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Why I Love...Columbo

Peter Falk as Lt Columbo
  • Posted at 5:16am
  • 15 March 2007
  • by DavidBrown-RT
  • 13 comments

"I seem to bother people," says Peter Falk's dishevelled detective Columbo in the show's pilot. "I make them nervous."

Too right he gets his suspects hot under the collar. It's bad enough when he shows up at your house once - if he makes a return visit, you know you're done for.

The 1970s really did belong to LAPD's shambling lieutenant; a seemingly confused blue-collar bumbler who snared his prey in an elegant cat-and-mouse game and wiped the smug smiles off their murderous faces in the final act. His performance turned Peter Falk into a sleuthing icon.

Here was a show in which you saw who committed the crime in the opening minutes, an oddball narrative ploy that turned the rules of TV detection inside out. With the best line-up of villains since Batman, the likes of Donald Pleasence, Johnny Cash and Patrick McGoohan would then underestimate the cigar-chomping, raincoat-wearing Columbo, who would itch at them like a sore until they broke, all the while ingratiating himself on their time.

The decade was full of quirky, one-named investigators - Quincy, Rockford, Starsky, Hutch, Banacek, Kojak - but the slyest fox amid this screech of Gran Torino tyres and shootouts used his nous to make his case. Columbo was the most cerebral cop on the block.

In the intervening years, his methods have become instantly recognisable. In the episodes made in the 1990s, you wonder how the murderers haven't twigged. Especially with modern sleuth Adrian Monk borrowing a lot of the great man's idiosyncrasies. But like Columbo's indestructible rustbucket Peugeot, if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

So if you are going in for a spot of homicide, beware of a detective who:

If you want to sample classic Columbo, it's best to stick to the ones made during the original run. It's a time of brown interiors, bad haircuts and leisure suits, but future heavyweight TV writers (Steven Bochco) and directors (Steven Spielberg) were cutting their teeth on these brilliantly crafted tales, and the quality shows.

If you want to sample classic Columbo, it's best to stick to the ones made during the original run. It's a time of brown interiors, bad haircuts and leisure suits, but future heavyweight TV writers (Steven Bochco) and directors (Steven Spielberg) were cutting their teeth on these brilliantly crafted tales, and the quality shows.

And just "one more thing": if you watch enough of them, maybe you could solve the longest-standing mystery of all - did Columbo's wife really exist? She's often referred to, but never actually seen. Is she merely a part of the detective's elaborate plan to toy with his prey? If so, that really would be genius.

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Comments

  • Posted on 21 June 2009
  • at 2:46pm
  • by rabbit

the thing i like about colombo's character is his complete uninterest in wealth and possessions. he pretends to be envious and impressed by his suspect's (usual) lifestyle but is really mocking them in a very subtle manner. he has different values to them, it is quite heart warming.

  • Posted on 17 March 2007
  • at 10:16am
  • by Steve F

I love Columbo.

In my opinion it's the greatest detective series ever. It's so satisfying to see the smug villians being gradually worn down and they always make that one mistake where inevitably Columbo is there waiting to catch them.

Classic.

I think I might watch an episode now.

  • Posted on 04 March 2007
  • at 12:00pm
  • by Pam I

I'm an oldster and, given the truly abyssmal quality of Canadian tv during my formative years, watched Columbo whenever he was rarely scheduled to appear as a sort of innocculation against the rest of the crap. With the quality of the plots, no wonder Steven Bochco and the like cut their teeth there. As well as many actors - did anyone see the two minutes of Jamie Lee Curtis as a surly cafe waitress? I do think Mrs Columbo exists, though. He would only have worn that horrifying black shroud of a raincoat that he claimed was a gift from Mrs Columbo for as long as he did, for love. But, as in life, the head will rule the heart and he eventually ditches it as it "throws him off". Brilliant, compadre!

  • Posted on 20 February 2007
  • at 10:09pm
  • by si bennett

columbo is probably my favorite show of all time. I particularly like the episode "death of Mrs Columbo" Genius....

just one more thing.

no actually its nothing.

