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Post-50th Anniversary Viewing
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The Mod Squad
"The Connection"
Originally aired September 14, 1972
Two-hour Season 5 premiere
Edited Wiki said:
When Greer is seriously hurt by two phony cops freeing a drug dealer whom he had apprehended, and four suitcases of heroin belonging to a crime syndicate are stolen, Sgt. Ed Lassiter (Ed Asner) leads the Squad on their most challenging assignment ever, looking at every possible connection.
The red carpet is rolled out for this Very Special Premiere, the intro being extended for credit shots of the all-star guest lineup:
Greer's old pal, Sgt. Lassiter, is late meeting the captain, who flies in via helicopter with a prisoner being extradited from Chicago to Lassiter's division, Charlie Drango (The Hulk Hunter). Greer is met by a pair of phony cops; when one of them (Washington) pulls his gun, Greer puts up a fight, but is pistol-clocked by the other guy (uncredited Victor Campos), to be found by Lassiter after the trio squeal away in the phony squad car. Lassiter calls the Mods as Greer's apparent next of kin to inform them that he's in surgery. Drango dons a uniform to join the other two in holding up the cashier's office of the Amherst Hotel (desk manager Bill Quinn) for a quartet of suitcases that they're holding for a guest, containing $23 million in uncut heroin. The guest, Syndicate middleman Jerry Silver (a man named Brady), pops in with another guy during the holdup to be held at gunpoint, taunted by Drango, and tied up.
Greer pulls through, and while he's laid up, the Mods, who busted Drango for murder, get involved in the case with Lassiter. A runner named Deak Tate is brought in, who was supposed to make a pickup from a dealer named Bolo--Drango's old partner when they were both working for Silver. Linc subs for him, dropping by the place of Bolo's girlfriend, Amanda (McNair), who lives with a Granny Marshall (McNeil). Their guests are the two phony cops, now out of uniform. Amanda takes Linc to the Hollywood Bowl, where Bolo (Sheriff Bart) is hanging with rehearsing jazz trumpeter Cat Griffin (Richard Pryor)--who happens to be an old numbers-running buddy of Linc's. After Linc reacquaints himself with Cat, he spots a glint as Drango takes aim from the top of the bowl with a sniper rifle, and foils the attempt by tackling Cat. Linc tries to pursue Drango, but after his stunt double takes a ride around the parking lot on the outside of the killer's passenger door, he's ditched into a row of trash cans. Cat, who set Drango up for his bust, suspects Bolo's involvement, and learns on the phone from Silver how Drango's gone rogue.
Pete hangs out at the Amherst's bar posing as a visitor from Oklahoma, where he learns from a lady he buys drinks for named Celeste Benson (Barbara Rhoades) about a party having been held by the son of a diplomat from Paraguay named Andre Vacheya (sp?; actor?), who was the guy with Silver during the robbery. At the hospital, Greer learns from an embittered Ed how his wife recently died in an auto accident with a guy she turned out to have been having an affair with; and how their developmentally disabled child, Ed Jr., is in a state mental hospital.
Posing as a welfare department caseworker, Julie visits the pad of Drango's pregnant and estranged wife, Francie. Francie's other children, Bobby and Carolyn (Ricky Powell and Mia Bendixsen), direct Julie to the apartment basement's laundry room, where she awkwardly walks in on Francie (The Girl from H.A.R.T.) with a group of junkies; though Francie vouches for her. Julie pretends to be there to fill out forms and helps Francie in the kitchen, learning that she and a sister who died as a teenager inherited their smack addiction from their father. Francie collapses in the bathroom while trying to shoot up and is rushed to the hospital, where the doctor (Ron Stokes) tells Julie how the baby will likely suffer withdrawal after birth, and will possibly suffer long-term chromosome or brain damage if it lives.
Linc, who's accompanying Bolo at Cat's insistence, finds that Bolo's pretty cavalier about the attempted hit. Pete, posing as a cab driver, takes the two of them first to a recording studio, then to a ferry, where Pete tails Bolo as he meets with his connection--Drango. Pete's spotted, and Drango recognizes him as one of the cops who busted him. A ferry scuffle ensues in which Pete ends being tossed into...
