Pilot (Numb3rs)
Encyclopedia
"Pilot" is the first episode of the American television show Numb3rs
. Based on a real-life serial rape case, "Pilot" features two brothers, an agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation
(FBI) and a mathematics professor at a Southern California
university, using their individual skills to capture a serial rapist who has begun to kill his victims. "Pilot" also introduces the theme of mathematics being used to solve crimes.
Written by series creators Cheryl Heuton
and Nicolas Falacci
, the episode was filmed twice, once in Boston, Massachusetts and once in Los Angeles, California
, with two different casts using two somewhat different scripts. The test audience could not believe that the three men who portrayed the family could be related to each other, so the producers made cast changes to the family. They also made several changes to the rest of the cast to accommodate the changes in the script. Heuton and Falacci changed the script to focus on the brothers' relationship with each other. When filming finished, CBS picked up the episode and the series three weeks later.
"Pilot" first aired in the United States on January 23, 2005. The episode received mixed reviews. Mathematicians and students at California Institute of Technology
enjoyed the episode and were impressed with the mathematics in it. In contrast, television critics felt as though the episode's plot about a serial rapist was unoriginal, although one critic called the math boring.
(Rob Morrow
), Terry Lake (Sabrina Lloyd
) and David Sinclair
(Alimi Ballard
) investigate a serial rapist who has begun killing his victims. With the twelfth victim, Karen Silber (Kate Norby), changing her story again and the thirteenth victim's car missing, Don runs out of viable leads. Taking a map and a case file with him, Don goes to his childhood home, owned by his father Alan Eppes
(Judd Hirsch
), to take a shower. Don's younger brother, Dr. Charlie Eppes
(David Krumholtz
) of CalSci's mathematics
department, finds and studies the map which Don lays on the dining room table. As Don prepares to return to the office, Charlie tries to talk Don into letting him help with the investigation and is inspired by the pattern of drops emanating from the family's sprinkler. He tells Don that he can use a mathematical model to find the neighborhood where the rapist resides. Skeptical, Don agrees to let Charlie assist him in the investigation.
Charlie develops the model needed to find the rapist and refines it with graduate student Amita Ramanujan
's (Navi Rawat
) assistance. Charlie's model yields what he calls a "hot zone", an area in which the suspect probably lives. As the case progresses, Silber is found dead in her house. Don and his team resort to comparing DNA
samples of men who live in the hot zone to samples of the rapist/killer. Using statistical analysis, Charlie deduces that Silber lied about where her rape took place. After Don learns from Silber's colleagues where Silber was raped, Charlie refines his equation, which yields a smaller area within the original hot zone. DNA, however, clears everyone in the original hot zone. As a result, Assistant Director in Charge (ADIC) Walter Merrick (Anthony Heald
) pulls Don and his team from the investigation. At the same time, Dr. Larry Fleinhardt
(Peter MacNicol
), Charlie's colleague and friend, encourages Charlie to make his equation "less elegant" and to evaluate the worth of his consultation work.
Back at the Eppes house, Charlie and Don discuss what went wrong. Alan is confident that the math is correct. Don tells Charlie that if Charlie ran his model on Don, the model will not show Don at his apartment. Instead, it would zone in on his office, where he spends most of his time. Charlie then realizes that he needs to modify his model to identify two hot zones, one where the suspect possibly resides and one where he possibly works. Using the new equation and a list of potential suspects who work in the new hot zone, Don, Terry, and David confront the suspect and find his latest victim. After Don kills the suspect in a hostage situation, he calls Charlie down to the crime scene to tell Charlie that the suspect lived in the original hot zone but moved three weeks earlier. This revelation proves that Charlie's models are correct.
and Nicolas Falacci
decided to create a show about one. With the encouragement of CBS development executives, they wrote several pilots revolving around mathematicians and scientists, including the pilot for Numb3rs, over the course of 14 years. Knowing that mathematics would not be readily accepted by the general public on its own, Heuton and Falacci in 2003 decided to use the police procedural format to facilitate the acceptance. When Falacci and Heuton pitched the pilot, CBS agreed to produce it about halfway through their presentation.
