the pilot files: Cold Case
I’m spending the month of July writing the pilot for a series I pitched at a June workshop in PEI. In preparation I am watching the pilots of various shows I am/have been a fan of and reporting back on how they set up the show, what was successful, what failed and what changed. It’s more of an exercise for me than for the general public, but here they will be. This first one is mad long because I hadn't seen it before.
Cold Case
Premiere date: September 28, 2003 (CBS)
Network tagline: Hope lives...because the evidence never dies.
What goes down: The body of a teenage girl is found on the tennis court after a rich kid’s house party – we’re in 1976 and “More Than a Feeling” is wailing, reminding me of the 1980 Jodie Foster movie Foxes and many K-Tel commercials. (One of my dream jobs is to be the music supervisor for this show.)
In present day, we take a ride through the gritty streets of Philadelphia to the strains of a hip-hop song announcing “Nobody knows where I been.” One gets the sense they were going for a Homicide thing at first before settling into Generica: Life in Interior Locations. A crowd has gathered outside a neighbourhood place, and here comes black-rooted Lilly Rush (Kathryn Morris), our hero, looking even paler than usual in the sun, which totes blows her out. Hey, fun fact: Justin “Alex Karev” Chambers is billed second. He lasts less than half a season before Danny Pino comes in to spur on a million fan videos and sleep with Lilly’s slutty sister. They’re investigating a triple homicide – Vera (Jeremy Ratchford) is on the team – not a titular case.
Lilly has mad attitude, sighing a lot and taking shots at scene officers and yelling at Stillman (John Finn) about her time being wasted and calling Vera a pain in the ass. (She also appears to be pigeon toed.) She’s much more beaten down and empathetic these days. (I have a feeling Morris was trying to sass her up a bit – this series, now a top 20 sure shot, needed to distinguish itself from the interchangeable Law & Order template, and Special Victims Unit was still a couple seasons from hitting its stride with Olivia Benson.)
They haven’t hauled out the blue filter yet.
Lilly gets sucked into the cold case by the rich kid’s immigrant maid, who wants to right the wrong she committed by never reporting it because she’s dying of cancer now. Cue one of my favourite Cold Case mainstays: the room of boxes! Because I am a nerd I wonder what’s actually in them. Once I toured the set of The West Wing and there was a Rolling Stone stuck in with the documents in the briefing room. In the Gilmore mansion they had Werthers and peanuts on the drink tray.
Stillman points out one of the main problems with this show’s concept: “A lot of the witnesses from that time are gonna be shaky.” I think that’s why you see a lot of cold cases from like 2004 nowadays.
There’s Jeffries (Thom Barry) with a moustache – he knows the deal on the detective assigned to the ’76 case. Now Lilly’s pissed because Stillman wants her to take the case – she brought it up and thinks it should be re-opened, and yet, “I got a job,” she spits. Stillman says Lilly will do better with the rich people. Where he gets this from I have no idea – must be because she is hotter than Vera.
They keep mentioning a detective we never see – Brit, the guy who handled the original investigation – so I am going to guess, at 10 minutes 10 seconds in, that he did it. Lilly yells at an old lady, the victim’s mother, who has given up – her surrender inspires Lilly to take this case on.
Personal fact reveal that makes no sense: Lilly is questioning a squirrelly dude. He says, “I have a meeting.” She says, “There’s a one o’clock in Old City.” Him: “It’s not that kind of meeting.” Her [embarrassed laugh-sigh]: “Oh.” Who the hell would assume a businessman leaving his house with a briefcase in tow meant he had an AA meeting? Is Lilly an alcoholic maybe? (SPOILER: No, but like all lead female detectives on TV, her Mom is, and she will be played by Meredith Baxter!)
Lilly stands awkwardly, either unaware she is in a long shot or just not knowing what to do with her hands, her arms hanging in front of her. It’s a nice choice by Morris – Lilly feels out of place for a number of reasons. She throws doe-eyes at the dude, who is obviously constantly haunted by the murder of the girl he loved 30 years ago, as you are. “You look really athletic,” she Valley-Girls him.
She keeps the eyes out for the next guy, her main suspect. He is unmoved, wonders why she became a cop (“bad education, limited talent,” she smiles) then tells her she should be married. Uh-oh. “Well, no one ever asked,” she says breezily, but you know she wants to shoot him. (They have already set him up as woman beater.) THEN he mentions “your kind of people” and Lilly’s had just about enough of pretending she is an old maid with a gun. (THIS is a nice way of setting up her class issues.) She gets on him about punching ladies and he shuts her down.
She tells the old lady she yelled at that her ex-husband used to beat her, but I think “ex-husband” is code for “Meredith Baxter.” At any rate she gets her to confirm what the OTHER wife beater said, which is that her husband was abusive to her and Jill, the victim.
