Tue 6 Mar 2012
A Made-for-TV Movie Review: LADY AGAINST THE ODDS (1992). [Rex Stout’s Dol Bonner.]
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV mysteries[15] Comments
LADY AGAINST THE ODDS. Made-for-TV movie, NBC, 20 April 1992. Crystal Bernard (Dol Bonner), Annabeth Gish, Rob Estes, Kevin Kilner, John Finn, Dan Castellaneta, Heather McAdam, Steven Flynn, Roy Thinnes, Polly Bergen, Barbara Luna. Based on the novel The Hand in the Glove, by Rex Stout. Director: Bradford May.
The Hand in the Glove is one of the small handful of mysteries written by Rex Stout that did not include Nero Wolfe as a character, and I have to admit that I’ve never read it, perhaps for that very same reason. In fact there’s no doubt about it. I confess!
While it may be true that as a devout Nero Wolfe fan – and I have been since I was 12 – I might not have missed anything by passing this one by, but looking back, I kind of wish that I hadn’t. At least I could talk intelligently about it, instead of what I am doing now, and I apologize. But I’ll fake it a little, and maybe not too many people will notice.
For example. I do know that the book took place in New York circa 1937 (when the book was written) and the movie takes place in Los Angeles in 1943.
And whereas in the book wealthy businessman P. L. Storrs (Roy Thinnes) hires female PI Dol Bonner to check out the charlatan who’s inveigling his way into his family, in the movie it’s a wartime buddy of their dead son who’s doing the same, and whom she’s asked to investigate.
This is the kind of job that Dol and Sylvia Raffray, her partner in PI work, are equipped to do. They’re not ready for the big leagues, though, as they quickly discover when their client is found hanged from a tree behind his mansion. The killer used gloves to protect his hands; hence the title of the novel.
The color photography is quite terrific, reproducing the period in wonderful detail – the clothing, the hairdos, the newspapers, the automobiles – all extremely well done. But there’s no spark to the tale. It may be that there are too many characters, and it takes a lot of time for the viewer to know who each of them are, and their relationships to each other. All of these characters seem to have known each other for a long time before the story begins. It takes the viewer a while to catch up.
To be honest, and I’m sure you realize this, I’m talking about me. But I don’t believe the movie did all that well in the ratings, and assuming that it was intended to be a pilot for a possible series, it didn’t work, no matter how much money was spent on production.
There’s no spark to the story, as I said before. I’ll lay some of the blame on the actors also. When you watch a movie and you see actors playing their roles, instead of being their roles, then you know that something is just not working.
March 6th, 2012 at 7:40 pm
I doubt this was a pilot for a TV series. Crystal Bernard had a major role in the TV series WINGS at the time.
March 6th, 2012 at 9:09 pm
Yes, two years into a eight year run on WINGS. I have to agree with you.
March 6th, 2012 at 9:24 pm
On the other hand, I knew I’d read somewhere that the movie wasn’t intended as a one-and-done. I didn’t find that, but I found an online interview with Crystal Bernard that says it was a pilot of sorts:
From the CHICAGO SUN-TIMES, 15 April 1992:
http://www.crystal-bernard.info/articles02/sun_times02_article.php
“Bonner could become the heroine of a TV-movie series that would air several times a year, like Raymond Burr’s PERRY MASON whodunits. ‘That would be cool, but I would have to shoot the movies during hiatus periods,’ Bernard said. ‘We filmed LADY AGAINST THE ODDS in four weeks, so it can be done. But I would never give WINGS up.'”
What also struck me while watching it is that the production values were a lot higher than they might have been for a single shot TV film. In fact it won an Emmy for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Cinematography for a Miniseries or a Special: Bradford May (cinematographer) . (Taken from IMDB.)
March 6th, 2012 at 10:12 pm
Nice research work, Steve. I’m impressed.
March 6th, 2012 at 10:22 pm
I never knew this movie existed. I tried a Dol Bonner book once and didn’t get far. I read Red Threads – Stout’s Inspector Cramer standalone – and wasn’t real impressed with that either. I’ll stick with Wolfe from here on out.
March 7th, 2012 at 12:39 am
There was only the one solo Dol Bonner novel, the one this movie was based on, though she showed up every so often in the Wolfe novels whenever he needed a female operative. I think she helped out on one of Tecumseh Fox’s cases too, but only in a minor role.
I never tried any of the Fox books, but I did read RED THREADS. But like you, Bill, I was rather disappointed with it.
I don’t know exactly how, but Stout hit paydirt when he came up with the Wolfe and Archie characters. If his career had depended on Cramer, Bonner or Fox, I think it would have been a rather short one.
