In addition to the guest stars, series regulars Ralph Manza and Murray Matheson provided excellent counterpoints to Peppard’s Banacek.
Those surprising guest stars are one of the pleasures of these vintage TV shows. The mystery series Murder, She Wrote accomplished a similarly impressive guest star list a decade or so later, but few series in recent years have been able to do so. That partial guest list is a nostalgic reminder of how many superb actors and actresses were around in the early 1970s and willing to guest star on a quality television show. Among the memorable guest stars were Linda Evans, Broderick Crawford, Kevin McCarthy, Stefanie Powers, William Windom, Joanna Pettet, Margot Kidder, Janis Paige, Stella Stevens, David Wayne, Jessica Walter, Cesar Romero, John Saxon, Anne Francis, Harry Carey Jr., Victoria Principal, and Sterling Hayden. “You can read all the books in the library my son, but the cheese will still stink after four days.”Īn additional attraction of the show was the numerous guest stars who played the suspects in the cases Banacek investigated, with the most attractive females doubling as romantic interests for the wealthy, handsome investigator.“Just because the cat has her kittens in the oven doesn’t make them biscuits.”.Those were truly cheer-able moments, especially for life’s underdogs.Īnother way Banacek showed pride in his heritage was by quoting old Polish proverbs-presumably invented by the show’s writers-which would initially strike the listener as rather confusing and indeed a bit silly but would, upon reflection, usually have a clear relevance to the issue at hand and in fact prove rather insightful. Banacek would invariably correct their pronunciation, and rather pointedly suggest that they were vulgar and ignorant. Oftimes characters in the show expressed open contempt for Banacek’s ethnic background, pronouncing his name incorrectly and often doing so deliberately. It’s a message that should resonate with people of all colors, in fact, and is well worth hearing even now. If it were so, few of today’s silliest public arguments would be sustainable.)īanacek’s Polish background was an important element of the show, and a particular inspiration to urban ethnic young people of the time, I’m sure, as his pride in his Polish heritage proved that a disadvantaged upbringing need not be any impediment to success in life. (Too bad that it seldom is accepted as such.
It does, however, seem true to both the character and the times, and truth should always be a dispositive defense against accusations of political incorrectness. Speaking of the latter, Banacek was an unapologetic ladies’ man, and this element of the show may irk current-day feminists. As a result of his freelance status and his independent streak, Banacek ran into much hostility from insurance company investigators, but he ultimately charmed rival Carlie Kirkland (Christine Belford), and the two became friendly rivals (and more).
First, George Peppard was just superb as the title character: a self-confident, smart, tough, worldly, and, perhaps most interesting of all, truly independent freelance private investigator who specialized in recovering lost or stolen objects, for a fee of 10 percent of the total value of the item.īanacek worked mainly for insurance companies, who were eager to engage his services in hopes of saving 90 percent of the dollar value of the object in question. It enabled producers to pay more attention to both the writing and the production values, and some of these series ended up becoming TV classics, such as Columbo, McMillan and Wife, McCloud, and The Snoop Sisters.īanacek is my personal favorite of these.
The mystery movie “wheel” was a great concept: a new mystery movie each week in a ninety-minute time slot, rotating among three or four series. For two seasons, in 1972-1974, Banacek ran as part of the NBC Wednesday Mystery Movie anthology program.
I’ve just discovered that several (and possibly all) episodes of the great 1970s TV series Banacek are now available for free viewing on YouTube.