Michael Gleason, RS, Diagnosis Murder

[Myrtle Groggins]

Having been a DIck Van Dyke fan all my life, it's only natural that I would love his show, Diagnosis Murder. Twice this week I've seen some RS "repeats" on DM. I've seen other episode "reruns", too.

Just tonight, they did the solution scenes where the group holds up in an area and one by one, the suspects enter, and the group confronts them, they realize that person's not the killer, and they all go back in hiding until the next suspect enters. I know RS did this at least twice in its first season alone, Vintage and Gold, although in Gold it was more in the middle than toward the end.

There was another episode last week but I've forgotten which one it was. That's when I noticed Michael Gleason as the Executive Producer of DM. Then today, I was listening to a 4th season RS commentary and they discussed stealing from RS for other TV shows, and that they stole from other things for RS.

Any other examples I've missed? I know they did some RS rewrites for Moonlighting which I rarely watched. Wasn't it Glenn somebody (Caron?) who did Moonlighting? Michael Gleason wasn't in on that one, was he?

[Ace]

Glenn Caron who wrote or had input in the first dozen of so Steele scripts broke off and produced and wrote for Moonlighting. He actually reuses a couple of his jokes from RS. The Steele quotes he gives to David Addison are "Finally, we're sleeping together "He's seeing things that aren't in the TV Guide" (I think that's the quote). Caron created one of my favorite short lived series "Now and Again" and currently has "Medium" on the air that's very good.

Many of the RS writers went on to create and write for other shows, several long running and several good (some both) They had quite the talent pool.

The most blatant DM ripoff of Steele was the episode that SZ guest starred as a British Jewel/Art thief. the role was very much written as a female Steele and in another nod to Steele -- her lover was played by Phillip Casnoff- the same actor that played Ben Pierson on License to Steele.

Ace

[Myrtle Groggins]

Yes, I remember that episode. It's the one where an old looking woman removes her mask and she's SZ underneath, a la Elementary Steele.

There was also the DM episode where Amanda sees a couple hugging in a dressing room, which actually turned out to be the end result of a murder, based on the RS episode Cast In Steele where the same thing happened to Steele at an awards ceremony.

Recycled stories.

[laura]

Oh yes, I've seen that one too. Oh my, it was exactly the same plot !!

[Myrtle Groggins]

On tonight's DM episode (I Network), more shades of RS, MG Executive Producer. It was about lifeguards being killed off and one of the killers had a beach in his backyard, like the RS episode "Steele Alive and Kicking" where the gym/sports center owner had a similar setup in his place. It was one of DM's earlier shows because Scott Baio was part of the cast.