The celebrated 70s detective show had stars aplenty queuing up to play the murderer of the week.
If you're a fan of ‘Columbo', and excited by the prospect of revisiting every episode of the original run in high definition Blu-ray, then you're not alone. News of the release of ‘Columbo – the 1970s Complete Collection Seasons 1-7' has us fired up about the brilliant LA-based crime drama from yesteryear.
Sporadically throughout the 1970s, Peter Falk's loveable creation Lieutenant Columbo from LAPD's homicide department faced off against a killer that was almost too clever for his or her own good. Convinced that they have committed the perfect murder, the guest star satisfies themselves that the absent-minded and naive Columbo is no threat to their liberty. The joy is in seeing their confidence collapse once the wily lieutenant tightens the net around them using his craftily concealed ingenuity for deduction.
The success of the show depended upon Peter Falk's Columbo bouncing off the guest star who plays the perfect foil. Here's our top ten of Columbo's greatest ever adversaries.
10. Leonard Nimoy
The ‘Star Trek' actor played the cold-blooded killer Barry Mayfield in Season Two's ‘A Stitch in Crime' (1972). Best known for playing the logical Vulcan Mr Spock, Nimoy brought the same emotional detachment to his clinical practitioner whose use of the incorrect stitches during a surgery plants a time-bomb of a heart attack in his victim's chest. Tightly-written, and with Nimoy showing a creditable capacity to play nasty, it's a corker of an episode and a shame that it was the only time Nimoy squared up against Falk's Columbo.
9. Johnny Cash
The country music star played the murderer Tommy Brown in Season Three's ‘Swan Song' (1974). Not only is the non-actor surprisingly convincing in the role, but he's unusually sympathetic too. One can see his reasons for wanting to dispatch his harridan of a wife, and his murder plot is as ingenious as it comes, staging his own plane crash with a high risk strategy of bailing out just in time. The scenes between Cash and Falk seem genuinely affectionate, and Tommy Brown is one of the killers that Columbo takes a shine to.
8. Dick Van Dyke
The star of many musicals played icy photographer Paul Galesko in Season Four's ‘Negative Reaction' (1974). His performance is a million miles away from the happy Cockney geezer of ‘Mary Poppins'. Galesko is one of the haughty, arrogant and sneering Columbo villains, always keen to threaten and abuse the good detective. We love to hate him in this, and even more so because it's the usually cuddly Van Dyke. The episode is rock solid and delivers one of the series' greatest ever ‘gotcha' moments. Dick Van Dyke is certainly one of the most memorable one-time-only ‘Columbo' killers.
7. Robert Vaughn
‘The Man from UNCLE' star played slick and stylish Hayden Danziger in Season Four's excellent outing ‘Troubled Waters' (1975). Set entirely on board a cruise ship, the fan favourite episode sees Columbo on holiday, wearing a fetching Hawaiian shirt. His wife is on board too, somewhere, just out of shot… Typically, trouble follows Columbo around and he can't even take a break from investigating murder on vacation. Not with Hayden Danziger determined to silence a cabaret act by faking a heart attack, skipping out of the sick bay to shoot the woman in her cabin, returning to the sick bay in the nick of time to avoid suspicion. The perfect murder. Or is it? Columbo knows Danziger is the killer from the start, but he plays along, even gratefully accepting the killer's apparent help in keeping the passengers calm and broadening his inquiries. Danzinger thinks he's pulling the wool over the detective's eyes, but boy is he in for a shock! Vaughn would later return in ‘Last Salute to the Commodore', playing a prime suspect who end up being crossed off Columbo's list. He is the best thing about that dreary misfire.
6. Janet Leigh
The ‘Psycho' star plays Grace Wheeler in the Season Five episode ‘Forgotten Lady' (1975). We take an immediate dislike to her when the famous actress murders her kindly old husband. And she comes across as haughty when she keeps forgetting Columbo's name, as if the scruffy detective is beneath her time. But when we later find out that there are reasons behind her memory lapses, the episode is turned on its head. Janet Leigh's performance is razor sharp, pinpointing precisely for the audience when their perspective of the killer should change. It's a clever, nuanced and moving performance, and Leigh delivers it sublimely well. This was an episode that proved that ‘Columbo' could keep evolving and finding new ways to play with the premise.
