This Saturday, July 29, TMC is rebroadcasting the series Colombo. Worn by cult classic Peter Falk, who made the character famous with his scowl and iconic raincoat, the series has many secrets surrounding him. One of them is particularly dramatic, because it concerns the death of one of the actresses of the series.
When we talk about cult series, we think directly of Game Of Thrones, Desperate Housewives, Sex and the City or The Sopranos. But before the boom of the medium in the 2000s, there were already many cult series, such as Baywatch which revealed to the whole world Pamela Anderson, K2000 piloted by David Hasselhoff, and also The Little House On The Prairie with the late Michael Landon. In the midst of these emblematic programs of the small screen, there was also and above all Colombo.
Before detective series took over television, few investigators tackled the bloody affairs of the time. In addition to Hercule Poirot and his magnificent mustache, there was of course the inspector Colombo and his magnificent raincoat. A cop show which has the particularity of revealing in its first seconds the face and the motive of the murderer. A particularity that does not prevent the series from continuing to attract a large number of spectators, and from continuing to reveal filming secrets. Including one concerning the death of an actress who made an appearance in the program.
Victim on and off screen
In the first episode of the television series, titled The witness book, and directed by a certain Steven Spielberg, Ken Franklin – a failed writer – is seized with murderous madness and coldly murders his friend James Ferris. A murder witnessed by a neighbor, whom the killer decides to eliminate in turn. The second victim embodied by actress Barbara Colby had a very tragic fate.
On July 24, 1975, a few years after his participation in Columbus, Barbara Colby’s body is found in a parking lot in Los Angeles. It is while leaving a theater class accompanied by the actor James Kiernan, that two men appear and shoot them. If the actor manages to get out of it, the actress succumbs to her injuries. Despite long months of investigations, the police have never managed to find those responsible for this tragic death.which forever mourned the history of the series.