"Peter Gunn" Streetcar Jones (TV Episode 1958) Poster

(TV Series)

(1958)

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7/10
Wow...imagine that a lawyer COULD be evil!
planktonrules28 November 2013
Warning: Spoilers
In this installment of "Peter Gunn", a musician named 'Streetcar' Jones is accused of murder. However, his boss, Lodi, KNOWS he cannot be guilty so he asks Peter (Craig Stevens) to investigate. Not surprisingly, once Gunn takes on the case, folks start sprouting up everywhere to beat the snot out of him! And, oddly, the trail might just lead to Streetcar's lawyer! Fortunately, his friend, Lieutenant Jacoby (Hershell Bernardi) is nearby--just in case.

As in all the "Peter Gunn" episodes, the show is very stylish--with great jazz music, snappy dialog and lots of hipsters. However, also like other shows in the series, it is VERY fast--and could have used an hour format. In other words, there is just too much plot for 30 minutes! Still, watchable and well made.
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8/10
Intrigue, Assumptions, Evidence Prevailing
biorngm28 September 2017
Warning: Spoilers
I promise the readers not to give away too much of juicy conclusions but I can set this episode review up by saying the intrigue is as good as the story moves along with Pete in search of another killer covering some clues off camera but explaining the facts as we move along. The man stabbed at the beginning wasn't liked by fellow musicians as we are lead to believe a musician likely killed him. The band leader asking for Pete's help is convinced the murderer was one amongst them. Pete, however, can't neglect individuals he meets by their choice. Streetcar Jones is a musician and likely did not kill Marty because Pete has suspicions about others as he digs into more history of all involved. When Pete is assaulted by thugs he chooses to look into those paying the thugs who assault him. The casting is believable and well done, the smoke-filled rooms always present when necessary, the ultimate gunfire settles the case after Pete does. Not surprising how Pete is able to wheedle a confession when he has evidence to back it up just in case he has to use it. Watch and enjoy as the story is well written and told to the viewers like me.
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7/10
All (Except) That Jazz
scottfrench9 January 2023
A fine second episode of the noirish series, all good here except its landscape: the jazz. It's 1958, and we're told that Lodi and Streetcar Jones are the cutting edge of jazz. Yet they're playing a version of Dixieland -- so out of date by the late '50s -- when hard bop and cool ruled the day and free jazz was starting to rear its head.

That may seem a minor detail, but it's not. This is an episode about jazz, its musicians, and ethics in creating art, and although "Peter Gunn" is hardly realist programming, there is an authentic core to its noir approach. Missing badly on so central a plot point damages that claim of authenticity.

That aside, it's a decent 26 minutes, fits in with one of the finest series of late 1950s television.
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9/10
Like, Crazy, Man; You Dig?
ccthemovieman-120 December 2009
This episode is full of jive talk of the late '50s. The ironic thing is, many of the words are still being used today frequently, like "like" where it shouldn't be and "cool," which never seems to go out of style.

Crazy.

No, "crazy" means "cool," too, but is one of the expressions not used in years. Anyway, this story involves jazz musicians so you get a lot of the hip lingo. "Streetcar Jones" sounds a lot like "Maynard G. Krebs," if you're old enough to remember him, too.

"Streetcar" is the prime suspect of a murder of a fellow jazz artist. The victim was not well-liked by any of his peers, though, so the killer could be anyone. However, since he didn't up a struggle, the guess is that he's a fellow musician, someone he wouldn't turn his back on. I don't want to ruin it by saying how it exactly was, or even if it was a musician.

Leigh Whipper was fun to watch as the goateed jazzman "Lodi," This was his last acting role. The man was 82 years old when he played this part!! He came close to living 100 years.

Carlo Fiore, who played "Streetcar," had a limited career and had drug problems for decades. This role was perfect for him. For a guy with such a short acting career, he has a long and interesting biography here on IMDb.

Suffice to say this a fun episode to both hear and see. Ya "dig?"
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9/10
Great Episode of a Great Series
gordonl5617 April 2013
Warning: Spoilers
PETER GUNN – "Streetcar Jones" -1958 This is episode two of the great 1958 to 1961 series, PETER GUNN. Craig Stevens headlines as the cool sharp dressed, but hard as nails P.I. He works out of a jazz joint called Mother's that is ran by Hope Emerson.

A jazz piano player at another club is killed with a knife to the back just before a show. The killer is unknown. Carlo Fiore, another jazz-man is grabbed up as the main suspect. He and the victim had thrown around harsh words on more than one occasion.

The other members of the jazz combo pool their cash and ask Stevens to look into the matter. He gets his Police Lt. buddy, Herschel Bernardi to let him have a talk with Fiore. Stevens quickly decides the Police have the wrong man and goes looking for the real killer.

