson … Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Lisa Patterson

         J. K. Simmons … Deputy Dist. Atty. for Major Crimes Joe Carter

         Peter Outerbridge … Deputy Mayor Jerry Weicker

         Felicity Huffman … Charlotte Ellis, noted defense attorney, formerly of the D.A.’s office

         Michaela Conlin … Jinette McMahon, Mr. Franks’ media and campaign assistant

         Cheryl White … Kathy Franks, the D.A.’s wife

   I’ve not burdened you before now by commenting on the television shows I’ve watched while this blog has been active, but in this case, I thought I’d make an exception. The show came and went very quickly, so I’m willing to wager that most of you did not see it when it was broadcast, including myself. Before last week, I’d never even heard of it.

   I happened to come across someone who had all four episodes on DVD, and I obtained them from him. And the last four nights I’ve spent watching them, one after the other. Time well spent, in my mind.

   I’ve found only two images to show you. The first is the one above of the major players in the cast, the second that of David Franks below as he opens a suicide note in episode 3, and immediately recuses himself from the case and refuses to talk about it, to the consternation of his staff. It turns out that the dead woman’s husband had died of leukemia because their HMO had refused to pay for a bone marrow transplant, part of a pattern of similar denials.

   In episode 4, a case of terrorism is reopened when the suspected killer’s body is found under a parking lot — one that had been paved over two days before the killing. The only problem? He can’t be conclusively identified.

   Episode 2: A well-known comedy entertainer is gunned down as he enters his home. His wife pleads spousal abuse. Defending her is Charlotte Ellis (Felicity Huffman), one of two possible contenders for Franks’ job in an upcoming election. The deputy mayor is the other.

   Episode 1 [and I seem to have done this wrong] centers on the shooting of a prosecution witness while in seclusion. Question: Where did the leak come from?

   While the detective work conducted by young Mark Camacho (Bruno Campos) is extremely well conceived — and I do not say that lightly — what makes this series of cases all the more watchable is the peek it provides into the power politics that goes on behind the scenes in the offices of a most highly politically motivated district attorney’s office and his staff, some of whom dislike him very much. Camacho, who’s new on the job, walks right into the midst of it. Who’s loyal to who? That’s what he needs to know, and soon.

   One of the few reviews I found of the show called it dull. A typical TV-beat hack reporter at work here. Because there is little actual gunplay (well, now that I think about it, there was once a fairly graphic scene, but all of the other deaths were well after the fact) nor car chases in any of the four episodes, it is therefore dull? Not on your life. The total combined intellectual level is as high or higher here than in any other full-season series I have ever watched. (Admittedly there are very few that fall into that category, but the statement is still true.)

   Steven Weber as D. A. David Franks is man of contradictions. Derided by his staff as a hack, he also has a bent for justice, the word “bent” used deliberately, as bending the rules sometimes is exactly what is needed to make the wheels of justice go around. Gil Garcetti, mentioned in the credits, was himself the D.A. for Los Angeles County at one time, as some of you may remember. I’ll bet he wishes some of his cases could be finished in 45 minutes at a time, that’s what I bet.

   Note to self: Both Garcetti and James Duff have been involved with another television series, The Closer, shown on TNT. I’ve not been watching it, and perhaps I should have been.

   Perhaps the limitation of only four shows was a Good Thing, as certainly there was not enough time in the few episodes The D. A. was on to have the stories to become predictable in any way, for they were not. I was caught leaning the wrong way more than once.

   Don’t you just love it when that happens? I do.

Hi Steve,

   Regarding your recent posting, in the interests of perhaps useless footnotes and trivia, I’d like to add some further film and TV notes to the following names:

      Stephen COULTER

Film: Embassy (UK, 1972) d. Gordon Hessler. Screenplay by William Fairchild, based on the novel by Stephen Coulter. Story revolves around the efforts of a U.S. diplomatic mission in Beirut to smuggle out Max Von Sydow’s Russian defector. For followers of the absurd, this Mel Ferrer production cast Chuck Connors as a KGB assassin impersonating an American Air Force colonel.

      Ian MACKINTOSH

TV: Warship (BBC, 1973-77) co-creator with Anthony Coburn of this 45 eps x 50 mins. drama about Royal Navy life onboard a frigate.

TV: Wilde Alliance (ITV, 1978) producer and occasional scriptwriter of the 13 x hour comedy-thriller featuring the amateur sleuthing adventures of a thriller novelist and his busybody wife (the latter in the Pamela North, Jennifer Hart vein).

TV: The Sandbaggers (ITV, 1978; 1980) creator and main writer (until his death in 1979) of this tightly made and occasionally grim espionage saga.

TV: Thundercloud (ITV, 1979) creator/writer/executive producer of the 13 half-hour comedy series featuring a group of sailors operating on a shore-based station that the Admiralty thinks is a destroyer in the North Sea.

      William MARSHALL

TV: Yellowthread Street (ITV, 1990) was a 13-episode series adapted from the novel by William Marshall focusing on British detectives in the Hong Kong force; a costly, on-location production attempting Miami Vice on the seemingly Triad-ridden streets of steamy Hong Kong. Marshall also scripted the episode “Spirit Runner.”

      James MAYO

Film: Hammerhead (UK, 1968) d. David Miller. Screenplay by William Bast, Herbert Baker, based on the 1964 novel by James Mayo. Features Vince Edwards as U.S. secret agent Charles Hood. The Variety review in July 1968 suggested that it ‘might be dubbed a junior edition of Goldfinger without any of the sock elements of the James Bond film’.

      Alfred MAZURE

Film: Secrets of Sex (UK, 1969) d. Antony Balch. Screenplay by Martin Locke, John Eliot, Maureen Owen, Elliott Stein, Antony Balch; ‘Lindy Leigh’ segment based on the story by Alfred Mazure. Exploitation sex film featuring a collection of titillating stories connected by the view that sex is less often fun than funny (with truckloads of 1969 nudity for the furtive front-row viewer).

   Mazure’s story tells of Agent 28 Lindy Leigh’s assignment by the British Home Office to rob the safe at the Moravian Embassy; she succeeds in her mission to enter the safe, only to discover that it’s a harem housing female agents who have failed in the same mission. The topless Maria Frost plays the topless Lindy Leigh.

      Alan WHITE

Film: The Long Day’s Dying (UK, 1968) d. Peter Collinson. Screenplay by Charles Wood, based on the 1965 novel (US: Death Finds the Day) by Alan White. Men trained in the art of killing, in this instance three British paratroopers somewhere in occupied Europe during the Second World War, as skilled practitioners in nothing more than a competitive game (war) is the core of this film, starring David Hemmings, Tom Bell and Tony Beckley. The director takes some 95 dreary minutes to make his point.

   Now, if only Secrets of Sex was available on DVD (for research purposes, of course)…

               Regards,

                  Tise

>>> Thank you very much, Tise, and do I have news for you. Secrets of Sex is available on DVD in this country, subtly disguised as the following: