Episode 5: The Fix

After mobster Forest kidnaps Hutch and addicts him to heroin in order to find his girl, Jeanie, Hutch escapes and is found by Starsky.

Ben Forest: Robert Loggia, Monk: Geoffrey Lewis, Jeanie Walton: Leigh Christian, Mickey: Gene Conforti, Officer Bernie Glassman: Macon McCalman, Coney: Anthony Charnota. Written By: Robert Holt, Directed By: William Crain.

QUESTIONS AND NOTES:

This is an extraordinary episode for many reasons: a tough, realistic and beautifully economical script by Robert Holt, the cast of off-beat characters, the intensely-focused story. Most importantly, however, is the intimate, brutal look at the power of friendship and trust. As with all the best episodes, this one has no extraneous detail and no concession to conservatism. It’s still shocking to watch and painful to witness. Most of the praise must go to the principle actors, who not only bring to life what is on the page, but also what lives between the lines, those precious details that must have spontaneously arisen from the rehearsal and filming process. (Not that I know this for sure; someone write a book already!) The main thing to realize about this episode is the fact it was written before the actors were cast, which tells me two things. One, the writers were on a mission to create better, more relevant and realistic episodic television and two, they had great confidence that the actors were going to be able to carry this difficult, daring script. Both premonitions came true. While it’s not possible to know what input the director and others may have had, it’s the incendiary chemistry between the two actors that is responsible for the grit, intensity and emotional impact of this episode. It’s surprising how physically easy they are with each other: when Starsky holds Hutch in the alley in his arms, letting him fall into his lap, it’s as if they’ve been close for years. There’s just no distance between them.

Filming notes: Soul did a lot of research, used special eyedrops, went without sleep for days, and stayed to himself while filming to make his addiction and withdrawal scenes as wrenching and real as they are, to the point of worrying Glaser and the crew. The script also originally called for Hutch to be much worse off and meaner in withdrawal, even using racial slurs against Starsky and threatening to kill him, but Glaser and Soul softened the scenes to make this one of the best examples of the closeness of their friendship.

I love how this episode opens, with a reputable-looking man in a business suit who seems more like he’s just ambling along the hallway, interested in the light-hearted banter Starsky and Hutch are engaging in, only to be revealed as a perp in handcuffs. This little visual joke is more important than it seems at first glance, because this is one of the themes the series has explored throughout its run and was likely more revolutionary then than it is now, but which still retains its amusing piquancy: you can’t judge a book by its cover, particularly a “respectable” one. I also like how Starsky calls him, without rancor, “fancy pants”.

Starsky is always short a dime at the candy bar machine. Of course it turns out he’s been scamming Hutch for a dime or so every time, because he can kick the machine and make it give him what he wants. This is an interesting parallel to Starsky as a person: manipulating through charm as a form of mental exercise, much like a girl who flirts as a way of reassuring herself that she’s still got what it takes. Hutch, in a surge of I-love-everyone, chucks Starsky what must be a quarter and tells him to buy whatever he wants. Starsky then makes a big deal out of bringing out the fistful of coins he’s accumulated from Hutch (who must have these surges on a regular basis since meeting Jeanie). Enjoying his take, which is a bit meager considering the time and guile he must have wasted getting it. This may be the only way he can mock-battle his partner, who bests him in the verbal spar department, but if this is the case, it’s a battle of one, as Hutch has no idea.

What exactly did they do to keep Hutch unconscious, or at least plaint, throughout the journey to Monk’s hideout? Were these thugs syringe-happy early on?

Forest tells Monk, “Why is it you are always wrong?” Actually, Monk is cautious, which to an impulsive sadist like Forest seems like the very definition of wrong. This is a series that likes to have its arch villains continually irritated by their lieutenants, whom they see as weak and obsequious. This necessarily close but antagonistic relationship, in which the increasingly anxious underling tries harder and harder to prove himself while nursing a growing hatred, is a fascinating way to show how the chilly kingdoms ruled by psychopaths are always riddled with destabilizing cracks.

There are some word games played here. Both the names, Monk and Forest (not the more commonly spelled Forrest), imply hiding, darkness or being sequestered. Both are archetypal objects. One can say both imply something medieval in nature. Also, “The Fix”, as a phrase, contains multiple meanings, becoming both verb and noun.

Robert Loggia gets to see Hutch tied to a chair in all three episodes he is in. One is “Foxy Lady”, the other is the best-forgotten “Groupie”. Coincidence, or contractual obligation?

