Tonight's TV: Columbo (1975): "Forgotten Lady," "A Case of Immunity," "Identity Crisis" - A Kino Lorber Blu-ray Review

It's time for one of my periodic surveys of COLUMBO episodes, as I continue to work my way chronologically through the marvelous set of "1970's" episodes released on Blu-ray by Kino Lorber.

This time around we'll take a look at the first three episodes from Season 5, "Forgotten Lady," "A Case of Immunity," and "Identity Crisis." All were from the fall of 1975.

I thought all three episodes were quite good, with the exceptional acting and strong writing of "Forgotten Lady" making it one of the best episodes.

In "Forgotten Lady" 48-year-old Janet Leigh plays Grace Wheeler, a faded film actress who sees a chance at a Broadway comeback and shoots her elderly physician husband (Sam Jaffe), who holds the purse strings necessary for the show's backing and doesn't approve. Grace sets her husband's death up to look like a suicide.

Grace gets to work on the show with her old movie partner, Ned Desmond (John Payne, who was 63). Ned has carried a torch for Grace for years. But Grace's behavior is becoming increasingly erratic...

I won't spoil exactly how things turn out, but this was an extremely well-written show (by William Driskill), which goes in unexpected directions; it's a bit unusual as COLUMBO mysteries go. The episode was directed by Harvey Hart and filmed by Charles Correll.

Leigh is great, but it must be said that Payne absolutely steals the show with a performance so good that I'm shocked he wasn't Emmy-nominated.

One of the interesting things about this episode is it falls to Payne to have the arguments smart villains often have with Columbo -- but in this case the arguments are different because he's an innocent man defending someone else. For his part, Falk was also especially good in this one, especially the moment when he tells Payne "I think she did it."

The supporting cast includes Maurice Evans (BEWITCHED) as Grace's butler, plus Francine York and Ross Elliott. There's also the return of Columbo's beloved Dog.

The next episode, "A Case of Immunity," was written by Lou Shaw from a story by James Menzies. It was directed by Ted Post, with photography by Richard C. Glouner.

The episode guest stars Hector Elizondo and Sal Mineo, with Kenneth Tobey (THE THING FROM ANOTHER WORLD) as the Police Commissioner. The plot concerns a murder at the Los Angeles embassy for a Middle Eastern country.

The suspects have diplomatic immunity, which complicates things for Columbo considerably... I really enjoyed that angle, and it was also enjoyable to watch the young Elizondo, who did quite a bit of TV work in that era; I remember him guesting on THE ROCKFORD FILES.

This was a very interesting show which was filmed at Harold Lloyd's Greenacres Estate. The looks at '70s Southern California in general, and Los Angeles in particular, is one of my favorite things about the series.

"A Case of Immunity" was also fun for me due to supporting actress Brioni Farrell, who was the great-niece of Oscar-winning actress Katina Paxinou (FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS); Farrell is billed here as Xenia Gratsos. She's little remembered today, yet her presence brought back a fun memory for me.

Roughly half a decade after this COLUMBO episode, Farrell briefly appeared on GENERAL HOSPITAL as Martha, a waitress at Kelly's Diner. I found Farrell to be a striking presence and sent her a fan letter.

In those pre-Internet days, networks and especially soap stars were typically very responsive to fan mail, which would also help influence the success of actors or TV series. When I was in college I would periodically use some of my "down time" to write and share my appreciation of an actor or series, and then I'd often find fun mail in my dorm mailbox a few weeks later. And indeed, Brioni Farrell sent me a very nice note on a postcard not long after I wrote her, which I still have in my memorabilia collection. She died in 2018, at the age of 78.

If you look very, very carefully -- you might need to use the pause button -- you can spot a young Jeff Goldblum as one of the student protestors in this episode.

The third episode of this batch, "Identity Crisis," starred and was directed by Patrick McGoohan, who had a long-running relationship with COLUMBO.

Like "Forgotten Lady" it was written by William Driskill, and like "A Case of Immunity" it was filmed by Richard C. Glouner. David White (BEWITCHED), Bruce Kirby, and Vito Scotti were among the supporting cast.

The story concerned the murder of a secret agent (Leslie Nielsen) by another spy (McGoohan) and the tricky work Columbo must do to unravel the case. His home is even bugged by his prime suspect!

This was another very well-done episode which has especially interesting locations, including the Long Beach Pike, which has been gone for many years now, plus the Santa Monica Pier, the Travel Town Museum at Griffith Park, and "The Enchanted Hill" estate used in several episodes.

All three of these episodes are very good television and strong examples of why the COLUMBO series continues to be enjoyed decades after the shows first aired.

There were three more episodes in Season 5 which aired in 1976, and they'll be the focus of my next COLUMBO post.

Previous COLUMBO review posts: "Murder By the Book" (1971), "Death Lends a Hand" (1971), "Dead Weight" (1971), "Suitable for Framing" (1971), "Lady in Waiting" (1971), "Short Fuse" (1972), "Blueprint for Murder" (1972), "Etude in Black" (1972), "The Greenhouse Jungle" (1972), "The Most Crucial Game" (1972), "Dagger of the Mind" (1972), "Requiem for a Falling Star" (1973), "A Stitch in Crime" (1973), "The Most Dangerous Match" (1973), "Double Shock" (1973), "Lovely But Lethal" (1973), "Any Old Port in a Storm" (1973), "Candidate for Crime" (1973), "Double Exposure" (1973); "Publish Or Perish" (1974), "Mind Over Mayhem" (1974), "Swan Song" (1974), "A Friend in Deed" (1974), "An Exercise in Fatality" (1974), "Negative Reaction" (1974), "By Dawn's Early Light" (1974), "Troubled Waters" (1975), "Playback" (1975), "A Deady State of Mind" (1975).

Thanks to Kino Lorber for providing a review copy of this Blu-ray set.

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