Guess the Guest Stars for Hooray for Homicide!

You know the drill, guesses in the comments!

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5 (Saving the best for last!)

Season 1, Episode 4: Birds of a Feather

The episode opens (after the summation), and we see Al Drake (Martin Landau!) and Howard (Jeff Conaway) in a tense conversation. Howard wants to get out of a secret shameful deal and is refused.  He jogs off and then Drake is threatened (again) by this other dude named Mike.  So within the first 3 minutes, we totally know that Drake is a goner.  We meet up with JF and her niece, Vicky, at the church. Vicky is planning a small, intimate wedding to Howard, who is late.  Howard shows up later to meet JF, but says he must bow out of the proposed dinner (again!) because of work (we learn this is the 5th night in a row of cancelled dinner).  JF and Vicky go off to dinner to a seafood restaurant. So JF flies to California to eat lobster flown in daily from Maine?  Vicky tells JF that Howard wanted to be an actor but now he works as an insurance salesman to support Vicky, who in turn doesn't care what his job is, she just wants to marry Howard.  During dinner, Vicky confides in JF that she (Vicky) thinks Howard is having an affair as evidenced by late nights, matchbooks from a nightclub, and a handkerchief smeared with lipstick (not Vicky's color!).
We shift to Drake's nightclub and find a full house, Drake talking to his secretary Barbara about having no desire to sell the club.  Then Patterson (Bart Braverman), a talent agent, sidles up to tell Drake that Patterson will get Freddy York (Gabe Kaplan), a comedian/drummer, out of his terrible contract with Drake, but Drake refuses to let him go!  Vicky and JF arrive at Drake's club and are unable to get a table.  Vicky attempts to use JF's celebrity to get a table, but that doesn't work; the host doesn't know who she is!  However, when Vicky appeals to Drake and reveals that JF has written 6 best sellers and is on a press junket out in San Francisco (JF is not going to waste any time in Cabot Cove, I guess).  We then hear Freddy York's terrible act (it is really bad).  Mrs. Drake show ups with the most stereotypical evil eyebrows (permanently arched and located half-way up her forehead).  The staff goes out of their way to notify Mr. Drake that his wife is here (so you know their marriage is great!).  And then the club's drag show starts!  Barbara discovers the body of Mr. Drake and then calls out to stop the figure running about.  The figure then runs on stage and we discover that it is Howard in a dress!  By the way, I have to say the drag queens in this show are not committed at all to their craft.  They aren't even trying; RuPaul would not approve!
Vicky is then reunited with Howard and is so relieved that Howard is not cheating.  But Howard is then immediately arrested for Drake's murder. While at the scene of the crime, a feather is discovered on Drake's body and is thought to have come from his pet bird. JF (of course) attempts to insert herself in the investigation, but Novack (the lead investigator) is not really interested.  She then shows off both impressive knowledge of gun shot residue tests and understanding (for the time) towards Howard and his current employment.  Howard explains to JF that Drake would not let him out of the contract and he went to Drake's office to talk to Drake.  While in the office, he picked up a gun (smart, get those prints on anything you can!) before discovering that Drake was dead.  The police think that they can pinpoint the time of death since the sound of Freddy York's terrible drum act would drown out the sound of the gunfire.
We switch over to a waterside scene between Mrs. Drake and Mike that lets us know that they were having an affair and both aren't sure the other one didn't kill Drake.  We head back to the club with JF who is talking with Freddy York in his dressing room and finding a chaise lounge under a window with a great view (one of the few rooms with a window).  As JF is leaving, she overhears Mrs. Drake firing Barbara (the secretary).  During a shared cab ride, JF extracts a variety of information from Barbara that throws suspicion on both Mrs. Drake and Patterson.  And we learn that Mike wanted to buy the club.  JF and Novack return to the club to determine if York's act would indeed drown-out the sound of gunfire. While JF is onstage, a set of lights falls to the stage that almost crushes her, forcing Freddy to jump off the stage, injuring his neck.  JF later meets Novak at his insanely decorated apartment (which includes ceramic duck and cow busts on the wall and bunch of ferns) to discuss the case and why she thinks that Howard is innocent. She later bails out Howard (and buys him a suit) and reassures him that she is on the case and she will clear him of the charges.
JF meets with Mrs. Drake while she (Mrs. Drake) is golfing and learns that Freddy had indeed ended his contract with Drake.  She heads over to the hospital and finds Freddy (wearing an inapproriately short hospital gown) and Patterson celebrating, Patterson speculating that the falling lights were meet to kill Freddy (though Mike and JF are also listed as potentially targets).  While returning JF to her hotel (with light construction occuring in the next room), Howard tells Vicky that they should postpone the wedding because he doesn't have a good job (I guess she doesn't either).  After attempting to drown out the construction noise with a pillow, JF realizes that the source of the the feather on the Drake's body is due to a pillow being used as a silencer for the gun!  That means that the time of death was not fixed to overlap with Freddy's act.  When they return to Drake's office, they find that the pillow in the chaise is not missing, but it was missing on the day of the murder (as shown by the crime scene photos that JF has procured, which I think maybe against the law).  JF figured out that Freddy could have heard the lights and then just waited until the last moment to jump out of the way. JF accuses Freddy of killing Drake and replacing the damaged pillow with the sun-bleached pillow from his own chaise (he was the only with a window in the dressing room). When reminiscing about his career, Freddy legit says: "I'm the Edison of comedy. I'm Robert Fulton on the drums." because he is the first comedian that does his own rimshots (but not the first one to use the terribly bad jokes that make up his act, I guess).  He also claims that Drake broke his spirit and his heart.  Freddy staged the falling lights to throw suspicion off himself.  We then attend the wedding of Vicky and Howard.  At this point we see Vicky with her hair down. Prior to this, any other time that we have seen Vicky, he hair was up in this Gibson girl updo.  And based on the amount of hair she had, she would have to be wearing a lot of wigs to get that updo. Howard gets ready to start a career in real estate after their honeymoon (job supplied by JF), but Patterson comes to the church to tell him that he got Howard a job as a day player (2 days a week) on a soap opera, which may be the thing that dates this episode the most!

