Champagne for One
Encyclopedia
Champagne for One is a Nero Wolfe
Nero Wolfe
Nero Wolfe is a fictional detective, created in 1934 by the American mystery writer Rex Stout. Wolfe's confidential assistant Archie Goodwin narrates the cases of the detective genius. Stout wrote 33 novels and 39 short stories from 1934 to 1974, with most of them set in New York City. Wolfe's...

 detective novel by Rex Stout
Rex Stout
Rex Todhunter Stout was an American writer noted for his detective fiction. Stout is best known as the creator of the larger-than-life fictional detective Nero Wolfe, described by reviewer Will Cuppy as "that Falstaff of detectives." Wolfe's assistant Archie Goodwin recorded the cases of the...

, first published by the Viking Press
Viking Press
Viking Press is an American publishing company owned by the Penguin Group, which has owned the company since 1975. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim...

 in 1958.
The back matter of the 1995 Bantam edition of this book includes an exchange of correspondence between Stout and his editor at Viking Press, Marshall Best. A letter from Stout to Best, dated July 1958, shows that Stout suggested as a title both "Champagne for One" and also "Champagne for Faith Usher." Best's reply states that Viking was quite satisfied with "Champagne for One."

Plot introduction

Archie Goodwin sits in for a friend at a charity dinner dance for unwed mothers, and one of the guests drops dead on the dance floor.

Plot summary

Archie gets a phone call from Dinky Byne, who is expected at a dinner party that night, given by his aunt in honor of four young, unwed mothers. These women have recently left Grantham House, a home where expectant mothers receive support, room and board in the months prior to giving birth.

Dinky wants to beg off the dinner, saying he has a bad cold, and asks Archie to fill in for him. Archie agrees and, chatting with Rose Tuttle after dinner, learns that Faith Usher carries around a vial of cyanide. Apparently Faith wants to have it handy should she ever decide to commit suicide. Rose is worried, and Archie reassures her by promising that he'll see to it that nothing bad happens.

But something bad happens a few minutes later, when Faith suddenly dies, poisoned by cyanide later shown to have been in her champagne. Those present hope that Faith suicided, largely because they hope to avoid notoriety. But Archie had been keeping his eye on Faith and is certain that she put nothing in her glass – therefore, it must have been murder.

Archie comes under pressure from the guests, the police and the Police Commissioner himself to back off his position regarding Faith's death. Meanwhile, Edwin Laidlaw hires Wolfe to see to it that the investigation does not result in the discovery that he is the father of Faith's child. Wolfe agrees to identify and expose the murderer – if there is one – before the police learn of Laidlaw's role in Faith's life.

Sexual mores

The book reflects the transitional situation of American sexual mores at the time of writing, on the verge of the sexual revolution
Sexual revolution
The sexual revolution was a social movement that challenged traditional codes of behavior related to sexuality and interpersonal relationships throughout the Western world from the 1960s into the 1980s...

 of the 1960s. Unwed mothers are a major issue in the book, and comprise a large part of its cast of characters. They are presented sympathetically, but still unwed motherhood is presented as "a problem" for which they need to be helped. The preferred solution is to provide a friendly and supportive environment during pregnancy and to have the baby given over to adoption immediately upon birth. The option of the unwed mother keeping and raising her child is presented as a far more problematic idea. Indeed — as it ultimately turns out — it has much to do with the circumstances that led to the murder being investigated.

In chapter 2 Archie Goodwin is rather shocked to discover that one of the young women, Rose Tuttle, had given birth outside marriage not once but twice. He recounts at length his moral dilemma at hearing this: "I had on my shoulders the responsibility for the moral and social position of the community, at least in part (...). To list my objections would have been fine if I had been ordained, but I hadn't, and anyway she had certainly heard these objections before and hadn't been impressed. (...) While it was none of my business if she kept on having babies, I absolutely wasn't going to encourage her."

On the other hand, in chapter 6 Archie is surprised to learn that Edwin Laidlaw seriously expects his bride-to-be to remain a virgin until their wedding night. His reaction to this is scathing: "Laidlaw turned out to have an old-fashioned streak (...) an old fogey at thirty-one."

The unfamiliar word

In most Nero Wolfe novels and novellas, there is at least one unfamiliar word, usually spoken by Wolfe. Champagne for One contains but one example, apart from the legalese respondeat superior found in Chapter 9. (In Chapter 2 the reader is also treated to a discussion of the derivation of protocol from the Greek proto, "first," and kollon, "glue".)

