Show188
Best part about this episode is the funeral director. The maudlin environment, his little asides about how business is bad, (oh! but that's a good thing you understand), the way he keeps replaying the record and raising the volume to set the mood. That guy was perfect for the part. Della's facial expressions were priceless. Submitted by DellaMason
Alas, we have no Ray Collins (Lt. Tragg) today, even though his name appears in the credits, more than likely because of his health. Submitted by gracenote, 8/3/2011.
+ Between Burger and Tragg, there were an awful lot of missed episodes. That’s really a shame, because they are adamant yet respectful foils to Our Hero. And I am knitting a “gracenote” shawl. Submitted by cgraul, 1/20/2012.
This is another episode where we see someone's vehicle registration attached to the steering column for anyone to see. Would anyone know if that was the law in California at that time? Submitted by 65tosspowertrap, 11/25/2013.
+ Yep! At the time Perry Mason was filming it was required to attach your registration to the steering column. They even sold leather holders (kinda like a luggage tag) that attached with a couple of metal springs that wrapped around the steering column. Submitted by Lynne, 3/25/2015.
Powerful Pippa: A great episode. I don't know any of the other work of Pippa Scott (Gwynn Elston, our heroine) but I think she shows great energy in her acting. It also helps that it's a "genuine" Perry Mason story by ESG with those twists in Bakersfield. Michael Conrad was on his toes, too. Last, is Betsy Hale - who played the little Gillette girl - the daughter of Barbara? IMBD does not specify. JohnK, 29 October 2015.
+ According to wikipedia, her daughters were named Juanita and Jodi. Of course, her son, William Katt, played Paul Drake in the movie series. Submitted by Perry Baby 8/25/15
++ It is highly unlikely that Betsy is Barbara's daughter. Barbara's "real-life" surname was Katt, the birth name of her husband, who acted under the name Bill Williams. It seems likely a daughter might have been credited under her actual name, as their son, William Katt, was when he began his career in 1970. He went on to play Paul Drake Jr. for the first nine Perry Mason TV movies; he is still acting as of 2021 (age 70) according to IMDb. OLEF641 6/17/21
Frank Gillette's car is the one-of-a-kind Buick Villa Riviera, decked-out in white paint and without bumpers, the same as it was for the 1964 movie For Those Who Think Young. The car was transformed from a 1963 Buick Riviera by L.A. car-customizer George Barris, builder of Cars of the Stars (& the Batmobile!). Modifications to incorporate what Barris called "the latest in European design concepts" included a lengthened body, a removable roof section (not yet called a targa top) and relocation of the headlights from the grill to the front wings behind the fixed (non-opening) visors. Frank Gillette / Felton Grimes apparently liked danger, drawing attention to himself by driving this unique car around L.A. in either or both halves of his double life!
The car's part in For Those Who Think Young is recounted here in Chapter 4 of the book Barris TV and Movie Cars, pages 76-80. The Villa Riviera has been painted red, white or blue (but not all at the same time).
After appearing in Perry Mason and For Those Who Think Young the car received bumpers and red paint before appearing in The Outer Limits The Duplicate Man (aired 19 Dec 64, note the headlights ON behind the covers). It wasn't long before the Villa Riviera's hidden-headlight styling appeared on the standard production 1965 Buick Riviera: see "+" immediatly below. Added by Gary Woloski 12/8/11, revised 2/27/14.
+ A dark-painted car with hidden headlights and an apparently identical front end to the Barris '63 Villa Riviera is shown in a long approach shot in Episode #258 TCOT Vanishing Victim. What we see of the side profile says "Buick Riviera" as well. However, the car is not Barris' customized '63 Villa Riviera; it is actually an unmodified 1965 Buick Riviera! When Buick was designing the new Riviera line for introduction in 1963, the intention was to have hidden headlights but they were unable to engineer the innovation in time (the '63 & '64 Rivieras had the headlights exposed on the grill). It wasn't until the '65 model that Buick had a solution to conceal the headlights: read the story here. See 32sec video of the '65 "Clamshell Headlights" here. Added by Gary Woloski, 12/29/11.