It is interesting that Forest would allow Hutch to be taken to a house in a small, middle-class neighborhood, possibly a house rented or owned by Monk himself. There’s a bigger chance they’ll be noticed, and later recognized. Why not a warehouse, an abandoned building, a safe-house of some kind? Also, those are really weird ornaments on the bookshelf, a porcelain cartoon dog, a vase, a snail, a red china bull, as Monk goes from the bedroom to the main room to talk to Forest. Not the décor of a criminal mastermind, or his disreputable cronies. Perhaps the real owners are on vacation and have no idea their house is being used as a hideaway. Perhaps the house belongs to Monk’s sister, who has her doubts about her weird brother but is unable to say no to him.

Dobey says Starsky has to get Hutch back to work and Starsky smiles and says he doesn’t know where Hutch is to tell him that. This means Starsky has already checked up on him. It must have been by phone, because when he finally goes to his place he is shocked by what he finds – namely, Hutch’s gun.

How well does Starsky know Jeanie Walton? Starsky describes her as a pretty girl, knows where she lives and can get into her home. He doesn’t know about Jeanie splitting in the middle of her shift, but he must know she was working at the bar, even though he gives no indication of it when he goes to talk to Huggy. Instead he lets Huggy natter on without interruption because that’s what a good cop does, he listens more than he talks. He’s very calm during this discussion with Huggy (who is playing pinball, a lovely bit of metaphoric staging implying this has not yet become a personal crisis for him); the sort of calmness that hides, for him, true worry. I still have a minor issue with Hutch not telling Starsky the real story about Jeanie, how she slipped from her bondage to Forest and is now living a precariously free life – I can only surmise Jeanie asked him not to tell anyone, even his partner. That makes sense, and Hutch is the sort of person who would take those promises to heart, and is romantic enough to believe the past can be erased by good intentions. But my more pressing issue is why Hutch did not tell Starsky about Jeanie’s past when that past grew fangs and began racing down the path toward them. Jeanie must have been warned, she called Hutch in a panic and together they ran into hiding. This is dramatic, serious stuff. Lives are in danger, and Hutch needs all the help he can get. So why not approach Starsky and let him in on the secret? And also, while we’re thinking of this turn of events, why is Hutch basically floating on a cloud of joy, rather than being pensive, or furtive? His girl is in imminent danger. Weekend love-nest or not, this puts a damper on things.

This will be the first of two blonde sex workers Hutch is involved with. Granted, he didn’t know Gillian was on the job, but he knew Jeanie was, and wanted to save her. How would they have met, and how long after they met did he realize she was in the employ of a Very Dangerous Man? Also, does the disastrous outcome of this relationship – and his feelings of impotence, failure, heartbreak and frustration – play a role in his violent rage in Gillian’s apartment, years later?

“What do you want to do about it?” Dobey asks Starsky, right after telling him to “calm down” even though Starsky is already frighteningly calm.
“Missing persons?”
“That’s a missing officer,” Dobey says, implying officer is more important.
“No, I mean missing partner,” says Starsky. Trumping Dobey – partner is greater than officer, which is greater than person.

Still Dobey takes Starsky seriously when he hears the story, proof that Dobey is remarkably trusting.

It’s incredibly moving to see how much of himself Hutch is able to hang on to even in the depths of his torture – he’s snappish, rude, tough and disdainful.

“Seaview Point” is still a pretty vague direction; Hutch doesn’t give a house number but Forest seems happy with what he’s got. And yet there could have been hundreds of beach houses on Seaview Point – how did they find Jeanie’s? Is she in fact renting this house? How can she afford it, seeing as she was forced to find work as a waitress after escaping Forest? If she was renting it, most likely she would use an assumed name, hampering Forest’s ability to track her. And is this is the house of an acquaintance of Hutch’s (to me the most likely scenario) I don’t see how she could be found at all.

Wow, the saddest bar in the world, Mickey’s place, with drunk trombone and shitty furniture and mushroom walls. Not even a window to the street. When Mickey turns down the offer of fifty bucks for information, saying “I’d givea half of that if I knew anything. Honest”, is this statement to be believed?

When Jeanie is found and is brought to Hutch – a truly harrowing scene, Leigh Christian’s finest moment – you can’t help but think she’s dressed like a Thanksgiving turkey – white mutton sleeves, golden midriff – ready for the eating. Still, I always wonder why they bring her to him at this point. Wouldn’t his devastated state only confirm her loyalty to him, and her hatred for Forest? There must be better ways to force her compliance, yet Forest believes she will be disgusted (and made disloyal) by the state Hutch is in. He’s just stupid and vain enough to believe that, which proves he doesn’t understand the concept of love (or women) at all.