On page 202 of the 1996 Bantam edition, in Chapter 16, Wolfe says, "You have trimmed long enough." The word "trimmed" is not itself unfamiliar, but the usage may be.

Cast of characters

  • Nero Wolfe — The private investigator.
  • Archie Goodwin — Wolfe's assistant (and the narrator of all Wolfe stories).
  • Mr. and Mrs. Robert Robilotti — Mrs. Louise Grantham Robilotti is a wealthy heiress, who inherited the fortune of her first husband, Mr. Grantham, and later married Mr. Robilotti.
  • Faith Usher, Helen Yarmis, Rose Tuttle and Ethel Varr — Four honored guests at a dinner party given by Mrs. Robilotti.
  • Elaine Usher — Faith's estranged mother.
  • Austin "Dinky" Byne — Mrs. Robilotti's nephew.
  • Edwin Laidlaw — A publisher who is terrified that his prior relationship with Miss Usher will be exposed by the investigation into her death.
  • Cecil and Celia Grantham — Mrs. Robilotti's son and daughter from her first marriage.
  • Paul Schuster and Beverly Kent — Along with Edwin Laidlaw and Archie Goodwin, dinner partners for the young women at the party.

Reviews and commentary

  • Jacques Barzun
    Jacques Barzun
    Jacques Martin Barzun is a French-born American historian of ideas and culture. He has written on a wide range of topics, but is perhaps best known as a philosopher of education, his Teacher in America being a strong influence on post-WWII training of schoolteachers in the United...

     and Wendell Hertig Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime
    A Catalogue of Crime
    A Catalogue of Crime, by Jacques Barzun and Wendell Hertig Taylor, is a critique of crime fiction first published in 1971. A revised edition was published in 1989 by Barzun after the death of Taylor in 1985. The book was awarded a Special Edgar Award from the Mystery Writers of America in...

    — Archie and Nero shine, once again, on the question: Who slipped the cyanide into the glass of the girl attending the unwed mothers' annual party at the house of their benefactress? Two small queries: would the dead philanthropist write the odd letter of gift that provides no better control of large funds than someone's probity? And how was the poison actually administered? One can't buy ready-mixed KCN.

  • Nancy Pearl
    Nancy Pearl
    Nancy Pearl is an American librarian, best-selling author, literary critic and was, until August 2004, the Executive Director of the Washington Center for the Book at Seattle Public Library...

    , Book Lust — When Stout is on top of his game, which is most of the time, his diabolically clever plotting and his storytelling ability exceed that of any other mystery writer you can name, including Agatha Christie, who invented her own eccentric genius detective Hercule Poirot. Although in the years since Stout's death I find myself going back and rereading his entire oeuvre every year or two, I return with particular pleasure to these five novels: The Doorbell Rang
    The Doorbell Rang
    The Doorbell Rang is a Nero Wolfe detective novel by Rex Stout, first published by the Viking Press in 1965.-Plot introduction:Nero Wolfe is hired to force the FBI to stop wiretapping, tailing and otherwise harassing a woman who gave away 10,000 copies of a book that is critical of the Bureau and...

    ; Plot It Yourself
    Plot It Yourself
    Plot It Yourself is a Nero Wolfe detective novel by Rex Stout, published by the Viking Press in 1959, and also collected in the omnibus volume Kings Full of Aces .-Plot introduction:...

    ; Murder by the Book
    Murder by the Book
    Murder by the Book is a Nero Wolfe detective novel by Rex Stout published in 1951 by the Viking Press, and collected in the omnibus volume Royal Flush .-Plot summary:...

    ; Champagne for One; and Gambit
    Gambit (novel)
    Gambit is a Nero Wolfe detective novel by Rex Stout, first published by the Viking Press in 1962.-Plot introduction:A chess prodigy is poisoned during a club tournament, and the police arrest the member who served the victim hot chocolate...

    .

