Mystery History - Please Murder Me

It was on this day in 1956 that moviegoers got their first glimpse of Raymond Burr and Angela Lansbury in the noir film, Please Murder Me. It's the story of an attorney, Craig Carlson (played by Burr) who defends his lover, Myra Leeds (played by Lansbury) against a charge of murder when she shoots her husband in self-defense. After winning an acquittal, Carlson is horrified to discover that she really killed her husband to inherit his money, and the claim of self-defense was a ruse. Leeds also plans to dump Carlson for another lover, an artist she has been seeing on the sly.

Stung by this double betrayal, Carlson announces to Leeds that he will have her arrested...for his own murder. Leeds dismisses his threat, but Carlson begins his plan. He even purchases a gun in a pawn shop, the "murder weapon" he will use to trap Leeds. By the end of the film, he makes good on his promise and manipulates Myra Leeds into shooting him. Carlson, of course, has already tipped off the police, and when they arrive, they play back the tape recording that will condemn Myra for Carlson's murder.  It was one of the most ingenious movie plots ever put on the silver screen, but the film has fallen into the public domain and remains almost unknown today.

Angela Lansbury was already an established star, with two Oscar nomination under her belt for Best Supporting Actress in Gaslight and The Picture of Dorian Gray when she made this film. Until this movie was released, Burr had played mostly villains, such as the psychopathic kidnapper in A Cry In The Night and a wife murderer in Rear Window. Both Burr and Lansbury put in A+ performances.

Angela Lansbury went on to star in many more movies as well as appearing on the stage before taking on Murder, She Wrote. which established her as the "American Miss Marple" in the TV series.

Raymond Burr went on a screen test for a new TV series just two months after Please Murder Me, and tested for both main roles as the DA and the defense attorney. He won the second role, and became the star of Perry Mason. The show ran for nine seasons and became Burr's trademark.

Yet he almost didn't get the part. Many bigger stars auditioned for the role, including Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Mike Conners, and Fred MacMurray. Burr's reputation as a typecast villain didn't help either, but he got the part. His appearance in Please Murder Me may have played a crucial role in this decision, according to a blog post by American Film Noir.

The evidence is circumstantial but convincing. He did the screen test for Perry Mason just after the movie's release, so the producers of the TV show almost certainly were aware of it or had seen the movie. Several persons associated with the film later played a role in the early Perry Mason series, including production crew and one of the screen writers. Finally, there is the performance of Raymond Burr himself.  Watch the movie and you can see the tone, the voice, and the mannerisms that we recognize as being unique to Perry Mason. Raymond Burr wasn't born for the role. He earned it, with his performance in Please Murder Me.

For an in-depth review and discussion of Please Murder Me, check out this podcast on Orphaned Entertainment.

To watch the film, go to any of the public domain releases. Here's a pretty good one on Youtube.

Mystery History - Raymond Burr Born Today

It's the birthday of Canadian actor Raymond Burr, born May 21st, 1917 in British Columbia. He is most famous for his role as an incorruptible defense attorney for the downtrodden in the television series Perry Mason. 

But Burr was a versatile actor. Long before he gained national recognition for his role as Perry Mason, he had starred in numerous radio and film crime dramas. He not only played a defense attorney on Perry Mason, but also a police detective on the TV show Ironside, a prosecuting attorney in the movie A Place in the Sun, and a judge in the made for TV movie Perry Mason Returns. The only courtroom role he didn't play was that of a juror.

Early film roles often cast him on the other side of the law. He played a gangster in Desperate, made in 1947. Natalie Wood starred with him in A Cry In The Night, with Burr as a psychotic stalker. He portrayed a murderer in Rear Window and was even a murder victim twice, in The Blue Gardenia with Anne Baxter and again in Please Murder Me with Angela Landsbury.  No other actor portrayed so many different courtroom and crime roles in his career, let alone so successfully. When he auditioned for the new TV series Perry Mason, he initially sought the role of the prosecutor, Hamilton Burger. But when Erle Stanley Gardner saw him, he reportedly declared "There's my Perry Mason".

Burr beat out over 100 other actors who sought the role, including Mike Connors, Fred MacMurray, and Efrem Zimbalist Jr. His starring role as an attorney in the noir film, Please Murder Me, released only a few months before his screen test, may have helped him win the role.

The choice did not go over well with critics, who still saw Burr as an actor playing criminal parts. But he soon proved them wrong.  The show ran for nine seasons and earned him two Emmy Awards for Best Actor in a dramatic series.

After leaving the show he starred for 7 seasons as a paraplegic detective in the TV show Ironside. It was one of the first shows on television to star an actor portraying a handicapped lead character. He was nominated for six Emmys in this role but didn't win one. Raymond Burr later reprised his role as Perry Mason in several made for TV movies starting in 1989 with Perry Mason Returns, defending Della Street against a murder charge.


In 1981 Canada included him in one of the stamps celebrating Canadians in Film. He also appeared in a commemorative stamp series issued by the U.S. Post Office called Early TV Memories.

In 1986 Raymond Burr planted grapes on his property in southern California. The result was the Raymond Burr Vineyards, which still produces fine wines today.

His interest in orchids led him to create several new species, one of which he named after Barbara Hale, his Perry Mason co-star who portrayed Della Street.

Burr influenced dozens of actors and writers with his powerful screen roles. Read one example about how Raymond Burr inspired the crime novelist Joel Goldman in his blog post, Why I Write.