Columbo (season 1)

Columbo (season 1)
Country of origin	United States
No. of episodes	7
Release
Original network	NBC
Original release	September 15, 1971 (1971-09-15) – February 9, 1972 (1972-02-09)

This is a list of episodes from the first season of the American television detective series Columbo.

Broadcast history

The season originally aired Wednesdays at 8:30-10:00 pm (EST) as part of The NBC Wednesday Mystery Movie.

DVD release

The season was released on DVD by Universal Home Video. The DVD includes the two pilot movies: Prescription: Murder and Ransom for a Dead Man.

Episodes

No. in series	No. in season	Title	Directed by	Written by	Runtime	Original air date
3	1	"Murder by the Book"	Steven Spielberg	Steven Bochco	73 minutes	September 15, 1971 (1971-09-15)
Ken Franklin (Jack Cassidy) is one half of a mystery writing team, but partner Jim Ferris (Martin Milner) wants to go solo. That would expose the fact that Ferris did all the actual writing, and would leave the high-living Franklin without his cash cow. Franklin makes it look like Ferris was investigating gangsters, then takes Ferris to his cabin two hours away. Lily La Sanka (Barbara Colby), a general store owner, happens to see Ferris in the car while Franklin makes a call to Ferris's wife (Rosemary Forsyth) to establish that he is far away. At the cabin, he convinces Ferris to call home and say he's working late at the office. During the call, Franklin shoots Ferris, then takes his body back north and dumps it on his lawn. La Sanka tries to blackmail Franklin into a relationship, so he bludgeons her to death and capsizes her rowboat, making it look like an accident. After his arrest, Franklin makes a startling admission to Columbo. Jack Cassidy played the villain in a total of three Columbo episodes (this one, episode 22 (Season 3), and episode 36 (Season 5)). Note: In 1997 TV Guide ranked this episode number 16 on its '100 Greatest Episodes of All Time' list.
4	2	"Death Lends a Hand"	Bernard L. Kowalski	Richard Levinson, William Link	73 minutes	October 6, 1971 (1971-10-06)
Carl Brimmer (Robert Culp), the head of a private detective agency, is hired by Arthur Kennicut (Ray Milland), a powerful publishing magnate who suspects his wife, Lenore (Pat Crowley), of infidelity. Although Brimmer indeed finds evidence of her being unfaithful, instead of reporting this to his client, he attempts to blackmail Lenore into revealing secrets about her husband. She refuses and threatens to expose his plot to Kennicut, at which point Brimmer accidentally kills her in a fit of anger. He then dumps the body at a scrapyard. To catch the killer, Columbo employs the use of a trick he learned as a boy. This episode won an Emmy for writing.
5	3	"Dead Weight"	Jack Smight	John T. Dugan	73 minutes	October 27, 1971 (1971-10-27)
Major General Martin Hollister (Eddie Albert), a retired Marine Corps war hero, learns that he is being investigated for embezzling military funds, then shoots his accomplice (John Kerr) when he decides to flee the country. The act is witnessed from a boat by Helen Stewart (Suzanne Pleshette), who is wooed by the General into doubting her own story.
6	4	"Suitable for Framing"	Hy Averback	Jackson Gillis	73 minutes	November 17, 1971 (1971-11-17)
Art critic Dale Kingston (Ross Martin) murders his uncle and frames his aunt, Edna Mathews (Kim Hunter), to obtain what is considered to be one of the most valuable art collections in the world. Don Ameche portrays family lawyer Frank Simpson.
7	5	"Lady in Waiting"	Norman Lloyd	Teleplay: Steven Bochco Story: Barney Slater	73 minutes	December 15, 1971 (1971-12-15)
Beth Chadwick (Susan Clark) murders her domineering older brother, Bryce (Richard Anderson), in order to gain control of her own life and the family business. She arranges for it to look like an accident but is tripped up by the sharp memory of her fiancé, Peter (Leslie Nielsen). Beth's mother is played by actress Jessie Royce Landis, veteran of two Hitchcock films, in her final performance.
8	6	"Short Fuse"	Edward M. Abrams	Teleplay: Jackson Gillis Story: Lester Pine, Tina Pine, Jackson Gillis	73 minutes	January 19, 1972 (1972-01-19)
Roger Stanford (Roddy McDowall) is a chemist and photography buff whose uncle, David (James Gregory), has taken over a business that his parents built and his aunt (Ida Lupino) controls. David proposes selling the business to a conglomerate in return for a seat on the board of directors, then tries to blackmail Roger into resigning. Roger decides to murder his uncle with a box of exploding cigars. William Windom guest stars as the next-in-line Vice President whom Roger must remove before he can take over the company. Anne Francis plays David's secretary, who is involved with Roger. Columbo tricks him into incriminating himself, bringing a box of cigars, that he claims came from the death scene, with him on their ride in a cable car. Stanford figures these must be the exploding cigars he had planted and gradually becomes hysterical, begging Columbo to throw the box out the window, only for Columbo to reveal that the cigars are, in fact, just cigars.
9	7	"Blueprint for Murder"	Peter Falk	Teleplay: Steven Bochco Story: William Kelley	73 minutes	February 9, 1972 (1972-02-09)
Elliot Markham (Patrick O'Neal) is an architect with a vision for a city of the future, and a penchant for classical music. His latest project is being bankrolled by the young wife of Beau Williamson (Forrest Tucker), a wealthy industrialist who has been away on a lengthy overseas business trip. When Williamson returns and finds out how his money is being spent, he is furious, and intends to cut off the funds. Markham decides that the only way he can continue his work is to eliminate Williamson. Simply killing him, however, poses a problem, because his money reverts to a trust fund when he dies. Markham comes up with a clever plan to conceal the body and make it appear as if Beau has gone on another long foreign trip. With Pamela Austin and Janis Paige. This is the only episode Peter Falk directed.