A Nero Wolfe Mystery (A&E Network)

Lee Goldberg
Lee Goldberg
Lee Goldberg is an American author, screenwriter and producer, known for his work on several different TV crime series, including Diagnosis: Murder, A Nero Wolfe Mystery, Hunter, Spenser: For Hire, Martial Law, She-Wolf of London, SeaQuest, 1-800-Missing, The Glades and Monk...

 and William Rabkin
William Rabkin
William Rabkin is an American television producer, television writer and author.He has written for a number of notable television series namely Spenser: For Hire, Murphy's Law, Hunter, Baywatch, Diagnosis Murder, A Nero Wolfe Mystery, Monk and many other series.Nearly all of his television work has...

 adapted Champagne for One for the second episode of the A&E TV series A Nero Wolfe Mystery
A Nero Wolfe Mystery
A Nero Wolfe Mystery is a television series adapted from Rex Stout's classic series of detective stories that aired for two seasons on the A&E Network. Set in New York City in the early 1950s, the stylized period drama stars Maury Chaykin as Nero Wolfe and Timothy Hutton as Archie Goodwin...

(2001–2002), a Jaffe/Braunstein Films coproduction with the A&E Network. The second of four Nero Wolfe episodes directed by executive producer and star Timothy Hutton, "Champagne for One" made its debut in two one-hour episodes airing April 29 and May 6, 2001, on A&E.

Timothy Hutton
Timothy Hutton
Timothy Tarquin Hutton is an American actor. He is the youngest actor to win the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, which he won at the age of 20 for his performance as Conrad Jarrett in Ordinary People . He currently stars as Nathan "Nate" Ford on the TNT series Leverage.-Early life:Timothy...

 is Archie Goodwin; Maury Chaykin
Maury Chaykin
Maury Alan Chaykin was an American-born Canadian actor. Best known for his portrayal of detective Nero Wolfe, he was also known for his work as a character actor in many films and on television programs.-Personal life:...

 is Nero Wolfe. Other members of the cast (in credits order) are Bill Smitrovich
Bill Smitrovich
-Personal life:Bill Smitrovich was born in Bridgeport, Connecticut, the son of Anna and Stanley William Zmitrowicz, a tool and die maker. Bill is a graduate of the University of Bridgeport and holds an MFA from Smith College . He is married to Shaw Purnell from Pittsburgh, PA...

 (Inspector Cramer), Colin Fox
Colin Fox (actor)
Colin Fox is a Canadian actor. His acting credits include playing Jean Paul Desmond and Jacques Eloi Des Mondes in Strange Paradise , as well as voice work in various animated series, and in other roles in film, television and on the stage...

 (Fritz Brenner), James Tolkan
James Tolkan
James S. Tolkan is an American actor, often cast as a strict, overbearing, bald-headed authority figure.-Personal life:He was born in Calumet, Michigan, the son of Ralph M. Tolkan, a cattle dealer, and attended the University of Iowa, Coe College, the Actors Studio and Eastern Arizona College...

 (Mr. Hackett). Marian Seldes
Marian Seldes
Marian Hall Seldes is an American stage, film, radio, and television actress whose career has spanned six decades and who was elected to the American Theatre Hall of Fame.-Life and career:...

 (Mrs. Louise Grantham Robilotti), Kari Matchett
Kari Matchett
Kari Matchett is a Canadian television and film actress. She played Mariel Underlay in Invasion, Lisa Miller in 24, and Kate Filmore in the cult favorite science fiction movie Cube 2: Hypercube. She currently appears in the USA television series Covert Affairs.-Early years:Matchett was born in...

 (Celia Grantham), Conrad Dunn
Conrad Dunn
Conrad Dunn is an American actor. He began his screen career with the role of Francis "Psycho" Soyer in Stripes . Working for some ten years under the name George Jenesky, he achieved soap-opera stardom in Days of our Lives as Nick Corelli, a misogynistic pimp who evolved from bad guy to romantic...

 (Saul Panzer), Nicky Guadagni
Nicky Guadagni
Nicky Guadagni is a Canadian actress who has worked on stage, radio, film and television.-Career:Originally from Montreal, Nicky Guadagni majored in drama at Dawson College and went on to train at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London. Her first role after graduation was playing Miranda, with...

 (Elaine Usher), Kathryn Zenna (Helen Yarmis), Alex Poch-Goldin (Edwin Laidlaw), Robert Bockstael (Paul Schuster), R.D. Reid (Sergeant Purley Stebbins), Christine Brubaker
Christine Brubaker
Christine Brubaker is a Canadian actress. Well known for her work in the ensemble cast of the A&E TV original series, A Nero Wolfe Mystery , she is a member of the creative and performing arts faculty of Humber College in Toronto....

