The Rockford Files


The Rockford Files is an American detective drama television series starring James Garner, aired on NBC from September 13, 1974, to January 10, 1980. Garner portrays Los Angeles private investigator Jim Rockford, with Noah Beery Jr. in the supporting role of his father, Joseph "Rocky" Rockford, a retired truck driver. The show was created by Roy Huggins and Stephen J. Cannell.
Huggins had created the American Western TV show Maverick, in which Garner also starred, and he wanted to create a similar show in a modern-day detective setting. In 2002, The Rockford Files was ranked number 39 on TV Guides 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time.

Premise

Huggins and Cannell devised the Rockford character as a departure from typical television detectives, essentially Bret Maverick as a modern detective.
In the series storyline, James Scott "Jim" Rockford had served time in California's San Quentin Prison in the 1960s due to a wrongful conviction. After five years, he was pardoned. His work as a private investigator barely allows him to maintain his weathered mobile home in a parking lot on a beach in Malibu, California.
In early episodes of the first season, Rockford's trailer is located in a parking lot alongside the highway at 22878 Pacific Coast Highway, Malibu, and near the ocean; for the rest of the series, the trailer is at Paradise Cove, adjacent to a pier and a restaurant.
In the television movies from 1994 to 1999, Rockford is still living and working at the same Paradise Cove location, but in a much newer trailer that has been extensively enlarged and remodeled.
In contrast to sharp-dressed, pugnacious television private eyes of the time, Rockford wears casual, off-the-rack clothing and tries to avoid physical altercations. He can hold his own in a one-on-one fistfight, but is frequently overpowered when ambushed or outnumbered, often from behind, but he almost always winds up figuring out what is going on, catching the bad guys/gals, and usually exacting revenge by the end of the episode, with some notable exceptions. He is experienced, observant, tenacious, and quick-thinking, and has a faculty for impersonation and accents.
He rarely carries his Colt Detective Special revolver, for which he has no permit and usually stores in a cookie jar, and prefers to talk his way out of trouble. He works on cold cases, missing persons investigations, and low-budget insurance scams, repeatedly stating that he does not handle "open cases" to avoid trouble with the police.
Rockford has been a private investigator since 1968, and his oft-quoted fee, when he can collect it, is $200 per day plus expenses By the time of the 1990s reunion movies, Rockford's fee was $450 a day, plus expenses. Rockford is very insistent on his fee, but in a running gag, circumstances often conspire to prevent Rockford from collecting the full amount he is owed after a case.

