Since somebody asked about the Philip Carey version of
Marlowe, I think he actually looked more like my idea of
Marlowe than anyone else who's played the part. Except for
the circular scar they put under his eye, to make him look
tougher, I suppose. I don't know whatever happened to those
shows. They were hit and miss, but certainly better than most
of what's on today. One has surfaced and is available on DVD.
Not bad, but far from what I remember as the best -- a truly
inspired episode in which a clever scriptwriter, possibly
Charles Beaumont, put Marlowe into Beaumont's short story,
"The Hunger."
SPOILER WARNING
The short story is about a sexually frustrated spinster who
learns that a homicidal rapist is on the loose in her
neighborhood. It ends with her leaving the safety of her home
to try to find him, having decided that her first sexual
experience is worth death. In the TV episode, Marlowe
discovers the spinster's plan and races to stop her. Building
suspense, the camera cuts from Marlowe being thwarted first
by stupid cops, then a lynch mob, to the spinster as she
moves closer to the slavering rapist-killer. Just as the
rapist-killer attacks her, Marlowe arrives, trailed by the
mob. As I recall the mob drags the rapist away, presumably to
tear him apart. The story ends with the spinster and Marlowe
reacting to the mob. She turns to him and says, "You saved
me, Marlowe, but I'll never forgive you for it."
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