Perry Mason

Perry Mason
Robert W. Douglas illustrated "The Case of the Crying Swallow" for the August 1947 issue of The American Magazine
First appearance	The Case of the Velvet Claws (1933)
Last appearance	The Case of the Postponed Murder (1973)
Created by	Erle Stanley Gardner
Portrayed by	Warren William Ricardo Cortez Donald Woods Bartlett Robinson Santos Ortega Donald Briggs John Larkin Raymond Burr Monte Markham
Information
Gender	Male
Occupation	Lawyer
Nationality	American

Perry Mason is a fictional character, a criminal defense lawyer who is the main character in works of detective fiction written by Erle Stanley Gardner. Perry Mason is featured in more than 80 novels and short stories, most of which involve a client's murder trial. Typically, Mason establishes his client's innocence by implicating another character, who then confesses.

The character of Perry Mason was adapted for motion pictures and a long-running radio series. These were followed by its best-known adaptation, the CBS television series Perry Mason (1957–66) starring Raymond Burr. A second television series, The New Perry Mason starring Monte Markham, ran from 1973 to 1974; and 30 Perry Mason television films ran from 1985 to 1995, with Burr reprising the role of Mason in 26 of them prior to his death in 1993.

The Perry Mason series ranks third in the top ten best selling book series. In 2015 the American Bar Association's publishing imprint, Ankerwycke, began reissuing Gardner's Perry Mason books, which had been out of print in the United States.

The name "Perry Mason" dates to creator Gardner's childhood. As a child, Gardner was a reader of the magazine Youth's Companion. The magazine was published in Boston, Massachusetts, by the Perry Mason Company (renamed "Perry Mason & Co." after the founder died). When Gardner created his fictional attorney, he borrowed the name of the company which published his favorite childhood magazine. Gardner provided more information about Mason's character in the earlier novels; knowledge of his character is largely taken for granted in the later works, the television series and movies. In the first novel, Mason describes himself:

You'll find that I'm a lawyer who has specialized in trial work, and in a lot of criminal work...I'm a specialist on getting people out of trouble. They come to me when they're in all sorts of trouble, and I work them out...If you look me up through some family lawyer or some corporation lawyer, he'll probably tell you that I'm a shyster. If you look me up through some chap in the District Attorney's office, he'll tell you that I'm a dangerous antagonist but he doesn't know very much about me.