Perry Mason (Raymond Burr) defends a famed mystery novelist called Martha Robertson (Barbara Babcock) whom is accused of poisoning fellow writer Bradley Thompson at a conference. Martha was once married to Thompson (David Warner) during which time she wrote the majority of his books and he took sole credit for them making a lot money. In addition, a lot of circumstantial evidence was found against Martha including poison being found in her purse and in her hotel room. As usual, Sergeant Brock (James McEachin) believes he has an open and shut case but Mason delves deeper into the life of Thompson proving that everybody at the writers' conference had strong motives for wanting him dead. Not least Rita Sue Bliss (Cindy Williams) who was once romantically connected to him but he also plagiarized her work as well. Then there's Thompson's former research assistant, Rebecca Austin, who stands by her late employer despite the fact that nobody has a good word to say about him. But Mason's investigation proves that she had a motive too since she wrote Thompson's last best seller, A Passionate Death, for him while he enjoyed all the money and prestige that went with it. This book was an account of a case that Mason worked on, in which a woman was accused of killing her wealthy husband and his mother. Mason was successful in proving that somebody else other than the accused could have done it. But in his book, Thompson went right ahead and pointed the finger at a man who committed suicide as a result. Worryingly for Mason, even his secretary Della Street (Barbara Hale) and Ken Malansky (William R Moses) were considered as suspects by Sergeant Brock since they gave Thompson a grilling about accusing a guy whom there was no reason to suspect committed the double murder in front of everybody at the conference. Meanwhile, the young man who tended the bar at the hotel when Thompson was murdered has disappeared. It transpires that he was using a false name and the bar in Chicago where he claimed to have worked does not exist. In addition, he also had opportunity to plant the poison in Martha's room since he had a pass key. Malansky follows a lead to St Louis to track him down and bring him back to testify as he is vital to Perry Mason if he is going to clear Martha's name.
An enjoyable outing for Perry Mason, which does not seem as padded as many of its predecessors. This is thanks largely to better writing than usual by George Eckstein. He also penned the excellent The Case Of The Desperate Deception episode. This one isn't quite as good but it makes a genuine attempt to vary the formula in that usually, Perry's clients were usually old friends of his and that became a little tiresome since how many old friends could Perry possibly have had? In this instance, the murder of Thompson is connected to an old case of his in which an innocent man committed suicide due to his accusations against him in his novel and the plot follows on from there. This makes a refreshing change from what is usually the norm for this series and for once, the story moves along logically with the clues running smoothly into one another without the usual holes in the too often lazily written scripts that left too many questions unanswered. The only let down is the denouement, in which the film falls into the trap of trying to surprise the audience with the usual unsuspected ending that has no logical insight as to how Mason found it out and therefore it is more disappointing than surprising.
William R Moses' action man part is used more effectively here than is usually the case. More often than not his gallivanting around the States searching for a missing witness with stunts, car chases and the odd shoot out or two was simply a way to pad out the episodes, which were often far too long for their plots. But here, Malansky's turning over of St Louis in search of the missing bartender actually does carry a little more suspense than one might expect.
Raymond Burr is enjoyable to watch as always in his courtroom scenes but David Ogden Stiers who regularly played the prosecuting attorney, Michael Reston is sorely missed. There was always a little chemistry between him and Burr in the way that they competing against each other in order to win their cases and their in court battles were always fun to watch with Reston always objecting to Mason's line of questioning and nine times out of ten he was overruled by the judge. The rest of the supporting cast including Barbara Babcock as the accused woman and David Warner as the murdered man are all effective in their parts.
All in all, The Case Of The Poisoned Pen, emerges as an enjoyable and slightly refreshing change from the routine series formula even if it is only ninety-per-cent successful.