  • Posted on 20 February 2007
  • at 9:47pm
  • by Daniel G

I can't recall how many times I've seen every episode… but they just never seem to get old.

  • Posted on 20 February 2007
  • at 11:22am
  • by Gav

Columbo was definitely modelled on the character of Porfiry Petrovich in Crime and Punishment. Richard Levinson and William Link have acknowledged this when writing about the show's creation.

I was watching an episode the other week in which Jack Cassidy played a magician The Great Santini and was also that instalment's killer. I think he's by far the best of the guest stars to play the murderer, but my wife always says Patrick McGoohan is her favourite. I'd be interested to know what others think.

  • Posted on 11 February 2007
  • at 4:07pm
  • by Columbo fan since ?

I have watched Columbo since well since when he started! Iwatched him in the evenings whilst ironing the childrens' clothes. Those children now have their own and still I watch Columbo whenever I can or record them on my new recorder. I probably know most of the endings but still… occasionally I see one I haven't see before like the one I am watching now! Why??? no idea

  • Posted on 09 February 2007
  • at 8:27pm
  • by Paul B

Columbo and Perry Mason are clearly the greatest of the American imports that have filled our daytime schedules for the last umpteen years.

Incidentally, does anyone know if it's true that the character of Columbo was strongly based on the detective Porfiry from 'Crime and Punishment'? The similarities are so startling that it seems unlikely to be merely a coincidence.

  • Posted on 09 February 2007
  • at 6:57pm
  • by Roland

I'm a big fan of Columbo too. But what amazes me the most about the series is that it ever made it onto our screens in the first place. Surely everything is wrong ! The plot is inverted, and the hero is an untidy, forgetful, unassuming, bumbling, shambles of a detective. And of course the evidence that finally nails the murder would never stand up in a modern court of law. But of course it is sheer class !

  • Posted on 04 February 2007
  • at 12:21am
  • by Patrick Simpson

Several characters referred to Mrs. Columbo as if she was real, when they went on a cruise in 'Troubled Waters'.

Why is Columbo so good? Think of all the arguments you've had with the kind of people who cannot stand to admit they're wrong. Some people swear black is white, when it comes to things like drink-driving, smoking, or global warming. Whenever I've had to go to ludicrous extremes in order to prove the simplest and most obvious thing, I always say, "This is like an episode of Columbo"!

That's why I love it, anyway.

  • Posted on 14 January 2007
  • at 2:30pm
  • by Joy Stein

Dear Sir

What an ace and timely article!

At the end of "Rest In Peace, Mrs. Columbo" (1990) Columbo calls his wife and chats uxoriously about having her photo taken professionally. He conducts this conversation (I'm pretty sure) whilst alone. I think we may propose a competing hypothesis along the lines of: Columbo has no wife but, having pretending to be married for 30 years, is no longer aware of this fact. Indeed, much of his disturbingly distrait behaviour in the latter episodes might be explained by the psychological damage occasioned by this sedulous self-delusion. "It's All In The Game" (1993) in particular is rendered, by the lights of this azygophrenia-with-a-twist hypothesis, a deeply weird exercise in mental and moral torture. Speculation along such lines fast becomes labyrinthine.

  • Posted on 13 January 2007
  • at 4:05pm
  • by Elle

It just so happens that i have just come from watching an episode of Columbo… I am eighteen years old and have enjoyed these stories since I can remember. I agree that a Sunday afternoon (or in fact any day!) is not complete without our scruffy detective. He is pure genius!

  • Posted on 10 October 2006
  • at 3:30pm
  • by Stuart Ian Burns

As for Mrs Columbo…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mrs._Columbo

"In 1979, over the strong objections of the producers of Columbo, NBC executive Fred Silverman produced a US television series starring Kate Mulgrew* which was initially named Mrs. Columbo. Over the course of the second series, the linkage between this Kate Columbo and the Mrs. Columbo of the original television series was reduced. The name of the character was changed to Kate Callahan after an off-screen divorce, and the series was renamed Kate Loves a Mystery. In its latter incarnation it was determined that this Kate Columbo and the Mrs. Columbo of Columbo were entirely different people."

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