Joe Mannix

Created by William Link and Richard Levinson
Developed for Television by Bruce Geller

“If you’re not gonna pull that trigger immediately, mind if I have a cigarette?”
— Joe in “To the Swiftest Death”

Your classic American hard-boiled private eye, television division. And I mean classic in every sense of the word. Accept no substitutes. “the eternal eye,” someone tagged him. Iconic, I say.

Oh, there were flashier dicks, smarter dicks, and quirkier dicks. Trendier dicks. More popular dicks. And certainly better written dicks. But if there was a Mount Rushmore for TV eyes, JOE MANNIX would be front and center. As played by rugged Amernian-American actor Mike Connors, he was the ultimate TV eye — tough, decent and loyal, and more than willing to mix it up if he had to.

Formerly the dubious pride of Intertect, a high-tech detective firm based on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, Joe left after the first season to start his own agency where he relied less on the sophisticated gadgetry and databases of Intertect and more on his own wits and a wicked right hook. This Korean War veteran was remarkably even-tempered and seems to take fist fights, high-speed car chases and bullet wounds in stride.

Although his chiseled good looks, snazzy convertible — with a car phone!– and dizzying array of loud sports jackets attracted a seemingly endless stream of beautiful women, he remained a bachelor. The only woman who was a constant presence in his life was his ever-faithful (and much-kidnapped) secretary, Peggy Fair. But she didn’t even come along until the second season, after he had left Intertect.

Although, to tell the truth, it was the first season that really shined. Originally Joe was a hotshot op for Intertect, a high-tech, ultra-modern Pinkerton-like high-tech detective agency headed by Lew Wickersham. Where Lew was a white-collar, straight company man, Mannix was a rough-and-tumble loner with his heart on his sleeve and a loaded gat. It was the Continental Op versus IBM.

The friction (and mutual respect) between Joe and Lew was milked for all it was worth, and gave the show an edge most P.I. shows could only dream of, as Wickersham rattled on and on about databases, company reputations and computer analysis, while Mannix’s M.O. often seemed to consist mostly of hunches, fistfights, and an occasional gun battle.

In “You Can Get Killed Out There,” an episode near the end of the first season, Joe and Lew’s differences boil over and Joe leaves Intertect rather than accept an assignment. The following episode, “Another Final Exit,” had Joe cutting all ties with Intertect. And yet, not many viewers seems to remember the first season. Perhaps because that first season was at least originally rarely included in the syndication package.

By the second episode of the second season, “The Silent Cry,” the Mannix most of us remember was firmly in place. The one-man agency in the swanky, Spanish-style office in a well-to-do area of LA, with Gail Fisher in her regular role as faithful receptionist and secretary Peggy, the widow of a police officer killed in the line of duty, and the mother of one son, Toby. One of the first African-Americans to become a regular cast member in an American drama, Peggy made quite an impression.

In fact, the relationship betweeen employee and employer — chiding and occasionally at odds, but always respectful and professional and even at time affectionate — have lead many over the years to speculate on whether Joe and Peggy were “doing it”, and to suspect that CBS didn’t reveal the relationship due to the “racial sensitivities” of the time. Me? I’ve always suspected they were just getting it on during commercials, so as not to interfere with the case. Or ratings.

But whatever. There was certainly affection and respect there, and Peggy was an integral part of the agency, more than simply a secretary, running background checks, brainstorming with Joe and frequently rescuing Joe from the local hospital, or bailing him out of the local hoosegow. And she could be counted on to be threatened or kidnapped once or twice a season, just to keep things rolling.

Not that Joe had completely turned his back on technology, mind you. He did have a car phone — something extrememly rare at the time. And the fans loved it. And Joe. During its long run it was always a popular show.

But eventually CBS, possibly corncerned about ongoing complaints about the show’s violence, did what various hoods and thugs never quite managed. They cancelled Joe’s ticket in the mid-seventies.

But by then, the airwaves were alive with a new, slightly hipper (or at least more colourful) breed of TV dicks. Blind dicks (Longstreet), fat dicks (Cannon), con artist dicks (Rockford), grumpy ex-cop dicks (Harry O), and even old dicks (Barnaby Jones). Mannix’s own producers, Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts, would even return, with an even more successful show, featuring bimbo dicks (Charlie’s Angels).

