The Undertaker's Widow

Former policewoman Jane Crease is now a state senator running for the Republican nomination to the U.S. Senate from Oregon. Tough-talking, cigar smoking Crease grabs the spotlight when she kills an intruder who's just shot her millionaire husband, Lamar Hoyt, in their mansion. Is Crease a heroine? Or did she have her own motives for wanting her husband dead? On the other hand: is she being set up by an opponent so tough that previous political adversaries have come to physical harm?

Crease's murder case is assigned to Richard Quinn, a highly ethical trial judge who finds himself being blackmailed to fix the case so that Jane Crease is convicted. The disappearance and presumed murder of a beautiful woman on a Caribbean island where Quinn had gone on vacation places him in a compromised position; yet he bends over backwards to insure that Crease, whom he believes to be innocent, isn't sent to the electric chair.

After his surprising ruling, Quinn finds that his troubles are just beginning, in this legally sophisticated thriller about a good man who digs himself deeper and deeper into an insidious maze of murder and deceit as he tries to do the right thing.

James Naughton won two Tony Awards for Best Actor in a Musical for his performances in the critically acclaimed City of Angels and Chicago.  Other Broadway theater credits include Whose Life Is It Anyway and Long Day's Journey into Night.  He has also appeared on television, and in the feature films The Good Mother, First Kid, and The Glass Menagerie.