The Devane and I
Watching the premiere of 24: Live Another Day earlier in the week gets me to thinking where it is that I have heard the name of William Devane before... Once Upon a Time, 24 years ago strangely enough, in September 1990, a client of mine named Barbara Paul called to say that there was a TV movie on NBC by the name of Murder COD being previewed in TV Guide that sounded a lot like her book Kill Fee. The TV movie and a perfectly respectable cast. Patrick Duffy, still on Dallas, starred as a police detective, and one William Devane was the bad guy. Devane was on Knots Landing. And if it sounded a lot like Barbara Paul's novel Kill Fee -- well, that's because it was. The book had been under option for a while. The option had, if memory serves, expired on September 10, which was now a few days in the past. The producers of the TV movie had not quite forgotten to pay the purchase price for the TV movie, which they should have done months before when the started filming ...