Suddenly, Joe Mannix seemed a little bit like a dinosaur. All he did was solve cases. For many, the idea of a hard-boiled private eye like Joe suddenly seemed old-fashioned, even quaint. And so Joe, like a two-fisted Puff the Magic Dragon, quietly slipped into his cave…

But for eight glorious seasons, that was be enough for many of us. More than enough.

Ironically, it was Mannix‘s very success that had revived the P.I. genre in the first place. Before Mannix, the genre had been treading water for the most part, tripping over its own gimmicks (77BourbonStreetEye, anyone?) and regurgitated copies of copies.

By humanizing and subtly updating the private eye, bringing him unapologetically into the sixties (and seventies), even while still respecting the roots of the genre, Mannix paved the way for all who would succeed him–and replace him.

As Connors himself once mused (in Ric Meyers’ Murder On the Air) somewhere out there “Mannix is still working…there was a decency and a dignity about the man…”

THE WILDERNESS YEARS

Turns out Ric was right.

Mannix’s no-muss, no-fuss status as an affably generic TV eye made him all the easier to play with. Joe first popped up about halfway through his own show’s original run in an October 1971 episode of Here’s Lucy, of all places. The ep’s title, “Lucy and Mannix Are Held Hostage,” pretty much gave the plot away: Lucy accidentally witnesses a burglary, and her worried brother-in-law Harry hires Mannix to protect her, but when the detective arrives at her apartment, Lucy–in typical Lucy fashion–mistakes Joe for one of the criminals, and knocks him out by hitting him over the head with a vase. When Mannix recovers consciousness, he discovers that the real criminals have arrived and tied both Lucy and him to a couple of chairs. Hilarity, predictably, ensues. It’s an unlikely pairing, to be sure, but it works. Well, sorta.

In March 1976, Joe returned to television less than a year after Mannix was cancelled, on a Bob Hope Special, subtitled “Joys.”  It was a full-length spoof of Jaws, that featured nearly fifty actors, comedians and other “stars,” mostly playing themselves. They’re all invited to a party at Bob Hope’s house, only to be attacked by a great white shark. Connors has a brief cameo as Joe Mannix, alongside several other TV detectives (including David Janssen as Harry O), hired by Hope to crack the case. Yes, it was horrible.

It took a while (over twenty years), but Mannix finally got a little respect, when Connors stepped back into Joe’s gumshoes in an episode of Diagnosis Murder. sure, the show was a lighthearted piece of fluff, about a Dr. Mark Sloan (played by Dick Van Dyke), a teaching physician who somehow becomes deeply involved in crime-solving in his role as consultant to the local police department. Sort of a Murder, He Prescribed, with a scary similiarity to Matlock, starring an equally beloved, former sitcom star. But in “Hard-Boiled Murder,” one of the few episodes that interested me, Mannix teamed up with his “old friend” Dr. Sloan to solve a 25-year-old murder case. what made it rteally interesting was that scenes from a 1973 Mannix episode, “Little Girl Lost” are used in the flashback sequences. Pernell Roberts and Beverly Garland reprise their guest-starring roles from the original episode as Mannix, in an attempt to honour a promise he made to a little girl (now a grown journalist) to track down her father’s killer. When Joe arrives at Community General Hospital with a bullet wound, he runs into Mark and together they work the case. Meanwhile, the good doctor uncovers a more serious health risk while treating Mannix for his bullet wound and strongly advises him to take immediate action — a warning Mannix promptly chooses to ignore. It’s gimmicky as hell, and nowhere as good as it could have been, but it was good to see Joe back in the saddle, being treated with some respect. And Joe, being Joe, rises to the occasion.

Seems you can’t keep a good dick down.

Don’t believe me? Check out how many TV private eyes STILL wear heavily patterned, tweed sports coats… even in balmy Southern California. James Garner even used to occasionally gripe about that “darn Mannix jacket.”

