A Perry Mason Mystery: The Case of the Jealous Jokester (TV 1995)

Bill McKenzie's niece works as a production assistant for controversial television personality Josie Joplin, who publicly accuses her of having an affair with her husband. One night ... See full summary »

Director:

Vincent McEveety

Writers:

Gerry Conway, Erle Stanley Gardner (characters)

Stars:

Hal Holbrook, Barbara Hale, William R. Moses

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Hal Holbrook	...	Wild Bill McKenzie
Barbara Hale	...	Della Street
William R. Moses	...	Ken Malansky
Tony Roberts	...	Toby Joplin
Victoria Jackson	...	Lisa Kaye
David Rasche	...	Ben Landry
Holland Taylor	...	Janice
Tina Yothers	...	Claire Howard
Khrystyne Haje	...	Patricia MacDonald
Susan Diol	...	Ivy West
James McEachin	...	Lt. Brock
John Laughlin
Leslie Bevis	...	Rosa Westlake
H. Richard Greene
Sal Viscuso

Storyline

Bill McKenzie's niece works as a production assistant for controversial television personality Josie Joplin, who publicly accuses her of having an affair with her husband. One night McKenzie's niece receives a message which she believes is from Josie to go to her hotel room, when she gets there someone knocks her out and when she wakes up, Josie is dead and she's the number one suspect, so McKenzie defends her.

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Mystery

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Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

10 April 1995 (USA)

Also Known As:

Perry Mason: A féltékeny komédiás esete

Filming Locations:

Denver, Colorado, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Dean Hargrove Productions, Fred Silverman Company, Viacom Productions

Technical Specs

Runtime:

96 min

Sound Mix:

Stereo

Color:

Color

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

Final full length film of James McEachin.

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Connections

Follows Perry Mason (1957)

User Reviews

Uncle Bill For The Defense

The last of the contracted Perry Mason television movies is The Case Of The Jealous Jokester where Dyan Cannon plays television mom of Harriet Nelson family values with a comic twist and who is one real hellcat off the stage. Mean, manipulative, and vindictive to all around her, Cannon is probably one woman who really did deserve her fate. The problem is that the perpetrator fixed a good alibi by framing the niece of Wild Bill McKenzie played her by Victoria Jackson.

Hal Holbrook's character was an interesting one and I'm sorry the series wasn't continued with his name on it. I believe that the public just didn't accept him as a Perry Mason lite. Probably because of contracts, the films had to be presented as Perry Mason mysteries. It would have been better had they even just dropped that identifiable theme music, used Barbara Hale and William R. Moses in their characters and simply said that Perry had died.

Barbara Hale was going to retire in any event, in fact you can see she's breaking in Holland Taylor to fill her familiar role. Billy Moses would have no doubt continued as lawyer/investigator Ken Malansky with the Wild Bill McKenzie law firm had they continued the series.

It's not a bad film, but the McKenzie character, maybe because of legal problems was sold wrong.