GIVING THE DOG HIS DUE

KITMAN, MARVIN

On Television GIVING THE DOG HIS DUE BY MARVIN KITMAN A new star was born on the "Columbo" segment of The NBC Sunday Mystery Theatre the night of February 10. The unheralded performer easily...

...Mostly, the part consists of sitting around in the lieutenant's locked car—an old beat-up Peugeot convertible...
...The lieutenant handed the leash to Ferrer who was a murder suspect at the time, and asked him to watch the dog...
...The Columbo marriage is in trouble...
...He probably has six kids, judging by the way he dresses...
...The major shortcoming of the show is that the dog is not seen enough...
...How do you get a raincoat to look like Columbo's (Don't have it dry-cleaned...
...After that spectacular debut, I was rather surprised when the dog didn't appear in the March "Columbo," entitled "Swan Song...
...Brooks Brothers...
...In fact, that dog is the only reason the Columbos are still together...
...They are mistaken...
...This is not as hard as it sounds, because the locks on Columbo's car need fixing...
...Don't tell me how many Emmys or Oscars Ferrer has won...
...Is Columbo really in the right profession...
...Columbo has never been on the show because she is dead, the victim of the perfect crime...
...Etude in Black" on September 17, 1972, and "Most Dangerous Match" on March 4, 1973—was about 20 years old...
...It simply looks like the other dog...
...And when he announces that he telephoned his home, and his wife gave him a list of things to buy at the grocery store, he is only stalling for time, waiting for the show's writers to finish the script so he can know what to do next to crack the case he's working on...
...But remember, this is not just your average dog—it's a Hollywood dog, and they are terrific actors...
...I even believe there is a Columbo family...
...It was an outstanding example of teamwork between a policeman and his dog...
...But inside sources say my source got the information from Jack Webb's first partner—the one who did two episodes of Dragnet in the early days, was then dumped, and went on to become a consultant for class-C crime movies...
...It's not our fault...
...A rumor making the rounds of the networks has it that Columbo's hound will be starring in a series of his own next season...
...The truth is he is a chickenshit guy who never goes after anybody who could be revenged...
...He don't come anyway, whatever you call him...
...They can't decide who would get custody...
...A lot of "Columbo" fans probably think the dog is the same one seen during the 1972-73 season...
...That's the reason he always looks like such a mess...
...Columbo has never been seen on the program...
...Where is Mrs...
...Columbo's hound certainly looks like the classic dumb dog...
...Or a shoe salesman...
...In the February episode, however, he was given an additional assignment...
...This year's "Columbo" dog was just a pup when that other dog was appearing...
...wash it in a coin-operated laundry...
...Then who has Columbo been calling all the time...
...When the lieutenant says, "Yah, yah, my wife was just telling me eggs went up two cents a dozen," he is only trying to increase audience identification with the Los Angeles Police Department...
...He is two years old, which is relatively young for a star, and his real name is Winston...
...McCloud has his horse...
...And then the lieutenant shlumped off, supposedly to find clues...
...When we first saw him in February, he was being thrown out of a dog-training school for incorrigibility...
...BUT the biggest mystery of all—perhaps the most important unanswered question in Western culture today—concerns Columbo's wife...
...You don't mean . . ." "That's right," the network fellow went on...
...And Columbo should have his dog...
...He's always asking, "Say...
...where did you get those nice drapes...
...But she'll be on the show next season...
...Another possible reason Columbo's dog wasn't hyped may be that he is not smart enough to be a TV star...
...And those jowls...
...The TV police, for example, are looking into a particularly bizarre possibility...
...The guilty one is always a loner, usually a wealthy eccentric...
...He was having trouble learning his lines...
...One inside source at NBC told me: "She's in prison...
...I believe there is a Mrs...
...Actually he was only Cleo's understudy...
...Columbo's dog's tricks have included opening the door of the locked car...
...Columbo has got to realize that Columbo doesn't have banker's hours...
...They had to let him go," an inside source at NBC explained...
...They say Mrs...
...The promising new performer had more expression on his face...
...No, make that a policeman's dog...
...The lieutenant himself went into that: "My wife and I just call him 'dog,' 'hey' or 'you.' It doesn't make any difference...