THE EVIDENCE

• “Lew, we’ve been here before. I know you won’t change the system. I know I won’t change the system. It’s logical. Can me.”
  — from “The Name is Mannix”
• “Intertect? Oh, well, that’s a big detective agency. Big building, y’know, lots of machines, computers all the time tick, tick, tick tick all the time! Well, one day I cussed at the machine, and I think I heard it cuss back, so I quit. Now, if I can’t get along with a machine, just think what would happen with a wife!”
  — Joe explains why he’s not married in “The Silent Cry”
• “Stop worrying Peggy, I’ve got 50 pounds on her.”
• “There is no reason for war that reasonable men cannot resolve.”
  — Joe translates an Armenian proverb in “Wine from These Grapes”
• “What’s this, love at the zoo?”
  — Joe interupts a couple of lovers in “Death in a Minor Key”
• Peggy: I took the liberty of going to, uh, well, y’know, a certain organization and now don’t be angry because it worked! Intertect put ‘Kelly Green Frame’ through the computer and what do you think?
  Joe: That I’m gonna strangle you.
• — from “Pressure Point”

THE ULTIMATE QUOTE

• “If nothing else, just do the right thing.”
  — supposedly one of Mike Connors’ favourite sayings, but it might as well be a Mannix quote.

UNDER OATH

• “He’s not as famous as Columbo or as lauded as Jim Rockford, but few TV detectives have remained as beloved and under-the-radar cool as Mike Connors’ Joe Mannix…right from the start Connors emitted broad-shouldered Everyman solidness (solving) cases with his brains, his gun and his fists: he was an all-purpose detective.”
  —Ken Tucker (Entertainment Weekly)

TOUGH GUY, HUH?

• During the show’s eight-year run, Mannix shot almost twenty times, stabbed, beat up, run off the road and knocked unconscious at least 50 times. And that was just pretend. During the filming of the show’s pilot, Mike Connors managed to dislocate his shoulder and break his hand.

CAR TALK

• “In the first year of the show, when he worked for Intertect, Mannix, Joe drove a George Barris-customized convertible Oldsmobile Toranado. AMT or MPC made a model of it, in fact (this is true! I had one- ed. ) When he quit Intertect, he went downhill and drove various Dodge Challengers and Darts for the rest of the series. The book, Barris Movie & TV Carshas photos of it. The Mannix cars were pretty cool…one was sold a couple of years ago for not much money…I think less than $10,000.”
  — John Boyle

THERE WAS MUSIC IN THE AIR

• Neil Diamond makes a cameo, in one of the very first episodes, “The Many Deaths of Saint Christopher” (October 7, 1967), performing in a night club.
• Buffalo Springfield appeared just a few weeks later in “Warning: Live Blueberries!” (October 28, 1967). You can see Neil Young and Stephen Stills ripping through the Springfield song “Bluebird” in a “hippie night spot” on the Sunset Strip.
  In fact, when Stephen Stills was asked by Rolling Stone if he ever regretted not taping some of the Buffalo Springfield’s early concerts, he replied “Yeah. The best sound we ever got was when we did this stupid TV show where we played just a little bit of a song and we were like, ‘Oh, my God, that’s the sound we’ve been looking for.’  It was the only place we could get that sound right.”
• Lou Rawls played (and performed) as “Vance Logan,” a night club singer (and a friend of Peggy’s) who gets in a jam in “Lifeline” (February 16, 1972).
• John G. says the Bobby Troupe played in at least a few episodes as a jazz pianist, and damn if he wasn’t right. Troup played “Bobby” in “A Pittance of Faith” (1969) and “Medal for a Hero” (1970).

TYPOGRAPHICALLY SPEAKING

• Although the show now  may seem incredibly dated, at the time there was a certain edgy style to it; an attempt — however misguided — to be “cool.” (Joe may have been the hippest square on television at the time). Hence the car phone, the black secretary, Joe’s “swinging” social life, the occasional attempt to deal with “social issues,” the pop music cameos, the jazzy opening theme by noted composer Lalo Schifrin, and the very hip-at-the-time split-screen opening credits sequence. And, of course, in the first season when Joe worked for Intertect, the early nod to computer technology and its ramifications, reflected not just in the plots, but even in the squared-off, split-serif modernist typeface chosen for the show’s opening and closing credits. It’s called “City, and was used by IBM as part of their “brand” for years (and still appears in their logo). Sharp-eyed viewers may recall the dot over the “i” in Mannix was a computer tape reel in the first season.

THE ADDRESS BOOK

• The Intertect Building was located at 3470 Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles. It was known as the Tishman Plaza Office Building at the time.
• Joe’s Spanish-style office/apartment was located at “17 Paseo Verde” in Los Angeles. Supposedly, it was based on the El Paseo Building in Santa Barbara on State Street. Wherever it actually was, the location was also used quite often on Mission: Impossible, another Bruce Geller production.

