The writers of this series should have gotten medals. This episode is about people who covet extremely expensive coins, even those that don't exist, in order to use them as collateral, justify bragging rights, or reclaim them as stolen family heirlooms.
It's not as if the writers sat down, got high on java mochas, and swapped ideas. They had to do homework on the subject. And they couldn't simply google "twelve Cleopatra dubloons" or something; they had to find out how coins were collected, stored, and sold on the market. It's the kind of material that, unlike Kekule's benzine molecule, doesn't come to you in a dream.
A man is found with his head bashed in on the floor of his rare coin shop. The detectives dig up various suspects, some of them working against each other. Motives have to do with maintaining one's own private Boeing 747 and with replevening the coin collection of one's father, stolen before the holocaust in Germany.
The usual complications arise. Knowing ahead of time that a suspect, Karen Allen, is claustrophobic, the Assistant Executive Minister of the District Attorney's office or whatever she -- Carey Lowell -- is, and two burly detectives crowd her against the wall in order to obtain permission to search her apartment. Naughty.
It's difficult to tell whether Karen Allen overacts the part of the neurotic or not because, as a neurotic, she's supposed to be overacting. The fourteen years since "Raiders of the Lost Ark" have changed her considerably, to the extent that she's barely recognizable and her voice is now a muted croak. Not her fault in any way, of course. Time changes all of us but it's a little sad when we see its effects in a professional actor or actress.
The award for the most spirited performance goes to Maurizio Benazzo as a sarcastic, gay head waiter in a fancy Soho restaurant. His gestures are flamboyant, the contours of his speech exquisite.
It's not as if the writers sat down, got high on java mochas, and swapped ideas. They had to do homework on the subject. And they couldn't simply google "twelve Cleopatra dubloons" or something; they had to find out how coins were collected, stored, and sold on the market. It's the kind of material that, unlike Kekule's benzine molecule, doesn't come to you in a dream.
A man is found with his head bashed in on the floor of his rare coin shop. The detectives dig up various suspects, some of them working against each other. Motives have to do with maintaining one's own private Boeing 747 and with replevening the coin collection of one's father, stolen before the holocaust in Germany.
The usual complications arise. Knowing ahead of time that a suspect, Karen Allen, is claustrophobic, the Assistant Executive Minister of the District Attorney's office or whatever she -- Carey Lowell -- is, and two burly detectives crowd her against the wall in order to obtain permission to search her apartment. Naughty.
It's difficult to tell whether Karen Allen overacts the part of the neurotic or not because, as a neurotic, she's supposed to be overacting. The fourteen years since "Raiders of the Lost Ark" have changed her considerably, to the extent that she's barely recognizable and her voice is now a muted croak. Not her fault in any way, of course. Time changes all of us but it's a little sad when we see its effects in a professional actor or actress.
The award for the most spirited performance goes to Maurizio Benazzo as a sarcastic, gay head waiter in a fancy Soho restaurant. His gestures are flamboyant, the contours of his speech exquisite.