March 7th, 2012 at 10:51 am
If in fact this movie wasn’t intended as a “one-and-done,” you have to wonder exactly how poorly it fared in the ratings, even up against nothing but repeats (Murphy Brown, Northern Exposure, Star Trek III: The Search for Spock,” etc). I have to admit I haven’t seen the film, but I have an awfully hard time envisioning Crystal Bernard as a PI.I do find it very, very interesting, however, that a book written in 1937 (if I understand Steve correctly) features a female professional private investigator (as opposed to the Agatha Christie amateur variety). Surely this was not a common occurrence? I am under the impression that the female PI became an item with the so-called “female dick” neo-noirs of the eighties and nineties, like Kathleen Turner in V.I. Warshawski.
March 7th, 2012 at 12:00 pm
I saw this on Netflix instant view (don’t know if it is still available) along with This Girl For Hire which is another period female PI made for TV movie (that I liked more). Its OK but I would rather watch the new season of Top Gear (British version of course) they just added . . .
March 7th, 2012 at 1:13 pm
David
I meant to say something about the historical significance of Dol Bonner as a female PI, but somehow it didn’t manage to get said.
From the Thrilling Detective website, here’s a timeline of early female PI’s:
https://www.thrillingdetective.com/trivia/triv138.html
.
1933
Trixie Meehan and Mike Harris by T.T. Flynn
Make no mistake — big, rugged Mike was supposedly the lead here, but his “pert sidekick” Trixie was what made these stories, which appeared in Detective Fiction Weekly, so special.
.
1934
Grace Culver by Roswell Brown
One of the first female eyes, Grace appeared in the back pages of The Shadow. She worked for the Noonan Detective Agency as a secretary and sometime-op, and while she wasn’t exactly hardboiled, she was smart, brave and independant. Think of her as Kinsey, Sharon et al’s great grandmother.
.
Nora Charles by Dashiell Hammett
Smart, tough when she has to be, but always a woman. And she knows how to drink.
.
1935
Violet McDade and Nevada Alvarado by Cleve F. Adams
The first hardboiled lady eye, Violet McDade, and her partner, Nevada Alvarado, slugged their way through a string of stories in the pulps
.
1936
Sarah Watson by D.B. McCandless
Another pulp eye, this one “medium-boiled,” although she admits she’d like to “beat up a man proper, for once!”
.
Torchy Blane by Frederick Nebel (sorta)
The movies transformed Nebel’s drunken reporter Kennedy into fast-talkin’ girl newshawk Torchy Blane, in a successful (and influential) series starring Glenda Farrell.
.
1937
Carrie Cashin by Theodore Tinsley
The most popular of the female pulp eyes by a long shot. Attractive as sin, hardboiled as hell, she appeared in over three dozen pulp stories.
.
Dol Bonner by Rex Stout
Possibly the first novel featuring a woman private detective. Although the book never had a sequel, Dol showed up later in several of Stout’s Nero Wolfe books.
Me again. I wouldn’t include Nora Charles as a private eye, if it were me. All of the stories about the other ladies mentioned here came from the pulp magazines. Personally, without doing some more looking into it, I’d be careful about saying that Dol Bonner was the first to appear in novel form, but if not, she was right up there toward the front of the line.
March 7th, 2012 at 1:17 pm
Stan
David Vineyard reviewed THIS GIRL FOR HIRE for this blog in February of last year.
https://mysteryfile.com/blog/?p=7864
It stirred up a lot of discussion at the time since David wondered, and I quote:
“If any of this sounds a little familiar it may be because save for the actual plot, the characters, setting, and the name are all taken from This Girl For Hire by G. G. Fickling — the first Honey West novel, by a husband-and-wife writing team.”
Without any credit to the Ficklings, he went on to say.
March 8th, 2012 at 9:13 am
Steve, thanks for that timeline. Very informative!
March 11th, 2012 at 10:06 pm
RE: timeline – what about Bertha Cool?
March 11th, 2012 at 10:46 pm
Bertha Cool came along a little later, but not by much. The first Cool-Donald Lam book was The Bigger They Come, Morrow 1939.
March 11th, 2012 at 10:46 pm
Bertha Cool first appeared in 1939, after Dol Bonner. There was an unsold TV pilot done in 1958 about Bertha. While it never aired it is available in the collector to collector market/
March 18th, 2023 at 11:57 am
I, too, have read The Hand in the Glove and Red Threads, but none of the three Tecumseh Fox novels, about which a wee bit more in my next Wolfe post. Bonner and Cramer are both good characters, and used to good effect in the Wolfe series proper, but the absence of Archie’s narration in their third-person stand-alone books is, in my opinion, a blow to their readability.