pilot

The Pilot

Wednesday, April 30, 1975

After two college students in a red-and-white Torino are killed by the famous hitman team of Zane & Canelli (hired by a colleague of S&H’s, Henderson), Starsky & Hutch try to figure out if the hit was meant for them.

WB: William Blinn, DB: Barry Shear.

Hutch: David Soul, Starsky: Paul Michael Glaser, Captain Dobey: Richard Ward, Huggy Bear: Antonio Fargas

Fat Rolly: Michael Lerner, Zane: Richard Lynch, Canelli: Michael Conrad, Ass’t DA Mark Henderson: Albert Morgenstern, Patty: Karen Lamm, Frank Tallman: Gilbert Green, Steele: Don Billett, Coley: Buddy Lester, Vinnie/Frankie: Gordon Jump, ‘Lijah: Doug Fowley, Gretchen: Carole Ita White, Stan: Larry Manetti.

BEAUTIFUL !

And so say all of us as we recall the first word spoken by the partners in ‘Starsky and Hutch’ pilot movie. This special commemorative feature takes us back to where it all began

Starsky & Hutch’s creator and writer, William Blinn, was right on the money when he said that shortening the Pilot’s movie script from two hours to 90 minutes brought the story and its characterisation into focus (see ‘The Writer’s Garret’ in this issue).

Every scene in the Pilot drips with iconic meaning. From the moment the window opens on to the Boys’ partnership to the time the curtain is drawn, we are given telling glimpses into the Boys and what makes them tick – leaving us filled with the glory of this partnership.

Starsky:          Beautiful!

Hutch:            You're late.

Starsky:         Coming down here to watch you sweat is not the high point in my day. Go ahead. Hey, I got coffee and a Danish. You want to share?

Hutch:            Have I ever?

Starsky:         No, but I keep hoping.

Hutch:            You shouldn't drink that crap. It rots your guts away.

Starsky:         Mama, I just met a doctor. I think he loves me.

Hutch:            Funny. Very funny.

Thus were spoken the very first words on screen by our two capeless heroes who fight crime on the streets of Bay City. Right away we are left in no doubt about the differences between these two men. But wait, there’s more as the partners leave the gym …

Starsky:         Hey, whose car?

Hutch:            Mine..

Starsky:         Why yours? The suspension of yours makes this thing ride like a rock in a washer.

Hutch:            What are you talking about?

Starsky:         I'm ashamed of that car. Hurts my image.

Hutch:            Get in, get in!

Health and cars bring the partners’ differences out – even their clothes, as noted in the Pilot script where S&H are likened to a pair of oddly matched bookends.

Yet despite these differences, Starsky & Hutch still get mixed up in one of the show’s enduring gags that’s launched and repeated in the Pilot: ‘I’m Hutch, he’s Starsky’, Hutch tells The Suits. ‘I’m Starsky, he’s Hutch,’ an aggrieved Starsky tells two uniform cops.

Behind the partners’ good-natured banter lies an acute awareness of the seriousness of the situation in which they work. And they are right – just see the hit men who, the night before, mercilessly mowed down two young lovers in their car, point blank. There begins a deceptive story of murderous intrigue with twists and turns that culminate in an explosive end.

But not before the story unfolds itself in a series of compelling scenes:

… the bar room scene where S&H interrogate the customers in their inimitable style

… the looking through the shattered windscreen scene

… The Suits – not Starsky & Hutch’s long suit

… the undressing scene – ‘Would either of you like anything to drink?’ ‘No, thank you, ma'am. We're on duty.’ ‘Couldn't tell, honey. You ain't wearing a badge.’

… the ‘take no prisoners’ stairway scene at Tallman’s mansion – ‘Not nice, Joseph. Not nice,’ Starsky tells one of the two henchmen as he takes his gun after Starsky & Hutch have dispensed of them both down the stairs.

… the steam room scene – ‘Even dyin’s a livin’’, Starsky tells Tallman. (And what about Starsky’s purple towel – we have one just like it from back in the day. It’s now a proud artefact in our Starsky & Hutch collection!)

… the stakeout by the pool on a rainy night– ‘I’m shrinking!’ whines Hutch to Starsky’s dirty laugh.

