Nice to go back and watch the first episode of the mystery series which partnered Allan Davies and Caroline Quentin as the crime-busting duo with an interest in stage magic. I only ever watched the odd episode of the succeeding series but may make a bigger effort to now watch them sequentially.
For this opener, writer David Renwick gives another variation to the old "locked-room" whodunit going back, if I remember rightly to Edgar Allen Poe and Arthur Conan Doyle. A famous artist is found shot in his own home with a gorgeous young blonde model tied-up in the same room. His disenchanted wife, who is both aware and tired of his numerous affairs with his various life models, is the prime suspect but she was very publicly working in her 13th floor office which she apparently never left.
Davies' Jonathan we first meet creating magic tricks for his top magician boss, who also has an eye for young dolly birds. Creek is drop-dead boring, a geek who lives alone and dresses like his dad. Quentin is the go-ahead writer, specialising in true crime, in a failing relationship with a boyfriend she'll soon ditch. They meet over this particular murder and form an unlikely partnership to solve the crime. There's a nice David and Maddy "Moonlighting"-type will-they-won't-they frisson to their relationship in this episode which I can't remember ever leading to anything, but the real pleasure is in Renwick's clever script which subtly drops clues and red-herrings in no particular order and invites the viewer to crack the case, no matter how unlikely the denouement, as with this particular episode.
I know it's over 20 years old and I might wish the show episodes were a half-hour less than their 90 minute running time, but nevertheless I'm pretty sure I'll be paddling my way back to this particular creek again in the future.