MISSING LINKS - "COLUMBO" & "SEINFELD"

October 2 - Today is my brother Tim's birthday.  This being a Tuesday (I'm writing this post back in June.), maybe I'll have a special TV-related post better suited specifically for him to make it "Two for Tuesday".  But in the meantime, we'll take a look at somebody else whose birthday was on this date....

1931, October 2
Independent Labour Party, Indian National Congress, and the Gandhi society arranged a birthday luncheon for Gandhi at Westminster palace rooms.  Spoke at women’s reception arranged by Women’s Indian Association at Central Y.M.C.A., London.

'COLUMBO'

"TRY AND CATCH ME"

MARTIN HAMMOND:

Lieutenant, I trust you realize 

that Miss Mitchell is a rather influential lady. 

LIEUTENANT COLUMBO:

Oh, I'm aware of that, sir. 

I saw all those pictures of her 

signed by Eisenhower, and Truman, 

and Kennedy, and Mahatma Gandhi. 

How did she know Mahatma Gandhi? 

MARTIN HAMMOND:

Perhaps from her travels.

If there are any 'Columbo' fanficcers out there, there is a lot of material to work with in that exchange.  We'll be coming back to that tele-quote again in future posts as we deal with each figure,  But the reference to Gandhi is the most intriguing based on the information given.  (We can extrapolate on the others but those can go anywhere.)

G.D. Spradlin's delivery of his dialogue, perhaps based more on how he normally speaks, has  terse quality to it which is not quite evident in plain text.  But it could be that he was being curt with Columbo in that reply, not wanting to go any further into it.

And as such, it could be that he didn't know the answer himself.  Abigail did tell Edmund that she had sneaked around her lawyer's prying eyes in the past.  So if Martin didn't know how Abigail knew Mahatma Gandhi, then maybe Abigail had a good reason for that.

People who know me know that I have a reputation for going there.  So yes, I am going to make the suggestion - when she was much younger, Abigail might have had an affair with the much older Mohandas Gandhi while she was on a publicity tour for the novel which was published in 1931.

At this point, I feel as though I should share the Toobworld position on Abigail Mitchell's life: Assuming she was the same age as Ruth Gordon (who played her), Miss Mitchell was born in 1896.

She grew up in Massachusetts, perhaps in Quincy like Ms. Gordon, but perhaps in a Massachusetts town found only in television.  She would spend her summers on the Cape and since her family was poor they must have lived close by..

She published her first book at the age of 20.  So that happened in 1916.  With her first royalties advance, she bought her father a new car.

As of 1977, she had written 32 books and "Murder Of The Year" - a play which ran on Broadway for 19 years and would be opening in Warsaw later that year.  She had given the rights to the play to her (great?) niece Phyllis on her fifth birthday.  But Phyllis died in 1977.

Of those 32 books by Abigail Mitchell, we know of only these titles:

• MURDER MOST FOUL (likely her first and perhaps most famous novel)
• DEATH IN HAVANA
• DEATH WITHOUT TAXES
• THE NIGHT I WAS MURDERED (not yet published at that time)

Pretty much all of that information... information... information... comes from the 'Columbo' episode.  These next few details are pure conjecture on my part:

All of the 32 murder mystery books (mostly novels, but I think there would be at least two compilations of short stories), featured a main character - it was Abigail Mitchell who created the detective Inspector Lucerne.  

'Inspector Lucerne' would become a popular television series starring Ward Fowler, but the franchise would come to a halt after Fowler murdered the show's producer.  ('Columbo' - "Fade In To Murder")

Here's my fanficcerish outline for Miss Mitchell in London in the Fall of 1931.

Her 1931 book was probably set in London, which is why her publishers decided to build on that with a trip to the British Isles.  While there, she met with Charlie Chaplin, who expressed interest in playing Inspector Lucerne in a talking picture (an industry in its infancy.)

Gandhi was in London in 1931 from September 12 to December 5.  During that time, he advocated strongly with the representatives of the British government for full independence for India.  He made plenty of speeches and met celebrities like Charlie Chaplin and George Bernard Shaw.  Gandhi tired of the non-progress in the talks and sought a form of escape by traveling to Darwen and Lancashire to meet with the textile mill workers whose livelihoods were on the verge of collapse because of India's boycott of English cloth.

As to where the meeting between Miss Mitchell and Chaplin took place during the overlap with Gandhi's visit, I don't know whether Chaplin met with Gandhi first and then told Abigail about it, or if he met with the authoress first and then enthused about her to Gandhi.

There was one speech which Gandhi gave where I think his televersion could have met Abigail Mitchell:

1931, October 2
Spoke at women’s reception arranged by Women’s Indian Association at Central Y.M.C.A., London.

So I think it could be suggested that Abigail Mitchell went to that women's reception and was introduced to Gandhi.  Her original intent may have been to use him as the inspiration for a character in her next Lucerne novel, and he may have been curious to meet the woman who seemed to have made a fortune from having one of the most limited minds in the world.*

But that afternoon encounter at the luncheon would prove to be the spark to a tempestuous affair that would last for more than a month, until he finally returned to India where he would continue his quest for independence and his bizarre sexual practices.

Don't believe me about his sex obsession?  It's an easy Google search.  I'll be here when you get back.

And it's not like we don't have confirmation within Toobworld of the possibility of Gandhi being a playa....

'SEINFELD'
"THE OLD MAN"

From The Sunday Guardian:
In an attempt to be a better person, Elaine, one of the lead characters of this iconic TV sitcom, decides to spend time with the elderly, assist them, give them company. The old lady she visits has a frightening goiter that freaks the s**t out of the not-very-evolved Elaine. She also discovers that, back in the day, the old lady had had an affair with “Mohandas”, and there are photos to prove it. We can say with some amount of certainty that it’s a fictitious account on a fictional show with very little grounding in reality, but the left-of-field appearance of Gandhi on the "No Hugs, No Learning Seinfeld" is hilarious in its absurdity, and also symbolic of the overarching influence of the man — even Nietzschean sitcoms aren’t spared. 

From the IMDb:
The old lady (whom Elaine visits) mentions her romantic affair with Mohandas K. Gandhi. It is true that Gandhi had several adulterous relationships with many women, as revealed in the book "Gandhi Behind the Mask of Divinity" by Col. G.B. Singh.

So it's a fanfic possibility which could serve as a conjectural connection between 'Columbo' and 'Seinfeld'.

I know a fan of both who might find that idea funny.  Then again, that 'Seinfeld' episode dissed Journey, so maybe not.

BCnU!

O'Bservation: *  In the text of a speech she gave to a women's group in 1977, Abigail Mitchell said, "I come before you as the author of 32 books on the same subject. In other words, I have one of the most limited minds in the world."  I could see that being a mild jest made to her by Gandhi and she never forgot it nor her time spent with the "Great Soul".....

BCnU!