… the laundry scene, where Hutch unravels the case that leads Starsky to the famous question underpinning the entire Starsky & Hutch show – ‘Who the hell are we supposed to trust?’ To which Hutch replies with every conviction of his being, ‘The same people we always trust. Us.’

… the climactic hotel scene – suspenseful as Starsky climbs the stairs and Hutch the fire escape outside, staying connected to each other via their two-way radios as they track their quarry who’s riding an elevator to an upper floor. Great team work, that.

This staircase/fire escape scene explodes when Starsky attempts a bust that sees Hutch and him give rapid chase to the two hit men. Starsky races down the stairs with remarkable speed and agility … Hutch furiously keeps pace as he rushes down the fire escape and leaps onto his car’s roof…. the show’s iconic soundtrack pounds along to their every breath-taking move until it all erupts in an explosive shootout in the basement’s parking garage where the two hit men are shot down. Oh, how the mighty have fallen!

Of Starsky and Hutch, their creator, Blinn, has said:

‘The overall thing they share is an awareness that sometimes the world through which they move is just absurd and you can take it seriously or you just say this is too funny for words, and they get hung up on that … S&H were part of a system that they knew was screwed up, run by flawed human beings, and they were among those flawed human beings, and occasionally you just had to laugh at it and not take it as doggedly seriously as most cop shows at that time’.1 (Interview vid at with another fine love sotry between two men.https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/william-blinn Retrieved 4th September 2020)

This awareness is brought out in the Pilot in a scene between the two partners as they drive:

Starsky: It’s a toilet bowl. That’s what it is.

Hutch:            What are you talking about?

Starsky: This. What we go, where we do it. You and me are like little bugs waiting to crawl out and every time we try, someone flushes.

Hutch:            Yeah, well, you and me can be thankful we’re a couple of bugs who know how to swim.

Starsky:         Yeah. (Looks in the rear view mirror and sees a car following them) Especially since we have a shark on our tail.’

It’s like Hutch told Frankie in the gym, ‘Yeah, Frankie we know what we’re doing. But I’ll be damned if I know why’.

In this Theatre of the Absurd where Starsky & Hutch float in an incomprehensible world where anything can and does happen, the partners are not unlike Stan & Ollie in their own Laurel and Hardy absurd theatre.

It’s no coincidence that Laurel and Hardy are cited throughout the Starsky & Hutch show. When Starsky tells Hutch in the Pilot, ‘That’s a fine idea, Ollie’, we are clued in to this connection with another legendary male relationship inhabiting an absurd world.

Now let’s not forget another important part of the Starsky & Hutch story – Huggy Bear, played inimitably by Antonio Fargas (pictured right). Huggy makes his usual entrance with pulsating cool as he slips through the curtains into a darkened cinema showing an X-rated film. He swaggers to a seat in front of where the Boys are sitting.

‘What It is,’ he says to them, ‘What’s happening?’

As Starsky and Hutch lay bare their inquiry, Huggy demurs, ‘I don’t like to talk to cops about cops.’

But the Boys prevail. ‘Huggy, they tried to kill us’, Starsky says. ‘Us. They tried to put holes in our bodies where our bodies were not intended to have holes. So you'll talk to us now?’

Huggy complies, seeing the seriousness of the Boys’ situation and showing us, the viewers, that he cares about these two detectives. Why he cares is not yet clear – and it’s never explicitly explained in the show. It just is what it is as far as police/informant relationships go, and then some.

Richard Ward played Captain Harold C. Dobey, a role that was then taken up by Bernie Hamilton (pictured above) in the series itself. The two actors brought very different sensibilities to the role, and it is interesting to think what the series would have been with Ward. There’s no doubt that Hamilton made a well loved Captain who cared for his Boys and knew when to give them free rein and when to rein them in.

There was never any doubt or change about the casting of David Soul and Paul Michael Glaser in the lead roles. Soul was quickly hand-picked on the strength of his acting performances, particularly in the Dirty Harry movie, Magnum Force.

But the question of who would play Starsky took a long time to resolve. It wasn’t until a curly-haired brunette swaggered into an audition, munching on some walnuts, and played opposite David Soul in a bar room scene where they interrogate the customers, that lightning flashed and the producers knew there was magic electrifying the room. Thus was cast Paul Michael Glaser, who had known Soul back in New York in the 1960s.