Cast

Listed in the opening credits:
  • James Garner is Jim Rockford.
  • Noah Beery Jr. as Joseph "Rocky" Rockford, is Jim's father, a retired truck driver.
  • Joe Santos as Sergeant Dennis Becker, is Jim's friend in the Los Angeles Police Department; he was promoted to lieutenant in season five.
Frequently recurring cast:
  • Stuart Margolin as Evelyn Angelo "Angel" Martin, is Jim's former prison friend. Angel is an untrustworthy, pathologically lying, con artist whose schemes constantly get Jim in trouble, yet Jim remains his friend.
  • Gretchen Corbett as Elizabeth "Beth" Davenport, Jim's lawyer and sometime girlfriend.
  • James Luisi as Lieutenant Douglas J. "Doug" Chapman, is Becker's superior officer. Chapman and Rockford despise one another, although in later episodes, Chapman grudgingly acknowledges Rockford's street smarts.
  • Tom Atkins as Lieutenant Alex/Thomas Diehl, Becker's superior officer who has an antagonistic relationship with Rockford.
Seen in multiple episodes:
  • Pat Finley as Peggy Becker is Sergeant Becker's wife.
  • Isaac Hayes is Gandolph "Gandy" Fitch, a brutal, violent acquaintance of Rockford's from his prison days. He almost always calls Jim "Rockfish". Jim helps prove Fitch did not commit the crime for which he was imprisoned. The two become friendly. In later episodes, Fitch tags along with an unscrupulous investigator Marcus Hayes trying to cash in on one of Rockford's cases, and needs Jim's help dealing with mobsters connected to the ex-husband of his new girlfriend. Jim remains on good terms with Fitch, towards whom he seems to display an almost naive blind spot despite Fitch's refusal to ever take Jim's "no" for an answer, and his lack of compunction about using violence, including occasionally on a recalcitrant Jim himself.
  • Bo Hopkins is John "Coop" Cooper, Jim's disbarred attorney friend in season five.
  • Tom Selleck is Lance White, a successful and glamorous private investigator with an uncynical approach to the business. Lance is liked and admired by everyone, and Jim is a bit jealous and considers him naive, lucky, and likely to cause others to get hurt. According to Stephen J. Cannell's Archive of American Television interview, Lance White was based on "Waco Williams", a similarly polished character in Maverick appearing in the episode "The Saga of Waco Williams". Williams was portrayed in Maverick by Wayde Preston, who in 1958 resembled Tom Selleck two decades later. Selleck later became famous as Thomas Magnum in the 1980s detective series Magnum, P.I.
  • Dennis Dugan is Richie Brockelman, a young, idealistic, and seemingly naive private investigator who seeks Jim's help from time to time. Bereft of Jim's cynicism and physical toughness, Richie is nevertheless a sharp operator who used his outwardly trusting gee whiz persona to mask his dogged cleverness. This character was initially introduced in the short-lived Richie Brockelman, Private Eye.
  • Kathryn Harrold is Dr. Megan Dougherty, a blind psychiatrist who hires Jim. Their relationship eventually blossoms into a romance. Jim is upset in a later episode to learn that she has become engaged to another man.
  • Simon Oakland is Vern St. Cloud, a blustery, arrogant, and often untrustworthy fellow private investigator. St. Cloud and Rockford grudgingly accept each other's assistance from time to time, trading insults along the way.
  • Louis Gossett Jr. as Marcus Aurelius "Gabby" Hayes, an impeccably dressed, chauffeur-driven, boastful P.I. who is nearly always on a hustle, usually to Rockford's misfortune. Gossett appeared first in Foul on the First Play wearing a full wig with sideburns, appearing the following season in Just Another Polish Wedding without it.
  • Rita Moreno as Rita Capkovic, is a call girl and occasional police informant, who is targeted by a millionaire businessman because of her friendship with an elderly widow. In later episodes, she gets accused of the murder of a client; when she tries to leave her profession and hides out with Rockford, it enrages her sadistic former pimp. Whether Jim and Rita are ever romantically involved, beyond their close friendship, is unclear.
  • James Whitmore Jr. is Fred Beamer, an auto mechanic who aspires to be a private investigator, and involves himself in Jim's affairs. In his first appearance, Beamer assumed Jim's identity, living in his trailer, making numerous purchases on credit for detection equipment of questionable efficacy, driving his Firebird, and taking on clients, plunging Jim into trouble. .
  • Al Stevenson is L.J., a friend of Rocky's, who often performs odd jobs for Rocky and Jim. L.J. is closer to Jim's age than Rocky's, and they likely met during the latter's career as a trucker.
  • Luis Delgado as Officer Todd Billings, is seen frequently at the precinct or at crime scenes. Delgado played a number of other bit roles in early Rockford seasons before settling into the recurring minor role of Billings starting in season three. Delgado was the brother-in-law of series co-creator Roy Huggins, and James Garner's long-time stand-in.
  • Bucklind Beery as Officer Al Mazursky, is another recurring bit-part officer very occasionally seen at the precinct during seasons two-five. Bucklind Beery is the son of Noah Beery Jr.
  • Hunter von Leer as Skip Spence, is a libidinous, money-seeking lifeguard stationed on the beach near Jim's trailer. Jim finds Skip distasteful, but Skip occasionally provides information helpful to him. In one episode Skip gives information to gangsters searching for Jim.
  • Jack Garner was seen in numerous bit parts including a policeman, a gas station attendant, and a stranger in a bathroom. He then assumed the role of the fence-sitting, ineffectual Captain McEnroe in season six.

