Sat 16 Jan 2021
TV Episode Review: MR. & MRS. NORTH “Weekend Murder.â€
Posted by Steve under Reviews , TV mysteries[11] Comments
MR. & MRS. NORTH “Weekend Murder.†CBS, 03 October, 1952 (Season 1, Episode 1.) Barbara Britton (Pamela North), Richard Denning (Jerry North), Francis De Sales (Lt. Bill Weigand). Guest Cast: Margo Wood, Rita Johnson, Paul Cavanagh, James Kirkwood. Writer: DeWitt Bodeen, based on the characters created by Frances & Richard Lockridge. Director: Ralph Murphy.
The TV version of Mr. & Mrs. North lasted for two seasons, the first on CBS from 1952-53, and the second, only 18 episodes long, on NBC in 1954. They were also on the radio from 1942 to 1954. Alice Frost and Joseph Curtin had the title roles for most of the run. And of course before that, there were the books, 26 of them, before Frances Lockridge’s death in 1963. After her passing, her husband Richard continued writing, but he never produced a Norths novel on his own.
It surely must have helped that so many people knew who the Norths were, because this, the first TV episode jumps right into the story without so much of an introduction. (I think this was common, however, back in the early days of television.) In any case, it is Jerry, a book publisher who has to be persuaded by his wife Pam to take a weekend off and spend it at a famous actress’s country home, somewhere outside Manhattan and their usual city environs.
But as chance would have it, when they all arrive, the housekeeper is missing and there is a dead man in the kitchen closet. As in all the books and their other adventures, it is Pam who decides that she needs to solve the case. Jerry would just as soon let the police handle it. I don’t know whether (or how many) other married sleuths tackled their cases in this same particular way, but this was the usual Norths’ modus operandi, with Pam always sticking her neck out a little too far along the way. And so it is here.
I don’t think that most readers of the books had too much to complain about in terms of the casting. Richard Denning does ham up the comedy a little too much for my tastes, but that’s just me. As for the case itself, the clue to the killer is way too obvious, although the writer does try to gloss it over as it happens. Not enough so for a long-time TV crimesolver such as myself, though.
January 16th, 2021 at 12:54 am
No thoughts about Barbara Britton?
January 16th, 2021 at 2:29 am
Barry,
My thoughts exactly.
I can’t have seen and recalled these first run, I was barely 2 when this ran, but I do remember from 4 or 5 on having a huge crush on Britton’s Pam North.
The North’s as played by Denning and Britton were my entry drug to the genre, and while I grant even the best episodes of the series are perfunctory at best in today’s terms, they were then bright, just a bit sexy, and considerably more sophisticated than most series fare.
I was twelve or so when I discovered the books, and to this day it is largely Denning and Britton I envision when reading them, and read them I still do, delighted they are available again in e-book form and read as well as I remember them.
The thing about Pam, that I think only Fred Dannay ever gave her credit for (in the introduction to THE PEOPLE VS WITHERS AND MALONE) is that she is a Great Detective figure (he suggests her as an Archie Goodwin replacement for Nero Wolfe as the ultimate “Leg Man”), albeit a sexy, cat obsessed, martini swigging, lateral thinking, sophisticated housewife Great Detective.
Of all the married sleuths Pam is probably the most proactive female sleuth other than Halia Troy (Jean Abbot and the distaff side of the McNeils seem to spend more time HIBKing than sleuthing from my perspective) and most of the rest like the Duluth’s, Marshalls, and Blakes the man is the detective.
Pam wins hands down just by sheer number of cases solved though she also has a tendency to put the final pieces together at the most inopportune times — usually when alone with the killer or when Bill Weigand and Jerry aren’t available to save her until the last minute.
Jerry only really seems to be fired up about trying to keep Pam from getting killed.
I don’t know if I would put any North mystery among the best the genre has to offer, but they are among the most entertaining and fun the genre offered, good plots, likable protagonists, decent mystery, often very well done suspense elements, smart writing, a sheen of sophistication, not too annoying cats (at least for me), and frankly I have known more than one Pam North style lateral thinker, married a few, and enjoyed every minute of it probably as a result of that youthful crush on Barbara Britton.
January 16th, 2021 at 7:50 am
I didn’t see your question until this morning, Barry, but how could I improve on David’s reply? In a word, she was perfect in the role. Perfect, and I should have been clearer about that in my review.
January 16th, 2021 at 10:20 am
David, Steve, these are my sentiments, exactly. Love Barbra Britton.
January 16th, 2021 at 10:40 am
To see this episode online, and many more, go to:
https://www.solie.org/alibrary/MrandMrsNorth.html
January 16th, 2021 at 10:45 pm
Is Barbara Britton the landlady to Ray Walston and Bill Bixby in ‘My Favorite Martian’? That’s imprinted on my recall for that name.
As far as ‘Mr. and Mrs. North’ on radio. This is a program which I should have an insight on, but I’m caught wit’out one.
I know the serial exists, I know it has a decent reputation, but ..I’ve never sought it out. And I listen to a hell of a lot of OTRR and music and etcetera from the 1930s and 40s. It’s a deliberate omission on my part.
Somehow this sub-genre (husband and wife crime-solving duos replete with vivacious and sparkling murder quips) rarely pulls me in; unless that duo be Hammett’s Nick and Nora. Or Agatha Christie’s ‘Tommy and Tuppence’
January 16th, 2021 at 11:00 pm
Sort of close, but not really: Pamela Britton is the name you are looking for, and very good, but Barbara was pretty near a movie star, and just adorable.
January 16th, 2021 at 11:05 pm
Lloyd Kolmar, originally William Morris agent, later on his own representing talent principally for commercial endorsements, negotiated a contract for Barbara Britton with Revlon, as television spokeswoman, which was the first above scale deal ever made. Oh, and no one at the agency believed this was even possible much less a groundbreaking arrangement.
January 16th, 2021 at 11:07 pm
Always fun to learn more lore. And this is the place for it. Thank ya!
How about…the nosey next door neighbor of Elizabeth Montgomery in ‘Bewitched’? I sometimes suspected ‘Mrs. Kravitz’ had a previous career in the big studios.
That voice of hers. Eeech.
January 18th, 2021 at 7:21 pm
This sounds like a great series! I’ve heard of this sleuthing couple before, but have never been able to track any of the books down. A fine review!
Also, David – an entertaining recollection in its own right. I hope you and your own Pam Norths never encountered any murder!
Steve – Thanks for linking to Uncle Earl’s site, as I haven’t discovered it before. I’m now really excited to see this series and so much else! Goes to show that the internet can be a wonderful, positive thing!
January 18th, 2021 at 8:03 pm
Uncle Earl’s is quite a site, isn’t it? If I let myself, I could spend every evening there and do nothing else.