5. Donald Pleasence
The ‘Halloween' star plays wine connoisseur Adrian Carsini in Season Three's ‘Any Old Port in a Storm' (1973). This episode is one of the finest examples of Columbo hoisting the killer using his own petard. Always a wonderfully eccentric performer, Pleasence doesn't disappoint, and his killer is prone to petulant fits of rage. Despite that, the viewer can't help but warm to him, and so too does Lieutenant Columbo. What could well be the beginnings of a beautiful friendship blossoms between the two men, who genuinely enjoy spending time in one another's company. Columbo has an ulterior motive, of course, which is to bring a killer to justice, but he handles Carsini gently. The killer doesn't seem to hold his eventual arrest against Columbo. This episode subverted all of our expectations about police procedural drama and is a truly original piece of television drama. The delightful interplay between Falk and Pleasence is the icing on the cake. Simply a wonderful, charming, witty and intelligent piece of TV drama.
4. Ruth Gordon
The multi-talented, multi-Academy Award winner and nominee Ruth Gordon was the oldest ‘Columbo' killer, entering her ninth decade by the time she appeared in the show in Season Seven's ‘Try and Catch Me' (1977). It was one of the last truly great episodes of the original run. As Abigail Mitchell, Gordon is a diminutive, homely yet crafty killer. What makes the episode so great is that the viewer (and Columbo) can entirely sympathise with her motive for murder. And yet, the good Lieutenant must do his duty and find a way to link her to the crime. There is a lot of warmth and affection between Gordon and Falk in this final triumph for the original series.
3. Jack Cassidy
Truly one of the best of the bunch, Jack Cassidy is often the top of the fan favourite lists. It's easy to see why. He played the killer no fewer than three times, and all of his episodes are excellent. His first outing, in Season One's ‘Murder By the Book' (1971), is even directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Steve Bochco. No actor would have a better chance to leave a mark, but Cassidy certainly doesn't fail to live up to expectations. His performance as jealous author Ken Franklin gets the series proper off to a rip-roaring start. With a double-murder under his belt, the second in a botched attempt to cover his tracks, Franklin is truly a nasty piece of work. Falk brings a relish to his performance as he wipes the smug grin off his opponent's face. Cassidy left a huge impression for his work on the episode, and he would return in Season Three's ‘Publish or Perish' (1974), one again playing a writer with a penchant for murder. His third and final appearance in the show is in Season Five's ‘Now You See Him' (1976) in which he plays Stefan Mueller, a magician with a sinister past whose powers of illusion are used to create himself a perfect alibi whilst he's undertaking a murder – or do they? Sadly, Cassidy died later the same year, or it's likely that the ever-popular villain would have been invited back for a fourth chance to outwit Columbo.
2. Robert Culp
There's always an edge to Culp's three performances in ‘Columbo' (he matches Jack Cassidy's record for the highest number of outings as the murderer). It helps Culp to appear second in the leaderboard simply because he was in three terrific episodes, all coming towards the start of the series' run. He follows Jack Cassidy in Season One, playing Carl Trimmer in ‘Death Lends a Hand' (1971), only the second episode of the series proper. He's a nasty piece of work in this, playing a blackmailer who murders a woman. His character Paul Hanlon is no more likeable in Season Two's ‘The Most Crucial Game' (1972), when he bumps off ‘Quantum Leap's Dean Stockwell, and his surly encounters with the good detective on the golf course invite the viewer's contempt. This episode has a cracking ‘gotcha', but even this is outdone in Culp's third and final appearance, in Season Three's ‘Double Exposure' (1973) where Culp is playing killer Bart Keppel. In this one, even he can't help but laugh at the brilliant way in which Columbo conspires to make the killer incriminate himself.
1. Patrick McGoohan
The quirky, mercurial star of ‘Danger Man' and ‘The Prisoner' made a huge impression on the ‘Columbo' series. Unlike the other actors who played murderers, McGoohan would regularly play a role behind the camera, directing several episodes – some good, some not so good. It all starts with ‘By Dawn's Early Light' (1974) in which McGoohan plays Lyle Rumford, a careful, measured and reserved military man. Columbo finds a way through his defences, but does so in a way that is both gentle and respectful, showing that ‘Columbo' was always a police procedural drama quite unlike any other. McGoohan's brilliance in the role was recognised, and he won an Emmy for his performance. Having struck up a good friendship on and off set with Falk, McGoohan would return in Season Five's ‘Identity Crisis' (1975), in which he bumps off comedy legend Leslie Nielsen. Playing a secret agent, McGoohan regurgitates several of his catchphrases from ‘The Prisoner', and the way in which Columbo closes the net around him is reminiscent of a scene from the psychedelic Sixties show. Is McGoohan reprising his most iconic role and transplanting Number Six into the ‘Columbo' universe? The idea is so inventive and delicious it's why McGoohan steals the top spot. He would twice return in the later 1990s episodes.
If you enjoyed our roundup of the best ‘Columbo' murderers, then see also our review of the new Blu-ray box set, ‘Columbo – the 1970s Complete Collection Seasons 1-7', which is a must for all Columbophiles.
