User Reviews

VEGA$ is remembered today as Robert Urich's breakout series, lasting three seasons and 69 episodes. Many more would follow of course, but in some ways he remained comfortably typecast as private investigators like Dan Tanna. "The Games Girls Play," scripted by STAR TREK producer Fred Freiberger, begins as a prominent senator (Don Porter) is photographed in a compromising position with two lovely ladies, just as he's about to promote a bill condemning pornography. Dan Tanna is quickly on the trail of the three women involved, who are also being stalked by a stranger (Skip Homeier) who tries to strangle Linda Stockwood (Shelley Fabares), before running down instead Helen Martin (Linda Thompson). Linda and Doris (Tiffany Bolling) come clean with Dan, confessing that they were just 'playing games' (bored by the lack of attention from their wealthy husbands, played by Ed Nelson, Troy Donahue, and Alex Trebek), with no intention of using the photos for potential blackmail, only now someone has decided not to play by the rules. A totally gratuitous funeral sequence gives us a final glimpse of America's 'Toastmaster General' himself, George Jessel ("he had twelve children who would have been here today if they knew that Shorty was their father"), just three years before his death at age 83, while venerable scene stealer John Carradine cameos as impatient funeral director Mr. Goody ("the organist is running out of hymns!"). Both Carradine and Jessel were among the huge veteran cast of the 1975 satire "Won Ton Ton, the Dog Who Saved Hollywood."