++ My grandfather owned a 1965 Riviera Gran Sport. Although I was only ten when he died, I was old enough to appreciate that amazing car. Incredibly, when he died neither of his two adult sons wanted the car; it was sold! Submitted by 65tosspowertrap, 11/6/2013.
+++ Correction: At our Thanksgiving feast my cousin told me that her father did indeed keep the car. That makes me feel better. Submitted by 65tosspowertrap, 12/18/2013.
++++ Lucky You! The more I look at them, the more I think that the '63-'65 Rivieras are the best-looking U.S. standard-production cars ever made. And the '65s are the best of the lot! GSW, 2/28/14.
The case of the B surnames: We have Belding Baxter in this show and the exterior shot of the mansion looks very familiar. Submitted by Perry Baby 8/25/16
Starring Nell Gwyn: Nell Gwyn was a famous seventeenth-century English actress and mistress of King Charles II. Surely it's not a coincidence that the two friends in this episode are named Nell and Gwynn? Submitted by Miss Carmody, 10 October 2023.
A Confederacy of Pitkins: Reporting his investigative findings to Perry, Paul comments that Frank Gillette's father had a "rather unusual name"--Gorman Gillette. Unlike, one supposes, some of the other characters in the episode: Felton Grimes, George Belding Baxter, and Corley Ketchum. Submitted by BobH, 29 October 2017.
Another episode in which the traditional court interior bears no relation to the modern exterior. The only episode I recall in which Perry’s client takes the stand. In keeping with the tradition of alliterative titles, this one should be called “TCOT Bigamous Blackmailer”. Perry's questioning of Mrs. Gillette about the attempted poisoning of Gwynn is odd. Why should she know anything about that? In my opinion, one of the best, most neatly plotted episodes, with some great performances and directed with a bit more flair than usual, although I do wonder what TV detectives would do if folks didn't put their initials on everything. DOD 01/20/20
TCOT Smart Remarks: This episode is notable in that it contains several extra-funny asides as part of the dialog -- one from Gwynn, another from the caretaker, and a third from Paul Drake. It's from a "genuine" ESG story, although I don't have a copy and don't know if they are in the original. Or maybe the script writers were just inspired. JohnK, 23 August 2018
Testy Drake After Drake returns from the murder scene to Perry's office, Drake tells Perry to never send him to retrieve evidence from a crime scene "again." I have never seen Drake scold Perry like that. He was obviously peeved. Drake was probably concerned about losing his license or worse. Perry just explains that Drake would not be liable since Drake didn't know it was a crime scene at the time. Legal response of course. Rick P 12/16/21
Mason's cross-examination questions to Baxter keep getting objected to. One question that Mason -could- have asked during the cross-examination (and was the point of his questions) would be about Baxter's name, since Baxter would have to have sworn in and identified himself by name. He could have asked "You identified yourself as 'Baxter,' but were you always known by that name?" Although it was pointless to cross-examine him then, since he was going to be called later as Mason's witness and Mason could have asked him anything. --yelocab 03JUN19
Mason also asked Gwynn, on the stand, "Who could have had your compact?" but that should have been objected to as speculation. --yelocab 03JUN19
Gwynn didn't notice that one address on her list was typed in a completely different font? and that address was where she saw the photo of the bigamist. --yelocab 03JUN19
> I don't think it's so much she wouldn't notice as it wouldn't mean much: nowadays personal computers and printers make it easy to edit things, and reprint them whole, but when this was produced I'm sure ad hoc revisions - to original documents - were commonplace. (Even in the 1980's, in the early days of word-processors, I can remember an instructor telling my team he liked our paper because it looked professional.."a lot of them you could see had been typed on three different typewriters!") Nostalgically, Notcom 061721.
Another Indulgent Client Not only does Nell let her friend Gwynn be falsely accused of the murder, Nell also plants the compact to frame Gwynn. Gwynn's response when her "friend" Nell is exposed? "Poor Nell!" Good grief. Rick P 12/16/2021