The Pilot is populated with a terrific guest cast –

Michael ‘Let’s be careful out there’ Conrad of later Hill Street Blues fame, played one of two assassins, Canell (Conrad appeared as ‘Iron Mike’ in Season 2)

Richard Lynch played the other assassin, Zane; he re-appeared in the show as Lionel Fitzgerald II in ‘Quadromania’, and Joey in ‘Starsky vs. Hutch (see ‘International Profile’ for more on Lynch).

Michael Lerner as Fat Rolly, drew critical acclaim in 1991 for his part as Jack Lipnick in the film, Barton Finch.

Gordon Jump of WRKP and Soap, played Frankie, the owner of the gym where Hutch works out.

Gilbert Green as Tallman, Carole Ita White as the dryly observant Gretchen, and Doug Fowley as the homeless Lijah, all put in nice turns.

Interestingly, William Blinn would have liked to have seen Starsky & Hutch episodes shift from action to explore issues impacting police officers’ lives.

For example, in a recent interview1 (From https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/william-blinn), Blinn mentioned his idea for an episode that focused on Hutch’s estranged marriage – recalling that in the Pilot, we learn that Hutch is separated from his wife, Nancy. Blinn’s idea was to have Nancy in a divorce case sue Starsky for alienation of affection. This would bring out the difficulty of a police officer leading a ‘normal’ life where the job is the mistress. Blinn saw the dramatic and the comedic possibilities that could emerge in this scenario.

Blinn’s idea is an interesting one, and so I leave you with this writing prompt –

How would the story go if you were writing an episode about Hutch’s estranged wife suing Starsky for alienation of affection?

Pauline Daley

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WRITTEN BY  

William Blinn

We have a Toledo kid to thank for ‘Starsky & Hutch’ – William Blinn, creator of the show, born on 21st July, 1937, to Clare Allen and Pearl Ariel (neé Schaeffer) Blinn in Toledo, Ohio, U.S.A.

Blinn began his writing career in the 1960s, writing for TV series such as Rawhide, Bonanza and Here Come the Brides that co-starred our favourite Blond Blintz, David Soul.

Blinn first rose to prominence when he wrote the ABC television movie, Brian’s Song, a movie based on a true story about the football player, Brian Piccolo, stricken with terminal cancer. The story is told through his friendship with a fellow team mate, Gale

Sayers. Like Starsky and Hutch, the two players were vastly different from each other, and they made an unlikely pair. They became the first interracial roommates in USA’s National Football League. Their friendship evolved and prevailed through Brian’s illness until his death in 1970.

Telecast in 1971, Brian’s Song met with high critical acclaim and earned Blinn three prestigious awards –a Peabody, an Emmy, and a Writers Guild of America Award.

Television critic Matt Zoller Seitz named Brian's Song as the fifth greatest American TV-movie of all time, stating that the film was ‘an influential early example of the interracial buddy movie.’ 1

In 1972, Blinn created and produced The Rookies, and wrote multiple episodes of this police drama series. The series co-starred Georg Sanford Brown, who amongst other works directed ‘Starsky’s Lady’ in 1977. David Soul guest starred as a rookie cop who was shot down and lost a leg in an episode called ‘A Test of Courage’.

The seeds of a new style of cop show were sown when Blinn conceived a two-hour, one-off movie called Night Side, about two cops working night shifts. In development, the film was reduced to 90 minutes and became the pilot for what we would come to know and love as Starsky & Hutch.

Shortening the film to 90 minutes was a decision that Blinn in retrospect praised as it brought into clearer focus the characterisations of the two protagonist police officers and the mystery story at hand. Blinn likened the reduction in time to:

‘diluting a sauce. The more heat you put to it, there’s less and less sauce and more and more taste. That’s what happened once we were working from two hours to 90 minutes.’2

The movie, re-named Starsky and Hutch, aired on 30th April, 1975, and was a critical and popular success. Critics praised the story for being a good murder mystery – laying out all the clues before the viewer and bringing the viewer along with the two detectives, Starsky and Hutch, charged with solving the crime.

To everyone’s surprise, including the two lead actors, it was decided to develop the Pilot into a TV series. The rest, as they say, is history.

