Watch The Cheap Detective

The Cheap Detective, an American comic satire, was directed by Robert Moore and written by Neil Simon. This film was designed to be a sequel to their previous and acclaimed, Murder by Death, produced by Columbia in 1976. Peter Falk, protagonist, is Lou Peckinpaugh, supposedly another Humphrey Bogart type. The movie kindly parodies Bogart's The Maltese Falcon and Casablanca. Also satirized here is A Streetcar Named Desire, Chinatown, and To Have and Have Not.

Falk's character is a clumsy and confused-acting PI, a private detective in the city of San Francisco. He is intent on proving his own innocence in his partner's mysterious demise, as he assists a circus-like crowd of characters, in locating lost treasure, a black bird. So, Lou is continuously sleuthing, while trying to stay a step ahead of law enforcement.

Cast characters include the following: Ann-Margret, Stockard Channing, Madeline Kahn, Eileen Brennan, Louise Fletcher, Marsha Mason, and Nicol Williamson. The males are comprised of the following actors: Dom DeLuise, Phil Silvers, Scatman Crothers, Sid Caesar, Paul Williams, John Houseman, Abe Vigoda, Paul Williams, Fernando Lamas, and James Coco.