Stirling Silliphant liked to write strange yet familiar stories, often with outlandish titles for his tv shows, especially for "Route 66" , and here he manages to come up with a goofy exercise in nostalgia and bathos for "Naked City". James Barton, journeyman actor whose career dates back to the 1920s gets quite a role as a Bowery bum, playing it to the hilt.
Silliphant portrays the bums of downtown Manhattan in a glorified fashion, while their scruffy costumes and makeup plus the real, grubby locations make for an extremely old-fashioned approach. Notably, everyone enjoys themselves as a Sophie Tucker-esque singer belts out a song at the Bowery Follies, making the show seem like 1930s B-movie rather than late 1950s TV. (She doesn't get a screen credit for this otherwise all-male episode).
The story of a drunken old goofball, with the pipe dream of returning to his old home town on a horse as a last hurrah is likewise very old, and coiled with a Pollyanna-ish happy ending makes the episode seem rather silly and condescending. Mixing with obviously authentic local extras, various character actors like Louis Guss join in on the phnoy play-acting, presenting various caricatures of drunkenness.
The story's gimmicks to get our hero arrested for murder in a mugging of a wealthy guy are phony, and it turns out his pals among the bums save him, not any police work (in fact, the police and district attorney are all ready to throw the book at him). A very fine director, John Brahm, cannot overcome Silliphant's script cliches, including a vigilante mob of bums meting out vigilante justice when they capture the real killer, a real creep.