The Untouchables (TV Series) The King of Champagne (1961) User Reviews

During the Depression, some folks had a thirst for the good stuff and these slobs were more than happy to oblige!

[planktonrules · 9/10 · 2 March 2016]

In this episode of "The Untouchables", an ordinary looking guy, Edmund Wald (Michael Constantine) manufactures bottles and this could turn out to be VERY profitable since he's come upon a way to make cheap fake champagne which could pass for the real stuff. And, during the Depression the stuff is going for $10 or more a bottle...making this a potentially a goldmine. But he needs some startup help. He needs contacts so he begins working with Michel Viton (Barry Morse). But he needs more--bottling equipment (which they kill to get) and money. As for the money, Wald seeks it out from his incredibly cheap and nasty uncle (Robert Middleton). Through the course of this show, see how these men and Wald's assistant sink deeper and deeper into murder and depravity to make their fortunes.

This is a very juicy episode...full of ordinary looking folks becoming consumed by greed and evil. I also appreciated how the deaf character played by George Kennedy actually WAS using American Sign Language...not just some made up gibberish (though Constantine's signs back to him WERE gibberish). Well worth seeing and well written. Greed at its worst...and most entertaining.

Three kings

[AlsExGal · 8/10 · 19 March 2022]

Michel Viton goes into business with bottler Edmund Wald (Michael Constantine) to bottle and distribute an alternative to champagne during prohibition. Champagne has been difficult to impossible to imitate up to this point, but Edmund has connected with somebody who has mastered the formula for a good imitation. Edmund, in need of funds to start up his operation, turns to his uncle, Barney Loomis (Robert Middleton), who owns a successful restaurant.

This is a noir-like episode in that it is a study in greed of three people who start out in legitimate businesses. All three are really despicable, aggrieved, greedy people before they are involved in an actual criminal enterprise, so I hardly sympathized with them as they got in deeper and deeper. None of the players are designated "special guest stars", but the actor not even mentioned in the opening credits - George Kennedy - is probably the actor best known today. In this episode he plays the deaf mute muscle for Michael Constantine's character and he does something that I haven't seen up to this point in the series - he attacks and tries to strangle Eliot Ness.

Corner the market on champagne

[bkoganbing · 5/10 · 18 November 2013]

The time that this Untouchables episode is taking place is November of 1932 after the election when FDR was president-elect and everyone knew Prohibition was coming to an end. Which makes all the maneuvering in this story quite unfathomable. A little patience and everyone would be drinking legally.

But Michael Constantine wants to corner the market in champagne and goes through an elaborate scheme to do just that. He takes into partnership an elegant Frenchman in Barry Morse and a penny pinching restaurant owner Robert Middleton who is Constantine's uncle.

Both Morse and Middleton squeeze Constantine pretty good and in the end he decides it might be better to be a sole proprietor. Unfortunately for him Robert Stack and his team are hot on his trail.

Also in this episode is George Kennedy who plays a deaf mute killer for Constantine who only wants to be paid in booze.

Good cast, but only a fair story.