Starsky’s name came from a kid Blinn knew in high school; and Huggy Bear’s name was inspired by an off-beat DJ named Huggy Bear, whom Blinn heard one day on his car radio.

Following the initial success of Starsky & Hutch, Blinn moved on to other projects. He created the family television series, Eight is Enough, in 1977, and wrote numerous episodes for the series.

Also in 1977, Blinn began work on the acclaimed miniseries, Roots, which tells the story of Kunta Kinte, an 18th-century African in West Gambia who is captured and sold into slavery and transported to North America. The story follows Kunta’s life and the lives of his descendants in the USA.

For his work on Roots, Blinn won an Emmy Award for Best Writing in a Drama Series, with his co-writer, Ernest Kinoy.

Blinn’s most recent work includes co-writing the Prince movie, Purple Rain (1984); and creating and being a writer for Pensacola: Wings of Gold (1997-2000).

On writing, Blinn has these words of advice:

‘It's not enough just to tell the truth. Then you're doing the History Channel. There's something to be said for that, but it may not always be compelling. And it's not enough just to be interesting, because then you're doing Paris Hilton and her elephant. You know it'll be interesting, but it's cotton candy. If you can tell the truth in an interesting way, then you accomplished something.’ 3

We might all take some inspiration from his wise words!

ENDNOTES

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian%27s_Song Retrieved 4th September 2020.

From https://interviews.televisionacademy.com/interviews/william-blinn Retrieved 4th September 2020

From same source as 2 above.

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DIRECTED BY   ICON

Barry Shear

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GUEST STARS ICON

Gordon Jump (Vinnie) – ‘Alexander Gordon Jump (April 1, 1932 – September 22, 2003) was an American actor best known as the clueless radio station manager Arthur "Big Guy" Carlson in the TV series WKRP in Cincinnati and the incompetent "Chief of Police Tinkler" in the sitcom Soap. Jump's most memorable guest starring role was on a two-part episode of the 1980s sitcom Diff'rent Strokes, where he portrayed a pedophile who attempts to molest main characters Arnold and his friend, Dudley. He also played the "Maytag Repairman" in commercials for Maytag brand appliances, from 1989 until his retirement from the role in July 2003.’ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gordon_Jump Retrieved 26th July 2018)

Michael Conrad

Richard Lynch

Michael Lerner

Richard Ward

Michael ‘Let’s be Careful Out There’ Conrad (Canelli) – ‘Michael Conrad (October 16, 1925 – November 22, 1983) was an American actor perhaps best known for his portrayal of veteran cop Sgt. Phil Esterhaus on Hill Street Blues, in which he ended the introductory roll call to each week's show with "Let's be careful out there". He won two Emmy Awards for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Drama Series for Hill Street Blues in 1981 and 1982.

‘Conrad had a long acting career in television from the 1950s to the 1980s. In 1962 he appeared in the television series Car 54, Where Are You? in an uncredited part as a construction worker. [Pauline: another famous cop partners show – see the episode where they broke up.]

‘In 1963 he played Felton Grimes, the title character and murder victim, in the Perry Mason episode "The Case of the Bigamous Spouse".

‘He played Michael Stivic's conventional Polish-American Uncle Casimir on All in the Family.

‘Conrad played the role of a villain named AC in My Favorite Martian, "Martin's Revoltin' Development" (1965). In 1972, he appeared together with Richard Crenna and Alain Delon in the French language film Un flic, directed by Jean-Pierre Melville. He also had a memorable role in the 1974 film The Longest Yard, playing Nate Scarboro, a retired NFL tight end (New York Giants) who was also the head coach for "the Mean Machine", the team of prisoners put together by Burt Reynolds' character Paul Crewe to play the team of guards. During the 1976–77 season of Delvecchio, Conrad was a regular as Lt. Macavan.’

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Conrad Retrieved 27th February 2020

Richard Lynch (Zane) – ‘Richard Lynch (February 12, 1940 – June 19, 2012) was an American actor best known for portraying villains in films and television. His film credits included The Sword and the Sorcerer, Invasion USA, The Seven-Ups, Scarecrow, Little Nikita, Bad Dreams, God Told Me To, and Halloween. He appeared in science fiction productions, including Battlestar Galactica (as Wolfe) and its sequel series Galactica 1980 (as Commander Xaviar). He also appeared in such shows as Starsky and Hutch, Baretta, T. J. Hooker, Blue Thunder, Airwolf, The A-Team, Charmed and Star Trek: The Next Generation.

