Trivia / Danger Man

• Actor-Shared Background: Drake claims to be Irish-American in the first series and British in the later years. It's possible both of these are technically true, as Patrick McGoohan had Irish parents, was born in New York City and grew up in Monaghan, Ireland and later Sheffield, England.
• Breakaway Pop Hit: The international version has the theme "Secret Agent Man" as performed by Johnny Rivers. UK viewers never actually saw the US version of the opening credits until they were included as a bonus item on the DVD releases. For the UK, the show's real theme song is the harpsichord-driven "High Wire" played over the first post-teaser scene.
• California Doubling: Many episodes were set outside the UK, but overseas location filming was not possible for a 1960s British television series, so many British locations are called on to double for overseas locations. Perhaps the most consequetial example of this was in "View from the Villa", the very first episode to be broadcast, in which Portmeirion village in North Wales doubles for an Italian village.
• Creative Differences: The second unit director on the pilot, according to Brian Clemens: "... shot some location and background stuff and sent the dailies back to the editing room at Elstree. Ralph Smart looked at them, hated them, and called up the second unit director and said "Look, these are terrible, you'll never be a film director," and then he fired him. The name of the second unit director? John Schlesinger".
• Directed by Cast Member: Patrick McGoohan directed two episodes, "To Our Best Friend" and "The Paper Chase."
• Fake Nationality: McGoohan affects an American accent in the first season. The result is a bit odd. (Although if you see Actor-Shared Background above, it's not entirely a "fake" nationality.)
• Uncredited Role: Dino Shafeek as a club barman in "The Colonel's Daughter".
• Unfinished Episode:
  • The Prisoner made use of one Series 4 script that was abandoned when Patrick McGoohan cancelled the series, "The Girl Who Was Death". Discounting adaptations made for The Prisoner, the story feels more like an episode of The Avengers than traditional Danger Man and might stand as an indication of the direction that was planned as the series moved into colour production. The sci-fi spy series The Champions also adapted an unmade Danger Man script.
  • There were a couple of other episodes that never saw the light of day.
• Wag the Director: Patrick McGoohan was adamant that Drake live up to a higher moral standard than the likes of James Bond. As a result, the character rarely becomes involved with women (beyond mission requirements), and rarely kills anyone - in fact he almost never carries a gun.
• Working Title: Lone Wolf.
• You Look Familiar: Susan Hampshire played two different roles in the series.

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