Just One More Thing: Candidate for Crime

 Notes and screenshots for Candidate for Crime: Originally broadcast on Nov 4, 1973, starring Jackie Cooper as a politician with skin in the game, a quick cameo from the director's daughter, the beloved character actor Vito Scotti, and, of course, Peter Falk as Columbo.

"Senatorial candidate Nelson Hayward murders his domineering campaign manager, staging it to appear that Hayward himself was the intended victim of a mob hit gone wrong."

-IMDB Summary

"Politics. No one’s tired of that yet, right? Ha. Ha. Ha. Yeah. So, in “Candidate for Crime,” Jackie Cooper is Nelson Hayward, a US Senate candidate who’s sick and tired of his campaign manager telling him what to do. Does he fire him? Nope, it’s a literal Saturday Night Massacre, as the pol kills him in cold blood, then tries to pin it on a mob assassination attempt. Of course, Columbo doesn’t buy this angle for a minute and engages in a one-man filibuster against…. murder. JD Ryznar (Beyond Yacht Rock) returns to the program to talk about the (rather uneven) episode, Dixieland jazz, the arcane world of writing credits, and oh so much more."

-RJ's episode summary

Listen to the original podcast episode here:

Episode 46: Still a Lot of Wear in This Fella with our guest JD Ryznar. 

Candidate for Crime

Season 3, Episode #3

Director: Boris Sagal

Writers: Irv Pearlberg, Alvin R. Friedman, Roland Kibbee

I think that RJ, our guest J.D.Ryznar and I came to the joint conclusion that this ended up being something of a mixed bag of an episode. There was a fair amount of padding, a slow start, a headscratcher of a murder motive and more moving parts than were strictly necessary. 

As a for instance, I’m not sure what role the mandatory strip-search played in the plot, nor why any time at all was given over to Tisha Sterling’s character “Linda" cheerily agreeing to participate in the security precaution. But they went and hired extras to flesh out that aspect of the script. A bit of a puzzler, really... 

On the other hand, Cooper made for a gruff and convincing Columbo-type killer, Joanne Linville was remarkably sympathetic as Hayward’s long-suffering, lonely and alcoholic wife Vicky, and Columbo was given a good bit of business in investigating the crime scene. The padding in the episode ranged from entertaining to fluffy (ranked in order of my own personal preference, from most to least entertaining: The dentist’s office, Columbo getting pulled over, Vito Scotti as a tailor -- because it’s always great to watch Scotti perform -- and then the garage mechanic scene), but the mechanics of the faked assassination attempt and the means by which Columbo catches Hayward at it were both pretty well done.

There’s also the merely trivial but still interesting point that Columbo appears in the very first scene of the episode, before there’s even a murder. This doesn’t happen often, so at least Candidate for Crime earns an honor in that catalog. 

Not a bad episode, exactly, but not necessarily one of the standouts, either. Very good performances hiding in something of a shabby script, which still makes it worth watching.

Below, as long as I brought up the seemingly pointless strip-search element of Candidate for Crime the other day, please enjoy the almost aggressively already-tired-of-your-happy-ass-shit expression on the officer assigned to pat butts.

As a matter of fact, I have decided that the officer’s name is Sgt.Pat Butts.

A very young Katey Sagal -- whose father, Boris Sagal, was the director for this episode -- makes an appearance in Candidate for Crime as a secretary in Nelson Hayward’s campaign office. Plus, look at that, it’s Tucker Carlson’s screen debut!

(not really)

Lastly, frequent Columbo presence and popular character actor Vito Scotti makes an appearance as a fussy tailor in Candidate for Crime:

Next episode: Double Exposure