Commentary

It's A Mystery: New Perry Mason Won't Be A Lawyer

If a character named Perry Mason is not a lawyer, can this character really be Perry Mason?

Logic would dictate that the answer to that question is no. The Perry Mason character has been around since Erle Stanley Gardner introduced him in the first Perry Mason novel titled The Case of the Velvet Claws in 1933.

From that very beginning, Mason was a lawyer. Nowhere in any description of the character found online is there any mention of him working as a private investigator before taking up the law as a profession.

And yet, here comes a redo of “Perry Mason” in which the character is not a defense attorney but a detective -- one who is described as “down on his luck” in a Hollywood Reporterstory about this new “Mason” reboot.

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The real (albeit fictional) Perry Mason was never “down on his luck.” On the contrary, he seemed to possess ample financial resources and thereby lived very well. In addition, Mason had a detective on retainer -- Paul Drake -- who was almost as memorable a character as Mason himself.

In this “limited” series being made for HBO, Mason the cheap detective will be played by Matthew Rhys, formerly seen in “The Americans” on FX. This new “Mason” reportedly takes place in 1932. It is being described as a heretofore untold “origin” story of the Mason character, as if this mystery-fiction icon is to be considered on par with comic-book superheroes.

So if the character is not to be a defense attorney -- which is the occupation for which Perry Mason has been known throughout the reading world for 86 years -- then why name this character Perry Mason at all?

The answer might be that the makers of this series, and the network that wants it, believe that giving this character a brand name known the world over would have the effect of really putting this production over the top (to apply a bit of show business parlance someone might have used in 1932).

Of course there is nothing wrong with producing a detective series set in 1932. But there seems to be little reason to name him Perry Mason.

On the other hand, there is no crime in doing so either. But the challenge of this particular character might not lie in his origins but in the man who later played him so indelibly -- Raymond Burr.

To many, the Mason character and Burr are so intertwined as to be inseparable. But here again, time marcheth on, and there are likely more people alive now on the planet Earth who wouldn't know Raymond Burr from Ray Romano than those who would.

So Perry Mason won't be a lawyer anymore. He will now be a detective. Oh, well. What's next? Philip Marlowe as a doctor?

Matthew Rhys photo courtesy of FX, from “The Americans.” Raymond Burr photo courtesy of MeTV, from “Perry Mason.”

1 comment about "It's A Mystery: New Perry Mason Won't Be A Lawyer".
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  1. Douglas Ferguson from College of Charleston, May 9, 2019 at 11:32 a.m.

    I agree. Gardner himself was a lawyer before becoming a mystery author. Two observations: Maybe they want to avoid the debacle that was Monte Markham as the New Perry Mason. Also, I recall from my dad who read all the books that Perry and Della shared a sexual relationship in the books, implied or otherwise, that never made it onto early TV.

    Yes, it's a mystery, all right, the whole re-imagining. Blame Robert Downey, I guess, according to this other story:  https://deadline.com/2019/05/john-lithgow-hbo-perry-mason-limited-series-team-downey-1202608975/

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