Jessica Fletcher is in San Francisco where she is working on serializing one of her novels for The San Francisco Union newspaper. There’s a lot of upheaval at the paper as it recently got a new owner who is butting heads with the managing editor. And this is on top of the usual threatening letters from disgruntled readers that the staff advice columnist receives. When the columnist is found dead, with the managing editor’s name carved into a table, Jessica helps the investigation!
Just the facts:
Click on the text below to reveal spoilers.
Click to reveal the victim
It was Loretta Lee — whose real name was actually Claire Hogan! The name Loretta Lee is owned by the newspaper, and Claire took over from the original Loretta Lee after she left 25 years ago to start a family. Claire was only the face of Loretta Lee as the column was actually written by the managing editor John.Click to reveal the killer
It was Alexis Hill, the journalist who has been nominated for the Gramercy award!Click to reveal the weapon
It was a blow to the head with a metal water pitcher!Click to reveal the location
The victim was found in her apartment!Click to reveal the motive
The victim had learned that the killer had plagiarized the story on homelessness that got her the Gramercy nomination! (She stole a homeless man’s journal when he was dying in the hospital.)Click to reveal the major clue
It was the fact that the killer had claimed she had a phone interview with the victim at a time when the victim didn’t yet have her hearing aid back from the repair shop!Cast of characters (in order of appearance):
- Charles Gunning as T.D., a man who has been writing threatening letter to the newspaper’s advice column “Letters to Loretta”.
- John Rhys-Davies as Harry Mordecai, the new owner of the newspaper. This is Rhys-Davies’ third and final appearance on MSW; he previously appeared in “J.B.. As in Jailbird” and “Night of the Tarantula“.
- Laurence Luckinbill as John Galloway, the managing editor of the newspaper. This is Luckinbill’s fourth and final appearance on MSW; he previously appeared in “A Lady in the Lake”, “Through the Looking Glass“, and “Lone Witness“.
- Kristen Cloke as Emma Kemp, a gossip columnist at the newspaper.
- Eric Woodall as Troy Higgins, the delivery person/mailroom employee at the newspaper.
- Daphne Ashbrook as Alexis Hill, a journalist at the newspaper who has recently been nominated for the (fictional) Gramercy Award. This is Ashbrook’s second of three appearances on MSW; she previously appeared in “Ballad for a Blue Lady“.
- Casey Biggs as Max Charles, a finance columnist who writes “Inside Wall Street” (and who is getting shady stock tips over the phone from a mysterious person named Sydney).
- Eileen Brennan as Loretta Lee, the public face of “Letters to Loretta” who is getting threatening letters from T.D. This is Brennan’s second and final appearance on MSW; she previously appeared in “Old Habits Die Hard“.
- Jerry Taft as “Charlie” the security Guard at the door to the newspaper offices.
- Rosanna Huffman as Nell Carson, a homeless woman who has served as a source for Alexis in the past and who is now working with Loretta on something relating to the death of a homeless man. This is Huffman’s seventh and final appearance on MSW; she previously appeared in “Jack and Bill“, “The Sins of Castle Cove“, and “Trouble in Eden“.
- Seth Jaffe as Lt. Evans, the detective with a cat allergy who is investigating the threatening letters and later the murder. This is Jaffe’s first of two appearances on MSW (arguably as the same character); he goes on to play Lt. Evers in S12 “Death by Demographics”.
- Mike Barger as the Lab Man who finds forensic evidence at the scene of the murder.
Final thoughts and other trivia:
The episode gives us a bit of a clue as to the timeline of events as we see that the article reporting on the death of a homeless man (who was familiar to Nell Carson and Alexis Hill) appeared in the May 10th edition of the newspaper.
Based on the establishing shots of the newspaper office, we also know that The San Francisco Union newspaper is located at the corner of Battery and Greenwich in San Francisco. Nonetheless, while many establishing shots were filmed in San Francisco, the action scenes were likely all filmed in Los Angeles. There are a couple of on-location scenes — such as one in with Jessica is having lunch in the park, and one in which she is in the newspaper building lobby — however, I’m not sure what real world locations these were actually filmed at.
We also learn a few details about the book that Jessica Fletcher is writing. We learn that originally, the murder victim of the story is an aging astronaut named Charles Graham — but the new newspaper owner, Mordecai, wants Jessica to change the victim into a “beautiful, vibrant, driven young woman on her way up in the space industry” who dies in a jacuzzi.
Murder, She Watched 