The Shabby Detective: Yet Another Columbo Podcast
· Season 7 · Episode 8 · Latest episodeMurder by Natural Causes (1979)
How many push-ups can you do?
Between Columbo seasons, Mike and Chris dig into another Richard Levinson and William Link production: Murder by Natural Causes (1979), directed by Robert Day for CBS. Hal Holbrook stars as Arthur Sinclair, a stage mentalist whose heart condition makes him an inviting target: his younger wife Allison (Katharine Ross) and her lover, struggling actor Gil Weston (Barry Bostwick), cook up a plan to literally frighten him to death with a staged home invasion. Naturally, nothing goes as planned. Arthur's lawyer George (Richard Anderson) has his own designs on Allison, and the film piles on twist after twist — the kind of nested double-crosses Levinson and Link built entire careers on.
Holbrook and Ross had already played off each other in They Only Kill Their Masters, and Bostwick brings a slippery, vain energy to Gil that makes his scheming both funny and pathetic. Mike and Chris talk through how the film's chamber-piece structure (four characters, one house, one long night) squeezes maximum tension from minimal sets, how it fits the "TV movie as filmed stage play" tradition Levinson and Link mastered, and why the finale's final line lands as one of the great mean little punchlines in their catalog.
Between Columbo seasons, Mike and Chris dig into another Richard Levinson and William Link production: Murder by Natural Causes (1979), directed by Robert Day for CBS. Hal Holbrook stars as Arthur Sinclair, a stage mentalist whose heart condition makes him an inviting target: his younger wife Allison (Katharine Ross) and her lover, struggling actor Gil Weston (Barry Bostwick), cook up a plan to literally frighten him to death with a staged home invasion. Naturally, nothing goes as planned. Arthur's lawyer George (Richard Anderson) has his own designs on Allison, and the film piles on twist after twist — the kind of nested double-crosses Levinson and Link built entire careers on.
Holbrook and Ross had already played off each other in They Only Kill Their Masters, and Bostwick brings a slippery, vain energy to Gil that makes his scheming both funny and pathetic. Mike and Chris talk through how the film's chamber-piece structure (four characters, one house, one long night) squeezes maximum tension from minimal sets, how it fits the "TV movie as filmed stage play" tradition Levinson and Link mastered, and why the finale's final line lands as one of the great mean little punchlines in their catalog.
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About this show
An episode-by-episode critical rewatch of Columbo (Peter Falk), examining the character and his creators. Currently in its sixth season of coverage.
Hosts
- Mike WhiteHost
- Chris StachiwHost
All episodes (57)
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48:06Season 4 · Episode 4Troubled Waters
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44:20Season 4 · Episode 3By Dawn's Early Light
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1:06:14Season 4 · Episode 2Negative Reaction
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1:14:01Season 4 · Episode 29Exercise in Fatality
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1:20:40Season 3 · Episode 28Corky Romano
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51:22Season 3 · Episode 27A Friend in Deed
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57:57Season 3 · Episode 26Swan Song
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45:03Season 3 · Episode 6Mind Over Mayhem
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48:14Season 3 · Episode 6Publish or Perish
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42:10Season 3 · Episode 5Double Exposure
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36:34Season 3 · Episode 4Candidate for Crime
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1:28:04Season 3 · Episode 3Any Old Port in a Storm
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44:26Season 3 · Episode 2Lovely But Lethal
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45:03Season 3 · Episode 1A Woman Under the Influence
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30:20Season 2 · Episode 8Double Shock
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32:06Season 2 · Episode 7The Most Dangerous Match
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42:44Season 2 · Episode 6A Stitch in Crime
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1:06:07Season 2 · Episode 5Requiem for a Fallen Star
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42:24Season 2 · Episode 4Dagger of the Mind
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46:59Season 2 · Episode 3The Most Crucial Game
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41:22Season 2 · Episode 2The Greenhouse Jungle
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51:31Season 2 · Episode 1Etude in Black
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47:04Season 1 · Episode 11Blueprint for Murder
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42:12EpisodeShort Fuse
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41:48EpisodeLady in Waiting
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