Jack Laird Movies

In his first major TV project since Kojak, Telly Savalas stars as maverick Philadelphia criminal lawyer Nick Hellinger. He heads to Houston to defend a syndicate accountant accused of murder. The government seems inordinately interested in the case, as well it should be: The accountant is actually an undercover agent. Mob boss (Rod Taylor) also puts pressure on Hellinger in regards to the case. Hellinger's Law was the pilot for a series that looked as though it was an easy sell; but when it came down to the line, CBS, despite allegedly ordering several scripts to be written, decided not to go with the show. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

This television miniseries is based on Thomas Tryon's complex and suspenseful occult thriller Harvest Home, delving into the forbidden rituals of the small New England township Cornwall Combe, whose residents offer annual human sacrifices to pagan gods in return for a bountiful corn harvest. The production is notable mainly for the participation of Bette Davis, who plays the powerful Widow Fortune, the town's leading practitioner of the black arts. A very young Rosanna Arquette co-stars as one of the new kids in town. Beware the severely cut home video version, which omits almost 200 minutes of footage and thus loses a great deal of clarity. ~ Cavett Binion, All Movie Guide

The inaugural presentation of the syndicated "Operation Prime Time" anthology, the three-part, six-hour miniseries Testimony of Two Men was based on the 1968 best-seller by Taylor Caldwell; it originally aired in three separate two-hour installments. Sprawled over the course of several generations following the Civil War, this epic begins in 1865. It covers the saga of idealistic, straight-arrow Pennsylvania surgeon Jonathan Ferrier (David Birney) and his irresponsible, hot-headed and slightly effeminate younger brother Harald (David Huffman). The Ferrier boys battle over professional ethics (Jonathan campaigns for medical reforms, Harald is interested only a quick financial turnover) and personal peccadilloes. The drama heats up when the philandering wife of one of the Ferriers is charged with murder, precipating a scandal that threatens to rock the medical profession to its foundations. In the climax, a group of envious physicians try to destroy Jonathan when he lobbies for antiseptic operating conditions--and the truth comes out about Harald's dalliance with Jonathan's late wife. Made available for syndication in May of 1977, Testimony of Two Men was seen in most markets on May 9, 16 and 23. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

After volunteering to participate in a prison medical project, inmate Victor Bruno (Giovanni Vari) escapes from custody to get even with the man who framed him. Only after Victor dies is Lt. Kojak (Telly Savalas) alerted to the fact that the escaped convict was injected with a deadly virus. Unfortunately, Dominic Bruno (Joseph Hindy) is determined to carry out his brother Victor's vendetta--and in the process, he is slowly spreading the fatal virus throughout Manhattan. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

While Kojak (Telly Savalas) is following up several false leads in the bombing of a Manhattan restaurant, one of his detectives, Jeff Braddock (Joseph Mascolo), would seem to have inside information on the crime. Unfortunately, Braddock is unable to tell Kojak or anyone else what he knows. It seems that among those killed in the bombing was his mistress Gretchen Hodges (Judith Chapman)--and there is a strong likelihood that Braddock's own wife Molly (Fionnuala Flanagan), who suffers from mental illness, was responsible for the tragedy. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Azure Dee (Denyce Liston), a former prostitute who has struck it rich, is found hanging from the chandelier in the living room of her lavish home. Curiously affected by this death, Kojak begins to investigate Azure's friends, family members and customers, hoping to determine if the woman committed suicide or was murdered--and in either case, why it happened. Series star Telly Savalas is heard singing the episode's theme song in the final scenes. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

