Mina Vaughn

            I spent a lot of Thursday working on my review of Shab-e She’r.

            I took a siesta at the usual time but an hour and a half of sleep barely put a dent in my fatigue.

            I finished my review that night.

            I watched a quirky episode of Peter Gunn. It begins with some hoods carrying a body into a Laundromat, putting it into the one of the dryers and leaving it spinning. The owner of the automat is a former hood named Louis. After the cops take the body away Louis confesses to Gunn that the dead man had been his accomplice in an armoured car robbery eight months before in which $1 million had been stolen. The money had consisted entirely of marked $1000 bills and so they had not been able to spend a dime of it. It frustrated Louis so much that he went straight. He borrowed some money and bought the Laundromat. Since the robbery though, Louis and Willie had been bothered by a mobster named Shoes, who has the resources to unload the marked bills. Shoes is the one who killed Willie and stuffed him in one of his dryers as a message. Louis wants Gunn to go to the DA and make a deal. He will give the money back if he is not prosecuted and if they will protect him from Shoes. He says that Gunn could keep the reward for the return of the money. Later, Gunn is on his way from Mother’s to see Lieutenant Jacoby and is forced into a car by two of Shoes’s men. The driver is a beautiful woman who’s been spying on Gunn all along. Some time later we see Gunn tied to a chin-up bar in Shoes's headquarters, which seems to double as a personal gym. Shoes is playing ping-pong and other of his employees are also engaged in different forms of exercise. Gunn has obviously been worked over already but Shoes pauses from his game to ask him where the money is. When he says he doesn’t know his biggest hoodlum takes a break from his regime of punching with wall-mounted resistance bands to walk over and punch Gunn in the stomach. Sally, while doing sort of a shoulder stand and making bicycle-riding movements upside down says that she called the DA and said she was Gunn’s secretary. They told her that Gunn should have word on the DA’s decision on whether to pardon Louis in exchange for the money any time now. Gunn is asked for the money again and is punched again for saying he doesn’t know where it is. He says it again and is punched again. Shoes is finally convinced and lets Gunn loose. Shoes tells Gunn that he’s going to help him get the money from Louis and that he’s not going to the cops and shows him why. Edie is brought out from where she’s being held in another room. Shoes tells Gunn that Edie will fight just right in a dryer. Gunn is blindfolded and led to his car. Gunn goes to see Louis, who’s with his girlfriend Angie. Gunn calls the DA and he confirms that he won’t prosecute if they get the money back. Gunn tells Louis that he only needs one of the $1000 bills before they return the money. The money is hidden in a package inside of a furnace. Gunn goes to the Laundromat, puts a package in dryer 3 and turns it on. He calls Shoes and tells him to meet him there. Shoes arrives and Gunn shows him the bill. He says he’ll get the rest when Edie calls him on his car phone from the police station. Shoes agrees and after several minutes he gets the call. He goes into the Laundromat with Shoes and four of his hoods. As soon as Gunn hands Shoes the briefcase, Jacoby, who’s been posing as a customer pulls a gun. Shots are fired and some of the men try to get away but one of them is flipped by a female customer who also turns out to be a cop. Other cops arrive to take them all away. Jacoby and Gunn are left alone in the Laundromat. Jacoby, while working undercover, brought his own laundry to wash and now he has to dry it. Gunn decides to wash the bag that he’d brought with him. They sit down and read magazines while they’re waiting. Jacoby is reading Parent’s and Gunn is reading a copy of Life from April 28, 1959.

            Sally was played by Mina Vaughn. She moved from Texas to New York at the age of 19 and became a Rockette, a June Taylor dancer, a Copa girl and a dancer on Red Skelton. After acting in film and television she returned to school and earned a PHD in Organizational Communications. She then became a professor at various colleges.

            Angie was played by Pamela Duncan, who played Velda in the Mike Hammer movie “My Gun is Quick”.