TELEVISION

• MANNIX | Buy the complete series on DVD
  (1967-1975, CBS)
  193 60-minute episodes
  Created by William Link and Richard Levinson
  Developed for television by Bruce Geller
  Writers: John Meredyth Lucas, Chester Krumholz, Stephen Kandel, Ben Roberts, Donn Mullally, Daniel B. Ullman, Harold Medford, Robert W. Lenski, Ed Adamson, Howard Browne, Bernard C. Schoenfeld, Victor Canning, Daniel Mainwaring, Herb Meadow, Mel Tormé, Laurence Heath
  Executive producer: Bruce Geller
  Executive story consultants: Ivan Goff and Ben Roberts
  Theme by Lalo Schifrin
  Starring Mike Connors as JOE MANNIX
  and Gail Fisher as Peggy Fair
  Joseph Campanella as Lou Wickersham (1st season)
  Robert Reed as Lieutenant Adam Tobias
  Guest stars: Loretta Swit, Neil Diamond, Lew Alcinodor, Bobby Troup, Lynda Day, Robert Conrad, Fritz Weaver, Anne Archer, Elisha Cook Jr., Rich Little, Joan Van Ark, Dean Stockwell, Shelley Fabares, Milton Berle, Lou Rawls, Martin Sheen, Rip Torn, Eddie Egan, Adam West, Burgess Meredith, John Ritter, Diane Keaton, Lou Rawls, Howard Duff, Frank Langella, Greg Morris, William Shatner, Mariette Hartley, Vic Morrow, Adam West, Susan Strasberg, Elizabeth Ashley, Linda Evans, Lee Meriwether, Lloyd Nolan
  • SEASON ONE (The Intertect Episodes) | Buy this DVD set
  • “The Name Is Mannix” (September 16, 1967)
  • “Skid Marks on a Dry Run” (September 23, 1967)
  • “Nothing Ever Works Twice” (September 30, 1967)
  • “The Many Deaths of Saint Christopher” (October 7, 1967)
  • “Make Like It Never Happened” (October 14, 1967)
  • “The Cost of a Vacation” (October 21, 1967)
  • “Warning: Live Blueberries” (October 28, 1967)
  • “Beyond the Shadow of a Dream” (November 4, 1967)
  • “Huntdown” (November 18, 1967)
  • “Coffin for a Clown” (November 25, 1967)
  • “Catalogue of Sins” (December 2, 1967)
  • “Turn Every Ston” (December 9, 1967)
  • “Run, Sheep, Run” (December 16, 1967)
  • “Then the Drink Takes the Man” (December 30, 1967)
  • “The Falling Star” (January 6, 1968)
  • “License to Kill—Limit Three People” (January 13, 1968)
  • “Deadfall, Part 1” (January 20, 1968)
  • “Deadfall, Part 2” (January 27, 1968))
  • “You Can Get Killed Out There” (February 3, 1968)
  • “Another Final Exit (or, The Box)” (February 10, 1968)
  • “Eight to Five, Its a Miracle” (February 17, 1968)
  • “Delayed Reaction” (March 2, 1968)
  • “To Kill a Writer” (March 9, 1968)
  • “The Girl in the Frame” (March 16, 1968)
  • SEASON TWO | Buy this DVD set
  • “The Silent Cry” (September 28, 1968)
  • “Comes Up Roses” (October 5, 1968)
  • “Pressure Point” (October 12, 1968)
  • “To the Swiftest, Death” (October 19, 1968)
  • “End of the Rainbow” (October 26, 1968)
  • “A Copy of Murde” (November 2, 1968)r
  • “Edge of the Knife” (November 9, 1968)
  • “Who Will Dig the Graves? ” (November 16, 1968)
  • “In Need of a Friend” (November, 1968)
  • “Night Out of Time” (December 7, 1968)
  • “A View of Nowhere” (December 14, 1968)
  • “Fear I to Fall” (December 21, 1968)
  • “Death Run” (January 4, 1969)
  • “A Pittance of Faith” (January 11, 1969)
  • “Only Giants Can Play” (January 18, 1969)
  • “Shadow of a Man” (January 25, 1969)
  • “The Girl Who Came in with the Tide” (February 1, 1969)
  • “Death in a Minor Key” (February 8, 1969)
  • “End Game” (February 15, 1969)
  • “All Around the Money Tree” (February 22, 1969)
  • “The Odds Against Donald Jordan” (March 1, 1969)
