The episode I remember best is the one where Rossi helps a grieving mother track down the hit-and-run driver who killed her son as he was leaving a convenience store with “a six-pack of root beer and some cartons of yogurt.” She and Rossi doggedly go through the whole rigamarole of identifying the vehicle and its driver and finally nail the perp, who turns out to be … SURPRISE, SURPRISE … a hard-nosed judge in Traffic Court famous for handing down harsh sentences to violators!
The scene where they confront the guilty party in his office was one of the best I’ve ever seen.
I have never felt older than I did yesterday, when a young person of my acquaintance said, “Did you hear the guy who played Carl in Up died?” She was completely unfamiliar with Asner’s long body of work before that. The words “Mr. Grant” got nothing but a blank look.
I don’t want this to be a “kids today” post, and ultimately it speaks well of Asner’s talents that he continued to give performances that appealed to newer audiences right up until the end of his life. But it really made me feel my age.