Tue 15 Sep 2020
A Private Eye TV Episode Review: RICHARD DIAMOND, PRIVATE DETECTIVE “The Mickey Farmer Case†(1957).
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV mysteries[7] Comments
RICHARD DIAMOND, PRIVATE DETECTIVE “The Mickey Farmer Case.†CBS, 30m, 01 July 1957 (Season 1, Episode 1.) David Janssen (Richard Diamond), Regis Toomey (Lt. McGough). Guest cast: Christopher Dark (Mickey Farmer), Virginia Stefan. Screenwriter: Richard Carr, based on characters created by Blake Edwards. Director: Roy Del Ruth. Currently available for viewing on YouTube here.
Richard Diamond appeared first on radio, portrayed by Dick Powell as a suave wisecracking PI for four years on three different networks. When brought to TV, David Janssen took over the role, but at least in this the first episode, he did not have a steady girl friend to whom he sang songs to at the end of each show.
The TV version was done instead in a much more noirish style, with the final scene showing Diamond lighting up a cigarette in a dark alley. Well, I think it was an alley. It was dark out, though, so I may be mistaken.
There was no particular attempt to introduce any of the players in depth in this first episode. It’s obvious that Regis Toomey is playing a tough cop with whom Diamond has a reasonably good relationship with, but that’s doesn’t mean the former doesn’t threaten the latter with losing his license or even doing jail time if he doesn’t stop bending the rules.
In thirty minutes of playing time, there’s no room to do more than this, or even to create more than a minimal story, one in which Diamond is called in to help diffuse a tense hostage situation. But in doing so, he also ends up promising a dying killer that he’d help protect the latter’s girl friend from the guy’s partner, who has turned rat on him.
This was the beginning of Janssen long and successful career in television. Both personable and handsome, he was an actor who was perfectly made for TV, and it shows even in this very short first step. The series itself was on for three years.
September 15th, 2020 at 10:15 pm
The Diamond series not only gave Janssen a boost, and Mary Tyler Moore’s voice as Sam, if not her legs, but also acted as a gateway for the more stylish shows like PETER GUNN and JOHNNY STACCATO. Janssen’s Diamond falls about halfway between Mike Hammer and Peter Gunn.
September 15th, 2020 at 10:25 pm
I don’t believe that Mary Tyler Moore was in this first show, not even her legs. There is a short scene in which Diamond calls his answering service and talks to a sexy voice on the other end of the line, but that’s all she is, a sexy voice.
Later on, by the way, Diamond finds himself with a girl friend, a good-looking fashion designer named Karen Wells, who was played by Barbara Bain. Strangely enough, I never knew this until now!
September 16th, 2020 at 10:37 am
David Janssen is fine and I remember somewhat liking the show, but it was less amusing and certainly less visual than the original Dick Powell productions on radio. If you think about it, that is and was quite a problem for fifties television.
September 16th, 2020 at 11:04 am
When I was younger, back in the 70s when I was collecting as many radio shows as I could, I enjoyed the radio version of RICHARD DIAMOND, but to tell you the truth, I thought the show was kind of goofy, what with the humorous byplay with the thick-witted cop (Otis?) and Dick Powell always singing a song to his girl friend at the end. Now that I’m older, I can see that all that was part of its charm.
As for the TV version, the approach was different, as I hope I tried to get at in my review. Tougher and more stylistic than MIKE HAMMER but not as much as PETER GUNN, as David has already pointed out.
September 17th, 2020 at 9:03 pm
Moore was never seen in the series, and I believe she didn’t show up until they moved to LA.
September 17th, 2020 at 9:42 pm
You’re right about MTM never being seen, only her voice, her legs and (I think) her hair, but only from behind. IMDb says she appears in 10 episodes, all from 1959. Barbara Bain, whom I mentioned above, was in five.
December 26th, 2020 at 1:45 am
Much to chew on here. Enjoyable review and fine comment-contributions.
David Janssen –I confess I don’t know the chronology of his career –was this outing before his stardom as Richard Kimble?
In any case, what American worth any salt, does not admire David Janssen? Something indefinable always set that quirky actor apart. The way he delivered his lines was achingly slow; always latent with angst; he always seemed to be mulling over his next move. I don’t know how he got away with it. But it was a beautiful thing.
“Richard Diamond, Private Eye” on radio with Dick Powell. A horse of another color.
My feelings are so lukewarm towards this production that I’m embarrassed at how many times I’ve actually listened to it.
The truth is, Dick Diamond excels so slickly in its structure and format, that it worms its way into my OTRR listening habits far more often than I’d prefer. I never willingly seek it out, but somehow I wind up an audience to it anyway. The parts are less than the whole, in this case.
Dick Powell simultaneously yawns through his duties at the same time as he hams it up. Probably, he flounced around with his over-the-top Diamond-delivery, just to keep himself amused. I can’t blame him; the mechanics of each episode were never anything dazzling to work with. Every corny serial-contrivance ever invented, supports the progress of the story.
So much for plot. Character-wise? Limp as well. Richard Diamond on radio (as opposed to ANY detective on TV) is maddeningly inconsistent. He croons, he jokes; he brawls; he dances; he wisecracks; he swings; he romances; he brags again; he gets stomped on; he brags again; he gets stomped on again. He’s alternately tough or weak as the script calls for. What he never ever does is develop or mature. He never learns, or grows. He’s deliberately written inconsistently for the sake of always affording him something novel/timely to say or do. Diamond is endlessly mercurial to alleviate the tediousness of his cases. It’s so entirely ‘formula-fighting-formula’ that you listen half-heartedly just to hear if he ever elevates himself above it. He never does. It gets even a little sickening. (The utter worst is when Diamond gets slugged-on-the-head and ‘sinks into a swirling black pool’ etc etc etc.)
Dick Powell is so stagnant in this character that I’d go so far as to say it’s everything except Dick Powell which makes the show function. Instead of whatever he does, I’d rather listen to it for Blake Edwards’ ambitious early-career writing; or for Virginia Gregg (Diamond’s wealthy socialite ladyfriend); or for reliable Ed Begley as Dick’s “crusty old friend on the force”.
Ach. Sigh. You have to hunt for laughs in this slog-fest of Methuselah detective-plot story-tropes. For example, all the various phone calls that take place. The show revolves around phone calls; and it can often evoke hilarity. Or, Diamond’s sparring with front-desk “Sergeant Otis” at headquarters, anytime Dick drops in on his former superior. (Although there never was any such policemen ever so dense as Sergeant Otis, since vaudeville ended).
But –I ask you –what else can one do with a detective so strait-laced and conventional that he never falls for any shady, sultry, femme-fatale clients? Richard Diamond is too clean to be credible. He doesn’t play around. At all. At the end of every episode, Diamond is loyally back with V. Gregg in her hi-rise, indulging her request for a croon-fest; and her anguished downstairs neighbor is always ready to blow-his-brains out because Diamond won’t let him sleep.
We should all be so lucky. Richard Diamond is one of those worst albatrosses of old-time radio. Sometimes you just have to cringe and tolerate it when there’s nothing else available. It ‘is what it is’.
Best Diamond episode? The one where Diamond must take an annual NYPD municipal exam to renew his PI license; during his test a sleazy fellow-PI is found murdered in the station’s basement.