 (Rose Tuttle), Steve Cumyn (Cecil Grantham), Boyd Banks
Boyd Banks
Boyd Banks is a Canadian stand-up comedian known for doing edgy material, and actor.-Biography:Banks has appeared in such films as Bruiser , Wild Iris , Dawn of the Dead , Phil the Alien , Land of the Dead , Cinderella Man , Diary of The Dead and Pontypool...

 (Austin "Dinky" Byne), David Schurmann (Robert Robilotti), Michael Rhoades (Beverly Kent), Janine Theriault
Janine Theriault
Janine Theriault is a Canadian actress. She grew up in Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, where she lived until leaving to attend Walnut Hill School for the Performing Arts in Natick, Massachusetts...

 (Ethel Varr) and Patricia Zentilli
Patricia Zentilli
Patricia Zentilli is a versatile Canadian performer who has worked in film, television and theatre across Canada.Born in Kingston, Ontario but raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Patricia was bitten by the acting bug in Grade Six when she was cast as "Dorothy" in her school's production of The Wizard...

 (Faith Usher).

The episode's signature waltz is Jazz Suite No. 2 (Suite for Promenade Orchestra), VI — Waltz 2, by Dmitri Shostakovich
Dmitri Shostakovich
Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich was a Soviet Russian composer and one of the most celebrated composers of the 20th century....

, recorded by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra
The Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra is a symphony orchestra of the Netherlands, based at the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam. In 1988, Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands conferred the "Royal" title upon the orchestra...

 conducted by Riccardo Chailly
Riccardo Chailly
Riccardo Chailly, Cavaliere di Gran Croce OMRI is an Italian conductor. He started his career as an opera conductor and gradually extended his repertoire to encompass symphonic music.-Biography:...

. The soundtrack also includes music by Luigi Boccherini
Luigi Boccherini
Luigi Rodolfo Boccherini was an Italian classical era composer and cellist whose music retained a courtly and galante style while he matured somewhat apart from the major European musical centers. Boccherini is most widely known for one particular minuet from his String Quintet in E, Op. 11, No...

, Rick Krive and Antonio Vivaldi
Antonio Vivaldi
Antonio Lucio Vivaldi , nicknamed because of his red hair, was an Italian Baroque composer, priest, and virtuoso violinist, born in Venice. Vivaldi is recognized as one of the greatest Baroque composers, and his influence during his lifetime was widespread over Europe...

.

In North America, A Nero Wolfe Mystery is available on Region 1 DVD from A&E Home Video (ISBN 076708893X). "Champagne for One" is divided into two parts as originally broadcast on A&E.

"Champagne for One" is one of the Nero Wolfe episodes released on Region 4 DVD in Australia under license by FremantleMedia
FremantleMedia
FremantleMedia, Ltd. is the content and production division of Bertelsmann's RTL Group, Europe's second largest TV, radio, and production company...

 Enterprises. Nero Wolfe — Collection One (2008) presents "Champagne for One" as a 90-minute film with a single set of titles and credits. In 2009 the film was released on Region 2 DVD in the Netherlands, by Just Entertainment.

All three DVD releases present "Champagne for One" in 4:3 pan and scan
Pan and scan
Pan and scan is a method of adjusting widescreen film images so that they can be shown within the proportions of a standard definition 4:3 aspect ratio television screen, often cropping off the sides of the original widescreen image to focus on the composition's most important aspects...

 rather than its 16:9
16:9
16:9 is an aspect ratio with a width of 16 units and height of 9. Since 2009, it has become the most common aspect ratio for sold televisions and computer monitors and is also the international standard format of HDTV, Full HD, non-HD digital television and analog widescreen television ...

 aspect ratio for widescreen
Widescreen
Widescreen images are a variety of aspect ratios used in film, television and computer screens. In film, a widescreen film is any film image with a width-to-height aspect ratio greater than the standard 1.37:1 Academy aspect ratio provided by 35mm film....

 viewing.

Publication history

  • 1958, New York: The Viking Press
    Viking Press
    Viking Press is an American publishing company owned by the Penguin Group, which has owned the company since 1975. It was founded in New York City on March 1, 1925, by Harold K. Guinzburg and George S. Oppenheim...