As he often did in his 1970s TV appearances, Jackie Cooper forsakes his "good guy" image in this episode to portray a cold-blooded criminal. In this case, Cooper is cast as jewel thief Frank Mullvaney, who intends to pull off a heist at a jeweler's convention right under the nose of Lt. Kojak (Telly Savalas). Such an undertaking requires a disguise, and Mullvaney has a beauty: he's going to show up at the convention dressed as a priest. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The terror begins when dewey-eyed Peggy O'Malley (Lynne Marta) enters the United States after a flight from Canada, her leg encased in a plaster cast. But Peggy has not broken or even sprained anything: she is using the phony cast to smuggle a 20-dollar plate, stolen from the Canadian mint, past US customs. All the while, the hapless girl is pursued by the man who killed her boyfriend, and who will leave a trail of death in his wake while tracking her down. By the time Kojak (Telly Savalas) picks up the villain's trail, a doltish innocent bystander (Chuck McCann) has been swept up in the intrigue. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In the conclusion of Kojak's two part second-season opener (originally telecast as a single 120-minute episode), Lt. Kojak (Telly Savalas) races against time to solve a series of murders in New York's Chinatown--and, hopefully, prevent a bloody full-scale war between two rival crime clans. Meanwhile, the murderers persist in their plans to play both sides down the middle, kidnapping a powerful mob boss and holding him for ransom. Most of this episode was filmed on location--a rarity during Season Two of Kojak, when much of the series was being shot in the studio. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Kojak (Telly Savalas) begins his search for the murderer of a womanizing Wall Street lawyer. What he doesn't know is that the perp is one of his own detectives, Nick Ferro (Hector Elizondo). Having committed the crime after discovering that his own wife (Barbara Rhoades) was one of the victim's lovers, Ferro cunningly sets up an airtight alibi--and even arranges to join the investigation team. Inevitably, Kojak's instincts kick in and he deduces that something is amiss...while Ferro desperately tries to halt the steady strem of evidence that is flowing inexorably in his direction. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

The character of tough, sarcastic, lollipop-sucking New York City police detective Theo Kojak was introduced in The Marcus-Nelson Murders, a 1973 TV movie based on the novel by Selwyn Raab, which in turn was inspired by the real-life Wylie-Hoffert murder case of 1963 that ultimately led to the Supreme Court's Miranda decision in 1966. Telly Savalas, a busy, baldheaded character actor who had only occasionally received above-the-title billing in his long career, became an international superstar in the role of Kojak, which he carried over into a long-running CBS cop show. Debuting October 24, 1973, Kojak was set in Manhattan (though not filmed there until its fourth season), where hard-boiled, thoroughly incorruptible Lt. Theo Kojak took his marching orders from his former partner and longtime friend, 13th precinct Captain Frank McNeill (Dan Frazer). Although Kojak had a habit of bending the rules to suit his needs, he was much valued by McNeill and the force because he invariably got results. Kojak's associates and assistants included plainclothes detective Lt. Bobby Crocker (Kevin Dobson), Detective Stavros (played by the star's brother George Savalas, who during the series' first two seasons billed himself as "Demosthenes"), and detectives Rizzo and Saperstein (Vince Conti, Mark Russell).

Extremely popular with both civilians and law enforcement personnel -- and a veritable cornucopia of such quotable lines as "Who loves ya, baby?" -- Kojak lasted five seasons and 118 hour-long episodes before it was canceled by CBS and ended its run on April 15, 1978. Seven years later, Telly Savalas revived the character for the TV movie Kojak: The Belarus File, which was followed two years later by another feature-length endeavor, Kojak: The Price of Justice. And from November 4, 1989, through June 30, 1990, five two-hour Kojak episodes -- in which the title character had been promoted to inspector -- were telecast as part of the crime-anthology series The ABC Mystery Movie. This time around, Telly Savalas' co-stars included Andre Braugher as Detective Winston Blake, Charles Cioffi as Chief George "Fitz" Morris, Kario Salem as Detective Paco Montana, and the star's daughter Candace Savalas as Kojak's secretary Pamela. Kojak was revived for a third weekly series run in 2005, with Ving Rhames starring in the title role created by the late Telly Savalas. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

David McCallum stars in Hauser's Memory as scientist Hillel Mondoro. At the behest of the CIA, Mondoro willingly has himself injected with the brain fluid from a dying fellow scientist named Hauser. The purpose of this experiment is to preserve the missile secrets lodged in Hauser's memory banks. The result is a deadly liason between Mondoro and Hauser's pro-Nazi wife Anna (Lilli Palmer). Susan Strasberg costars as Mondoro's nonplussed wife Karen, while German film director Helmut Kautner alsos plays an important featured role. Made for television, Hauser's Memory premiered November 24, 1970. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide