RIP Peter Falk

Updated on June 24, 2011 By Ken Begg 18 Comments

Well, crap.

I have nothing to add to the image above. One of the great TV characters ever, bar none. And he wasn’t bad as the grandfather in The Princess Bride, either.

Mr. Columbo is survived by his wife, Kate Mulgrew.*

{*No way in hell was Kate frickin’ Mulgrew Columbo’s wife.}

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  • Wow. That’s a shock. Though I seem to recall something about him not doing well of late.

  • Just heard the news. All the main characters from ‘The Great Race’ are gone now. :(

  • zombiewhacker

    RIP Mr. Falk.

    And as Columbo would say, “Oh, wait, there’s just one more thing…”

  • silverwheel

    RIP – you were also a strong part of Wings of Desire, an all-time favorite. If eternity gets too boring, feel free to come back down and enjoy the coffee and cigarettes.

  • roger h

    or the last of the cast of “It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World”

    oops, forgot Mickey Rooney is still kicking at 90, I probably just doomed him.

  • Rock Baker

    Rest in Peace, Sir.

    What makes the whole thing even more horrible is knowing that he had been troubled with demintia and (sorry, I don’t know how to spell it, the condition where you loose all your short-term memory). What a frightening end.

    You might want to check out Falk in The Bloody Brood, which may have been his first film. He plays a sadistic beatnik who serves a random innocent guy a hamburger laced with ground glass! A minor gem that’s criminally obscure.

  • Rock Baker

    I guess I don’t know how to spell dementia either.

  • Kirk

    Damn. I’ll have to break out my copy of The In-Laws and raise a glass to him tonight.

  • @roger h. Johnathan Winters is still with us too. Dammit, now we’ve doomed two people.

  • John Campbell

    Ken always knows about people dying before the rest of us.

    Peter Falk died.

    Oh my God! Ken is death!

    Sorry…had a Glenn Beck moment there. I’m better now.

    RIP Peter.

  • roger h

    @John Hanna, my goodness Winters must be really odd ball in his old age.

  • Flangepart

    Aw, maaaan!
    R.I.P. Sir. You were one of the greats.

  • tim

    he was really good in murder by death. I liked that he wasn’t afraid to parody himself.

  • It’s very sad news, though I guess we should be at least happy that he lived to ripe old age of 90. RIP Detective Columbo.

  • sandra

    Lt Frank Columbo made his debut in a play by Levinson and Link entitled PRESCRIPTION MURDER. In the original production he was played by Thomas Mitchell (!). The play became a tv movie starring Falk in 1967. It wasn’t until 1971 that someone came up with the idea of turning him into a series. I have seen COLUMBO reruns many times, but I don’t recall seeing either the original movie or the series pilot, which was called RANSOM FOR A DEAD MAN since. It would be nice someone got the idea of showing them, in tribute to Peter Falk.

  • GenO2

    “Der Himmel über Berlin” is my wife’s favorite film, so I’ve seen it at art revival showings, college film series, VHS, DVD and Blu-Ray. Berlin is obviously the star of the film, but Peter Falk was the human heart. The monologue at the food truck, directed at the (to him) invisible angel Damiel (Bruno Ganz) has been showing up in most of the write-ups I’ve seen, possibly because it seems to fit this moment:

    Peter Falk: I can’t see you, but I know you’re here. I feel it. You’ve been hanging around since I got here. I wish I could see your face. Just look into your eyes and tell you how good it is to be here. Just to touch something. See that’s cold; that feels good. Or to smoke, have coffee. And if you do it together it’s fantastic. Or to draw: you know, you take a pencil and you make a dark line, then you make a light line and together it’s a good line. Or when your hands are cold, you rub them together, you see, that’s good, that feels good! There’s so many good things! But you’re not here – I’m here. I wish you were here. I wish you could talk to me. ‘Cause I’m a friend.

    Compañero!

  • A tremendous memory from my youth. RIP, Mr. Falk

  • He played monstrous villains in two episodes of the untouchables. Very effective as a heavy. He could have been another Peter Lorre, but I am glad he was a Peter in any case.