Although they had considered several story ideas, creators Cheryl Heuton
and Nicolas Falacci
wanted to feature a case in which math was used to solve a traditional type of crime. They decided to base the episode on a real-life serial rapist case in which police asked Dr. Kim Rossmo to assist them in the investigation. In 1998, Rossmo, then with the Vancouver
Police Department, was called in to help Lafayette, Louisiana
, police investigator McCullan Gallien find the South Side Rapist. Rossmo and Gallien visited the crime scenes, and Rossmo used criminal geographic targeting
, a mathematical model
used to find the area in which the suspect would most likely reside. Together, Rossmo and Gallien developed a map indicating the most likely location of the rapist's residence. After DNA cleared everyone living in the area, Gallien learned that a sheriff's deputy in a neighboring department, Randy Comeaux, was a potential suspect. He had lived in the area during the time frame of the rapes but moved to a residence in the neighboring jurisdiction some time later. DNA on a cigarette butt left by Comeaux confirmed that he was the rapist, and Comeaux was arrested.
The pilot was originally filmed in Boston, which was selected because of Falacci's familiarity with the area and because of the contrast between academia and the working class. Filming began in the spring of 2004. Although the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
(MIT) refused to allow filming on campus, the cast and crew spent two days filming in the city. Dr. Tony Chan of UCLA's physical science department consulted on the original pilot episode. Although initially hesitant about auditioning, David Krumholtz
was the first person cast and won the role of Charlie Eppes. Other original cast members were Len Cariou
as Alan; Gabriel Macht
as Don; Peter MacNicol
as Charlie's mentor; Anna Deavere Smith
as Don's boss; Jennifer Bransford, Michael Rooker
, and Alimi Ballard
as FBI agents; and Navi Rawat
as a MIT
graduate student. When filming was completed, executive producers Ridley Scott
and Tony Scott
and producer Skip Chaisson added graphics and music to the footage. They also added transitions to assist the storytelling. To accommodate these changes, CBS allowed the producers to delay the delivery of the pilot to the studio by two weeks.
Since both the focus group and network executives liked the concept of the pilot, CBS decided to recast and reshoot it. Filming began again in September 2004. To accommodate the budget for the new pilot, the second pilot was set and filmed in Los Angeles. Administrators at the California Institute of Technology
(Caltech) agreed to allow producers to film the academic scenes at Caltech. Dr. Gary Lorden, one of Caltech's math professors, served as math consultant of the second pilot. The producers kept Krumholtz, MacNicol, Rawat, and Ballard. Rooker and Macht left the cast, and Rob Morrow replaced Macht as Don. Other casting changes included the addition of Sabrina Lloyd as a FBI agent, Judd Hirsch as Alan, and Anthony Heald as Don's boss.
The producers rewrote the script to accommodate changes in story, characters, and basic idea of the series. They decreased the role of Don's boss to focus the main conflict on the brothers' worldviews. They rewrote the structure and composition of Don's team. They also revised the start of Charlie's involvement with the investigation to incorporate Heuton and Falacci's original idea of Don taking the work home with him. When the second pilot was presented to the focus group, the group liked it. CBS picked up the pilot three weeks after filming ended.
in Atlanta, Georgia
from January 12 through January 14, 2005. Ed Pegg, Jr.
, a member of the Mathematical Association of America
(MAA) who watched the episode at the conference, stated that he liked it and that he was impressed with the decision to depict the mathematics accurately. As for premiering on network television, the pilot initially was to air on January 21, 2005, but it was moved to January 23, 2005, after the AFC Championship game in order to be seen by a larger audience. When it premiered on TV on January 23, 2005, 25 million people watched the pilot episode of Numb3rs, beating the audience for the pilot episode of Desperate Housewives
by about 4 million viewers.
, another member of the association, gave the pilot a very favorable review.
As for the mainstream media, the reviews for the pilot were mixed. Gillian Flynn of Entertainment Weekly
commented that, given that the case was about a serial killer, the pilot did not show the math in an original way. John Leonard of the New York Magazine called the cast "superb" but criticized the pilot for being too busy. Melanie McFarland, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
s TV critic, asserts that the pilot's storyline was an "unfortunate choice" for the pilot episode. Robert Bianco of USA Today
stated that the pilot's storyline was unoriginal. Tim Goodman of the San Francisco Chronicle
, however, stated that the pilot and the cast were excellent but that the math was uninteresting.
and Tony Scott
, co-executive producer David W. Zucker, casting director Mark Saks, and producer Skip Chaissom detail the changes in cast, filming, wardrobe, and makeup. On the audio commentary for the "Pilot", Heuton, Falacci, Morrow and Krumholtz discuss not only additional changes in the pilot but also additional production trivia from the second pilot. Although the bonus feature "Crunching Numb3rs: Season One" features clips and discussions for other episodes throughout the season, it also addresses the production of the second pilot.