  • “Last Rites for Miss Emma” (March 8, 1969)
  • “The Solid Gold Web” (March 22, 1969)
  • “Merry Go Round for Murde” (April 5, 1969)
  • “To Catch a Rabbit” (April 12, 1969)
  • SEASON THREE | Buy this DVD set
  • “Eagles Sometimes Can’t Fly” (September 27, 1969)
  • “Color Her Missing” (October 4, 1969)
  • “Return to Summer Grove” (October 11, 1969)
  • “The Playground” (October 18, 1969)
  • “A Question of Midnight” (October 25, 1969)
  • “A Penny for the Peep-Show” (November 1, 1969)
  • “A Sleep in the Deep” (November 8, 1969)
  • “Memory: Zero” (November 22, 1969)
  • “The Nowhere Victim” (November 29, 1969)
  • “The Sound of Darkness” (December 6, 1969)
  • “Who Killed Me? ” (December 13, 1969)
  • “Missing: Sun and Sky” (December 20, 1969)
  • “Tooth of the Serpent” (December 27, 1969)
  • “Medal for a Hero” (January 3, 1970)
  • “Walk With a Dead Man” (January 10, 1970)
  • “A Chance at the Roses” (January, 1970)
  • “Blind Mirror” (January 24, 1970)
  • “Harlequin’s Gold” (January 31, 1970)
  • “Who is Sylvia? ” (February 7, 1970)
  • “Only One Death to a Customer” (February 14, 1970)
  • “Fly, Little One” (February 21, 1970)
  • “The Search for Darrell Andrews” (February 28, 1970)
  • “Murder Revisited” (March 7, 1970)
  • “War of Nerves” (March 14, 1970)
  • “Once Upon a Saturday” (March 21, 1970)
  • SEASON FOUR | Buy this DVD set
  • “A Ticket to the Eclipse” (September 19, 1970)
  • “One for the Lady” (September 26, 1970)
  • “Time Out of Mind” (October 3, 1970)
  • “Figures in a Landscape” (October 10, 1970)
  • “The Mouse That Died” (October 17, 1970)
  • “The Lost Art of Dying” (October 24, 1970)
  • “The Other Game in Town” (October 31, 1970)
  • “The World Between” (November 7, 1970)
  • “Sunburst” (November 14, 1970)
  • “To Cage a Sea Gull” (November 21, 1970)
  • “Bang, Bang, You’re Dead” (November 28, 1970)
  • “Deja Vu” (December 12, 1970)
  • “Duet For Three” (December 19, 1970)
  • “Round Trip to Nowhere” (January 2, 1971)
  • “What Happened to Sunday? ” (January 9, 1971)
  • “The Judas Touch” (January 16, 1971)
  • “With Intent to Kill” (January, 1971)
  • “The Crime That Wasn’t” (January 30, 1971)
  • “A Gathering of Ghosts” (February 6, 1971)
  • “A Day Filled with Shadows” (February 13, 1971)
  • “Voice in the Dark” (February 20, 1971)
  • “The Color of Murder” (February, 1971)
  • “Shadow Play” (March 6, 1971)
  • “Overkill” (March 13, 1971)
  • SEASON FIVE  | Buy this DVD set
  • “Dark So Early, Dark So Long” (September 15, 1971)
  • “Cold Trail” (September 22, 1971)
  • “A Step in Time” (September 29, 1971)
  • “Wine From These Grapes” (October 6, 1971)
  • “Woman in the Shadows” (October 13, 1971)
  • “Days Beyond Recall” (October 20, 1971)
  • “Run Till Dark” (October 27, 1971)
  • “The Glass Trap” (November 3, 1971)
  • “A Choice of Evils” (November 10, 1971)
  • “A Button for General D” (November 17, 1971)
  • “The Man Outside” (November 24, 1971)
  • “Murder Times Three” (December 1, 1971)
  • “Catspaw” (December 8, 1971)
  • “To Save a Dead Man” (December 15, 1971)
  • “Nightshade” (December, 1971)
  • “Babe in the Woods” (January 5, 1972)
  • “The Sound of Murder” (January 12, 1972)
  • “Moving Target” (January 19, 1972)
  • “Cry Pigeon” (January 26, 1972)
  • “A Walk in the Shadows” (February 9, 1972)
  • “Lifeline” (February 16, 1972)
  • “To Draw the Lightning” (February 23, 1972)
  • “Scapegoat” (March 1, 1972)