‘Richard Hugh Lynch was born on February 12, 1940 (sometimes incorrectly cited as 1936) in Brooklyn, New York City to Roman Catholic parents of Irish descent. His younger brother is actor Barry Lynch. Lynch served in the United States Marine Corps for four years. [Pauline: suiting him well to play Joey in S vs. H.)

‘Lynch's distinct scarred appearance made him a popular nemesis, and he can be seen in more than 100 film and television performances. The scars came from a 1967 incident in New York's Central Park in which, under the influence of drugs, he set himself on fire, burning more than 70% of his body. He spent a year in recovery, gave up drug use and ultimately began training at The Actors Studio and at the HB Studio. [Pauline: This trauma would have predisposed him well to not only play villains because of the physical scars, but deeply troubled, traumatised souls, because of the psychological scars.]

‘In 1970, he co-starred with Robert De Niro, Sally Kirkland and Diane Ladd in the short-lived off-Broadway play One Night Stands of a Noisy Passenger, written by Shelley Winters. [Pauline: He kept fine acting company!] He often played a villain in features, including Scarecrow, which marked his film debut, The Seven-Ups, Bad Dreams, The Sword and the Sorcerer, and Little Nikita.‘In addition to acting, Lynch was a musician, and he played the saxophone, guitar, piano, and flute. [Pauline: very accomplished] He held Irish citizenship through his Irish-born parents and was a frequent visitor to Ireland.

‘In 1977, Richard Lynch shared the stage with actor Al Pacino, a close friend, in the Broadway play The Basic Training of Pavlo Hummel. Lynch played a Vietnam veteran who used a wheelchair, and was nominated for a Tony in 1977. Through the years, Lynch worked with friend and colleague Don Calfa in the films Necronomicon (1993), Toughguy (1995), Corpses Are Forever (2003), and Lewisburg (2009).

‘Lynch married twice — once to Béatrix Lynch (their son Christopher died in 2005 from pneumonia), and later to Lily Lynch. [Very sad.]

‘Lynch's body was found in his home in Yucca Valley, California on June 19, 2012. It is not known if Lynch died on June 18 or June 19. After not having heard from Lynch for several days, friend and actress Carol Vogel went to his home to find the door open and his body in his kitchen. He was survived by his brother Barry and two sisters, Carole Taylor and Cathy Jones. News reports following his death incorrectly identified his birth year as 1936, but the obituary in the Los Angeles Times published by his family correctly listed the year as 1940.’ [Sad death to die alone.]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lynch 27th February 2020.

Quotes from Richard Lynch at https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070735/characters/nm0001727 (27th February 2020):

‘I've always felt like a thoroughbred without the proper track to run on.’

[on playing villains] ‘You always got to find the humanity in the character, no matter how bad he is. If you play him on the money, you're in trouble.’ Pauline: Yes, that. See his Joey in ‘Starsky vs. Hutch’ and his Lionel Fitzgerald in ‘Quadromania’.

He had quite an international profile – consider this for a Me ‘n’ Thee Global feature  See IMDB Bio for details: ‘His work in a variety of independent films has won him a high profile internationally. He has also worked in China, where he played in the first joint production between the Screen Actors' Guild and the People's Republic of China, The Korean Project. In his spare time, Richard enjoys fishing, the arts, architecture, music and poetry. He is also fluent in several languages including German and Italian.’ (https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0070735/characters/nm0001727 (27th February 2020)

• Michael Lerner
• Richard Ward

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ON LOCATION   ICON

• See our 2019 LA downtown tour J
• The alley where S&H encounter Lijah.
• Prince Edward Hotel, outside of which S&H’s encounter with Coley occurs
• Street where S&H come upon Fat Rolly at night?
• Barclay Hotel where the final climactic scene occurs

SCOPE FOR OUR PICTURES HERE ~jd

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SPOTLIGHT ON   ICON

• Max Franklin

Max Franklin (pseudonym used by Richard Deming) wrote Starsky and Hutch paperback books, each directly based on an episode, including this episode.

