Perry Mason (TV Series) The Case of the Wary Wildcatter (1960) User Reviews

Maybe not the best story- but great courtroom action.

[kfo9494 · 7/10 · 28 May 2012]

Roger Byrd, an novice nature photographer, is filming wildlife along a roaming meadow. Mr Byrd hears some commotion coming from the road above and points his camera toward the area. He sees a man, Charles Houston, placing his unconscious wife behind the wheel of a car right before pushing the car over a canyon cliff.

Mr Byrd then blackmails Mr Houston or he will release the pictures to the district attorney's office. Mr Houston, who has half interest in an oil well, has to over-sell his portion to pay Mr Byrd. Everything will be alright if the oil well does not produce - but to his dismay the oil well is a gusher. Now people that brought into his scheme- Lucky Sterling a big time gambler, Madelyn Terry the gambler girlfriend and Paula Wallace his dead wife's sister- will soon discover that he is unable to make the claims that he sold.

But before all that can happen Mr Houston is found shot in Mr Byrd's apartment. The police catch Paula Wallace running from the building and with the help of a witness claim that she murdered Mr Houston.

Even though there seems to be much activity in the story, by the time we get to the murder, the show has become cloudy with all the characters and the strange occurrence of events. But it picks up quite nicely when we get to the courtroom scenes.

Perry is at the top of his game when he faces Hamilton Burger at the bar. The show picks up pace with the exchanges and testimony in the courtroom. This action, plus the acting of the actors, saves this episode from digressing into boredom. A good watch for everyone and will have you guessing right till the end.

Oil's well that ends well...

[AlsExGal · 7/10 · 24 December 2022]

... as this week's Perry Mason episode takes us into the world of oil well drilling

Freelance photographer Roger Byrd is taking pictures of wildlife when he spots wildcatter Charles Houston posing his dead wife's body in his car and pushing it off a cliff, making it look like an accident. With pictures of the entire thing, Byrd blackmails Houston who pays Byrd a total of 45 thousand dollars. To cover this blackmail Houston ends up selling much more than 100% of his oil well to investors to get the needed money. At the same time, Byrd is trying to sell the incriminating photos to Paula Wallace, who is the sister of the murdered woman and has always believed Charles had something to do with her death.

When the oil well turns out to be a gusher, Charles is a distraught man. He is in a situation much like Mel Brooks' film "The Producers" - only the well turning out to be dry could have saved him from disgrace, scandal, and prosecution. Of course he ends up dead, and of course about the only person in tonight's episode who is not a loathsome creature is accused of the crime, that being Paula Wallace.

So what is different about tonight's episode is that the corpse of the week is not entirely self evident by the end of the first fifteen minutes. There are so many possibilities. And then once that person is murdered, any one of the other loathsome creatures guest starring this week could have been the killer. It's an interesting spin on the usual situation.

An Ugly Crew

[Hitchcoc · 8/10 · 8 January 2022]

Just about everyone in this episode is gamey. First, it involves a man who is paying blackmail after being seen pushing his wife's car off a cliff with her in it. Soon we find out that there is an oil well involved and the guy has been selling shares of stock totaling 180 percent. Then the well comes in and there is hell (and money) to pay. But the guy is murdered. The one thing that makes this work is the beautiful Barbara Bain who would go on to star in "Mission Impossible," a few years later.

Super Perry Mason Episode

[gerrytwo-438-470452 · 10/10 · 22 February 2018]

"The Case of the Wary Wildcatter" is one of the best Perry Mason TV series' episodes. Everyone in this story is out for money, a totally cynical story written by Robert Bloomfield. Bloomfield wrote 4 Perry Mason episodes and this one, his last, is the best of the lot. The story starts off with a guy sending a car over a cliff, the car containing the body of his murdered wife. Somehow, a nature photographer/blackmailer with a movie camera is nearby, camera recording the action.

William D. Russell directed this episode, so it is a class job. Somehow, Russell went from directing "Perry Mason" episodes (28 episodes in total through 1960) to directing the "Hazel" TV series (136 episodes, starting in 1961). Russell's presence could only have helped "Perry Mason" from Season Four on, when the series' quality and toughness declined under regular directors Arthur Marx and Jesse Hibbs before hitting rock bottom in Season Nine. Writer Bloomfield wrote a crime novel, "When Strangers Meets" (Pocket Book edition, 1957), that the producers of "Perry Mason" must have read. Bloomfield's career in American television ended around 1967. Bloomfield's credits also includes a 1965 play called "Portrait of Murder." This play is set entirely in the living room of a writer's home, which cuts down on staging costs. An Internet search shows this play gets produced pretty often by theater companies in Great Britain.

