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Originally telecast in the prime time slot following the 1993 Super Bowl, episode one of Homicide: Life on the Street wastes no time getting started, introducing the viewer to a myriad of characters and no fewer than three murder cases. Newly arrived at the Baltimore PD homicide division from the mayor's office, rookie detective Tim Bayliss (Kyle Secor) is assigned by Lt. Al Giardello (Yaphet Kotto) to investigate a brutal strangulation. Bayliss is teamed with Frank Pembleton (Andre Braugher), the division's prickly lone wolf who balks at working with a partner. Other cases on the "board" involve a woman who has evidently murdered several husbands for the insurance, an assignment given to detectives Medrick Lewis (Clark Johnson) and Steve Crosetti (Jon Polito); the hit-and-run killing of Jenny Goode, a three-month-old case reopened by detectives Stan Bolander (Ned Beatty) and John Munch (Richard Belzer); and a fourth murder, one which Sgt. Kay Howard (Melissa Leo) would rather handle on her own so as not to jeopardize her winning "cases solved" streak, but one for which Howard is reluctantly teamed with Detective Beau Felton (Daniel Baldwin). Barry Levinson won an Emmy award for his direction of this episode.