Comment by concinds | Hacker News Reader

Comment by concinds | Hacker News Reader

One thing might interest this community - the amusing amount of common actors between the Columbo and Star Trek series (and Quantum Leap, if you want to extend this).

Obviously Shatner and Nimoy, but also the lovable John Fiedler (of 12 Angry Men fame, as the possessed Mr. Hengist in TOS's "Wolf in the Fold" and a cardiologist in Columbo) and the fantastic Theodore Bikel (as the murderer in Columbo's "Bye-Bye Sky High I.Q. Murder Case", and as Worf's adoptive dad in TNG's "Family"). Ed Begley Jr, whose father was in 12 Angry Men, is in ST:VOY as Henry Starling, and in Columbo's "How to Dial a Murder" as Officer Stein. Laurence Luckinbill is Sybok (STrek V) and the victim in Columbo's "Make Me a Perfect Murder". Michael Strong: Columbo's "are you a witness to what he just did?" scene, and TOS's Dr Korby.

There are metric tons of links with minor characters, for example James Greene in the Columbo classic "Columbo Goes to the Guillotine" is also in TNG and DS9.

Dozens more are discussed here: http://pub10.bravenet.com/forum/static/show.php?usernum=8065...

There are other amusing non-Star Trek but sci-fi-related coincidences too, like Robert Culp (IMO the best Columbo villain, a first-rate actor) voicing Dr. Breen in Half-Life 2.

Obviously you could do this with absolutely any TV show, since there aren't that many actors in America, but this is a fun exercise and fans of both shows have a lot to be happy about. And if you're a fan of one, and start watching the other (I started with Columbo, possibly unlike most people here), try spotting common actors as a fun exercise.

I was once home sick from work and watching daytime TV between naps on the sofa. After I'd been watching an episode of Columbo for about three hours I realised it was actually an episode of Columbo, Diagnosis Murder, and Murder She Wrote (I think) consecutively with a few common bit-part actors and I'd nodded off between them :)

Edit: I remember it as being Dick van Dyck in all of them, but it was a long time ago and that seems unlikely!

Negative Reaction is a great episode!

There might have existed a moment where every broadcast television signal on Earth was showing John Fiedler (Mr. Peterson on the Bob Newhart Show, Piglet in Winnie-the-Pooh, a thousand other credits). He was everywhere in the same way people make fun of Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

For Columbo side-roles, Vito Scotti is a fun one to spot. I think he was in four or five episodes.

Ricardo Montalban was also on Columbo before being KHAAAAAAANN

And Leslie Nielsen was in 2 Columbo episodes

I watched Columbo only recently and it seems like every famous person in the 70s guest starred at one point or another.

> Ricardo Montalban was also on Columbo before being KHAAAAAAANN

"Space Seed", the TOS episode that introduces Khan is from 1967 while the Columbo episode with Montalban is from 1976.

Well, you’ve got me there. I only knew Khan from the movie. I don’t think I watched the whole TOS

Mystery shows are a great place for guest actors since outside of the detective and his sidekick most of the cast is new for each episode. Plus it is fun to see semi-famous actors playing soon-to-be-dead people on shows, or clever murderers.

My wife is a big fan of the British mystery shows like Midsomar Murders and has made comments about how the same actors keep showing up across the different shows.

It's almost always the 'biggest B-list actor' who did the murder (on Midsomer and others). And over the years I've learned to recognize these people across shows. Had to argue with my wife that the murder victim in a Jonathan Creek episode we saw the other night was Frank from Vicar Of Dibley. I won :)

Reply on news.ycombinator.com