87th Precinct

Revellers
And Carellas

87th Precinct
Airdate 1961 -1962
30 episodes
Timeless Media Group

I’ve never read an Ed McBain novel but he’s probably best known in literary terms for writing the many 87th Precinct books over the decades... from which there have been many movie adaptations and ‘inspired by’ credits... such as the novel King’s Ransom forming the basis of Akira Kurosawa’s High And Low. They even used some of the stories from his 87th Precinct books for TV shows, such as the odd episode or two of Columbo.

Ed McBain is also the pen name of one Evan Hunter, who wrote film and TV scripts such as The Birds with Alfred Hitchcock. As I said though, I’ve not read his books (yet, is there a nice big omnibus?) and I don’t know that much about him. But I knew of him mostly because, when I was a kid, my dad used to grab a lot of books from the library. Seemed like he’d get through quite a few books a week when travelling to and from work and also in his rare downtimes and, yeah, he read a lot of Ed McBain’s stuff. So I was absolutely delighted when, early last year, I stumbled upon a little known TV show based on McBain’s 87th Precinct. And what’s more, it had actually made it onto DVD in the US so, I imported one over for my dad’s birthday and sat down to watch the first episode with him, totally getting hooked on them myself too. We watched an episode a night and got through them in a month with my only puzzlement being, why the heck was this not picked up for a second series?

There are thirty stand alone episodes, of which, many are based on the original novels and some of which also have a screenplay by McBain. And they’re mostly pretty good. They are, like I imagine the novels are, ensemble pieces. Police procedurals involving a number of police detectives who work in the fictional 87th Precinct. The series takes four of the characters (another turns up for a single episode late in the show’s one season run) with some episodes getting equal play from all four characters and other episodes highlighting one or two of the four but, still with a little help from the others. And, there are an absolutely brilliant bunch of actors playing this lot too...

The top billed lead is Robert Lansing as Detective Steve Carella. I’m sure he’s best remembered by many now for the single episode of Star Trek he appeared in, Assignment: Earth, where he played mysterious intergalactic secret agent Gary Seven (one of my favourite episodes as a kid). That episode was supposed to be a stealth pilot episode for a new series highlighting the adventures of Mr. Seven but, alas, that did not come to pass. 

Then there’s Ronald Harper as Detective Bert Kling. Some may remember him for his later stint as Virdon on the TV show version of Planet Of The Apes. Next, my favourite of the bunch, Norman Fell as Detective Meyer Meyer, another actor who’s been in tonnes of stuff but finally found fame in the US as their version of George from the US versions of Man About The House and George And Mildred (got no idea what they were called over there, sorry). Finally there’s Gregory Walcott as Detective Roger Havilland... who I’m told is not written like the corrupt, unliked cop he is in the books but, heck, he’s pretty good in this regardless.There are a few other regulars but these are the main ones.

Also joining them for four episodes, randomly spaced throughout the season, is the great Gena Rowlands playing Teddy, Carella’s deaf/mute wife. She’s pretty good in the episodes she’s in and a few of the other spouses and girlfriends of the gang are also very watchable. Plus, there the usual slew of people who were guest stars almost, in that they were already famous, popping up for single episodes... such as Robert Culp and Victor Jory (who played The Shadow earlier in his career)... not to mention various people who hadn’t quite reached a level of fame yet such as Peter Falk, Bernie Hamilton and Sidney Klugman (who I used to love in Cagney & Lacey).

The plots are all great and it took the episode based on King's Ransom for me to realise just how much Kurosawa expanded and changed the material (and maybe the TV show did too. for all I know)... using the same story idea but making something completely different from the source (no train sequence or pink smoke in this one either). But what did surprise me, keeping in mind the years in which it was broadcast, is how gritty and edgy the show can be. 

For instance, in the first episode, Robert Culp is playing a very modern serial killer with a fair degree of mental illness and, while it’s a cliché these days, possibly... it’s certainly a step up in overt craziness compared to what other films like, say, Psycho were expressing at the time. And, quite often but not always, there’s no redemption for some of these characters, including the inevitable episode based on a well respected ex-87th Precinct cop pulling a string of brutal robberies.

Also, what really impressed me was the acting ability and imagination of the four leads. For example, someone may be scribbling an address down from a book held by another character while they’re in mid conversation and one character may close the book thinking the other has finished noting it down and then the other character will grab it and reopen it to the right page as he’s still talking, to finish writing down the lead (that one courtesy of Lansing). And there’s lots of little acting details like this which really show a bunch of thespians absolutely at the top of their game and all pulling together to bring a high level of believability and authenticity to their roles.. I think McBain used to ride around with the cops to get an ear for the dialogue and an understanding of police procedure and it really wouldn’t surprise me if some of these actors did the same here to get into their roles.

One last thing... the majority of the show is scored by Morton Stevens, who also supplied a superb piece of hard hitting, main title music. Why has this thing not been released on CD? A few of the shows also had scores by other people including a young Jerry Goldsmith on one. Morton Stevens would, of course, go on to become one of Mr. Goldsmith’s most trusted orchestrators.

And that’s me done on 87th Precinct. If you like cop shows and police procedurals then you’ll find this is a brilliant show. And with its hard hitting stories and sharp humour, I’m surprised it’s not better known. This one gets a solid recommendation from me any day of the week.