Show Stats:
Famous Guest Stars:  Gabe Kaplan (Welcome Back, Kotter! Your dreams were your ticket out!), Jeff Conaway (Kenickie from Grease and Taxi), Martin Landau (North by Northwest!, Mission Impossible, and Space 1999), Bart Baverman (I only know him from episodes of Match Game, but he was in Vega$, which also starred Robert Ulrich as a PI)
Relative Count: 1 Nephew, 1 Niece
Body location: In a office
Remaining Episode Count: 255

Guess the Guest Stars for Birds of a Feather!

Here are TV Themes for shows that feature the guest stars for the Murder, She Wrote episode "Birds of a Feather".  There are 4 guest stars, so put your guesses in the comments section! Plus this is an excuse to post some great(ish) TV themes from the 70s!

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Season 1, Episode 3: Deadly Lady

Starting with this episode, we get to see a short summation of what to expect for the episode, sort of a warm opening instead of a cold opening. So we open on literally a dark and stormy night with JF hard at work (on a typewriter of course). She's trying to squeeze in 3 more paragraphs before the lights go out due to the "deadly lady" (episode title! drink!) : a hurricane near Cabot Cove.  A friend (possibly a suitor; he is very flirty) named Ethan stops by to check on JF/ to do an exposition dump about a yacht with passengers aboard, possibly lost at sea.
The next day, JF is up for her morning jog and visits with some fisherman. She returns home to find some kind of hobo named Ralph who would like to exchange some landscaping work for food/board.  While in the kitchen, Ralph picks up a copy of her book, says that he had read it and complements her (I don't know about you, but I always keep hardback copies of books in my kitchen).  JF says that this is an Advanced Reader Copy of her new book. Ralph must know some muckety muck to be able to get his hands on this. She mentions that she doesn't think he is actually  a hobo since he didn't use the proper term. We learn that the act of being a hobo in "boing" (long o), not "hoboing".  She also could see where his wristwatch was.  Oh, Ralph, you would have fooled her if you just said bumming around.
Sheriff Tom Bosely then calls to tell JF that the boat has turned up but one of the passengers didn't!  The Bos asks for her help/advice (because, I guess, we should assume that the Cabot Cove deputies are useless).  We learn that Stephen Earl and his four daughters: Nan (a designer), Maggie (a fan), Lisa (HBIC, clearly the oldest), and Grace (who mentions that her husband has disappeared!). And when I saw this with my cousin, Lindy, I said that I was certain the Grace totally killed her husband.  This is what comes from watching too much film noir! The Earl family was sailing from Newport and got caught in the storm.   While the 4 daughters were below, Steven was on deck and being swept off the boat to sea.  The Bos doesn't buy this story and wants to investigate.  He orders the daughters to stay in Cabot Cove until the body washes ashore (so, your basic family vacation!).  This leads to a side point: based on comments from both Ethan and Maggie, it sounds like JF has published multiple books (which, rudely, the Bos says he had read none of).   And later we find out it is 6 books (so a bunch of time much have passed in the Cabot Cove universe)
Grace tells JF that none of the daughters really loved their father, Steven, and he had meddled in Nan's romance with a man named Terry (Steven was convinced that Terry was just a gold digger).  JF returns home to find Ralph, the psuedo-hobo, in the hammock and that he made a phone call to Paris (Kentucky).  JF fills him in about Steven Earl.  We learn that Mr. Fletcher (Frank was his first name) was a pipe smoker (this scene is scored with super nostalgic/romance music) and JF gives Ralph the pipe and they bond over both losing spouses.  Lisa's husband, Mr. Shelby, choppers in and lights a fire under the Bos to investigate Earl's death.  Cleaning up and watching the water drain from the sink makes JF realize something.  