Tuesday, January 24, 2017

OVERLOOKED TELEVISION: THE CASES OF EDDIE DRAKE

The Cases of Eddie Drake was a short-lived (13 episodes) private eye show on the Dumont Network.  It was based on the George Raft radio show The Cases of Mr. Ace, which in turn was based on the 1946 George Raft/Sylvia Sidney film Mr. Ace, in which Mr. Ace was a gangster rather than a detective.  The movie was written by Fred F. Finklehoffe.  The movie flopped, the first Raft movie to do so in ten years.  Jason James adapted the show for radio and later for television.  Raft never made it to the television version; the role of Eddie Drake was played Don Haggerty, a B movie actor who played cops and cowboys and later starred in the 1954-1955 syndicated PI show The Files of Jeffrey Jones.

The show was filmed by CBS Television -- anyway, nine episodes were -- but were never shown on CBS, which sold the episodes to Dumont, which began airing them on March 6, 1952.  These episodes also featured Patricia Morison (the original lead in Cole Porter's Kiss Me, Kate; she turned 100 in 2015 and may still be alive -- at least I've found no obituary for her) as psychiatrist Karen Gayle.  Dumont filmed four additional episodes on its own, replacing Morison's character with criminologist Dr. Joan Wright, played by Lynne Roberts, a B actress who appeared in 21 westerns starring the likes of Gene Autry, Roy Rogers, Monte Hale, Kirby Grant, and Tim Holt.  Female co-stars were not unusual for television shows of the time, but to feature two in high-profile, professional jobs was very unusual.

The episode I have linked below, "Shoot the Works," was one of those filmed by CBS in 1949 and shelved until Dumont showed it in 1952.

Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J50ExX9kGgk


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