PaleyArchive ColorBars TopBanner2

IRONSIDE: NO GAME FOR AMATEURS (TV)

Summary

One in this series about Robert Ironside, a former police chief paralyzed from the waist down by a would-be assassin's bullet.

Ironside emerges from an important grand jury trial revolving around Arnie Lane, a prominent mob boss in San Francisco. His presence there is to oversee the key witness in the trial, Richy Bolton. However, an unidentified man enters an office building across the street from the courthouse, accompanied by a pregnant woman, and leaves her in the lobby while he secretly sneaks a sniper rifle into the building and uses it to shoot Bolton on his way out of court. He and the pregnant woman then casually leave the office, with the scrambling police neither suspecting nor noticing either of them. While Ironside and the police attempt to follow up on the shooting despite a lack of reliable leads, the killer reports back to Lane, who pays him for the shooting and advises him to flee the city, which the killer seems to have already been planning to do. He returns to the home of the pregnant woman, Nancy, who is helping him to flee to Canada; she knows nothing of his true motives and believes he is a draft-dodger, and does not know his name.

In the course of his investigation, Ironside learns from a police officer on duty at the time that the police saw Nancy and the killer exiting the office building, and that the officer recognized her photograph from the newspaper after the fact. She was photographed at a peace demonstration; her husband was killed in Vietnam and since then Nancy has become an outspoken critic of the war. Ironside tracks down Nancy and questions her about the day of the shooting. She admits that she was in the office building with him, but that she knew nothing of his intentions. Meanwhile, the killer hides out in the back room of a bar with a few other young men, serving as part of a sort of “underground railroad” for draft-dodgers making their way to Canada. The organizer of the draft-dodgers, Phil, arranges to forge a draft card for the killer. Mark goes in undercover as a draft-dodger and soon gets Phil taken into custody. Ironside tries to get Phil to help him catch the killer, but Phil believes that this is all a ploy to get him to reveal his operation to the police. Meanwhile, Officer Whitfield learns from Nancy that part of her reasons for helping the killer was to earn money to help support her baby; she was not actually married to her “husband” and thus did not qualify for his G.I. insurance.

Nancy convinces Phil to help Ironside, and he and the police coordinate in planning a “trap” to arrest the killer. They plan to arrest him while Phil stops at a gas station, and undercover policemen are posted all around the area. However, the killer becomes suspicious when Phil tells him about the change in plans, and readies his handgun. Mark is selected to wait at the gas station and stage an argument with Phil as a distraction as part of the operation. Just before Phil pulls up to the gas station, the killer holds him at gunpoint and tricks Mark into entering the car, then has Phil drive away, ruining the operation. The police scramble to blockade the highways to prevent them from fleeing. Ironside gets Nancy to call someone she already helped escape to Canada so they can get information on the route Phil will take. The killer continues to threaten Phil, and prepares to shoot Mark when he remembers seeing him in front of the courthouse. However, the killer is successfully captured near a fake car accident scene staged by Detective Brown and the police. The killer, named Johnny, testifies that he was working for Lane, thus successfully indicting him. Phil and Nancy visit Ironside to turn themselves in for their illegal operation, but Ironside and his associates decide to look the other way, claiming that there is a lack of evidence. Phil indicates that they will continue their operation, and Ironside tacitly approves. Commercials deleted.

Details

  • NETWORK: NBC
  • DATE: September 24, 1970 8:30 PM
  • RUNNING TIME: 0:47:41
  • COLOR/B&W: Color
  • CATALOG ID: B:66390
  • GENRE: Drama, police/private detective
  • SUBJECT HEADING: Drama, police/private detective
  • SERIES RUN: NBC - TV series, 1967-1975
  • COMMERCIALS: N/A

CREDITS

  • Cy Chermak … Executive Producer
  • Winston Miller … Producer
  • Jay Benson … Associate Producer
  • John Florea … Director
  • Collier Young … Created by
  • Sy Salkowitz … Writer
  • Oliver Nelson … Music by
  • Quincy Jones … Theme Music by
  • Raymond Burr … Cast, Robert T. Ironside
  • Don Galloway … Cast, Det. Sgt. Ed Brown
  • Barbara Anderson … Cast, Officer Eve Whitfield
  • Don Mitchell … Cast, Mark Sanger
  • Martin Sheen … Cast, Johnny
  • Pamela McMyler … Cast, Nancy O'Dwyer
  • Johnny Seven … Cast, Inspector Reese
  • Michael Greer … Cast, Phil
  • Carl Reindel … Cast, Richy Bolton
  • Michael Christian … Cast, Roger
  • Tony Brande … Cast, Arnie Lane
  • Lew Brown … Cast, Edwards
  • Ken Drake … Cast, Bartender
  • Barbara Smith … Cast, Folksinger
  • Casey McDonald … Cast, Peggy