For amateur and professional television historians, the easiest place to begin the story of the modern golden age of television is January 10, 1999, when Tony Soprano paid his first toll on the New Jersey Turnpike. But perhaps it would be nice to wind the clock back about six years to January 31, 1993, the night of the 27th Annual Superhis Bowl. The Dallas Cowboys defeated the Buffalo Bills 52-17, and the broadcast was followed by the premiere of NBC’s new drama set in Baltimore, which explores the work of the city’s homicide detectives.
The series was called Homicide: Life on the Street, and was based on a book by David Simon, then a reporter for the Baltimore Sun who worked with the police department’s Homicide Squad for a year. Despite its post-Super Bowl premiere, Homicide was never a ratings success, but ran for seven seasons, winning four Emmy Awards and three Peabody Awards. The show is edgy, funny, morally powerful, endlessly discourse, and features future stars Andre Brauger (who won an Emmy for his role as Frank Pembleton), Melissa Leo, Giancarlo Esposito, And it was full of killer-matched actors, including veterans. He was known primarily as a stand-up comedian at the time, including Ned Beatty, Yaphet Kotto, and Richard Belzer.
The show’s fifth episode, “Three Men and Adena,” which premiered in March, was a clear and dramatic example of what makes “Murder” different from other police shows. (On the DVD release, this episode is the sixth.) It takes place almost entirely within the confines of an interrogation room, with Detectives Pembleton and Bayliss (Kyle Secor) confessing from Detective Risley Tucker (Moses Gunn). trying to pull out A man patrolling fruit and vegetables after murdering a girl named Adena Watson. Pembleton and Bayliss peck, provoke and infuriate, but “Murder” refuses to give audiences the solution they crave. Tucker is unbreakable. Adena’s case was never solved. (Showrunner Tom Fontana won an Emmy for writing this episode.)
Thirty years later, Fontana, executive producers Barry Levinson and Paul Attanasio, and actors André Brauer and Kyle Secor, are all about “Three Men and Adena” in particular, and with the series’ broader legacy, He reflected on his frustration with not being finished yet. Streamable. These are edited excerpts from conversations with them.