Awkward two-shot that looks like a rehearsal, followed by one where they’ve set the camera on the ground so the cobblestones lead to where the actors are. This show doesn’t have a distinctive style, necessarily – it’s got too many flashback scenes for NYPD Blue camerawork, but they haven’t found one that would be familiar now here in the pilot. Anyway, she gets on the lady’s case much more kindly – the lady doesn’t want to reopen old wounds – and says, “There’s new hope now.”
Old Lady and Lilly go to Wife Beater’s house where his wife says she shouldn’t be talking to them. They also bring up that detective again.
Future Karev does an insulin shot right there in the squad room. Ah, characteristics. He is still mad Lilly’s on this case and reminds her he’s got a wife (two characteristics!) and doesn’t have time to follow ghosts around the gritty Philly streets.
They go to a prison where this suspect hits on Future Karev, which is completely awesome. More mention of Det. Brit. Suspect implies Future Karev is closeted. There have been lots of fluorescent lights in this section.
Lilly gets her bitch back on for the Wife, and it looks like she got a haircut since yesterday and it hasn’t settled yet. I once saw Kathryn Morris on The View and she said women come up to her in the street to tell her to brush her hair. Classy. Anyway, Squirrelly, Wife Beater’s brother, IS an alcoholic after all (nice guess, but COME ON) and Lilly’s questions have set him drinking again.
Future Karev has chipmunk teeth. I bet he doesn’t on Grey’s.
Fancy Philly suburbs. Lilly looks anxious – yay, an undercover op, one of my favourite things about cop shows! She’s tailing Wife Beater and hilariously pretending to be a jogger – she stands behind a tree, dumps water on herself for sweat stains and fakes heavy breathing. Lilly Rush is not a Method cop, and anyway I don’t think she has the bones of a runner. She runs up to him with a completely obvious “Fancy seeing you here” line, and he acts like he’s been waiting for this, all surly and unsurprised.
Man, you can see every freckle, mole and line on Morris’ face, maybe because she could nose-kiss the camera. She normally looks like she’s in a Kabuki play. Wife Beater exposits that Lilly is a crusader. “I guess I am,” she says, all wild-west like. He laughs derisively. “Good luck.” He leaves while we zoom in on Lilly’s determination face.
Bureaucratic road block! The commish of the Philly PD was friends with Wife Beater’s father and has put in a call to get Squirrelly out of the clink. Ruh-roh. He wants Lilly back on open cases. “Screw him,” says Lilly. Vera says “Rush, your boyfriend’s downstairs.” “I’m single,” Lilly announces proudly, taking a swig of coffee (You Wanna Make Somethin’ of It blend), then adds for no reason, “You sure it’s not your boyfriend?”
It’s Squirrelly. She’s all in his grill about the commish thing. He tells her to back off and she yells after him, “...somethin’ tells me you and I are one Scotch away from a good conversation.” She adds extra swagger for the surrounding drunk tank occupants, then walks away quickly as we cut to see she’s crossing a pedway over a busy street. Pointless shot.
Jill’s Mother (the Old Lady) throws a new suspect into the mix, another kid. Lilly wonders why it wasn’t in the file – it should be, dude went to the POLICE. Maybe to Detective BRIT? Old Lady says something to Lilly about both of them knowing what it’s like to have husbands fail them. Future Karev is surprised to hear this. Lilly is shifty and does one of her laugh-sighs.
Lilly and Future Karev drive to an outdoor meditation retreat, led by the new suspect. He saw Wife Beater with a bloody tennis racket and Squirrelly crying over his jacket getting messed up. Meditation tells them the only thing Squirrelly could do that Wife Beater couldn’t was wrestle.
Lilly stomps up to the Wife as she’s putting the kids in the car outside their school and tells her the deal. Wife makes excuses for Wife Beater, but the Soundtrack of Confession amps up and you know there’s a big one coming. “I wanna tell you something,” says Wife. “But if I do I can’t go home.” Lilly nods, like she gives a shit, then promises, “I can help you with that.”
Wife tells her that they had an Aunt in the neighbourhood and Wife Beater was always telling Squirrelly to stay away from her house. “Pack a bag for you and the kids,” says Lilly. “You’re coming with me.” If this were SVU Cragen would be yelling about the budget.
Lilly walks through the department’s underlit parking lot alone in the pitch-black night. I bet this is going to go well. Oh hey, it’s Wife Beater! “Where’s my wife?” he asks. Hope Lilly didn’t leave her gun in her locker. She gets right up in his face, says “Safe,” and then he grabs her and shakes her a little. She starts baiting him, laughing and asking if this is how he handles women who don’t do what he says.