  • “Death in the Fifth Gear” (March 8, 1972)
  • SEASON SIX | Buy this DVD set
  • “The Open Web” (September 17, 1972)
  • “Cry Silence” (September 24, 1972)
  • “The Crimson Halo” (October 1, 1972)
  • “Broken Mirror” (October 8, 1972)
  • “Portrait of a Hero” (October 15, 1972)
  • “The Inside Man” (October 22, 1972)
  • “To Kill a Memory” (October 29, 1972)
  • “The Upside Down Penny” (November 5, 1972)
  • “One Step to Midnight” (November 12, 1972)
  • “Harvest of Death” (November 19, 1972)
  • “A Puzzle for One” (November 26, 1972)
  • “Lost Sunday” (December 3, 1972)
  • “See No Evil” (December 10, 1972)
  • “Light and Shadow” (December 17, 1972)
  • “A Game of Shadows” (December 24, 1972)
  • “The Man Who Wasn’t There” (January 7, 1973)
  • “A Matter of Principle” (January 14, 1973)
  • “Out of the Night” (January 21, 1973)
  • “Carol Lockwood, Past Tense” (January 28, 1973)
  • “The Faces of Murder” (February 4, 1973)
  • “Search for a Whisper” (February 18, 1973)
  • “To Quote a Dead Man” (February 25, 1973)
  • “A Problem of Innocence” (March 4, 1973)
  • “The Danford File” (March 11, 1973)
  • SEASON SEVEN | Buy this DVD set
  • “The Girl in the Polka Dot Dress” (September 16, 1973)
  • “A Way to Dusty Death” (September 23, 1973)
  • “Climb a Deadly Mountain” (September 30, 1973)
  • “Little Girl Lost” (October 7, 1973)
  • The Gang’s All Here” (October 14, 1973)
  • “Desert Run” (October 21, 1973)
  • “Silent Target” (October 28, 1973)
  • “A World Without Sundays” (November 4, 1973)
  • “Sing a Song of Murder” (November 11, 1973)
  • “Search in the Dark” (November 25, 1973)
  • “The Deadly Madonna” (December 2, 1973)
  • “Cry Danger” (December 9, 1973)
  • “All the Dead Were Strangers” (December 16, 1973)
  • “Race Against Time, Part 1” (January 6, 1974; aka “A Matter of the Heart”)
  • “Race Against Time, Part 2” (January 13, 1974; aka “A Matter of the Heart”)
  • “The Dark Hours” (January, 1974)
  • “A Night Full of Darkness” (January 27, 1974)
  • “Walk a Double Line” (February 10, 1974)
  • “The Girl From Nowhere” (February 17, 1974)
  • “Rage to Kill” (February 24, 1974)
  • “Mask For a Charade” (March 3, 1974)
  • “A Question of Murder” (March 10, 1974)
  • “Trap for a Pigeon” (March 24, 1974)
  • “The Ragged Edge” (March 31, 1974)
  • SEASON EIGHT | Buy this DVD set
  • “Portrait in Blues” (September 22, 1974)
  • “Game Plan” (September 29, 1974)
  • “A Fine Day for Dying” (October 6, 1974)
  • “Walk on the Blind Side” (October 13, 1974)
  • “The Green Men” (October 20, 1974)
  • “Death Has No Face” (October 27, 1974)
  • “A Small Favor for an Old Friend” (November 10, 1974)
  • “Enter Tami Okada” (November 17, 1974)
  • “Picture of a Shadow” (November 24, 1974)
  • “Desert Sun” (December 1, 1974)
  • “The Survivor Who Wasn’t” (December 15, 1974)
  • “A Choice of Victims” (December 22, 1974)
  • “A Word Called Courage” (January 5, 1975)
  • “Man in a Trap” (January 12, 1975)
  • “Chance Meeting” (January 19, 1975)
  • “Edge of the Web” (February, 1975)
  • “A Ransom for Yesterday” (February 9, 1975)
  • “The Empty Tower” (February 16, 1975)
  • “Quartet for a Blunt Instrument” (February 23, 1975)
  • “Bird of Prey, Part 1” (March 2, 1975)
    Based on the private eye novel Bird of Prey by Victor Canning. 
  • “Bird of Prey, Part 2” (March 9, 1975)
  • “Design for Dying” (March 23, 1975)
  • “Search for a Dead Man” (April 6, 1975)
  • “Hardball” (April 13, 1975)

