We didn’t catch last night’s new episode of Law & Order, but Marc Fisher did, and he reports that the show gave the Pearson Pants Suit the ripped-from-the-headlines treatment. Sort of. In typical Law & Order fashion, the show basically took the central concept of a dispute between some jerk and a dry cleaners over a pair of pants, and turned it into a love triangle/murder mystery.

The TV writers changed Pearson to a weaselly and apparently affluent white guy and threw in a murder and an extended and convoluted slam against a corrupt, thinly-veiled Wal-Mart called Savings Mart. The Chungs were portrayed as stammering, clueless, befuddled immigrants. And the writers couldn’t resist the same Johnny Cochran tribute that so many of us who wrote about the suit case played with during the trial last spring:
“If the pants fit, you must acquit.” Bottom line: The writers clearly concluded the pants suit could not sustain a full hour of television entertainment–and it needed a homicide and a corporate scandal to fill an hour of prime time. Also: The original $65 million demand by Pearson was apparently judged not believable, so they changed that to $20 million.