Columbo is no more

Peter Falk, the American actor most famous for his role as TV's scruffy detective, Columbo, has died at the age of 83.

The actor died peacefully at home in Beverly Hills on Thursday night, his family said in a statement.

He had been suffering from dementia for a number of years.

Peter Falk won four Emmys for his cigar-chomping role in Columbo, which ended in 1977, and was nominated for Oscars in 1960 and 1961.

But for most fans, his best-supporting actor nominations in Murder Inc and Pocketful of Miracles were eclipsed by his six years playing a deceptively bumbling sleuth with a shabby mac and the killer catch-phrase: "One more thing..."
'Like a flood victim'

Columbo was first aired by NBC in 1971, appearing every third week until it was cancelled in 1977.

Falk reportedly turned down an offer to convert it into a weekly series, citing the heavy workload.

The actor reportedly bought Columbo's trademark raincoat himself, only for it to be replaced after it became too tattered through its near constant use in the series.

He told one interviewer his shabby detective looked "like a flood victim".

"You feel sorry for him. He appears to be seeing nothing, but he's seeing everything. Underneath his dishevellment, a good mind is at work."

Peter Michael Falk was born in 1927 in New York City, where his parents ran a clothes shop.

He had an eye removed at the age of three due to cancer. He said he learned to live with the ailment after it became "the joke of the neighbourhood".

"If the umpire ruled me out on a bad call, I'd take the fake eye out and hand it to him," Falk told the Associated Press in a 1963 interview.

As an aspiring actor, he was reportedly warned by one agent the false eye would preclude him from working in television. In fact, it became another endearing trait of his most famous character.

Peter Falk had been under 24-hour care for several years.

The actor is survived by his wife of three decades, Shera, and daughters from a previous marriage Catherine and Jackie.

And why is this relevant:

He turned up to the Academy Awards the first time in a battered old Volkswagen and a rented tuxedo. His dishevelled appearance would later serve him well.