Magnum Mania!

Legacy From a Friend

Episode Number: 59
Season Number: 3.19
Air Date: 3/10/1983
Writer: Robert Hamilton
Director: Stuart Margolin
Producer: Chas. Floyd Johnson
Exec Producer: Donald P. Bellisario

Recurring Characters

Frank Atienza (Officer Puna)

Guest Stars

Annie Potts (Tracy Spencer), Rosemary Forsyth (Margaret Chase), Sinjin Smith (Marcus Phillips), Bob Minor (Rose), Annette McCarthy (Nancy Phillips), Julia Nickson (Carla), Susan Mechsner (Crystal), Ardi Maioho (Sylvia)

Episode Brief

A lifeguard is found dead soon after he's seen in an expensive new car that he clearly couldn't afford. Magnum partners with a young ambitious woman to crack the case in this story of blackmail and adultery.

Rating

8.0

(23 votes)

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Notes

¹ The original script for this episode was entitled "A Darker Side of Paradise".

² Beach volleyball legend Sinjin Smith has a minor guest starring role (credited as St. John Smith) as Marcus Phillips, Magnum's beach volleyball partner who is killed early in the episode. Joining Sinjin on the court is his younger brother Andrew Smith and Hawaii-based player Jon Anderson (both are uncredited). The beach volleyball scenes were filmed at the famous Outrigger Canoe Club (2909 Kalakaua Avenue). The OCC court was also used for the beach volleyball scenes in Season One's "Adelaide" (1.14). (Additional volleyball players ID'd by Henry Lewis)

³ Episode director Stuart Margolin (Angel Martin in The Rockford Files) will later guest star in "...By Its Cover" (3.21).

⁴ Annie Potts' character (Tracy Spencer) shows up again in "A.A.P.I." (7.5).

⁵ Magnum comments near the beginning of the episode that he "woke up one day and realized that he was 32 and had never had a chance to be 22". In the Pilot Movie ("Don't Eat the Snow in Hawaii"), he says that he woke up one day and realized he was 33 and had never been 23. (Noted by Jay-Firestorm)

⁶ Bob Minor (Rose) is the lead stunt coordinator for Magnum P.I., and is Roger E. Mosley's stunt double.

⁷ The beach scene where Marcus' body was found was fimed at Makap'u Beach, not Sandy Beach (where he was said to have drowned in the episode).

⁸ The scene with Magnum and Carla (the street merchant) was filmed at the Chinatown Cultural Plaza Center in downtown Honolulu. Sylvia's booth is on the Moongate Stage. (ID'd by Sam)

⁹ Julia Nickson (Carla, the street merchant) played one of the models in Season Two's "Three Minus Two" (2.22).

¹⁰ Magnum gets beat up by two female enforcers with tight pants and long fingernails!

¹¹ T.C. wears a Penn State baseball cap for the first and only time.

¹² Magnum is seen driving the Ferrari with the top on, a rare sight!

¹³ During Higgins' first tour of India (date unknown, but probably 1948) "one of the lads ran afoul of a minor Rajah".

Quotes

¹
Magnum: Higgins, there is nothing, absolutely nothing, that you can tell Robin that he doesn't already know - that we havn't laughed about together.
Higgins: The potato chip heiress from Buffalo who filled the tidal pool with...
Magnum: A little misunderstanding, Higgins. After it was drained...
Higgins: And then there is the Romanian mime troop who...
Magnum: You...You're not going to bring that up. I mean, you were there when the paramedics arrived! You know!
Higgins: I will take note of the panic in your voice and those guilt-crazed eyes as a scent to my favor, albeit with the slightest reluctance.
Magnum: Wait a minute! This isn't a favor, this is extortion and blackmail!

²
Tracy Spencer: Well look, when you're stalking big game, you've got to go into the jungle.

Flubs

¹ After Marcus has left the club in his new car, when Magnum drives off in the Ferrari, you can see the reflection of a bank of lights used to light the scene in the passenger door. (Noted by Jay-Firestorm)

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