Rewatch: Tenspeed and Brown Shoe

Tenspeed and Brown Shoe is a 1980 detective series that is simply a joy to watch. Perhaps best know these days for starring Saturn Award-winner Jeff Goldblum in his first lead TV role, the series also stars Tony Award-winner Ben Vereen in his first lead TV role.

The series followers Vereen’s E.L. “Tenspeed” Turner and Goldblum’s Lionel “Brown Shoe” Whitney as they start a detective agency in Los Angeles. Turner is an ex-con, working off his parole as a detective. Whitney is an ex-accountant, enamored by detective novels. The two are a perfect fit for each other. Whitney often takes the most dangerous cases, seeking to claim the glamour of his fictional detective hero, and Turner constantly comes to his rescue with his far more experienced people skills. In a sense, Turner is the brains of the team while Whitney is the heart. Without Whitney, Turner would be happy to chase down missing pets and run background checks, never doing anything as daring as saving lives. And, without Turner, Whitney would probably be dead by now, walking into a gun fight or saying the wrong thing to the wrong person. The two quickly build up a solid detective agency and become the best of friends.

Besides the characters being clearly written to go well with each other, the actors have great chemistry too, and it’s very clear that they were having the time of their lives (so far, of course). Vereen really gets to flex his acting chops by playing a ton of fake identities to get everyone out of tough situations, and Goldblum is really just himself. It’s hard to describe, but he’s unmistakably Jeff Goldblum, and he clearly loves it.

The series only ran for one season, it just couldn’t hold up against the amount of already established similar shows at the time, but it truly is a fun show to watch, and it doesn’t end on a cliffhanger.

You can stream Tenspeed and Brown Shoe for free on Shout! Factory TV. If you only want to try one episode, check out This One’s Gonna Kill Ya (there isn’t any overarching story to this show, so it’s ok to watch out of order), and if you need just tiniest of samples, I’ve posted a few GIFs. I hope you enjoy Tenspeed and Brown Shoe as much as I do!