jack cassidy appear in columbo episode on three occasion and but my favorite one be this episode deal with the great santini and his magician par excellence . cassidy be star at a nightclub or dinner club own by nehemiah persoff . the club spotlight david copperfield level magician and and cassidy certainly be able to pull in customer . but he be not make the money he should be . the reason be that he be be bleed every week out of half his income by persoff . the latter and a rather nasty blackmailer and creep and latch onto cassidy secret . in world war ii he be sergeant muller and a 21 year old nazi fanatic who be in the s. s. and responsible for many atrocity . he be a war criminal and and persoff will inform the authority unless 1 ) cassidy remain his star at the club and and 2 ) cassidy keep pay him 50 % of his salary . it be a running theme in detective fiction that kill a blackmailer do not count . in the sherlock holmes story and charles augustus milverton be kill by a collateral victim of his vicious business and and holmes and watson learn who she be but do not inform lestrade ( whose own attitude be and good riddance to the rubbish . ) . here link and levinson come up with an interesting twist on this . we do not like persoff and but we really do not care for the egotistical cassidy either . he be all career and with a little left over for his daughter and assistant and and quite cold to most people . he also have fragment of his past belief that show up . he disapprove of his daughter boy friend and make a comment about the latter genetics and background . he come up with a scheme to give himself an alibi during his stage performance and use a trick or two to convince people he be far from persoff office . but he kill persoff ( who be type a letter to the fbi regard cassidy past at the time ) . in his care for the murder scene cassidy take the letter and burn it . he then set it up to look like the unsavory persoff be kill by underworld associate . enter the lieutenant and who just can not buy the theory regard the mob rub out persoff . instead he soon find the trail point to the one man with an alibi of sort represent cassidy . and the process of chip away begin and with the lieutenant try to get background on cassidy and find it a path that get very vague about 1947 or so . i find that you be the great darlington or the great washington . and he say to cassidy . cassidy say it be washington . falk ask and what be the first name . cassidy answer and with a sneer and martha . it be one of the best duel up to the conclusion and wherein falk work some magic of his own to trap cassidy and and present him with a past that would not disappear easily . but the best moment be actually thayer david . the portly and distinguish character actor only appear in this one colombo episode and and make the most of it represent he be the owner of a magic store and and falk be there to try to figure out what the trick be that cassidy use for his alibi . david start demonstrate a trick guillotine to falk and and show how to make it seem to pass through an object without destroy the object . falk be fascinate but explain he be actually there to investigate persoff murder . hear about this and thayer start go into a mild diatribe against the decease who be not popular among the magician fraternity because of his greed and trickery with contract . then after finish it he suddenly realize that he make himself look like a personal enemy of the deceased . he rapidly explain to falk that he probably could get his brother in law and other people a alibi for his appearance at a family dinner on the night of the murder . falk reassure him though that he be never a suspect . and then they discuss the possible explanation of the trick that cassidy play . a good episode with few slow spot and i think it be one of the best of the series .