Overall, this is an OUTSTANDING episode !! One of the best !! It flows, has great continuity, and is entertaining. It's a "Who dun it" episode, where Mannix finally see's through the killer's alibi of having been on TV, in front of 2 million viewers, when the killing takes place. Mannix figures out that the killer (a television "bombastic" talk show host named Ted Hackett, played very nicely by Don DeFore) rigged a playback of the "killing", which he played via a telephone answering machine, when he called his home phone, from on the air. The "killing" was rigged using actual edited phone conversations from the victim, with gunshots added. The premise is GREAT, but there is ONE glaring flaw ..... after the playback of the "rigged" killing, when Hackett calls the police, and tells them to go to the victims house, an autopsy on the body would CLEARLY show that the victim was NOT recently murdered, but, in fact, was dead for some time !! But, none the less, this, obvious, fact, does NOT detract much from an, otherwise, outstanding episode.
7 Reviews
MarkTeacher01 is right about this one.
planktonrules7 July 2014
There is currently one other review for this episode. MarkTeacher01 describes this as a very good show even though it has a glaring mistake- -and they are correct. Had the man been murdered long before (and he must have been), the autopsy would have determined this and undermined the episode's premise. Still, if you can ignore this, it's a dandy one.
The show begins with an obnoxious TV host, Ted Hackett (Don Defore), doing his muckraking show. He's like a combination of Walter Winchell, Morton Downey Jr. and Nancy Grace--a bottom-feeder who likes to right wrongs...or at least get himself lots of publicity. With his latest stunt, he phones a man Hackett declares to be guilty of a crime and cover-up and you hear the accused man doing a brief interview. I say brief because you hear gunshots and the guy on the phone is soon discovered to be dead! When a woman is almost instantly accused of the crime, Mannix comes to the rescue.
The best thing going for this one is originality. It does NOT remind me of earlier "Mannix" episodes and was quite exciting.
The show begins with an obnoxious TV host, Ted Hackett (Don Defore), doing his muckraking show. He's like a combination of Walter Winchell, Morton Downey Jr. and Nancy Grace--a bottom-feeder who likes to right wrongs...or at least get himself lots of publicity. With his latest stunt, he phones a man Hackett declares to be guilty of a crime and cover-up and you hear the accused man doing a brief interview. I say brief because you hear gunshots and the guy on the phone is soon discovered to be dead! When a woman is almost instantly accused of the crime, Mannix comes to the rescue.
The best thing going for this one is originality. It does NOT remind me of earlier "Mannix" episodes and was quite exciting.
Very good episode with a great twist
pkfloydmh15 July 2021
This one is about a corrupt public official who hired Joe but was killed before Joe could do anything for him.
This is one of the best episodes of the season and features a really good performance by Don DeFore as Ted Hackett. There's also a great twist at the end.
Joe doesn't get clobbered over the head in this one but he almost gets run over. He also messes up his client's name at one point and calls him Harmitage instead of Armitage. All those blows to the head are starting to have an effect.
There aren't any of the usual clichés in this one, which is a nice change of pace. As mentioned, Joe doesn't get struck over the head and the police don't rush in at the end to wrap everything up. In fact, Lt. Malcolm only appears in one scene at the very beginning and then disappears for the rest of the episode.
So all in all, a very solid episode and one of the best of the entire season.
This is one of the best episodes of the season and features a really good performance by Don DeFore as Ted Hackett. There's also a great twist at the end.
Joe doesn't get clobbered over the head in this one but he almost gets run over. He also messes up his client's name at one point and calls him Harmitage instead of Armitage. All those blows to the head are starting to have an effect.
There aren't any of the usual clichés in this one, which is a nice change of pace. As mentioned, Joe doesn't get struck over the head and the police don't rush in at the end to wrap everything up. In fact, Lt. Malcolm only appears in one scene at the very beginning and then disappears for the rest of the episode.
So all in all, a very solid episode and one of the best of the entire season.
VERY CLEVER, BUT... NOT CLEVER ENOUGH
tcchelsey28 March 2023
One episode to remember, so very well directed by Harry Hart. Hart was associated with PEYTON PLACE, later MEDICAL CENTER and COLUMBO, so you know this story is going to be good.
Likeable, every day guy Don Defore (best known for HAZEL) plays a total work of art here. Don portrays arrogant, outspoken tv host Ted Hackett, supposedly the guy you tune in to hear all the dirt on someone. Here's the ingenious part. He calls a desperate man named Harry Armitage (played by Frank Gerstle) who apparently has some skeletons in his closet, and before he can tell all --someone shoots him while he is on the air! You have to see this.
