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Peter Gunn

kevinburtonsmith

Created by Blake Edwards
Pseudonyms include Sam O. Brown
(1922-2010)

Suave, sophisticated, hep to the jive, groovin’ to the oh-so-cool jazzbo-beat, PETER GUNN was like nothing ever seen before on television or anywhere else, really. He was a new kind of eye. While other dicks hung out in rundown offices, swilling rotgut, living hand to mouth, loners till the end, cloaked in rumpled trenchcoats and angst, Gunn hung out at Mother’s, a swank jazz club on the waterfront of a big but never named city, wearing his Ivy League finest, pitching woo at his best gal, singer Edie Hart, drinking nothing more than an occasional tasteful martini.

This was Rat Pack cool with the asshole bits boiled out.

The strong cast included Craig Stevens as Gunn, Lola Albright as Edie, Hope Emerson (and later, Minera Urecal) as Mother, and Herschel Bernardi as Lieutenant Jacoby, Pete’s long-suffering, sad-faced police contact and pal. A highly-innovative and influential show, it also boasted Mancini’s hit theme song, as well as witty dialogue, snazzy clothing and elaborate (for television) camerawork. A sort of Miami Vice for its time, but with far more substance and some very good, sometimes excellent, writing. It ran for two years on NBC, then for another year on ABC.

But for three years, Gunn hung around, tough, independent, principled and effortlessly cool, wooing Edie, and getting in–and then out of–trouble. And all in thirty minutes or less, displaying more private eye action that many (many!) sixty-minute shows would die for.

One of the other things that intrigues me is the violence in the show. Not that it existed–that’s a given for the era and the type of show it was–but the surprisingly visceral, almost brutal quality of some of it. There’s a rawness and wildness to the fight scenes, and some of the violence was just plain nasty, as when a frustrated thug suddenly kicks a prone Mother in the stomach.

And yet there were also moments of genuine tenderness and affection, particularly between Gunn and the beautiful but melancholy Edie, who were clearly in an adult relationship, and enjoying a healthy—if discreet–sex life.

Perhaps it was simply the era–violence and sexuality had not yet been codified into the shorthand of stale, overused tropes; the bland leading the bland. Watching the show now, there’s still a satisfying freshness to much of it.

But I like to think it was more than that–a perfect storm of solid casting, tight writing and someone at the helm with a clear sense of what he wanted.

That someone was creator Blake Edwards, who would soon be responsible for the Pink Panther movies and a lucrative film career, and and had previously worked the shamus game with radio’s (and television’s) Richard Diamond.

Occasionally, Edwards dusted off the Peter Gunn character, first in the ill-conceived 1967 theatrical release, Gunn, which missed the whole point, trying to turn Gunn into something he wasn’t–a cold-blooded Mike Hammer-style avenger (although the film was a reworking of “The Kill,” the very first episode of the TV show). It was stylish enough, but somehow, the charm of the series was missing. Also missing? Mothers, Lieutenant Jacoby, and Edie.

Then in 1989, a made-for-television movie/pilot for a new series appeared, starring Peter Strauss as an updated Gunn. The pilot didn’t catch on, but I thought Strauss was perfectly cast as Gunn. Alas, other changes weren’t quite as perfect. This new Gunn was cleaned up–he didn’t smoke, or even drink much, the scarf he sported seemed more like a dandyish affectation than any sort of stylistic cool, and he had an office complete with a ditzy secretary (a role seemingly written in to accommodate Jennifer Edwards, daughter of I wonder who?). In the series, Gunn hadn’t had an office–he’d worked out of Mother’s. After the nice, tightly-scripted thirty-minute plots of the original series, the pilot seemed overlong and bloated. It was a nice try, but nice doesn’t cut it. If only they’d cut down on the fluff, and given Gunn a drink, a smoke, and a better script, who knows?

UNDER OATH

SO, WHERE WAS IT SET?

TELEVISION

 

 

NOVELIZATIONS/TIE-INS

COMIC BOOKS

FILMS

FURTHER INVESTIGATION

Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith. Thanks to Edmund for the spell check.

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