With the help of Ethan, she points out to the Bos that, based on the story from the girls, the boat would have been in the eye of the hurricane when they claimed Steven went overboard.  When this is revealed to the girls, Maggie claims that she shot Steven when he was in a drunken rage (and Maggie was over it, officially).  And according to Grace, Maggie was the daughter that had to put up with this Steven's shit (so no one could blame her for losing it, I guess?).  Ethan and JF return the girls to their inn and pick up a copy of the paper that contains Steven Earl's biography (he started out as an actor before founding a cosmetic company, Mark of Earl) and a picture: Suprise! Ralph is Steven Earl (and both loved the boiled scrod made by JF).  Ethan is skeptical of JF revelation but will help her look for Ralph.  Then these two poor children, playing fetch with their dog, find Ralph/Steven Earl's body (for realies this time!).
At this time, Terry (Nan's fiance) shows up to be supportive of Nan.  JF expresses anger over the death of Ralph.  We move to a scene between Shelby and Lisa, with Shelby is saying that if Maggie goes to jail, they will get her shares and greater control of Mark of Earl.  Maggie then tells JF that the original plan was to fake Steven's death to draw Terry out (and break Nan and Terry up for good).  So Maggie has no idea how Steven ended up dead! Maggie is released from police custody when it is determined that the bullets in Steven do not match Maggie's gun.  Shelby tells JF that she is a sweet old lady but she should butt out of other people's business (so now, you don't have to feel guilty if you want Shelby to be dead).  Terry then gives Nan the hard sell for marriage, but she is not really into it.  Later, Terry tells JF that Maggie told him of Steven's scheme.  He came to Maine when he heard about Steven's fake death (from Steven himself; that was the call to Paris, Kentucky) to be with Nan (in Portland).  But once he heard about Steven's real death, he came to Cabot Cove to convince Nan he really wanted to marry her.  JF heads off to find the Bos, and at the police station, we meet Emma, the only supporting character in this whole episode that has an actually Maine accent.  The Bos is on the beach, where a search has turned up a pair of ladies high heels (with the heel broken off one shoe).  The Bos and JF prove that the shoes belong to Nan, but JF doesn't think that Nan is guilty. She decides to lay a trap to catch the guilty party. Meanwhile, Nan will be in jail.
Returning to the inn after celebrating Maggie's release, JF tells Shelby and the other daughters about finding a heel (but not the shoes) and Nan's arrest and mentions that she (JF) thinks that someone else could have worn Nan's shoes.  Lisa (and Shelby) walk away in a huff, but Grace and Maggie agree to let the police search their rooms. Maggie tells JF she isn't sure they should waste their time in her room; she wasn't Nan's (shoe) size and she doesn't wear pink.   Maggie realizes her mistake (JF never said the shoes were pink) and heads off to JF's house to silence JF!  We learn the Maggie travels with an all-black ensemble just for emergencies!  JF confronts Maggie with the fact that the attempted framing of Nan was so obvious. Maggie threatens to hurt JF.  Their conversation is being monitored by the Bos though a phone off the hook, so JF is not under any real threat).  JF takes Maggie to the police station and Nan is then released. Maggie tells JF how put upon she (Maggie) was, and that the only daughter that Steven really loved was Nan.  JF and Nan have a conversation about Steven Earl (and Nan's future).  However, they never really resolve if Steven was an a-hole or not.  JF (and Nan) don't think he was, but 75% percent of his daughters disagree! Anyway, the episode ends with some light flirting between JF and Ethan and a promise of a romantic fishing date!

Show Stats:
Famous Guest Stars: Tom Bosley (from tons of stuff including Happy Days and Love with a Proper Stranger (that one it for you, mom!)) 
Relative Count: 1 Nephew (no relations in this episode)
Body location: On the beach
Remaining Episode Count: 256