There’s also a wonderful moment in the living room when everyone is standing around and Monk and the henchmen are visibly embarrassed by what they have made to do, or, more precisely, the why of what they have been made to do. Namely, making sure their super-creepy boss has his sexual kinks secured and ready for him.

There are a lot of “baby”s being tossed around, for both Hutch and Jeanie; Forest and his goons use this word to turn adults to children as a way to control and humiliate.

I can never understand why they just didn’t shoot Hutch when he gave them the information they needed. They couldn’t be that confident he’d never be able to identify them. Instead they bundle him up and move him to a second location, opening the door for all sorts of trouble. They had already pegged him as a “tough monkey”, resisting far longer than they expected. They know he’s strong and willful. And yet they just haul him into that car and expect him to go along with it, to become “shark’s bait,” as it’s rather disturbingly put. Instead, a boot to the face and Hutch flies to freedom.

Hutch as far, far more scenes in the series than Starsky that consist of him loping dramatically through near-empty streets.

It’s interesting that Starsky knows the first name of the uniformed officer who happens upon Hutch in the alleyway. His grip of Bernie’s shirt is one of the most arresting moments in the entire series. They can’t be that familiar, however, because Bernie’s disgusted by Hutch’s track-marks, and if he knew Starsky and Hutch better he’d instantly suspect torture rather than a bad habit, although to be fair the crazy stories I’ve heard about 1970s policing makes a detective’s drug habit not the worst or most unusual situation on the force. However, he does like Starsky well enough to grant him the favor, which is, let’s face it, a pretty major one. How many of the hundreds of uniformed officers do Starsky and Hutch know by name? Or do they just know the ones that patrol their own turf? Come to think of it, is this alley in their turf?

When the scene cuts to the mansion, Jeanie is lying in the pool as robotic and vacant as if she has also been drugged. I just wonder how much Forest feels he needs to control those unruly bits of his life with pharmaceuticals.

If Starsky is so worried about Hutch escaping, why does he sleep in a chair that isn’t up against the door?

Starsky, when trying to help Hutch, riles him until he loses his temper, throwing the candy bar on the ground in a rage, telling Starsky to “shut up”, and Starsky grabs him and says – calmly, lovingly – “now that’s the Hutch I know.” This implies the Hutch Starsky knows is angry, confrontational, contrary and masterful.

Dobey is “out for the evening” while he has an officer in dire straits? Shouldn’t he stay close to the phone? Or is this an unpleasant glimpse into all the evenings Dobey has to spend with the brass, listening to speeches and accepting commendations at rubber-chicken affairs; these won’t be so easy to avoid, no matter what private information he has regarding one of his officers. It’s not like he can say to the brass, “I can’t attend your (function, ceremony, dinner, speech) tonight, one of my officers is detoxing from a heroin overdose.” (And no way would he invent an excuse, because he a)has no imagination and b)seems incapable of duplicity, even when it’s to his advantage). It reminds me of episode twelve when his wife and children are in danger from an escaped convict and he attends a televised interview anyway. It’s for the good of the case, and also, as he says, “you know how hard I’ve worked for this”. Speculate, if you will, that Dobey is, for all his blustery cuddliness, a cold-hearted bottom-line sort of guy, for whom status means more than friendship.

Starsky calls Hutch “boy” in the two scenes that have him particularly close to him, offering comfort. One is here, in the upstairs room. The other is in Gillian’s living room in the aftermath of her murder. This term is used during times of extreme stress, and it feels very different from the “babys” the bad guys use. Instead, it sounds loving and protecting, as if Starsky offering himself as “man” to Hutch’s “boy”, offering to take full control of the situation. It could be more than that: father” to Hutch’s “son”. He could be acknowledging that loss and pain render everyone to their most elemental, child-selves, or it could be an endearment he holds in special reserve. Contrast this with Hutch’s withering “buddy boy” thrown back at Starsky in Gillian.

Nectar or ambrosia? Either one. Nectar is sweet substance from a plant. Ambrosia is drink or food of the Greek gods.

Why does Dobey all of a sudden start yelling the numbers he is reading back to Starsky on the phone? Too used to yelling into bad radios, maybe?

