DIAGNOSIS MURDER: INHERITANCE OF DEATH (TV)
Summary
One in this series of mystery programs about Dr. Mark Sloan, a physician at Community General Hospital who enjoys solving murder cases with the help of his son, Steve, a homicide detective.
An old man tells his children that he plans to leave his inheritance to Community General Hospital; they are not pleased with this outcome and seems more than content to let the old man die without his wish being fulfilled. The old man is Jonathan Nash, a wealthy retired wine distributor and second cousin of Dr. Sloan. Late that night, Dr. Sloan gets a call from a nervous Jonathan, claiming that one of his children is trying to kill him. Dr. Sloan calls Steve and rushes over to the Nash household. Once up the stairs he finds Jonathan in his motorized wheelchair, seemingly dead. He collides with Dr. Sloan before careening down the stairwell; Dr. Sloan falls unconscious.
Dr. Sloan is recovering in the hospital when Steve comes to visit, saying the police have deemed Jonathan’s death an accident, but Dr. Sloan disagrees. When he sees a child playing with a remote-control toy car, Dr. Sloan gets the idea that Jonathan’s wheelchair could have been remote-controlled by an outside party. Steve investigates and finds no remote-control devices on the wheelchair in question. Dr. Sloan asks Dr. Stewart to drive out to the Nash house and figure out the whereabouts of each of his cousins during the time of death. Dr. Sloan gives Dr. Stewart details of their private lives.
Dr. Stewart arrives at the Nash house, finding a catering truck parked in front. He eavesdrops on the first cousin, Julian Nash, as he hands a bottle of pills to a man from the catering truck in a shady fashion. Dr. Stewart questions him; Julian’s medical license was revoked and Jonathan wouldn’t finance a private clinic as per his request. He refuses to answer any questions about the night of Jonathan’s murder.
Next, Dr. Stewart visits Judith Nash, who walks about in wedding attire. Thirty years ago she was engaged to be married to a man named Giancarlo, but he supposedly went missing just before their wedding date. Dr. Stewart points out that in actuality, Jonathan bribed Giancarlo into leaving, but Judith refuses to accept this and nearly attacks Dr. Stewart. She wanted to use the inheritance money to track down Giancarlo. Her hairdresser Dante appears and comes to her defense, providing an alibi for her at the time of Jonathan’s death. Still suspicious, Dr. Stewart leaves them.
Downstairs, Dr. Stewart runs across J. Edison Nash, the final cousin, working in his laboratory. J. Edison is a would-be inventor who wanted Jonathan to invest in his inventions when he was young, but Jonathan refused. While J. Edison was in the army, Jonathan disposed of all his inventions, but J. Edison claims that he sold them to earn his vast fortune. When Dr. Stewart questions him, J. Edison manages to escape and Dr. Stewart follows him. Julian watches Dr. Stewart go.
Dr. Stewart follows J. Edison to a Nash Wine Distribution Plant, where he eavesdrops on a conversation where he sets up a meeting in the plant that night. Dr. Stewart wants to spy on the meeting, but Dr. Sloan advises against it. Amanda offers to help Dr. Stewart, and they go to Dante’s hair salon. Amanda goes in as a customer while Dr. Stewart sneaks in the back way disguised as a hairdresser. They spy on Dante on the phone with Judith, talking about her “secret.” Dante leaves and Dr. Stewart snoops through his desk, finding a check from Judith for $100,000 in it.
While Dante and Judith meet, Dr. Stewart bursts in and tries to interrogate them. Judith reveals that Dante is her illegitimate son with Giancarlo; Jonathan made her give him up for adoption in Italy and they didn’t reunite until years later. This does not discount them from being possible suspects in Dr. Stewart’s eyes. On the way back to his car, Dr. Stewart is taken by men from the catering truck to their boss, who has been taking medication from Julian for some time and is now exhibiting maniacal behavior as a result. He claims to have been with Julian at the time of Jonathan’s death.
That night, Dr. Stewart sneaks into J. Edison’s meeting. He is caught and discovers the truth: the meeting was merely J. Edison demonstrating his prototypes for electronic toys to international businessmen. He claims he was working late on his toys at the time Jonathan died, but has no witnesses to corroborate his story. Dr. Sloan gets out of traction and notices that the pants he was wearing when he found Jonathan are ripped where the wheelchair collided with him. Dr. Stewart visits the Nash family as they have dinner. He announces that the police are on their way; Jonathan had two wheelchairs, one remote-controlled and the other not, and claims that the remote-controlled wheelchair was used to stage his death. Furthermore, he claims that the two wheelchairs were switched between the time of Jonathan’s death and the arrival of the police. When none of them confess, he leaves them to their own devices.
Later, Julian activates a secret wall switch, opening a secret compartment which hides the motorized wheelchair. He also finds Dr. Sloan within, waiting for him. Dr. Sloan noticed various discrepancies between his observations of the crime scene and the police photographs, leading him to deduce the location of the secret room. He notes also that the hidden wheelchair caught a strip of cloth torn from his pants, confirming that the chairs were switched. The crime is pinned on Julian, who draws a gun on Dr. Sloan. However, Dr. Sloan manages to delay him until the police arrive and arrest him. Commercials deleted.
Details
- NETWORK: CBS
- DATE: November 19, 1993 8:00 PM
- RUNNING TIME: 0:47:00
- COLOR/B&W: Color
- CATALOG ID: B:54552
- GENRE: Drama, medical; Drama, mystery/suspense; Drama, police/private detective
- SUBJECT HEADING: Drama, medical; Drama, mystery/suspense; Drama, police/private detective
- SERIES RUN: CBS - TV series, 1993-2001
- COMMERCIALS: N/A
CREDITS
- Fred Silverman … Executive Producer
- Dean Hargrove … Executive Producer
- Mark Masuoka … Producer
- Barry Steinberg … Producer
- Robin Madden … Co-Producer
- Joyce Burditt … Supervising Producer, Created by
- Frank Thackery … Director
- Gerry Conway … Writer
- Dick DeBenedictis … Music by, Theme Music by
- Dick Van Dyke … Cast, Dr. Mark Sloan, Jonathan Nash, Judith Nash, Julian Nash, J. Edison Nash
- Scott Baio … Cast, Dr. Jack Stewart
- Victoria Rowell … Cast, Amanda Bentley-Livingston
- Barry Van Dyke … Cast, Steve Sloan
- Michael Tucci … Cast, Norman Briggs
- Delores Hall … Cast, Nurse Delores Mitchell
- Charlie Schlatter … Cast, Dr. Jesse Travis
- Jim Pirri … Cast, Dante Reynaldo
- Michael Champion … Cast, Big Angie
- J. Rob Jordan … Cast, Driver
- Brian Jay … Cast, Hairstylist
- Adam Cadenhead … Cast, Hank
- Bob Apisa … Cast, Foreman