NUMB3RS
Numb3rs is an American television drama which premiered on CBS on January 23, 2005, and concluded on March 12, 2010. The series was created by Nicolas Falacci and Cheryl Heuton, and follows FBI Special Agent Don Eppes and his mathematical genius brother, Charlie Eppes , who helps Don solve crimes...
. Based on a real-life serial rape case, "Pilot" features two brothers, an agent with the Federal Bureau of Investigation
Federal Bureau of Investigation
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is an agency of the United States Department of Justice that serves as both a federal criminal investigative body and an internal intelligence agency . The FBI has investigative jurisdiction over violations of more than 200 categories of federal crime...
(FBI) and a mathematics professor at a Southern California
Southern California
Southern California is a megaregion, or megapolitan area, in the southern area of the U.S. state of California. Large urban areas include Greater Los Angeles and Greater San Diego. The urban area stretches along the coast from Ventura through the Southland and Inland Empire to San Diego...
university, using their individual skills to capture a serial rapist who has begun to kill his victims. "Pilot" also introduces the theme of mathematics being used to solve crimes.
Written by series creators Cheryl Heuton
Cheryl Heuton
Cheryl Heuton is an American television writer and producer. Along with her husband and writing partner Nicolas Falacci, she co-created the television series Numb3rs.-External links:...
and Nicolas Falacci
Nicolas Falacci
Nicolas Falacci is a television writer and producer. Along with his wife and writing partner Cheryl Heuton, he co-created the television series Numb3rs. His only directing credit is the season 6 finale of the program. Falacci also wrote the story and screenplay for the 1991 horror film Children of...
, the episode was filmed twice, once in Boston, Massachusetts and once in Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, with two different casts using two somewhat different scripts. The test audience could not believe that the three men who portrayed the family could be related to each other, so the producers made cast changes to the family. They also made several changes to the rest of the cast to accommodate the changes in the script. Heuton and Falacci changed the script to focus on the brothers' relationship with each other. When filming finished, CBS picked up the episode and the series three weeks later.
"Pilot" first aired in the United States on January 23, 2005. The episode received mixed reviews. Mathematicians and students at California Institute of Technology
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Pasadena, California, United States. Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphases on science and engineering...
enjoyed the episode and were impressed with the mathematics in it. In contrast, television critics felt as though the episode's plot about a serial rapist was unoriginal, although one critic called the math boring.
Plot summary
FBI Special Agents Don EppesDon Eppes
Don Eppes is the main fictional character in the television show Numb3rs. He is played by Rob Morrow.Don is an FBI Special Agent who runs the FBI Violent Crimes Squad in Los Angeles. Don recruits his mathematical genius brother, Charlie Eppes, to help him and the Bureau solve some of their most...
(Rob Morrow
Rob Morrow
Robert Alan "Rob" Morrow is an American actor. He is known for his portrayal of Don Eppes on Numb3rs and as Dr. Joel Fleischman on Northern Exposure, a role which garnered him three Golden Globes and two Emmy Award nominations for "Best Actor in a Dramatic Series."-Personal life:Morrow was born in...
), Terry Lake (Sabrina Lloyd
Sabrina Lloyd
Sabrina Lloyd is an American film and television actress.She has played the roles of Wade Welles in the science fiction series Sliders, and Natalie Hurley in the ABC sitcom Sports Night.-Early life:...
) and David Sinclair
David Sinclair (Numb3rs)
David Sinclair is a fictitious FBI agent in the TV show Numb3rs. First introduced in the Pilot episode, he has become the usual partner of FBI Special Agent Colby Granger and has also become the primary relief supervisor for the Supervisor of the FBI Violent Crimes division, Don Eppes...
(Alimi Ballard
Alimi Ballard
Alimi Ballard is an American actor. He is perhaps best known for his role as FBI agent David Sinclair on the CBS drama television series Numb3rs....
) investigate a serial rapist who has begun killing his victims. With the twelfth victim, Karen Silber (Kate Norby), changing her story again and the thirteenth victim's car missing, Don runs out of viable leads. Taking a map and a case file with him, Don goes to his childhood home, owned by his father Alan Eppes
Alan Eppes
Alan Eppes is a fictional character on the television show Numb3rs, played by Judd Hirsch. Alan is the father of the main characters, brothers Charlie and Don Eppes...
