I’ve had a hard time telling if this Robert Blake murder mystery is a real story or just a treatment for the next Elmore Leonard novel. I mean, doesn’t it read that way? Barely reformed grifter marries has-been actor. Weird, twisted relationship. She ends up dead. And so on.
Of course, I’d figure we’d have Mickey Rourke as the border-line psycho, sometimes hit-man who Blake hired to do the hit. And I’d cast Steve Buscemi as the night watchman who was behind the restaurant and saw the whole thing go down and is now trying to shake down Blake for the big money. And maybe Blake had just landed a big comeback role, and some big money too, and he figured he couldn’t bring her along on his ride back to the top. And that’s how the whole caper got started.
Anyway, that’s how I’d flesh out the story. But enough flights of fancy. Let’s get down to some real news. This story at ABCNews.com leads with a friend of Blake’s who says the actor “could not have done it because Blake once turned down a previous offer to have his wife killed.”
Yikes!
Not exactly the most convincing defense, is it?