Why doesn’t Dobey give Starsky the message from Mickey over the Torino radio, instead of relying on Huggy? We may never know, by the fallout lasts for years: Huggy’s “failure” might be the tipping point for Dobey to dislike and mistrust him from then on. Dobey may have misunderstood when Huggy says Starsky “just stepped out,” thinking he was gone for a second, to the bathroom or perhaps to get a drink, and so he would be back to get the message. Dobey made a tactical error in this assumption, feels the irritable itch of guilt, which he unconsciously directs at Huggy.

When Dobey calls Huggy back, he’s wearing a hat. A tweedy one too, one Hutch himself would probably like on a better day. On his way out to lunch, maybe?

Huggy pretends not to know who Mickey is when Hutch comes out of the shower asking who called. “Some guy named Mickey,” he says, which is strange given that he has already told Dobey he knows who Starsky’s stooge is. By the way, you know Hutch is getting back to his old self when he says truculently, “(the razor) was dull.”

They expected Starsky when they used Mickey, but got Hutch instead, which is a major score. But it makes me wonder what they were planning to do with Starsky if he showed up instead. Did they think they could torture him in the same way?

Starsky is trying to hide Hutch, but he parks the Torino right in front of Huggy Bear’s.

When Hutch takes off in a cab, why doesn’t Huggy alert Starsky? This inability to act shows he is unable to withstand serious pressure of any kind. He just crumbles. A half-crazy, weakened, sick Hutch is still so intimidating he’s able to stare at Huggy and get him to cough up the dough for a taxi.

I love it when Hutch is grabbed at the bar and Micky is careful to rescue his mug of beer.

Hutch head-buts the goon who promises to send him to “dreamland”. I don’t think we can underestimate how brave this is, someone turning their back on another hit even when every fiber of his being is crying out for it.

Monk is dead, dead, dead. He slides off the car door onto the ground in the deadest slither possible. But his compatriot isn’t; unfortunately we don’t see his arrest. I’d love to know what Starsky and Hutch do to him during interrogation, and what sort of evidence he gives, if any, against his boss. Although you can imagine how impermeable Forest is, smug behind a phalanx of expensive downtown lawyers, all his crimes hidden in mountains and mountains of paperwork and offshore accounts.

Tag: Forest says, “Go on, tell him (Hutch) about Vegas. Tell him about everything. You think he’ll want you then?” One can only imagine what terrible things Jeanie has participated in, to deserve this sort of accusation. Also, note that he’s trying to turn Hutch off Jeanie in the same way he tried with Jeanie earlier, when he brought her to see Hutch. Forest thinks that the sad, vulnerable, or regretful moments in someone’s life will make them ugly or unlovable. He is the sort of sociopath who demands perfection, and doesn’t understand the joyful irregularities and altruism of love.

Still, I suspect Hutch is glad on some level to rid himself of Jeanie, all in all, despite the fact he gives her a chance by telling her he’s coming back after they book Forest. He may already suspect this won’t be happening any time soon, if ever, and that Forest will have an army of wily lawyers who could distance their boss from the kidnapping and assault charges. She then tells him she won’t be there, enabling them to end things. Note that it’s her and not him that makes the break. Yes, this makes her both brave and sensitive, but there’s something about her passivity may cause Hutch to feel, rightly or wrongly, that she has a part to play in this whole terrible chain of events. It’s not only that she mutely complied with Forest, returning to his lavish compound, and stayed there. It’s also because of the choices, large and small, she has made throughout her life, from that first drink in high school to the allure of easy money instead of college and the series of powerful, frightening men her mother warned her about. This of course is wild conjecture on my part, but I see Hutch himself having paused at many forks in the road, weighing the consequences of this way or that one.

It may not be fair but it’s an interesting glimpse into his mind. (I want to believe that, months in the future, Forest will drop dead from an antifreeze cocktail, courtesy of the ever-compliant Jeanie, but maybe that’s expecting too much of this sadly depleted woman). She suggests a reconciliation and he tells her “if we’re going to end it, we’re going to end it.” You can tell she’s devastated, because the one good man in her life has decided she wasn’t worth the trouble; her breaking it off with him earlier may have been a complicated test of his loyalty, seeing how far he would be willing to go for her. She gets her answer, and it’s incredibly sad. Starsky ends the episode with a perfectly-timed joke that is much welcomed because of the kindness and understanding threaded through it.

Tags: 70s TV show, Antonio Fargas, Bernie Hamilton, David Soul, Gene Conforti, Paul Michael Glaser, Robert Holt, Starsky and Hutch, William Crain