Gerstle, by the way, one of the most busiest character actors in movies and tv, usually played detectives or doctors. He passed (due to cancer) not too long after completing this episode. Exotic Arlene Martel plays Muriel, who is caught up in this bizarre case. Martel was a cult tv figure, appearing in some classic TWILIGHT ZONE episodes and, of course, playing Mr. Spock's "future" companion T'Pring in STAR TREK. Martel appeared for years at Star Trek conventions.
Look for popular character actress and comedian Reva Rose (everywhere on tv) in a funny bit as the apartment lady with wet hair! It would have been neat if she had a recurring gag role, sort of as a go to person for info. Possibilities.
Applause to the set decorators who designed the most artistic tv set for Ted Hackett, a judge's desk on steroids. It has to be a first.
Recommended late night whodunit. Nearing the end of the season. SEASON 3 EPISODE 23 CBS remastered dvd box set.
Likeable, every day guy Don Defore (best known for HAZEL) plays a total work of art here. Don portrays arrogant, outspoken tv host Ted Hackett, supposedly the guy you tune in to hear all the dirt on someone. Here's the ingenious part. He calls a desperate man named Harry Armitage (played by Frank Gerstle) who apparently has some skeletons in his closet, and before he can tell all --someone shoots him while he is on the air! You have to see this.
Gerstle, by the way, one of the most busiest character actors in movies and tv, usually played detectives or doctors. He passed (due to cancer) not too long after completing this episode. Exotic Arlene Martel plays Muriel, who is caught up in this bizarre case. Martel was a cult tv figure, appearing in some classic TWILIGHT ZONE episodes and, of course, playing Mr. Spock's "future" companion T'Pring in STAR TREK. Martel appeared for years at Star Trek conventions.
Look for popular character actress and comedian Reva Rose (everywhere on tv) in a funny bit as the apartment lady with wet hair! It would have been neat if she had a recurring gag role, sort of as a go to person for info. Possibilities.
Applause to the set decorators who designed the most artistic tv set for Ted Hackett, a judge's desk on steroids. It has to be a first.
Recommended late night whodunit. Nearing the end of the season. SEASON 3 EPISODE 23 CBS remastered dvd box set.
Sex, lies, and videotape
cpotato101028 March 2023
Warning: Spoilers
The highlight of this episode is Arlene Martel (Muriel Price / Valerie Price), a true chameleon as an actress. Even though she plays twins in this story, little is made of it, no trickery beyond the camera work. Still, it is a joy to watch her.
Another stand-out acting bit is from Reva Rose (Woman in Apartment), hiding Joe from the thugs chasing him.
There is also Stanja Lowe (Miss Landon), who Don DeFore (Ted Hackett) is grilling at the beginning of the show. She looks a good deal like Hillary Clinton, circa her Secretary of State days. Plus the topic is a perennial, echoing in today's (2023) politics.
This is another Mannix episode where they started to play with the technology, slowing down a video-tape playback to count rotary-dial "clicks" to reveal the true phone number dialed. Thus revealing the killer, with further video to capture the confession. As for the killer pulling a gun after his confession, arrogant/narcissistic types don't always think straight when cornered.
Another stand-out acting bit is from Reva Rose (Woman in Apartment), hiding Joe from the thugs chasing him.
There is also Stanja Lowe (Miss Landon), who Don DeFore (Ted Hackett) is grilling at the beginning of the show. She looks a good deal like Hillary Clinton, circa her Secretary of State days. Plus the topic is a perennial, echoing in today's (2023) politics.
This is another Mannix episode where they started to play with the technology, slowing down a video-tape playback to count rotary-dial "clicks" to reveal the true phone number dialed. Thus revealing the killer, with further video to capture the confession. As for the killer pulling a gun after his confession, arrogant/narcissistic types don't always think straight when cornered.
