Some Like It Hot success of "Some Like It Hot" is considered one of the final nails in the coffin for the Hays Code. It is February 1929 in the city of Chicago, during the era of Prohibition. Joe (Tony Curtis) is a jazz saxophone player, and an irresponsible gambler and ladies' man; his sensible friend Jerry (Jack Lemmon) is a jazz double bass player. They work in a speakeasy (disguised as a funeral home) owned by gangster "Spats" Colombo (George Raft). Tipped off by informant "Toothpick" Charlie (George E. Stone), the police raid the joint. Joe and Jerry flee—only to accidentally witness Spats
Columbo of cancer while the play was touring in out-of-town tryouts; Columbo was his last role. In 1968, the same play was made into a two-hour television movie that aired on NBC. The writers suggested Lee J. Cobb and Bing Crosby for the role of Columbo, but Cobb was unavailable and Crosby turned it down because he felt it would take too much time away from the golf links. Director Richard Irving convinced Levinson and Link that Falk, who wanted the role, could pull it off even though he was much younger than the writers had in mind. Originally a one-off