    , November 24, 1958, hardcover
In his limited-edition pamphlet, Collecting Mystery Fiction #10, Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe Part II, Otto Penzler
Otto Penzler
Otto Penzler is an editor of mystery fiction in the United States, and proprietor of The Mysterious Bookshop in New York City, where he lives.-Biography:...

 describes the first edition
Edition (book)
The bibliographical definition of an edition includes all copies of a book printed “from substantially the same setting of type,” including all minor typographical variants.- First edition :...

 of Champagne for One: "Black cloth, front cover and spine printed with purple; rear cover blank. Issued in a mainly black dust wrapper."
In April 2006, Firsts: The Book Collector's Magazine estimated that the first edition of Champagne for One had a value of between $200 and $350. The estimate is for a copy in very good to fine condition in a like dustjacket.
  • 1958, London, Ontario: Macmillan
    Macmillan Publishers
    Macmillan Publishers Ltd, also known as The Macmillan Group, is a privately held international publishing company owned by Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than thirty others.-History:...

    , 1958
  • 1959, New York: Viking (Mystery Guild
    Book of the Month Club
    The Book of the Month Club is a United States mail-order book sales club that offers a new book each month to customers.The Book of the Month Club is part of a larger company that runs many book clubs in the United States and Canada. It was formerly the flagship club of Book-of-the-Month Club, Inc...

    ), January 1959, hardcover
The far less valuable Viking book club edition may be distinguished from the first edition in three ways:
  • The dust jacket has "Book Club Edition" printed on the inside front flap, and the price is absent (first editions may be price clipped if they were given as gifts).
  • Book club editions are sometimes thinner and always taller (usually a quarter of an inch) than first editions.
  • Book club editions are bound in cardboard, and first editions are bound in cloth (or have at least a cloth spine).
    • 1959, London: Collins Crime Club
      Collins Crime Club
      The Collins Crime Club was an imprint of UK book publishers William Collins & Co Ltd and ran from May 6, 1930 to April 1994. Customers registered their name and address with the club and were sent a newsletter every three months which advised them of the latest books which had been or were to be...

      , September 7, 1959, hardcover
    • 1960, New York: Bantam
      Bantam Books
      Bantam Books is an American publishing house owned entirely by Random House, the German media corporation subsidiary of Bertelsmann; it is an imprint of the Random House Publishing Group. It was formed in 1945 by Walter B. Pitkin, Jr., Sidney B. Kramer, and Ian and Betty Ballantine...

       #A2023, April 1960, paperback
    • 1961, London: Fontana, 1961, paperback
    • 1978, London: Penguin, 1978, paperback
    • 1992, London: Scribners ISBN 0356201082 1992, hardcover
    • 1995, New York: Bantam Crimeline ISBN 0553244388 December 8, 1995, paperback
    • 1998, Canada, Durkin Hayes Publishing, DH Audio ISBN 0886464560 January 1998, audio cassette (unabridged, read by Saul Rubinek
      Saul Rubinek
      Saul Rubinek is a Canadian actor, director, producer and playwright, known for his work in TV, film and the stage.-Early life:...

      )
    • 2006, Auburn, California: The Audio Partners Publishing Corp., Mystery Masters ISBN 1572705205 March 28, 2006, audio CD (unabridged, read by Michael Prichard)
    • 2009, New York: Bantam Dell Publishing Group (with Too Many Cooks
      Too Many Cooks
      Too Many Cooks is the fifth Nero Wolfe detective novel by American mystery writer Rex Stout. The story was serialized in The American Magazine before its publication in book form in 1938 by Farrar & Rinehart, Inc...

      ) ISBN 9780553386295 April 28, 2009, trade paperback
    • 2010, New York: Bantam Crimeline ISBN 978-0-307-75576-6 July 21, 2010, e-book
      E-book
      An electronic book is a book-length publication in digital form, consisting of text, images, or both, and produced on, published through, and readable on computers or other electronic devices. Sometimes the equivalent of a conventional printed book, e-books can also be born digital...


External links

  • A Nero Wolfe Mystery — "Champagne for One" at The Wolfe Pack, official site of the Nero Wolfe Society
  • Script (PDF) for "Champagne for One," written by Lee Goldberg
    Lee Goldberg
    Lee Goldberg is an American author, screenwriter and producer, known for his work on several different TV crime series, including Diagnosis: Murder, A Nero Wolfe Mystery, Hunter, Spenser: For Hire, Martial Law, She-Wolf of London, SeaQuest, 1-800-Missing, The Glades and Monk...

    and William Rabkin, at the official site of Lee Goldberg
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