‘Richard Deming wrote pulp stories featuring his first series character, Manville “Manny” Moon. In the Hammett and Chandler tradition … and Matt Rudd, a vice cop in the fictional Southern California city of St. Cecilia. The Rudd novels are police procedurals; St. Cecilia is a city steeped-in-sin and filled with numerous organized crime rackets. The Rudd novels are Vice Cop (1961), Anything But Saintly (1963), and Death of a Pusher (1964). Deming, using both his own name and the pseudonym Max Franklin, wrote more than 20 novelizations for TV shows such as Dragnet, The Mod Squad, Starsky and Hutch, Charlie’s Angels, and Vega$. Under the Ellery Queen name, Deming ghost-wrote novels featuring Manhattan police captain Tim Corrigan.’

From http://www.prologuebooks.com/books/richard-deming/richard-deming (16th June 2016):

INTERTEXTUALITY   ICON

John Wayne film, ‘Red River’, quoted in the episode

Pat O’Brien kind of cop

‘You follow?’ See Doyle Lonnegan in ‘The Sting’

Starsky [in bar room with Hutch]: It's time we set up some new lines of communication here. Now, you all know me and Hutch. That's Hutch over there with Fat Rolly. And you all know we're cops. And we know you know. And we know that you don't like us, but, gang, that's the way it is.

Come here, green eyes.

So all day long, everybody's been looking at us like we were Lazarus the day after and it's starting to get to us. You follow? So that's the question. What's so special about two cops patrolling the same district they've been patrolling for the past three years? Now, somebody in here has got the answer.

‘You follow’ is a repeated line spoken by Doyle Lonnegan in ‘The Sting’, usually in an intimidatory way. And let’s be clear, Starsky might be showing a playful side, but it is one that is distinctly intimidatory – as is confirmed moments later in the bar room when Starsky and Hutch bail up Fat Rolly and Hutch tells him, ‘We don’t like it when we don’t get what we want.’

[Doyle Lonnegan in ‘The Sting’: [losing his temper with Henry Gondorff] The name's Lonnegan! Doyle Lonnegan! You're gonna remember that name or you're gonna get yourself a new game! You follow?]

Starsky and Hutch’s ‘S’all right? S’all right’ routine when doing their inventory evokes a popular routine by Spanish ventriloquist Señor Wences (1896-1999), who frequently appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show. One of his characters was ‘the gruff-voiced Pedro [Pauline: any association with San Pedro is purely co-incidental], a disembodied head in a box. Wences was forced to suddenly invent the character when his regular, full-sized dummy was destroyed during a 1936 train accident en route to Chicago. Pedro would either ‘speak’ from within the closed box, or speak with moving lips – simply growling, ‘s'all right’– when the performer opened the box's front panel with his free hand.’

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Se%C3%B1or_Wences 18 June 2016.

See video clip of this act at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AJiYZ6QIAtY 18 June 2016. -

I CAN EMBED THIS HERE ~jd

‘That’s a fine idea, Ollie’, Starsky tells Hutch after Hutch suggests Starsky turn into an alley as they are being tailed. This is the first ‘Laurel and Hardy’ reference that the S&H show makes, but not the last. (See a separate note for more details and analysis.)

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Where are we with their partnership?

Their contrasting personalities

Hutch is a health freak, working out at the gym, while Starsky loves his junk food and chilli. ‘Wanna share?’ Starsky offers hopefully as he offers his junk food to Hutch in the gym. ‘Have I ever?’ replies Hutch. ‘No, but I keep hopin’, closes Starsky.

Starsky loves his car and is ashamed to ride around in Hutch’s beat up car, while Hutch complains the Torino’s suspension is killing his back.

They dress and talk differently from each other, too – the Pilot’s script has them “look like an oddly matched set of bookends.” (From the Pilot Script, 1/2/75, p.7)

Hutch’s idealism - giving ‘Lijah a dollar; his sensitivity to death and killing (both unscripted details) (from Korossy) Pauline => relevant to H’s jadedness in S4.

Starsky mentions a kid he played football with in high school, Blinn’s inside joke about the origin of Starsky’s name. (Korossy)

Despite their contrasting looks and personalities, they get mixed up by the suits (I’m Hutch, he’s Starsky’) and uniform (‘No, no, I’m Starsky, he’s Hutch!’) – setting the pattern in all its variations for the rest of the show.