On one hand, I admire her for not backing down; on the other, SHE’S ALONE IN THE PITCH BLACK NIGHT WITH A KNOWN VIOLENT MAN WHO IS PROBABLY A MURDERER. That whole building of cops 50 feet away is not going to help her when she weighs 89 pounds and doesn’t have her gun.
She neatly disarms his whole approach to women, then adds, “I’m the police. And we’re at the police headquarters, you moron. ... What are you gonna do? Kill me in the parking lot of central?” She tells him she knows about the Aunt’s and that they’re gonna get him tomorrow, meaning he will go there first and probably kill himself in front of everyone.
There’s a great sweeping shot of them standing literally chest-to-chest. I thought the initial tough cookie act was a bit much, but this is fucking awesome.
Wife Beater backs off and says he can’t protect Squirrelly anymore. Uh huh. Lilly gets him to come in and give her a statement.
The interview room is all white walls, like a lower management office that hasn’t been decorated yet.
We don’t see the confession, but Lilly says Wife Beater “flipped on his brother,” who she finds in a bar. She orders a Scotch and soda and there’s a great moment where it’s clear it’s just for show when she takes a sip and nearly throws up in her own mouth. She tells him she’s there to arrest him based on what Wife Beater said. He refutes it (surprise!) and she says it’s now or never. He says that Wife Beater got his own as well as the girl’s blood all over his precious wrestling jacket.
This makes Lilly’s eyes well up. “You didn’t throw it out, did you?”
Flashback to the crime – Squirrelly was making out with the girl when Wife Beater walked up on them. The girl calls WB an asshole, which surprises me because this is on CBS, Your Grandparents’ Network, and we’ve already heard “pain in the ass,” “son of a bitch” and “screw you.” (This scene also includes the phrases “jack off” and “you’re such a prick” AND Jill flips off WB. Kudos, writers!) Anyway WB beats the girl to death with a tennis racket while Squirrelly just stands there Milhouse-like, all, “My jacket!”
Here comes my favourite Cold Case element – the closing montage. Nice to know it’s been there from the start. “Have You Ever Seen the Rain” plays as they dig up the tennis racket in the aunt’s yard – seriously that was his plan? Throw it in one of your rich people lakes! At least it would wash the evidence away! – and Lilly wears terrible white pants with a ribbed navy turtleneck. WB is arrested – it would’ve been nice to have a scene where Lilly did admit to being scared by this guy.
It starts raining (see Ken Tucker’s quote for commentary on the rest of this rain business). Lilly and her ever-changing hair length pull WB out of the car in front of a bunch of reporters, but it’s Young WB, because another thing they do on this show is insert the past characters into present day, often in ghost form so that the closing detective can feel good about themselves. Here’s Future Karev hauling out Young Squirrelly in his polo shirt. The rain machine works overtime and everybody, like three dozen people, has umbrellas except for the cops and perps. Lilly, in her rain-soaked white shirt, water dripping off her face, gets the double stank-eye from Old Lady and Wife (nice gratitude, bitches) and then sees Jill, the victim, staring out of the crowd, and she knows that this storm is washing away all her cynicism and sassiness to leave behind a puddle of crusade with a film of egg-white foundation on top.
The one thing they don’t do, which is my favourite thing after the montage – though it’s technically part of the montage – is show one of the detectives putting the box of files back in the room of boxes with CLOSED written on it. But other than that, and Scotty, everything was there. They kept Lilly alone for a little too long, but they needed to establish her as the lead since there was no opening credits sequence and people get confused easily.
Choice review quote: “...the plot builds to one scene so extravagantly corny, it works like a cross between film noir and the soap operatics of director Douglas Sirk: As Creedence Clearwater Revival's ‘Have You Ever Seen the Rain’ swells in the background, there's a slo-mo shot of Lilly, drenched in -- you guessed it -- pouring rain, leading the guilty party into police headquarters. She looks heavenward, and you suddenly realize that television has just created another star.” [Ken Tucker, Entertainment Weekly]
Where we are now: A lot less sass. Lilly’s mother was a raging alcoholic who would abandon Lilly and her sister for days at a time while she went on benders. Then she died on Lilly’s couch in a scene that was not shown (sorry about your guest Emmy, Meredith Baxter), and in the same episode Lilly got shot, which she is not dealing with well. Bobby Cannavale showed up as a potential love interest. Sixth season goes this fall. Cold Case is thisclose to being a great fucking show, instead of a middle-of-the-road procedural with a few high points. SVU didn't hit its stride until about now. Go forth, Meredith Stiehm, and crusade for top-drawer television!
More: [Cold Case at CBS]
