User Reviews

This has to be the ultimate 'crime does not pay' tv episode ever ! No sublety or gentle nuance here folks,the message is delivered like a sledgehammer on an egg! Look for a very young Simon Oakland portraying one of the bad guys,he is a hoot ! We can see the beginnings of a character type that Oakland would portray successfully for decades to come. The other actors you may not recognize,(I did not recognize too many) but they all put in a solid performance here. This is a great episode of a very interesting tv series. If you think you have worries watch this show and you will get a new perspective.

Stirling Silliphant loves stories of little people, down-and-outers, and likes to pile on the pathos and sentimentality. He's well-served here by a strong performance by James Barton, a talented character actor who gave a tour de force performance the same season in Naked City's "Goodbye My Lady Love".

Here he's a has-been criminal, serving as getaway driver for hoods Johnny Seven and Simon Oakland in an armored car robbery. Some of the B-movie dialogue is laughable, but Barton is utterly convincing, as he has an expressive face and acting style reminiscent of Wallace Beery.

The episode is mercilessly downbeat, and suffers from an extremely contrived and corny ending. But Jan Miner makes a good impression as Barton's innocent daughter, who he dreams of sending some day to a top college. She was a promising talent whose career and life were cut short by a tragic illness.

***SPOILERS*** Desperetly needing cash to send his working girl teenage daughter Doris, Jan Norris,to get a good collage education former wheel-man, that's the guy that drives the getaway car, Bo Giles, James Barton, begs his former crime associate whom he did a number of jobs for Duke played by Simon "Oklahoma Sy" Oakland to reinstate him into his mob for one last job. That's an upcoming armored car heist that the wheel-man who was assigned to it got cold feet and called in sick. This entire operation was planned by Duke's boss Al Lacey,Johnny Seven, who was more then happy for Bo to do the driving in him. Lacey is planning to knock Bo off, after the job was finished, and keep his share of the profits a measly $750.00, out of a haul of $30,000.00, all for himself.

Due to both Lacy and Duke's sloppy planning the perfect crime that they planned blew up right in their faces. With Lacey getting plugged during the robbery and a desperate Duke thrown from the getaway car that Bo was driving when he noticed that he was just about to kill him. Now seeking revenge and the $30,000.00 that Bo took off with Duke tracked down where Bo lives in a shack off the George Washington Bridge and plans to kidnap his daughter Doris and hold her hostage until Bo gives him back the stolen money that he feels, ha ha, he owes him.

***SPOILERS*** In the end both Bo & Duke end up getting it, they gunned each other down in "High Noon" like shoot-out, but before that happened Doris got permission to marry her boyfriend stock-boy at the local A&P supermarket Jimmy Morgan, Jonathan Gilmore, from her father before the big shoot-out at the end of the "Naked City" episode. By the time the police got to the scene all they could do is collect the bodies and have them delivered, by the hospital meat wagon, to the city morgue.