...This is such a ghastly theory, you might well ask who my source is and if he is reliable...
...His eyes were more soulful...
...Both are male bassett hounds about one-foot, three-inches tall, weigh in the neighborhood of 75 pounds, move very slowly, look tired and always on the verge of tears...
...There are several theories about this, but the two most prominent are: 1. Columbo is not really married...
...McMillan has his wife...
...The unheralded performer easily stole the episode, titled "Mind Over Mayhem," from the widely publicized guest star, Jose Ferrer, who played a brilliant but hot-headed director of a think tank like Herman Kahn's Hudson Institute...
...My own position on this question, which has been preoccupying "Columbo" scholars since 1971, is a moderate one...
...Still, one might ask, why should Columbo's dog have a name...
...Doing three to five for bulb-snatching...
...She comes up for parole this summer...
...He'll rescue people the way Columbo solves mysteries," one vice president explained...
...Of course, playing Columbo's dog isn't overly challenging...
...Does Columbo pick on rich wasps, as Jeff Greenfield wrote in the New York Times last year...
...Among the other riddles are: -What is the name of Columbo's tailor...
...starring Jackie Cooper...
...It was the only case of a name like that, although there was something of a precedent in Sergeant Shriver...
...All a dog has to do is jiggle the handle slightly, and he's on the town...
...This car is so ancient, it would probably catch $15,000 in the vintage-automobile market, according to my son, who knows about such things...
...He can't stand to be left alone," Columbo explained, as Ferrer glanced down at the gloomy-looking canine with those mournful eyes of his own...
...But his wife is black, and the network feels the public is not yet ready to see her...
...Or, "Say, this couch looks swell over here...
...All this came as a surprise to me, but then many mysteries surround "Columbo," now completing its third season as the most popular program in the category of shows watched by closet television viewers...
...Only Lieutenant Columbo is being less than candid when he intimates that his wife is at home...
...Columbo's first name is 'Lieutenant.' He went to court...
...One reason there was so little publicity about the debut of Columbo's dog may be that he doesn't have a name...
...The dog who starred in two episodes with Columbo last season...
...As Columbo is away so often, she wants the dog to stay home and keep her company...
...My source can't reveal the names of his source, of course...
...Everybody knows Columbo's wife is very sentimental...
...Startling new evidence will be revealed soon, sources hint, showing that Columbo cremated the body and is carrying the ashes around in his raincoat...
...he never has a family, a brother who can swear if it's the last thing he'll do, it will be to get Columbo for what he did...
...The dog is a surrogate for her husband...
...Was the police dog—make that policeman's dog—out on a case by himself the night of March 3? "Oh, my gosh, no," a reliably informed source at NBC explained...
...That's why he never gives it out to be cleaned...
...How fitting the title was, since the show was the last original episode of the 1973-74 season, always a sad occasion...
...It's a police dog...
...The show's scriptwriters haven't even thought of a first name for Columbo yet...
...Absurd nonsense...
...The way he's always talking about the wife is a smoke screen...
...The featured guest star was old scarface himself, Johnny Cash, and the dog could easily have out-acted the singer, thus chalking up two stolen shows in a row...
...Many viewers thought he was the same dog who played Cleo in The People's Choice (remember that...
...Maybe McMillan's wife...
...2. Columbo is married...
...Cleo's understudy was replaced by Winston as Columbo's dog because of old age...
...Some people are suggesting that Columbo should have been an interior decorator...
...I am referring, of course, to Columbo's dog, whom the lieutenant said he was taking care of that night because his wife was visiting her mother in Fresno...
...Sixteen hours on, eight hours off...
...Unfortunately, there are those who don't buy this...
...He's at the whim of the commissioner, and his cases are so tough, he usually has to work a double shift—from 8-4 and from 4-12...
...Oh, my gosh, no, you're wrong about that," a top executive at NBC said...
...Yet frankly, while Columbo's home life makes for interesting gossip, it is irrelevant...
...Or, "Say, that's a nice pair of shoes you've got on...
...In my opinion, though, the dog belongs with his master on every single episode of "Columbo...

Vol. 57 • April 1974 • No. 7


 
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