Entertaining
Guad421 January 2021
Warning: Spoilers
Good episode to pass the time but not one of the best. The victim is killed while on the phone with a muckraker played by Don Defore in a departure from his good guy character in Hazel. He is the murderer and set up the phone call to give himself an alibi. This same stunt was used by murderer Daniel J Travanti in an episode of Perry Mason. Arlen Martel gets to do some real acting as twins in this episode. Despite her best efforts, she will always be Spock's bad fiancé or Tiger in Hogan's Heroes. The three bad guy gunmen are idiots. Why don't they just shoot Mannix and be done with it? The helpful woman who hides Mannix in her place is a bit of comic relief that doesn't fit into the tone of the episode but she is an original. Peggy gets in some good phone calls to produce timely information. Give her a phone and an hour and she could find Amelia Earhart. Mannix is not shot, knocked out, or drugged. Since his employer is one of the twins who fires him during the show, he might have only been paid for his initial work. Would have gotten considerable publicity for bringing in the muckraker so that's something.
Nothing but the truth: A disappointment!
filmklassik5 February 2017
Warning: Spoilers
Joe's latest client gets shot while making an on-air phone call to a controversial TV talk show host. The prime suspect: The dead man's beautiful blonde mistress whose gun the victim was shot with and who was caught fleeing from the scene mere moments after the killing took place. Is she guilty? Of course not.
Another twisty MANNIX caper... but one marred by several narrative missteps such as the sequence where Joe -- fleeing from a trio of dangerous gunmen -- scurries for shelter into the apartment of a lonely single woman who not only instantly agrees to help him, she offers to put her life on the line by acting as a diversion for the three killers.
After knowing Joe for all of five minutes.
Riiiiight.
Too bad for Joe she's maybe the stupidest woman in Los Angeles. But LUCKY for Joe the gunmen are even stupider. Moments before they see him hiding out in the woman's dresser, one of gunman peers down from the third-story window and assumes (for God knows what reason) that Joe leaped from the window and broke his leg!
"Let's go," the gunman says excitedly. "How far can he get?!" And off they go in pursuit of their "hobbled" quarry.
See? Stupid.
It also doesn't help that the woman cast as Joe's would be "protector" in this scene is playing the part for slapstick.
C'mon Goff & Roberts, what gives??
Also, does THIS remark seem far-fetched to anyone but me:
Joe, to a woman he suspects of being the REAL killer regarding why she would hire him to investigate a murder her sister was recently arrested for: "It makes a perfect cover," Joe says. "A sister who's worried sick so she calls in a private investigator."
Huh?? Joe, why would this woman believe she needed "cover" when the most likely suspect (her sister) was already in CUSTODY at that point?
And the resolution is terrible. In the final scene, why would the actual killer (the arrogant talk-show host) be dumb enough to pull a gun on Joe in the belief that no one but Joe knows he's guilty...
-- when Joe was just on the phone with a video engineer who had helped him establish the man's proof of guilt?!
Madness.
It's still MANNIX so it's watchable, but this is one of the weakest episodes of the season.
Another twisty MANNIX caper... but one marred by several narrative missteps such as the sequence where Joe -- fleeing from a trio of dangerous gunmen -- scurries for shelter into the apartment of a lonely single woman who not only instantly agrees to help him, she offers to put her life on the line by acting as a diversion for the three killers.
After knowing Joe for all of five minutes.
Riiiiight.
Too bad for Joe she's maybe the stupidest woman in Los Angeles. But LUCKY for Joe the gunmen are even stupider. Moments before they see him hiding out in the woman's dresser, one of gunman peers down from the third-story window and assumes (for God knows what reason) that Joe leaped from the window and broke his leg!
"Let's go," the gunman says excitedly. "How far can he get?!" And off they go in pursuit of their "hobbled" quarry.
See? Stupid.
It also doesn't help that the woman cast as Joe's would be "protector" in this scene is playing the part for slapstick.
C'mon Goff & Roberts, what gives??
Also, does THIS remark seem far-fetched to anyone but me:
Joe, to a woman he suspects of being the REAL killer regarding why she would hire him to investigate a murder her sister was recently arrested for: "It makes a perfect cover," Joe says. "A sister who's worried sick so she calls in a private investigator."
Huh?? Joe, why would this woman believe she needed "cover" when the most likely suspect (her sister) was already in CUSTODY at that point?
And the resolution is terrible. In the final scene, why would the actual killer (the arrogant talk-show host) be dumb enough to pull a gun on Joe in the belief that no one but Joe knows he's guilty...
-- when Joe was just on the phone with a video engineer who had helped him establish the man's proof of guilt?!
Madness.
It's still MANNIX so it's watchable, but this is one of the weakest episodes of the season.
See also
Awards | FAQ | User Ratings | External Reviews | Metacritic Reviews
