Richard Leighton Levinson and William Theodore Link are the creators of the crime, drama, mystery, and thriller television series Short Fuse. Columbo’s sixth episode of season 1 is titled “Short Fuse” and was written by Tina Pine, Lester Pine, and Jackson Gillis under the direction of Edward M. Abrams.
Detective Lt. Columbo, the protagonist of the television show, gets away with even hidden crimes thanks to his discrete manner and laid-back attitude. The series features several notable actors, including Peter Falk, Roddy McDowall, Anne Francis, James Gregory, Ida Lupino, William Windom, and Steve Gravers…
Roddy McDowall plays Roger Stanford, a quirky, prank-loving chemist who kills his uncle with exploding cigars.
Ida Lupino plays Roger’s aunt, Doris Buckner, who runs the company his parents started. The entire Columbo: Short Fuse Series production is shot in the USA. 1971 saw the start of this drama series’ principal photography and filming, mainly in California.
Columbo Short Fuse Filming Locations
California, USA
The production team filmed most of this film’s scenes in the United States of America. The crew members constructed filming sets at various places for the majority of the sequences in the movie.
The Hollywood sign and the state of California’s natural splendor are bonuses. The location is home to studios like Universal, Paramount Pictures, and Warner Bros. that provide behind-the-scenes tours. California’s capital is Sacramento. The majority of the movie was shot around California, including:
Palm Springs Aerial Tramway, Palm Springs, California, USA
One of the biggest spinning aerial tramways in the world, the Palm Springs Aerial Tramway is a mountain cable car in Palm Springs, California. The Palm Springs Aerial Tramway was used to film the movie.
Union Carbide Corp., 19206 Hawthorne Blvd., Torrance, California, USA
Union Carbide Corp., located at 19206 Hawthorne Boulevard in Torrance, California, was transformed into a chemical plant to film Columbo’s Short Fuse Episode. Arkema Coating Resins is a manufacturer there.
Universal Studios – 100 Universal City Plaza, Universal City, California, USA
A movie studio and entertainment park, Universal Studios Hollywood is situated in the San Fernando Valley neighborhood of Los Angeles County, California. Here, some scenes from the series were filmed.
The studios are distributed between Los Angeles, California’s municipal borders, and the unincorporated county island known as Universal Municipal, where 70% of them are located.
Plot Of The Episode
The eccentric genius Roger Stanford (Roddy McDowall) is not pleased with his Uncle ‘DL’ David’s attempt to sell off the family chemical plant against the wishes of both Roger and his cherished Aunt Doris (Ida Lupino).
Roger needs to leave the company so that DL can persuade Doris to support the sale. DL threatens to tell Doris about the secrets kept in Roger’s closet if he doesn’t cooperate. Said skeletons include acts of debauchery, auto theft, drug use, and other transgressions that are sure to crush the heart of even the most steadfast elderly person.
The proof has been gathered by Uncle D’s evil sidekick Quincy, who, in his dual roles as a driver and private investigator, may have been deserving of his spin-off series and could have ended the well-liked Jack Klugman vehicle years before it even began.
Roger not only rages but also exacts revenge. He sets up a bomb in a cigar case and skillfully manipulates events so that the booby-trapped box would be unlocked while DL’s automobile travels a winding mountain road, using his amazing mental power for EVIL.
The strategy he uses is effective. As the automobile moves up the mountain pass to explosive oblivion, David and Quincy fight against sky-splitting lightning and driving rain in a scene reminiscent of a Hammer Horror movie.
While this is going on, Roger is constructing his alibi by making out with business secretary Betty Bishop at a disco-like a pair of infatuated teens. The canoodling action is unapologetically intercut at one point, with a female Star Trek reject frantically cage-dancing to a funky little Gil Melle jazz piece.
Roger makes a pit stop to steal Quincy’s typewriter from his mansion and behold, and he comes across Lieutenant Columbo, who has been dispatched to look into the case after Aunt Doris reported DL missing.
