The Space Children

            On Friday I finished my review of Shab-e She’r.

            I managed to finally get in touch with my upstairs neighbour David about my friend Nick coming on Saturday to put up some shelves in his apartment.

            I watched another episode of Perry Mason. In this story a man named Ed has hired a private investigator named Beckmeyer to prove that his food has been poisoned. He accuses his wife Myrna of trying to kill him. He goes on a trip, checks into a motel and becomes sick. Myrna is called by a doctor who says Ed is dying. Myrna and her cousin Louise arrive to find Ed in an oxygen tent. Shortly after that Ed goes into convulsions, becomes still and the doctor declares him dead. Louise encourages Myrna to get a lawyer and so they go to Mason. The next day Ed’s body disappears and is found a day or so later in a grave in the woods. Because her wealthy uncle also died of arsenic poisoning, Myrna is charged with her husband’s murder. In court Mason uncovers that the doctor that declared Ed dead does not have a degree from a recognized medical school and that he conspired to fake Ed’s death with him to incriminate his wife. He'd already taken the $200,000 that she inherited from her uncle, whom Ed had actually killed. Mason gets the private detective Beckmeyer to admit that he killed Ed to take the money.           

            Beckmeyer was played by Adam Williams, who was typecast as a bad guy throughout most of his career. He played Valerian in North by Northwest, who fell off Mount Rushmore while trying to kill Cary Grant. One of the only good guys he played was in The Space Children about a brain from outer space that saves the Earth from atomic scientists by telepathically telling children how to stop them. He plays an atomic scientist whose children convince him that he's doing the wrong thing.