Le Coup du Parapluie. Macbeth et Columbo à Scotland Yard

Abstract

This article proposes a study of an episode of the series Columbo entitled “Dagger of the Mind” (1972), which centers on Shakespeare’s Macbeth. We will examine the tension that this episode puts into place between an American series from the 20th century, Columbo, on one hand, and Shakespeare’s play, Macbeth, on the other. The mirroring of the two works suggested from the first images, and taken up again throughout the investigation, allows for an exploration of how Columbo and Macbeth articulate together, what Macbeth does to Columbo and what Columbo does to Macbeth, notably in the British context that characterizes the episode and breaks with the ordinarily American setting of the show. After having examined several modes of interpenetration and articulation between the two worlds, we will analyze the process of demythologization and of petrification that seems to be at work in this episode, where the knife appears to find its grotesque substitute in an essentially English accessory: the umbrella. The revival that is at the heart of this episode will thus be analyzed in terms of overlapping on one hand, and differences on the other. To be and not to be all at the same time: in this tension resides the complexity of the reprise and the echo as they appear in this episode.

Keywords

• Columbo
• Macbeth
• cop show
• theatre
• Great Britain
• United States (the)