Make Me a Perfect Murder 

An Emmy-winning TV executive kills her lover (who is also her boss); Lt. Columbo is on the case.

Director:

James Frawley

Writers:

Robert Blees, Richard Levinson (created by)

Stars:

Peter Falk, Trish Van Devere, Laurence Luckinbill

Cast

Episode cast overview, first billed only:
Peter Falk	...	Columbo
Trish Van Devere	...	Kay Freestone
Laurence Luckinbill	...	Mark McAndrews
James McEachin	...	Walter Mearhead (as James Mc Eachin)
Ron Rifkin	...	Luther
Lainie Kazan	...	Valerie Kirk
Bruce Kirby	...	TV Repairman
Kip Gilman	...	Jonathan (as Kenneth Gilman)
Patrick O'Neal	...	Frank Flanagan
Milt Kogan	...	Dubbing Chief
Dee Timberlake	...	Madge
Don Eitner	...	Pete Cockrum
Morgan Upton	...	Ames
Joe Warfield	...	Al Staley
George Skaff	...	The Producer

Storyline

Kay Freestone is a West Coast TV executive whose boss, Mark McAndrews, is also her secret lover. When he gets promoted to a position in New York, he dumps her - and even denies her the job he's leaving. Her consolation prize is a new Mercedes. She's more interested in the gun he drops on the bed - after he jokingly invites her to shoot him. Joking or not, she takes him up on it. Later, he's found shot to death in his office. Kay seems to have been in the projection room when it happened. She was screening her pet project - a violent TV film called "The Professionals" - for her superiors. When our rumpled, redoubtable Lt. Columbo investigates, he learns this Emmy-winning producer can commit a bloody act just as well as film it.

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Plot Keywords:

tv executive | shot to death | alibi | gun | pearl handle revolver | 

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Genres:

Crime | Drama | Mystery | Thriller

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Did You Know?

Trivia

The Playland Arcade scenes at the end of the episode were filmed at the Santa Monica, California Looff Hippodrome. This location was also used as the carousel where Henry Gondorff (Paul Newman's character in The Sting) lived and worked. In The Sting, the carousel was located in Chicago.

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Goofs

At 0:25:38, the actress Trish van Devere looks briefly in the camera.

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Quotes

Columbo: [entering Kay's office] That's a very impressive desk, Ma'am. You can run the world from a desk like that.
Kay Freestone: The world doesn't count - just the West coast.

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Connections

Features Bolero (1934)

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Soundtracks

The Lady Is a Tramp
(uncredited)
Music by Richard Rodgers
Lyrics by Lorenz Hart
Sung by Laurence Luckinbill

User Reviews

Make me a more concise murder story

The ambitious lover and chief assistant to a top TV network programmer exacts murderous revenge when he gets promoted to a high-profile New York post and decides that she has not had enough experience to accompany him in that job.

Quite a freshly plotted Columbo episode considering it was made at the tail-end of the original series; it features quite an engaging and gritty performance from Trish Van Devere as the murderess who is very good at exhibiting her character's misfiring and impatient ambition.

The plot is cleverly and systematically developed: the murderess's grip on the prize job she temporarily acquire's after her lover's demise is dramatically loosened by the ironically erratic decision-making that her lover alluded to prior to his death, in line with the other harassment of Columbo's increasingly revealing investigation.

The main weakness of this Columbo adventure is that it wreaks of padding to satisfy a 120 minute slot - it could easily have been done in 90 minutes: the plot is bloated with prolonged scenes that add no value to the story, particularly the misjudged sub-plot involving a trouble-stricken actress on a TV show.

The circumstantial clues stack up against the murderess quite entertainingly and many of Columbo's intuitive observations are of a reassuringly high-standard, but the murder weapon scenario is rather unconvincing to say the least.

A Columbo story that probably would have had a higher mark but for its damaging protractedness; nevertheless, a story that is not without its merits.

Details

Country:

USA

Language:

English

Release Date:

25 February 1978 (USA)

Also Known As:

Meurtre parfait

Filming Locations:

3944 Lankershim Boulevard, Universal City, California, USA

Company Credits

Production Co:

Universal Television

Technical Specs

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

1.33 : 1