TELEVISION: THE CAMEOS

• HERE’S LUCY
  (1968-74, CBS)
  Series
  30 minute episodes
  Starring Lucille Ball as Lucy Carter
  and Gale Gordon as Harry
  • “Lucy and Mannix Are Held Hostage” (October 27, 1971)
    Writers: Bob Carroll Jr. and Madelyn Davis
    Directed by Coby Ruskin
    Starring: Lucille Ball as Lucy Carter
    and Mike Connors as JOE MANNIX
    With Gale Gordon, John Doucette, Robert FoulK, Vince Howard, Marc Lawrence
    Joe and Lucy are captured by criminals and bound together.
• THE BOB HOPE SPECIAL: JOYS
  (March 5, 1976, NBC)
  TV Special
  90 minutes
  Written by Jeffrey Barron, Ruth Batchelor, Gig Henry, Hal Kanter, Charles Lee, Paul Pompian, Ben Starr, Jean Topple, Harvey Weitzman
  Directed by Dick McDonough
  Starring Bob Hope
  With Don Adams, Marty Allen, Milton Berle, Dean Martin, Phyllis Diller, George Burns, Jack Albertson, Angie Dickinson, Scatman Crothers, Abe Vigoda, etc., etc…
  and Mike Connors as JOE MANNIX
  This “very special” Bob Hope Special was a full-length made-for-TV spoof of Jaws, featuring nearly fifty actors, comedians and other “stars.” They’re all invited to a party at Bob Hope’s house, only to be attacked by a great white shark. Connors has a brief cameo as Joe Mannix alongside five other TV detectives (including David Janssen as Harry O), hired by Hope to crack the case. Could this possibly be as horrid as it sounds?
• DIAGNOSIS MURDER
  (1993-2001, CBS)
  Series
  60 minute episodes
  Based on characters created by Joyce Burditt
  • “Hard-Boiled Murder”
    (October 27, 1974)
    Starring Dick Van Dyke as Dr. Mark Sloan
    and Mike Connors as JOE MANNIX
    with Victoria Rowell, Barry Van Dyke, Michael Tucci, Charlie Schlatter

FILMS

• NOBODY KNOWS ANYTHING! | Buy this DVD
  (2003)
  90 minutes
  Writer: David Pasquesi
  Director: William Tannen
  Starring Alanna Ubach as Sarah
  Also starring Alan Blumenfeld, Margaret Cho, Robert Englund, Janeane Garofalo, Kristen Johnston, Ben Stiller, Ed Lauter, Fred Ward, Michael Lerner, Stephen Colbert, Virginia Madsen, Tim Meadows, Mike Myers, Mary Kay Place ,Wayne Rogers and Mike Connors as JOE MANNIX
  A sort of film within a film, neither very good, that follows Sarah, a fledgling film director who sets out to get a studio to finance a movie about her loser cousin and his friend, who decide to rob a grocery store. Among the numerous cameos is one featuring Mike Connors as a psychiatric patient who thinks he’s (who else?) Joe Mannix.

NOVELIZATIONS

• Mannix (1968, by Michael Avallone)
• Mannix #1: The Faces of Murder (1975, by J.T. MacCargo)
• Mannix #2: A Fine Day For Dying (1975, by J.T. MacCargo [Peter Rabe])
• Mannix #3: A Walk on the Blind Side (1975, by J.T. MacCargo)
• Mannix #4: Round Trip to Nowhere (1975, by J.T. MacCargo [Peter Rabe])

FURTHER INVESTIGATION

• You’re a Mean Man with a Typewriter, Sister
  Kathleen insists I put a link here to my list of great secretaries.
• 17 Paseo Verde
  Mary Dee’s hard-boiled web site for a hard-boiled TV show.
• Get Yer Motor Runnin’…
  Some hot and not-so-hot wheels.
• Joe Mannix by Pete Emslie
  A great caricature by master cartoonist and blogger Paul Emslie of The Cartoon Cave, used with permission. 
• Mannix Was Vintage Tv’s Perfect Savvy PI
  Keith Roysdon looks back fondly on the heyday of the checked sport coat, when Joe Mannix was on the case. (December 2021, CrimeReads)

Respectfully submitted by Kevin Burton Smith. The caricature is by Angelo Torres from the July 1972 issue of MAD Magazine. Mannix was parodied in MAD not once, but twice — that’s how popular it was.