Details

Release year: 1971

Storyline

After killing her boring husband and disposing of the body, a supposedly brilliant tort attorney fakes his kidnapping and keeps the ransom money. The FBI may be fooled, but not Columbo.

Top credits

Directors

Richard Irving

Writers

Cast

Peter Falk — Columbo
Lee Grant — Leslie Williams
John Fink — Michael Clark
Harold Gould — Agent Carlson

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Did you know

• The morning after Leslie makes the drop, Margaret is watching Double Indemnity (1944), the classic movie about a woman who has her lover kill her husband to collect on a life insurance policy.

• Produced as a second pilot for Columbo (1971) three years after Prescription: Murder (1968). Its success led to "Columbo" being made part of The NBC Mystery Movie (1971) wheel of programs for most of the 1970s, which included McMillan & Wife (1971), McCloud (1970), and Banacek (1972), and several others.

• This second pilot TV movie features Columbo in his more usual ramshackle sartorial style. He is more disheveled than he was in Prescription: Murder (1968), frequently wearing his signature raincoat.