The trust that binds them as one – the trust scene in the laundromat

‘Who are we supposed to report this to? I mean, who in the hell are we supposed to trust?’ Starsky asks Hutch anxiously. ‘The same people we always trust,’ Hutch replies with quiet confidence as he looks steadfastly at his partner. ‘Us.’

Their shared hard-nosed approach to their work

‘Hutch and me are willing to risk getting burned out on the street, but it would hurt like hell if we lost sittin’ on our tails,’ Starsky explains to the suits in Dobey’s office.

‘Even dyin’s a livin’,’ Starsky tells Tallman in the steam room as Hutch and he leave, rejecting Tallman’s offer of staying with them to remain safe from whoever seems to be trying to kill them.

Hutch explains to Fat Roley – ‘There's something you oughta know about Starsky and me. We're not like most partners. Y'know, usually there's the one guy who's kinda folksy. Kind that wants the best for everybody. The Pat O'Brien kind of guy. And then there's the other guy, the rough 'em up, hardnosed kind of guy. Well, that doesn't work for Starsky and me. See, we're both hardnosed, Roley. And we don't like it when people don't give us everything we want.’

Their witty repartee

Their dialogue during their rainy night stakeout poolside. E.g., ‘I’m starting to shrink,’ complains Hutch as Starsky chortles. A Great Dane dog walked by its owner is stopped to relieve itself by a bush where Hutch is hiding. ‘Aren’t you glad she didn’t buy a pony,’ laughs Starsky.

Their ‘whats-her-name’ routine - ‘Are you still seein’ whats-her-name?’ inquires Starsky as they drive in Hutch’s car. ‘Sure. Still seeing whats-her-name. Took her to the whatcha-ma-callit. Gave her my thinga-majig.’ Starsky laughs and rejoins , ‘I didn't know it was that serious.’ Hutch smiles then says, ‘It’s not.’

Interacting with ‘their public’

Starsky: (bangs bar top with a platter) All right, folks, all right! Time we set up some new lines of communication here. Now, you all know me an' Hutch. That's Hutch over there. And you all know we're cops. And we know you know. And we know that you don't like us. But, gang, that's the way it is. So, all day long, everybody's been lookin' at us, like we were Lazurus. The day after. And it's starting to get to us. You follow? So, that's the question...what's so special about two cops patroling the same district they've been patrolling for the past three years? Now, somebody in here's got the answer. And that's what we wanna find out. You see, if each one of you would be so good as to write down what you think might be the answer--no names are necessary, 25 words or less will do, neatness and originality will be taken into consideration.
Bar floozy : What's for first prize?
Starsky: A 100,000 units of penicillin, sweetheart. Share it with your friends.

How long they’ve been together

Starsky’s spiel to folks in the bar (see above quote) reveals that Hutch and he have been ‘patrolling the same district for the past three years.’ (that is, since 1972, given the Pilot’s date is 1975). This shows they’ve been partners for at least that long; and given that in Pariah, we learn their first assignment out of uniform was two years previous in 1973, this must mean they patrolled this beat in uniform before becoming plain clothes detectives. (Unless the three years includes them patrolling the district separately.)

 They like to date girls and ask each other about their dates.

‘How was your date with Cindy last night?’ Hutch inquires. ‘Acceptable,’ replies Starsky, ‘Acceptable.’

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Huggy’s Rap Sheet ICON

Enter Huggy, as he slips through the curtains into the darkened cinema showing an X-rated film.

He swaggers to a seat in front of where the Boys are sitting.

‘What It is,’ he says to them, ‘What’s happening?’

As Starsky and Hutch lays bare their inquiry, Huggy demurs, ‘I don’t like to talk to cops about cops.’

But the Boys prevail. ‘Huggy they tried to kill us’, Starsky says. ‘Us. They tried to put holes in our bodies where our bodies were not intended to have holes. So you'll talk to us now?’

Huggy complies, seeing the seriousness of the Boys’ situation and showing us, the viewers, that he cares about these two detectives. Why he cares is not yet clear.

Huggy tells the Boys, ‘Dobey's a pretty good cop, but he likes the ponies too much but he ain't on the take.’