Created by Tom Dempsey
After incurring the wrath of Dom Gellatti, a local mob boss, who makes him an offer he dare not refuse, cigar-chomping Jersey City P.I. EDDIE MAZADA strikes out for safer and definitely greener pastures, in the 1989 made-for-TV movie Trenchcoat in Paradise.
Namely Hawaii.
And who could blame him?
As played by the slightly smarmy Dirk (Battlerstar Galactica) Benedict, Mazada’s pretty much your standard issue TV gumshoe of the era: down on his luck, divorced (he leaves his ex and child back in Jersey), mildly quirky and cynical (but not too cynical). He has a weakness for large stogies, spicy food (apparently you can take the eye out of New Jersey, but you can’t, etc., etc.), dark suits and slightly shabby trench coats.
Hey, dude! It’s Hawaii!
Eddie promptly re-establishes himself in Hawaii by buying out another P.I., and inheriting the former owner’s bright, very attractive female assistant, Mona (played by Sydney Walsh), who thinks bikinis are just about perfect office wear. Not that she’s the only attractive woman on display here: Kim Zimmer, Michelle Phillips, and Catherine Oxenberg are all lurking around. As is Bruce Dern, who plays an influential real estate partner whose partner has just been murdered by person or persons unknown.
In true TV it’s-not-a-pilot-but-it-might-be-a-pilot-if-enough-people-like-it fashion, Eddie solves the big case, and decides to stay in Hawaii, therefore setting everything up for a potential series.
Which never happened.
Too bad for CBS, which had all those sets and studio facilities left over from Magnum, P.I., which had wrapped up just the previous year.
TELEVISION
- TRENCHCOAT IN PARADISE
(1989, CBS)
100 minutes
Written by Tom Dempsey
Directed by Martha Coolidge
Music by John Debney
Executive producers Josh Kane, Michael Ogiens
Starring Dirk Benedict as EDDIE MAZADA
With Sydney Walsh as MONA
Also starring Bruce Dern, Kim Zimmer, Michelle Phillips, Catherine Oxenberg, Jeremy Slate
FURTHER INVESTIGATION
- Let’s Go to Hawaii!
Hawaiian Eyes
Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith.
