Title:"Fade in to Murder"
Directed by: Bernard L. Kowalski
Written by: Henry Garson (story), Lou Shaw & Peter Feibelman (teleplay)
Air Date: October 10, 1976
Previous: Last Salute to the Commodore
Next: Old Fashioned Murder
Guest Starring: William Shatner, Alan Manson, Lola Albright, Walter Koenig
"Fade in to Murder" is the first episode of the sixth season of Columbo.
Ward Fowler (William Shatner) stars as Detective Lucerne in a popular television mystery show. He is a prima donna who has been holding out for a higher salary. In this he is, surprisingly, supported by Claire Daley (Lola Albright), co-creator of the show. It turns out that she is blackmailing him. Claire, who discovered Fowler years ago and was once his lover, knows some dark secrets about how Fowler was a deserter during the Korean War. In return for not spilling the beans, she is getting half of his salary.
Ward has tired of this arrangement, and elects to murder Claire. Having overheard that Claire is stopping at her favorite diner for a sandwich after work, he intercepts her there, dressed as an armed robber, and shoots her. Before he left he arranged a complicated alibi involving Mark, his gofer. Ward and Mark sit in front of a TV broadcasting a Dodgers game. Ward drugs Mark's drink. When Mark falls asleep Ward starts recording the baseball game. After he gets back, Ward starts playing the tape and wakes Mark up, creating an alibi witness.
Of course Ward doesn't count on the real homicide detective, Lt. Columbo, who notices how the bullet hole in Claire's dress doesn't line up with the one in her body, and wonders why the credit cards weren't taken. Columbo is assisted in his investigation by...Ward Fowler, who relishes the chance to play Lt. Lucerne for real, and sometimes seems to forget that he's investigating himself.
William Shatner's Star Trek costar, Walter Koenig, appears in one scene as the reporting officer at the scene of the murder. Shera Danese, who appears as Sid's secretary/mistress Molly, was married to Peter Falk from 1977 to Falk's death in 2011.
Tropes:
- Artistic License – Gun Safety: It's rather unlikely but not entirely implausible that a TV show in the '70s would store real, functioning firearms rather than non-functional prop guns. Real, fully-functional revolvers are sometimes used with blank ammunition in film productions, and there have been at least two fatal accidents on film sets in real life. The gun shown in the episode is a revolver.note
- Blackmail Backfire: Claire Daley is blackmailing Fowler for half of his salary. It turns out that, having discovered him, she knows his secret. Fowler actually isn't Canadian, he's an American, and a deserter from The Korean War. However, like many Columbo victims, she doesn't anticipate that Ward will resort to murder due to growing tired of this arrangement. She does try to talk him down by trying to instill doubt that he's a killing type when she recognizes him through his ski mask, but this gambit ultimately fails.
- Clock Tampering: Part of Fowler's alibi—after starting the tape of the baseball game he alters the times of the clocks in his house as well as Mark's watch in order to trick Mark into thinking no time has passed. This bites him in the butt because Mark is in the habit of always setting his watch five minutes fast.
- Fake-Out Opening: The first scene has Lucerne confronting a murder suspect with his gotcha. It turns out that it's a scene from a TV show.
- Frame-Up: After certain evidence, mostly the location of the bullet hole in Claire's dress, leads Columbo to conclude that the killing was a premeditated murder, Fowler executes Plan B. He snags a thread from Sid's sweater and ties it to the gun. This turns out to be a mistake as Columbo sees Fowler catching a thread from the sweater on his cuff link.
- Hangover Sensitivity: Mark is wincing on the set the morning after Claire's murder. The fact that Mark is feeling poorly after having only two drinks is one clue that makes Columbo suspicious.
- I Know You Know I Know: Fowler becomes aware that Columbo is Obfuscating Stupidity, that he's doing it because he suspects him, and that he's closing in on Fowler's secrets fairly quickly. This in conjunction with him falling into character as Lucerne as both a help and a hindrance, leads to an odd game of wits where Fowler not only knows Columbo knows what he knows, but almost seems to enjoy and encourage it. There's even an extended scene where he and Columbo directly go over Fowler's own possible motive, means and opportunity and discuss in the open whether Columbo can deduce or prove anything solid without quite admitting anything.
- Impairment Shot: Mark's vision blurs right before he passes out from the drugged drink.
- Leaning on the Fourth Wall: Given that Fowler plays a TV detective suspiciously similar to Lt. Columbo, he sometimes comments on the story as it's unfolding.
- Ward is trying to steer suspicion to Claire Daley's husband Sid. Towards the end, as he's doing this, he says "That leaves us with Sid Daley. That's a great third act line, isn't it?"
- At the end, when confronted with his fingerprints, Fowler ruefully remarks, "I had to forget something. That's always how the third act ends."
- Nice Job Fixing It, Villain: For being this super-smart TV detective, Ward Fowler makes several very stupid mistakes, but his worst one is: while he brings the murder weapon back to the studio he not only fails to frame another character but leaves his own fingerprints on the blanks. Saves Columbo's time.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: In the oddest ever use of this trope on Columbo, Ward Fowler is clearly based on...Peter Falk. Fowler is the star of a hit murder mystery show, just like Peter Falk was with Columbo. Fowler is involved in contentious salary negotiations with the network, as was Peter Falk—in fact, Columbo nearly got cancelled after Season 5 due to Falk's salary demands. The single episode of Fowler's show we see shows Lucerne confronting the murder in classic Columbo style. Amusingly however, in dress Lucerne is the exact opposite of Columbo, wearing a natty suit with a flower in the lapel rather than Columbo's rumpled old raincoat.
- Sexy Secretary: Molly (played by Shera Danese, the future Mrs. Falk) is Sid Daley's hot secretary, and his mistress, and as it turns out his alibi witness—he was cheating on his wife at the time that his wife was murdered.
- Shout-Out: Columbo goes on the Universal studio lot (where Columbo was shot, of course) and notices and comments on the Jaws shot. Since this episode aired in 1976 he does not ask for Babs.
- Slipping a Mickey: Fowler drugs Mark's drink in order to render him unconscious so Fowler can go off and murder Claire.
- Special Guest: Lola Albright, a star of film and television since the early 1950s, gets Special Guest Star billing.
- Split Personality: Ward Fowler gets a little too much into his role as Detective Lucerne, helping Columbo catch him, going so far as to show Columbo the VCR that is crucial in unraveling his alibi.
- Sympathetic Murderer: One can argue how well Fowler fits this role, but at the end of the episode he expresses his opinion that he was one (as much as saying "in this story").
- Unexpected Inheritance: Sid Daley had no idea how much money Claire was making on the side through blackmailing Fowler, so he's stunned when he learns he's inherited said blackmail money upon her death.
- You Just Ruined the Shot: Columbo wanders onto the set during filming of an episode of Detective Lucerne, and ruins a shot, walking right behind a window as Ward Fowler's character is grilling the bad guy.
- You Wouldn't Shoot Me: After Fowler stops rasping and talks in his normal voice Claire realizes that Ward is the man in the burglar disguise. She turns, says that he doesn't have it in him to kill, and says she's leaving. Ward proceeds to shoot her In the Back.
