The Case of the Final Fade-Out

Appropriately entitled The Case Of The Final Fadeout, the Perry Mason show came to an end fortunately just left Perry Mason, Della Street, and Paul Drake just looking forward to yet another case that was never to be broadcast. That fadeout ending allowed the writers considerable freedom when Raymond Burr and Barbara Hale revived their characters in about 20 years for a class series of made for TV feature length films.

There's a twist on the Perry Mason paradigm, eager young star James Stacy is murdered on the set of his television series. Stacy was the last of several victims who really do get what they deserve on the show, though by no means were all of the victims so hateful. His producer Denver Pyle is arrested and Perry gets a dismissal when one of William Talman's witnesses is caught in a lie on the stand. Talman is steaming when he leaves the courtroom, but later on Pyle is found murdered in the editing room of his studio.

Old time eccentric actress Estelle Winwood is the new suspect and Burr might clear her if Winwood would stop being the diva. Of course he does would you suspect he would do otherwise?

Not the best episode, but a good one to go out on.

Oh, there are the little inside jokes and references (wink, wink), but it's typical PM fare - extremely poor dialogue writing, meandering plot, overacting, and ham-fisted direction.

Stick a fork in it! It's done! (mercifully)

Sorry, folks, but the final season ended not with a bang, but with a whimper. Worth watching solely for the cameos of the actual PM crew and the inventor of Perry Mason, Erle Stanley Gardner. The plot was contrived, the supposed relationships of the "actors" and production people on-set were truly Hollywood fiction -- the industry as portrayed is nothing like this. There was one glaring (I can't overstate how obvious) scene which upon later testimony pointed absolutely to the murderer (not that there was any doubt even without it). The acting here was mediocre; I expected much better from this cast. I blame direction. The crew scenes were acted better than the cast. Oh, well. I suppose when it's over, it's over...

A well-done series ending. The ensemble of Perry plus four was magic. All legal dramas since have been pale derivatives. But I have few quibbles about the final show:

* The actual crew appeared on screen, deservedly, but their dialog seemed a bit too amateurish.

* Lt. Tragg (Ray Collins) should have been mentioned somewhere, for old time's sake. He was my favorite actor in the series, and his wry wit was sorely missed after his death.

* Fred Steiner finally appeared in the credits as the composer of the Perry Mason theme, which is entitled Park Avenue Beat. (Incidentally, live performances of the full piece are on YouTube.)

This is kind of a fun episode with two murders at the center of it. It's about a hit TV show where the star is insufferable and leaves his producer out to dry. The star is eventually shot to death while shooting a scene. There are plenty of suspects and a couple of courtroom scenes. The biggest weakness is the casting of Dick Clark as a significant character. He is one of he worst actors I've every scene. I would give him a 2 because he was easy to dance to.