LSD to the rescue! (Maybe I should just nickname him Lucy.)
The two of them are picked up by a private boat. The end credits of syndicated Part 1 play over not a traditional walk-off, but a close-up of the unconscious Pete being hauled aboard.
Narrator: Tonight, the conclusion of "The Connection."
This falls on a freeze-frame of the opening shot of the credits; following which we get some scenes from "last week".
Pete seems none the worse for the wear as he visits Greer at the hospital with the others. Julie drops by the maternity ward to inform Francie that she has a 4-1/2 pound baby girl in an incubator...and to offer help in getting her on methadone treatment. In return, Francie exposits that her husband thinks that Cat set up his bust for the Syndicate, and that he won't let anything come between him and the shipment. His accomplices, now all believed to be in danger, are identified as Anthony Wilson (Washington), Cheech Avila (Campos), and Paul Rene (not even on IMDb's uncredited list). Wilson and Rene are subsequently found dead separately, the former having last been seen with Drango, and the latter believed to have OD'ed. At the Marshall apartment, Linc and Pete find Granny in a state of shock and Cheech shot. Pete pursues Drango down a fire escape, but Charlie jumps into a getaway car with Bolo.
Meanwhile, Julie manages to get into the party that Pete was invited to when Silver takes an interest in her. (He has a thing for hair of gold.) After he makes some moves on her, Julie eavesdrops as Silver answers to his uncle and Syndicate superior, Frank Barton (The Clown Prince of Crime), who's not in a laughing mood, but gives Jerry one chance to make good by bringing in another shipment. Pete shows up at the party to make contact with his "sister," who gets a bit of physical business when she runs through Silver in the hall as a distraction so Pete can grab his attaché case full of plans (of the dope operation, not a new housing project). Pete is wounded in an ensuing chase and cornered on a rooftop, but Greer, Lassiter, and uniformed CLE come to the rescue via a stairwell exit.
Julie learns that Lassiter's son, whom he claims to have been visiting, has been dead for a year, and that the lieutenant's been suspended for withholding narcotics evidence pending a psychiatric evaluation. The Mods eventually figure out that a badly scrawled note by the undereducated Granny points to Welfare Island. (This is a confusing bit of business as the only result I could find indicates that it was the former name of Roosevelt Island in NYC.) Linc and Pete find Drango and Bolo in an industrial complex and the stunt doubles go into action as a running chase ensues on catwalks and pipes. Once each Mod catches up with his quarry, Pete and Linc fairly easily take down Bolo and Drango, respectively.
Then Lassiter arrives on the scene with Amanda at gunpoint, and she shows him where the cases are stashed. Greer follows with Julie, and while Lassiter tries to pass it off as a tip-based bust, Greer confronts Ed with how he's on suspension and accuses him of having used the Mods to find the heroin and of being in cahoots with Drango. Ed goes into a rant about having to pay for Ed Jr.'s hospital bills and needing to make 20 years to get full pension...which he only repeats verbatim after Greer asserts that Eddie's dead. Finally Greer gets Ed to snap back to reality enough to put down his gun while begging Adam for help.
In the coda, the Mods are helping Francie move into her spiffy new place, with the promise of the new baby coming home from the hospital soon. (Getting her cleaned up is one thing, but who's paying for this? How much do the Mods have stashed away that they can chip in on new homes for any old guest of the week? And the timing seems suspect anyway...Francie managed to straighten herself out before the baby came home?) As the camera pans out on a shot of the Mods unloading the Challenger...
This is Michael Cole. Each year, thousands of heroin babies are born in this country. If you are pregnant and a drug user, please seek prenatal care immediately, through your family doctor or your county medical service. Don't let the next heroin baby be yours.
Vince Howard appears briefly as Granny's grandson; and Jason Wingreen plays a fleabag hotel manager.
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Just my little PSA for the day.
Get in line, buddy.
Carly in fine classic form.
Classic Epic Rock'n'Roll.
Was there a single edit? Who the hell cares?
Classic Steely Dan, although it's weird how they are singing directly to me.
Smooth soft rock staple.
Part of me wants to get the DeFranco Family singles just to stick it to the Osmonds.
