Perry Mason The Case of the Clumsy Clown (1957–1966) Online

I grew up with Perry Mason, and I still watch it almost every night. But I always hated this episode.

This episode represents what I think of as the "not the real world" characteristic of many episodes. In Masonland (and, to be fair, other shows of the era), unsuccessful playwrights live in lofty mansions, attractive young women all have vast fortunes waiting on the demise of some relative or other, and CLOWNS make enough money to buy the entire circus. Which is the most jarring note of this particular show.

When I was young, there were a number of circuses around, unlike today. Ringling Brothers was far from the only game in town. So I saw a few of these traveling shows. But never, and I mean never, have I seen such a pathetic circus as this. Seriously, can anyone say this was how circuses operated? The business plan for this circus seems more like the business plan for a greeting card shop to be located in an out-of-the-way strip mall in a dying town.

It is impossible to believe the "great clown" was considered "great," even by his mother. It is impossible to believe that this circus is worth killing for. It is impossible to believe the circus people ever worked in show business (which should be an easy get, right?). The plot is silly and the story unbelievable.

Read a good book tonight instead. Then tune back in tomorrow night.

Mason & Della & Tragg go to the circus. At the show they witness an apparent murder by a famous clown happen in front of them. Then Mason gets to Defend the famous clown.

The clown has an alibi except he can't prove that he was already leaving town when the murder occurred. He left a note behind that he needed a sub but the note has vanished. Mason sorts through a lot of clues as he is sure that the clown did not do the murder even though he saw it with his own eyes.

While Mason is searching for clues, the gun turns up on a highway on the rail road route the real clown took to San Francisco causing the clowns arrest for murder.. The gun while not necessarily the murder weapon, has 4 live rounds in it. The questions are, was it loaded with live rounds or blanks during the performance? Who was really in the clown suit? Who has the real motive to have been the killer?

Lt. Tragg expresses how good circus popcorn is in this episode. I think the same of movie theater popcorn as long as I can add the butter to it.

This episode never seemed to go anywhere. The writers used an extremely complex story to describe a simple plot leaving the viewer puzzled. So much time was dedicated to the selling of the circus and trying to discredit one character that the main plot was lost. Thus making it more of a disappointment than what the summary of the episode predicted. Another problem is the casting of Douglas Henderson as a clown. That was odd from the very start.

The story involves the Curtis-Franklin Circus. At the beginning of the show we see the main clown, Felix Heidemann and his new bride Lisa Franklin. They had just married and was breaking the news to one of the owner, Jerry Franklin, when Lisa accidentally let a leopard escape and it mauls owner Jerry Franklin.

The scenes switch to five years later and for some reason Lisa is now married to Jerry Franklin. (I guess she felt bad for the mauling) However she never got a divorce from Felix. (which is just a few strange things about this episode). ---- Anyway the two owners Jerry Franklin and Judd Curtis are trying to buy each other out of their half of the circus. And each is having a hard time coming up with the money that is needed.

During a circus performance which is attended by the entire cast of the show- including Perry, Della Paul and Lt Tragg-- Felix is to perform his clown act in full garb. During the act the clown points a gun that is thought to contain blanks at owner Judd Curtis and shoots. However the gun contained real bullets and kills Mr Curtis. The clown flees the tent before anyone can catch him.

Since a host of people saw the performance that was to be Felix's clown act- and now Felix is nowhere to be found-- Lt Tragg issues a murder warrant on Felix and Perry will defend him in court.

The part of the episode about the clown performance and the shooting was a point of interest. However, much of the show was spent on other minor details. And when we get to the final courtroom scene, we get slighted by strange courtroom confession.

This episode never lived up to expectations. A simple plot that was over-written.

I recall in two of the later Perry Mason movies the gambit of the murder with many witnesses, in one case a television audience, was used. In this episode a circus audience witnesses the murder of one of the owners of the circus by the arena's top performer, a clown. The clown is played by Douglas Henderson and he and the owner were rivals for Chana Eden.

Of course Henderson is innocent what Perry Mason client isn't? But try as I might I could not quite that his claim of not even being in the show that night couldn't hold up. He certainly would have to have been recognized by somebody on the train to San Francisco. William Hopper sure fell down on his job in locating an alibi witness.

Not the best Perry Mason out there.

One reviewer has expressed displeasure and disapproval about this episode. His complaints appear to reveal both his poor understanding of the formula for this series and his inadequate understanding of several of the key facts in this story. His analysis is quite shallow and almost juvenile. The intertwining threads here are typical of Perry Mason and Erle Stanley Gardner, yet the reviewer said that this is not simple or simplistic enough for him. His criticism is not persuasive -- just as his demonstrated difficulty with grammar, punctuation, composition, and articulation are also not persuasive. Despite his assertions, mature viewers do not feel puzzled about the plot or slighted by the resolution in the courtroom. Incidentally, the review in question should bear a warning against a spoiler.

This is the weakest PM episode I have seen so far. Not only is the plot convoluted, with a crippled circus owner and a fake marriage out of pity. I accept that, I like PM episodes with some complexity. The actual murder is the worst part, simply because it is practically impossible.

First, the clown act is unreasonable. A clown running around shooting blanks with a real gun is not funny, not to mention that it must be illegal. The act could work with an obvious toy gun, with much smaller charges making less noise. The sillier the better. A real gun is out of the question.

Furthermore, there is absolutely no way a gun can be fired as described and hit anything other than by pure accident. It would take multiple shots to get even a half-decent aim. Not to mention synchronizing with the clown! The idea is impossible, a one in a million thing. Even with a rifle and a steady aim, it would be unlikely to succeed.

