Richard Levinson(1934-1987)

His lifelong collaboration with William Link began with their writing sketches together at summer camp, then at the Univ. of Pennsylvania in their native Philadelphia.

[on casting Peter Falk in Columbo (1971)] We had a list of possible actors and Peter wasn't in the top five. We wanted Bing Crosby, Ernest Borgnine Lee J. Cobb--who later played the same role in El exorcista (1973)--until Peter got held of the script and said, "I must play this part!" And, luckily for us, he did.