1926—2012 · twelve parts over thirty-one years

John Finnegan

More Columbo parts than any other guest actor. John Finnegan first turned up in 1972 and was still there in the very last film, in 2003. A cop, a workman, a guard, an assistant director, a police chief — rarely a big part, but a face the audience knows at once.

Parts in Columbo

Episode	Season	Year	Character	Rating
Blueprint for Murder1×07	1	1972	Carl	7.5
The Most Dangerous Match2×07	2	1973	Workman #1	8
Lovely But Lethal3×01	3	1973	Sergeant	6.5
A Friend in Deed3×08	3	1974	Lieutenant Dreyer	9.5
Last Salute to the Commodore5×06	5	1976	Guard	6
Fade in to Murder6×01	6	1976	Assistant Director	8.5
Columbo Cries Wolf9×02	9	1990	Police Chief	8.5
Columbo and the Murder of a Rock Star10×03	10	1991	Quentin Corbett	7.5
It's All in the Game10×07	10	1993	Barney	8.5
Strange Bedfellows10×10	10	1995	Barney	7
A Trace of Murder10×11	10	1997	Barney	7
Columbo Likes the Nightlife10×14	10	2003	Sean Jarvis	6.5

One of the family

Finnegan came from the same circle as Falk: they met at the Actors Studio in New York, where they also became friends with John Cassavetes. When Finnegan moved to Los Angeles in the early fifties, his friends helped him get started. He went on to appear in five Cassavetes films, including A Woman Under the Influence and Gloria.

That explains his place in the series: not a star brought in to play the killer, but someone everyone was glad to see on set. Late in the run he plays the same character three times — Barney — in It’s All in the Game, Strange Bedfellows and A Trace of Murder.

Beyond Columbo

One of eleven children of Irish immigrants, he served in the Navy in the Second World War. On film: The Natural, Oliver Stone’s JFK, where he played a judge, and Big Trouble — again with Falk. He voiced the villain Warren T. Rat in the animated An American Tail (1986).

Facts

Twelve Columbo parts — from Blueprint for Murder (1972) to Columbo Likes the Nightlife (2003), the last film of the series.
In A Friend in Deed he plays a police lieutenant — in an episode directed by Ben Gazzara, also from the Cassavetes circle.
Played a character called Barney three times in the late films.
Appeared in five John Cassavetes films.

Questions

How many times was John Finnegan in Columbo?

Twelve times — more than any other guest actor, between 1972 and 2003.

How was he connected to Peter Falk?

They were friends from the Actors Studio in New York, and both were close to John Cassavetes.

More familiar faces

1925—2021