Four Star Playhouse 1.02

Dante's Inferno

starring Dick Powell, Virginia Grey, Regis Toomey

directed by Robert Florey

Nightclub owner Willie Dante (Dick Powell) runs into trouble when he tries to help out one of his customers. She says that her husband, gangster Steve Caspery, is going to kill her. Later that night she turns up dead. Police Lt. Manny Waldo (Regis Toomey) investigates the case. Dante is initially suspected of being the murderer but then someone tries to kill him.

Thoughts

This is the first of eight Willie Dante episodes in this series but it is the only one in the first season. Dante's Inferno is the name of his nightclub.

The picture quality of the recording that I watched was fair at best. I started to watch it on my television but switched to my computer which improved the picture quality a bit.

I enjoyed this story but I didn't think it was great. It works as an introduction to Willie Dante and the world in which he lived and operated but aside from that it didn't do a ton for me. I might have enjoyed it a little more if the picture quality had been better than it was.

Notes

This is the first of 32 episodes of this show in which Dick Powell appeared. He was one of the four stars of Four Star Playhouse. I saw him in a couple movies earlier this year: Murder, My Sweet (1944) and Cry Danger (1951). 

This is the first of two episodes of this show in which Virginia Grey appeared. Charles Boyer was the star of the other episode in which she appeared. I've also seen her The Big Store (1941) a Marx Brothers movie.

Regis Toomey played the part of Lt. Manny Waldo who investigates the murder of Mrs. Caspery. This is the first of eight episodes of this show in which he appeared. He played the part of Lt. Waldo in seven of those eight episodes.