I also find it disturbing to combine violence and circuses. A murder on stage is a horrible event, where it is hard for the audience to tell jokes from reality. This is not a major fault of the story, rather the effect it is trying to play on, but something that made it awkward to watch, detracting from my enjoyment.

The rest is routine. Perry, Della, Paul and Tragg are just the way we like, what we love them for. No Hamilton Burger though. The courtroom confessions are quite formulaic after four seasons, but I suppose they had to stick to the formula when it worked. Well, I like it so I don't really mind. I just want a bit better plots than this one.

Some of the reviewers have decided that this episode does not meet the usual standards of the Perry Mason show. However, the identity of the real killer could be easily discovered by the various clues which were available.

First, Perry decided early on that whoever was in the clown suit was not the killer, but that the fatal shot came from someone else.

Then it was made clear that the gun held by the clown contained only blanks, since there was no hole in the tent from the clown's first shot.

Then, when the gun was discovered, the only remaining possibility was that the killer was someone who had not been taken down to police headquarters for questioning -- he had to be back at the circus, tampering with the gun and replacing the blank cartridges with real ones. By process of elimination, the number of suspects was narrowed to one.

Too often the explanation only makes sense afterward, when Mason tells Della and Paul how he did it. But in this case the logic was clear for all to see.

****SPOILERS*** Far too much of a Perry Mason, Raymond Burr, episode to swallow down with one gulp or review unless your a 30 foot python or anaconda who hasn't had a good square meal in over six months. That all has to do with the murder of circus owner Judd Curtis, Walter Sande, right in front of hundreds of startled spectators including Perry Mason Stella Street, Barbara Hale, and Let. Tragg, Ray Collins. Dubbed as the funniest man in the world circus clown Felix Heidemann, Douglas Henderson, while doing his act guns down Curtis as he's standing and smoking a cigarette outside the big top enjoying the show. It soon turns out that someone was impersonating Heidemann who took off, in his clown outfit, from the scene since no one can be certain if in fact it was him that shot down Curtis.

Later while on the run in San Francisco Heidemann gets in touch with Perry, who decides to defend him, saying that he in fact was not at the circus doing his clown act when Curtis was shot. It was someone who had replaced him since he was at that time on a train going to SF on a business trip. What the trip had to do with was getting a $15,000 bank loan to buy out his partner in the circus Judd Cutis the man that he supposedly shot and killed! There's far more to this strange and over-plotted Perry Mason episode then meets the eye and that has to do with what happened earlier in it.

***SPOILERS**** It was the vicious mauling of then circus co-owner Jerry Franklin, Robert Clark, that left him a crippled what set into motion all the event that lead to Judd Curtis' death four years later. But by the time we finally got to know what exactly happened all the confusing sub-plots and red herring thrown into the story just about made you lose any interest into who did, and why and for what reason, murdered Judd Curtis in the first place anyway! Even after the killer was exposed by what looked like a bored to death, and suffering from sleep deprivation, Perry Mason that had him in a sigh of relief, in him knowing that the Perry Mason episode was just about over, break down and confess to his crime! Which in fact no one in the courtroom, including Perry Mason, seemed all that interesting in hearing.

P.S In seemed that Perry Mason's court room opponent the bulldog like state prosecutor the winless, with a perfect 0 and 271 record, Hamilton "Ham" Burger, William Talman, skipped this one and was replaced by his deputy D.A Jack Alvin played by actor Kenneth Tobey who stared in some of the best sci-fi films in the 1950's. Which also included the original 1951 sci-fi classic "The Thing".

**SPOILERS** I'd just love to know where anybody gets the idea that it's okay to aim and fire pistols or rifles at human beings when there are kids around; like in the circus. Especially even if there is preparation, or build up as part of an act. Another thing that makes it a bad idea is the proximity to wild animals. You don't want them to get upset by the report of gunshots, when the "animal trainer" might have to use one to startle their animals into obedience. I used to work for a circus, and one of my jobs was to sit with four big cats. The important thing was to keep them calm, keep people away from them, and NO loud noises. Another point is that NOBODY will ever hold a pistol close to their head and discharge a round; it's likely to deafen you, make you dizzy, and/or give you a serious headache. One more small thing: what the clown was doing was not funny, just stupid; gun or no gun.

This plot just needed to much dedication to detail for me, and the whole thing with the finding of the gun (and a .357 magnum, to boot) and all the silly running around took away from the story, which was pretty simple, after all. I generally dislike "Happy Endings" in these stories; murder almost never has a good result for anyone.

Chana Eden was sexy, Ken Curtis tried hard with a stupid role, Barbara was beautiful, and I give it an 8.

Not one of the best episodes in my opinion, so I didn't follow the story line as closely as I should have. OK, I confess, I stopped watching after the shooting scene. Anyway, what REALLY caught my attention was when one of the owners lit a cigarette and discarded the match on the (I'm assuming here) circus sawdust grounds. Not to mention when he fell to the ground with the lit cigarette still in his mouth. This immediately brought to mind the horribly tragic Hartford Circus fire that occurred in 1944 killing almost 170 people, mostly women and children since it was an afternoon performance. To this day, no definite cause for the fire has been determined. However, one cause that has been considered was a carelessly discarded cigarette. I'm sure that since that time 'No Smoking' laws were enacted and smoking during a circus performance was never permitted. I remember vividly as a child going to the circus many times with my dad and brothers where announcements were made regarding the 'No Smoking' policies. I'm sure this bothered my dad since he was a heavy smoker. Anyway, just thought I'd make this observation for general knowledge purposes only. I never watched Perry Mason during its original run, I was only a kid back then, but now I'm an avid viewer.