While for several seasons, TMC broadcast Columbo Saturday evening in prime time, the channel has decided to satisfy fans of the program even more by offering a second evening of investigations the following day, Sunday. Thus, this March 19, two episodes will be broadcast at 9:05 p.m.: “Ransom for a Dead” et “Dead weight”. The success remains twenty years after the end of the series which lasted from 1968 to 2003. The interpreter of Columbo, Peter Falk, died in June 2011, at the age of 83, in Beverly Hills. The man who suffered for several years from dementia and Alzheimer’s disease has passed away “peacefully”, following a simple cardiac arrest after pneumonia. From his youth, the little boy born in the Bronx, New York, in 1927 had health problems.
This disease that made him lose his eye
At only 3 years old, his family discovers that he has a malignant tumor of the retina, retinoblastoma. It made him losing the use of his right eye. So he quickly had a glass eye. This peculiarity did not prevent him from being a hit on television in the role of Columbo. The inspector in the famous raincoat is not the only character he has played. Peter Falk has also distinguished himself in the cinema in the films Next, The Wings of Desireand also A woman under the influence. The actor, however, had to face some harsh remarks about his disability. “Why hire you, when I can have an actor with two eyes?”would have one day launched the boss of Columbia productions.
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A glass eye on which he joked
Instead of pushing him down or pushing him to give up, this adversity contributed to strengthen his “steel mind”. In 2006, Peter Falk was in France to promote his autobiography. In We tried everything on France 2, he had notably answered questions from Laurent Ruquier that he seemed to have a hard time understanding. “I think we’re talking about my book here, right? The anecdotes are very short, very easy to read. Three-four pages maximum and then we laugh. It’s short and it’s funny. Read it book”, he had launched. Something to make people laugh. Hilarious, even when asked about his eye. “Indeed, I have a glass eye. Yes, that’s the one”he had launched after pretending to hesitate. “I don’t think it was a handicap (for my career), even if everyone thought so”he then explained more seriously.
Article written in collaboration with 6Medias