For those of us not traveling overseas to the UK in the near future, this Perry Mason episode is a super way to see writer Robert Bloomfield's best work.

Details, details....

[darbski · 10/10 · 3 August 2017]

**SPOILERS** 4 certain. In the beginning there was a void - of any sense of right or wrong, that is. 1st up is the decision by the original sinner to dump his dead wife over a cliff in a sweet 1956 Buick Super. 2-door hardtop, black on black; THIS is inexcusable. You know -- people kill each other all the time, but a cherry Buick? They saved themselves, barely; by pushing a much older Ford or Chevy over the cliff instead, but the thought of the original idea sends death chills through my blood.

Following right along, maybe someone else can explain how the dirtbag blackmailer/ photographer was able to zoom in on a subject (ANY subject), with an unlinked rifle scope? He plays with the lenses, alright, but how can he focus with the optics he was using? He doesn't actually peer through the camera viewfinder. You've gotta see this episode yourself to know what I mean. (available from Amazon, by the way).

Perry got Byrd to admit setting up Paula, and in doing so, cleared her of any charge in this case.After all's said and done, Lucky could have easily lied his way out of the accusation by denying any jealousy, and claiming that Huston sought him out earlier to get money for operational costs. This would be explainable. The well came in, but could not begin paying any investors until it was actually under control and pumping out. Just claim that Madelyn felt guilty about being conned by Huston. Lucky explains that he'd been conned TWICE by the guy, and all was well between he and Madelyn. Byrd was a patsy of his own making; just ready for the gas chamber. Who'd step up for him; he who let his own greed ruin so many other lives? A guy of Lucky's cold business logic; why not let the frame hang on Byrd? Perry's thought was that nobody else could have gotten the money "at that time of night".Alright; except Byrd bought the travel checks BEFORE the bank closed. Dump it all on Byrd. Great acting by Douglas Kennedy, Byron Palmer, and Lori March. Very good episode, the dead guy barrels out when the oil well comes in; he's driving a 1960 Buick LeSabre 2door hardtop. Just after Paul and Paula pull up in his '60 T-Bird (retractable hardtop).

Get the picture

[sol1218 · 6/10 · 2 October 2012]

***SPOILERS*** Your surprised at first watching this Perry Mason episode in that the killer is revealed within the first two minutes as Charles Huston, Bayon Plamer, whom we we together with free lance outdoor photographer Roger Byrd, Harry Jackson, saw him murder his wife,who was already dead, Evelyn by pushing her down a cliff in her car. Your almost about to turn the channel in thinking the surprise ending, in Perry revealing the killer, already happened when before you know It it's Huston who ends up murdered in his hotel-room! And as it turned out it's his sister-in-law Paula Wallace,Lori March, who's the person who found him and is later indited in his murder!

What happened in between all these events is that Byrd, who photographed Huston pushing his wife down the cliff, was blackmailing both Huston & Paula in both keeping quite about who murdered Evelyn her husband Charles Huston and at the same time promising to Paula to give the evidence of Evelyn's murder to the local D.A and have her killer brought to justice! And yes there's a little thing like an oil well that the late Charles Huston was having drilled that he oversold by as much as 200% that if it ever ended up gushing oil he'd be cooked. That's in him not having enough shares of the oil well's stock to pay off his buyers & investors!

***SPOILERS***The not so usually clam but a very aggressive Perry Mason, Raymond Burr, really lays into this case and uncovers the real reason behind Huston's murder and it had nothing at all to do with oil but a jealous boyfriend. Whom Huston was having an affair with his lover who in a fit of insane and uncontrollable rage murdered him! A story as old as man and woman themselves! But it took Perry Mason to dig up all the confusing facts in the case to get Huston's killer to break down and admit, before he was even called on the stand, to committing this dastardly crime.

Sleazy people

[bkoganbing · 4/10 · 27 September 2013]

This Perry Mason episode is about some sleazy people. Freelance photographer Harry Jackson happens to take some pictures of Byron Palmer rolling a car off a cliff with his dead wife's body in it. Jackson knows an opportunity when he sees it and blackmails Palmer for several months.

But that well is running dry and that's not just an expression. Palmer is an oil wildcatter also one of the sleazier of that breed. He's oversold shares in his oil well that his drilling operator King Calder says will be a titanic gusher. Trying to make his last bit of money to pay off Jackson, Palmer sells yet another share to gambler Douglas Kennedy.

In the meantime the only non-sleaze in the cast Lori March plays the sister of Palmer's late wife and she's contacted Raymond Burr. She'll need him when Palmer is murdered and she's at the crime scene.

But Perry Mason defends no guilty clients and in this sleazy crowd the murderer is rather obvious.