Stevens is soon warned by prominent lawyer, Carlyle Mitchell to mind his own business. And to help Stevens in this decision, he has two large men with an anti-social bent, "discuss" the matter with Stevens. The beating of course does not take and Stevens is all the more determined to solve the case.

He checks out the lawyer and discovers that the lawyer's daughter knew the dead man. The daughter, Patricia Powell, had also been a bit knife happy several years before with another jazz-man. Her father had gotten her off with self-defence with some witness testimony. The witness turns out to be the same man Fiore is charged with killing.

Stevens digs further and finds that Powell has forked over close to 100 grand to the dead man during the last couple of years. He had been blackmailing her. Powell had decided to end the blackmail and applied the knife solution again. The two large gentlemen again show, this time with revolvers. Stevens though was ready for the play and has the Police handy. Some solid punches drops one while Police Detective Bernardi is forced to shoot the other. Powell is needless to say hauled off for a vacation on the State's nickel.

Quick and to the point episode that features that great Peter Gunn theme written by Henry Mancini. There is also plenty of great film noir type photography throughout.

The episode was directed by Blake Edwards. Edwards was also the creator of the series. (B/W)
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A Series Pace Setter
dougdoepke8 June 2017
This second entry in the ground-breaking series helps set the pace. The cool jazz sounds echo throughout, along with Pete's unflappable demeanor. That plus a noirish atmosphere announce the arrival of urban hip. A few random comments follow.

Catch that glaring eye mock-up on the nightclub front; it's big enough to unsettle viewers of any decade. Also, catch that neat camera work that projects a lengthening shadow of a man exiting a room instead of just letting him exit. It's that sort of visual imagination that distinguished the series. Then there's poor, beautiful Edie, hanging on to her man, as he goes inexorably about his business. Come on Pete, first things first. Speaking of business, the plot revolves around a murdered jazzman, and is fairly standard except for the recurring jazz motif. Mustn't forget the jailed Streetcar making cool sounds on his cell bars. After years of bruised ears listening to cons banging on bars, this is a definite departure. Note too the brief discussion of the aesthetics of jazz music-- you don't "understand" the sounds, instead you sort of roll with them. In short, it's an experience, not a concept. All in all, this provocative early entry belongs in the front rank of the series and helps set the pace.

(In passing—it's an interesting cast. As shown here, Black man Leigh Whipper was an actor of compelling talents. In the classic western The Ox-Bow Incident (1943), it's his street-wise preacher that lends the movie its peculiar sense of soul. So if you haven't seen it, please do. Then there's Carlo Fiore, Marlon Brando's long-time buddy and hanger-on (IMDB). Here he does a good job banging on both the xylophone and the prison bars. And finally there's the unknown Patricia Powell who projects a vivid sense of superiority that shows talent. Too bad she has only 8 film credits in an unexplained abbreviated career.)
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6/10
Interesting but abrupt
grantss31 July 2022
I love the Peter Gunn series, essentially a film noir TV series. All that's missing is Humphrey Bogart! However, this episode revealed the one flaw in the series: 26 minutes per story is far too short.

Episode 1 somehow managed to pack everything in within that time but Episode 2 suffers with some major pacing problems. This develop in leisurely fashion and then suddently, bam!, we have a resolution and it's over.

As the final scene was playing out I kept thinking "This can't be the ending, can it? But it was.

It's still interesting enough but the ultimate feeling is one of deflation, rather than one of having been entertained.
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9/10
"Streetcar Jones" is a highly entertaining second ep of "Peter Gunn"
tonyvmonte-549739 May 2024
During a performance at a jazz club as the headliner introes a fellow musician, that person is revealed to have a knife in his back as he keels over! So Pete has to solve his murder but, as one would expect, he gets lots of resistance. I'll stop there and just say this was a fine second ep of this now-classic series. Some of the reviewers have complained these eps are perhaps too short with the less than 30-minute running time. Part of me seems to agree with that though enough material seems to have happened to make it mostly entertaining enough to watch from beginning to end. Anyway, "Streetcar Jones" is highly recommended.
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4/10
Streetcar Jones
Prismark1031 August 2020
A jazz musician is found dead as he is about to perform. Another jazz performer Streetcar Jones has been arrested.

Peter Gunn is hired to investigate. You dig.

It seems that the dead man did not have a jazz soul, he stole riffs. Gunn also finds that for a musician on a payroll he had a healthy bank balance.

Given the setting in jazz clubs such as The Big Eye which has a sign of a big eye. Something straight out of a Hitchcock movie. There is a lot of hip jazz talk and lots of jazz music featured here.

It is the second episode and I am not sold on the script. It is hackneyed. Gunn seems to be doing the job that the crime squad should be doing.

Could the police not figure out who has been paying the dead man such large sums of money?
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