Samuel Beckett Stars in 1970s Cop Show

Columbo. Kojak. Baretta. And now … Beckett. No, not the one from Castle. Samuel Beckett. The Nobel Prize-winning avante-garde playwright (and friend to kittens) is the star of a 1970s cop show, at least according to Theater Oobleck‘s Danny Thompson. Thompson has taken some grainy footage of Beckett walking around Berlin and – using the theme music from The Streets of San Francisco – has turned it into the opening credits of a fictional 1970s TV detective show, a Quinn Martin  production, no less.

Beckett co-stars Jean-Paul Sartre, Jean Cocteau, and the playwright’s car-pool companion, Andre the Giant. The tone and feel of the credits is pitch-perfect (but I do wish Thompson had used color footage). All that’s missing is a Kojak-style catchphrase for this tough cop to say each week as he cuffs the bad guys. How about “Fail better, baby”?