Trivia / Lewis

• And Starring: This show used this not for its main cast, but for its guest stars; for instance, in the pilot episode Jemma Redgrave got the "and" before her name due to being... well, Jemma Redgrave.
• Edited for Syndication: Several minutes per episode were cut to fit the program in the 90-minute Masterpiece time slot (and shoehorn in the rather pointless introduction by Alan Cumming) on PBS in the United States. This can make some episodes confusing to American viewers. Even worse, the discs and streaming videos on Amazon Prime of the first few seasons include these edits, rather than being presented without cuts as they were in the UK.
  • The season numbering in the United States is also different from that of Britain, due to episodes from three (UK) series being aired over two (US) seasons of Masterpiece.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The producers wanted James Grout to make a one-off appearance as the now-retired Strange in the pilot episode. Unfortunately, his health was failing, and he was too weak to appear.
  • Kate Jekyll from the pilot episode was originally intended as a potential long-term love interest for Lewis, with Laura Hobson simply being brought back because Clare Holman happened to be available for the pilot, and it was easier to re-use Hobson than create a new pathologist. This plan was quickly dropped when the producers realized there was no point killing Valerie off only to effectively give Lewis a new love interest straight away, and he spent most of the show's run showing no real interest in finding another woman, before he and Hobson eventually gravitated toward each other.
  • The initial pilot script actually introduced a new pathologist until the producers came to the conclusion that the show needed another character from Inspector Morse. They soon discovered that Clare Holman was about the only actor from Morse who wasn't retired from acting, deceased, or simply unavailable. As such, the new pathologist character was seamlessly replaced in the final script with Laura Hobson.
• You Look Familiar: While Inspector Morse had averted this by not reusing guest actors, the producers on Lewis decided that they would only apply this to episodes of their own series, thereby allowing them to bring back actors from Morse in different roles. Consequently, a murderous driving instructor and a promiscuous history professor from Morse turn up as an allotment owner and record producer respectively in this series.
  • Con O'Neill ended up playing the murderer in both episodes of Morse and Lewis he was in.

---