In 1995, Kate Mulgrew made her debut as Captain Kathryn Janeway in “Star Trek: Voyager,” but it wasn’t her first brush with a major franchise. Sixteen years earlier, Mulgrew landed the title role in “Mrs. Columbo,” the short-lived spin-off from “Columbo,” one of the best detective shows ever made.
Peter Falk’s iconic investigator often spoke about his wife, but she was never seen. When “Columbo” came to an end in 1978, NBC went forward with “Mrs. Columbo” and cast Mulgrew as Kate Columbo despite the nearly three-decade age gap between her and the man who was supposedly her husband. According to “Mrs. Columbo” producer David Levinson, Falk was upset about the implications of casting an actress in her 20s as Columbo’s wife.
“It would have worked if we could have cast Maureen Stapleton. That’s who everybody saw as Mrs. Columbo,” Levinson shared during a 2016 interview with Classic TV History. “Peter [Falk] went berserk. He didn’t like the idea of ‘Mrs. Columbo’ anyhow, but now it looks like he’s Woody Allen — you know, that he’s married to this girl who’s young enough to be his daughter. Kate Mulgrew was a nice actor, but there was just no way to overcome the premise.”
“Mrs. Columbo” debuted on NBC on February 26, 1979, for a short five-episode first season. By the time Season 2 debuted seven months later, Kate was no longer Mrs. Columbo.
Kate Loves a Mystery
Prior to Kate Mulgrew’s casting, Mrs. Columbo never appeared on screen. The spin-off series established that Kate and her husband had a young daughter, Jenny Columbo (Lili Haydn). Kate was also revealed to be a reporter, but she soon began solving murder mysteries like her famous husband.
However, the show’s Season 2 premiere on October 18, 1979, came with a slightly retooled premise and a new name: “Kate Loves a Mystery.” Although the series didn’t dwell on it, Kate had a divorce and reclaimed her maiden name, Kate Callahan. She also continued her reporting career while solving murders on the side. Unfortunately, audiences didn’t take to the series and “Kate Loves a Mystery” was canceled after only 13 episodes.
During a convention appearance, Mulgrew shared that NBC Head of Programming Fred Silverman personally recruited her for the show when she was 22 years old, and he had a response to her age gap concerns.
“‘We believe at NBC, Ms. Mulgrew, that you have great natural gravitas,'” recalled Mulgrew. “At first I said, ‘No,’ because I had been offered Desdemona on Broadway. … And then they made me an offer I felt at 22 that I could not refuse.”
Will the real Mrs. Columbo please stand up?
Kate Mulgrew voiced her reservations about playing Kate Columbo, but she went ahead with the series anyway.
“So I went out, but it didn’t have a leg to stand on,” she said. “If they’d done it [as] ‘Kate Loves a Mystery,’ it probably would have worked. But ‘Mrs. Columbo,’ how could you possibly do that? First of all, Peter Falk was so singularly great. And the beauty of ‘Columbo’ was his isolated self, right? That we never saw her. The wonderful secret of it.”
Although Mulgrew never revisited her “Mrs. Columbo” character, Falk returned to his role in 1989 for a series of TV movies that ran through 2003. The films maintained the tradition of keeping Mrs. Columbo off-screen. However, Falk’s wife, Shera Danese, co-starred in four of the “Columbo” TV movies in addition to her two guest appearances on the show. Danese played a different character in each of her “Columbo” stories and remained with Falk until he passed away in 2011.
“Mrs. Columbo” is currently streaming on The Roku Channel.