    Supporting characters

Dennis Becker: Rockford's pursuit of cases often leads to difficulties with his friend in the LAPD, Sgt. Dennis Becker, a homicide detective struggling to advance in the department under a series of overbearing lieutenants. The two most notable are Alex/Thomas Diehl during the first, second, and fourth seasons and Doug Chapman in the third to sixth seasons. Those higher-ups invariably dislike Rockford because of their perception that either he is meddling in open cases or is trying to make the LAPD look incompetent in its handling of closed cases. Further, Rockford often calls Becker asking for favors, such as running license plates through the California Department of Motor Vehicles computer system, often annoying the already overworked cop. By the fifth season, Becker is promoted to lieutenant; the episode where Becker is promoted stated that Becker's association with Rockford, considered by LAPD brass to be a shifty ex-con, had hampered Becker's chances for promotion. Chapman was irritated when Becker became his "equal". In season-six episode "The Big Cheese", the third-to-last of the series, Rockford gets a degree of revenge when Chapman inadvertently makes incriminating statements about his tax evasion before an undercover IRS agent who is with Rockford. Becker appears in 89 of the 123 episodes.
Joseph "Rocky" Rockford: Rockford's father, Joseph "Rocky" Rockford, is an ex-Seabee, semiretired, truck driver who nags his son to find stable employment, often urging him to follow in his footsteps as a truck driver, and often wishing Jim would get married. The relationship of father and son was an integral part of the show. Rocky appears in 101 episodes, and usually becomes involved in his son's cases. Occasionally, he hires Jim himself. Jim Rockford's mother is never shown or named, and is very seldom referred to; though never stated directly, she apparently died some years ago.
Rocky was portrayed by Noah Beery Jr. except in the 1974 pilot film, where he was portrayed by Robert Donley. Although much of the character's backstory is the same, in the pilot, Rocky is portrayed as more of a small-time grifter and operator — at one point, working with a partner, Rocky unsuccessfully tries to run a minor scam on Jim, his own son. This element of Rocky's character would largely be dropped as the series started. Beery's version of Rocky was generally honest and reliable, though not above working an unreported job under the table to supplement his pension income, or eating the most expensive food in Jim's refrigerator if he dropped by while Jim was out.
Beth Davenport: Rockford has a close relationship with his attorney, the idealistic, tenacious Elizabeth "Beth" Davenport. In second-season episode "A Portrait of Elizabeth", it is explained that Beth and Rockford had dated for a time, but she soon became aware of his emotional unavailability and lack of interest in a long-term relationship, and realized that they would be better off as friends.
Angel Martin: Rockford's scheming former San Quentin cellmate, Evelyn "Angel" Martin was something of a comic relief character played by Stuart Margolin. Jim employs Angel as an operative from time to time, often to gather street-level information, or to help him access the files of the newspaper where Angel works as a low-level filing clerk. Keeping this job is a condition of Angel's parole; even so, the ever-shifty Angel would be unlikely to be capable of doing so, except that his brother-in-law owns the paper. Jim also uses Angel on a few occasions to play a supporting role in con games that he sets up to sting especially difficult adversaries.
Angel is himself forever running some sort of con game, and is consistently ready to sell anyone out at a moment's notice for his own benefit — and often does. In doing so, Angel almost always gets Rockford in trouble, usually by involving him in hare-brained scams... often without Jim's knowledge, and never with his consent. As often as not, Angel's antics result in his, Jim's and/or others' arrests, and/or being placed on somebody's hit list. In spite of this, Jim considers Angel as one of his best, if most exasperating, pals. Towards the end of the series, a noticeable cooling occurs in Jim's attitude toward Angel in their often-fractious relationship; however, the rift seems to have been repaired by the time of the reunion movies.
Others:
After Corbett was dropped from the show following the fourth season, John Cooper, a disbarred attorney, was added as a new adviser for the frequent legal problems in which Rockford would become entangled. A new romantic interest, Dr. Megan Dougherty, a blind but highly independent psychiatrist, appears in two episodes in seasons five and six and the 1996 television movie The Rockford Files: Punishment and Crime.