What do you know about Perry Mason? Me, I knew he was a lawyer. That he had a TV series WAY back. I knew he had a revival in the 80’s or was it 90’s. I knew Raymond Burr played him (At least that is what the trivia games led me to believe). I knew there was a character named Hamilton Berger (that’s right Ham Berger!), I knew that because my head is filled with useless trivia that will some day, with $10., get me a cup of coffee at Caribou. Those are the things I knew before I watched the First Season vol. 1 of Perry Mason on DVD.
What I know now is:
In the 50’s EVERYBODY smoked cigarettes. EVERYBODY! Everyone had an ornate wooden box filled with cigarettes on their desk or coffee table, and next to the wooden box was at LEAST three lighters. And another thing I found disturbing is: only the BAD guys smoked cigars! What in the name of Gina Gershon was that all about!?! (Gina Gershon has nothing to do with Perry Mason, I just think she is HOT! You know that thing that Homer Simpson does when he see something he lusts after, with his tongue hanging out, his eyes half closed and he makes that gurgling sound? I call it “Homering.” That’s what I am doing now).
But I digress…
Actually I REALLY enjoyed watching the whole season, of Perry Mason: The Complete First Season, although after three or four episodes you can pick out the pattern and can pick out the murderer on most of the remaining episodes. But it was still interesting how Perry out smarts them.
It was also interesting to see old TV like that. It was a whole different time back then. But the writing was dramatic and not overly so. The acting was good…not overly so… The “sum ups” at the end of each episode where Perry tells everyone how he figured it out, alternated between interesting, obsurd, and painful to watch (sometimes the “witty banter” made me want to, as Joey said on Friends, “chew off my own arm and beat myself to death with it.”
What would have made this even better was if they would have left the original commercials in. During the credits they have little pictures of their sponsers.