(Judd Hirsch
Judd Hirsch
Judd Hirsch is an American actor most known for playing Alex Rieger on the television comedy series Taxi, John Lacey on the NBC series Dear John, and Alan Eppes on the CBS series Numb3rs.-Early life and education:...
), to take a shower. Don's younger brother, Dr. Charlie Eppes
Charlie Eppes
Charles Edward "Charlie" Eppes, PhD is a fictional character and protagonist in the CBS crime drama Numb3rs.Dr...
(David Krumholtz
David Krumholtz
David Krumholtz is an American actor best known for playing Professor Charlie Eppes in the television series Numb3rs. He appeared as Seth Goldstein in Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle and its two sequels, Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay and A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas...
) of CalSci's mathematics
Mathematics
Mathematics is the study of quantity, space, structure, and change. Mathematicians seek out patterns and formulate new conjectures. Mathematicians resolve the truth or falsity of conjectures by mathematical proofs, which are arguments sufficient to convince other mathematicians of their validity...
department, finds and studies the map which Don lays on the dining room table. As Don prepares to return to the office, Charlie tries to talk Don into letting him help with the investigation and is inspired by the pattern of drops emanating from the family's sprinkler. He tells Don that he can use a mathematical model to find the neighborhood where the rapist resides. Skeptical, Don agrees to let Charlie assist him in the investigation.
Charlie develops the model needed to find the rapist and refines it with graduate student Amita Ramanujan
Amita Ramanujan
Amita Ramanujan is a fictional character from the TV series Numb3rs. Over the course of the series, she has become a professor at CalSci and has since become romantically involved with her former thesis advisor, Dr. Charlie Eppes . First introduced in "Pilot", the character of Amita has received...
's (Navi Rawat
Navi Rawat
Navi Rawat is an American television actress, known for her roles as Theresa Diaz on the drama series The O.C. and math prodigy Amita Ramanujan on the drama series Numb3rs. She is the niece of Prem Rawat....
) assistance. Charlie's model yields what he calls a "hot zone", an area in which the suspect probably lives. As the case progresses, Silber is found dead in her house. Don and his team resort to comparing DNA
DNA
Deoxyribonucleic acid is a nucleic acid that contains the genetic instructions used in the development and functioning of all known living organisms . The DNA segments that carry this genetic information are called genes, but other DNA sequences have structural purposes, or are involved in...
samples of men who live in the hot zone to samples of the rapist/killer. Using statistical analysis, Charlie deduces that Silber lied about where her rape took place. After Don learns from Silber's colleagues where Silber was raped, Charlie refines his equation, which yields a smaller area within the original hot zone. DNA, however, clears everyone in the original hot zone. As a result, Assistant Director in Charge (ADIC) Walter Merrick (Anthony Heald
Anthony Heald
Philip Anthony Mair Heald, known professionally as Anthony Heald , is an American actor known for portraying Hannibal Lecter's jail nemesis, Dr. Frederick Chilton in The Silence of the Lambs and Red Dragon, and for playing assistant principal Scott Guber in David E. Kelley's Boston Public...
) pulls Don and his team from the investigation. At the same time, Dr. Larry Fleinhardt
Larry Fleinhardt
Larry Fleinhardt PhD is a fictional character in the television show Numb3rs, played by Peter MacNicol.Dr. Lawrence Fleinhardt is a professor of physics at CalSci and best friend and colleague of Charlie Eppes...
(Peter MacNicol
Peter MacNicol
Peter MacNicol is an American actor. He may be best known in films for his roles of Janosz Poha in Ghostbusters II, Stingo in Sophie's Choice, Thomas Renfield in Dracula: Dead and Loving It and David Langley in Bean...
), Charlie's colleague and friend, encourages Charlie to make his equation "less elegant" and to evaluate the worth of his consultation work.
Back at the Eppes house, Charlie and Don discuss what went wrong. Alan is confident that the math is correct. Don tells Charlie that if Charlie ran his model on Don, the model will not show Don at his apartment. Instead, it would zone in on his office, where he spends most of his time. Charlie then realizes that he needs to modify his model to identify two hot zones, one where the suspect possibly resides and one where he possibly works. Using the new equation and a list of potential suspects who work in the new hot zone, Don, Terry, and David confront the suspect and find his latest victim. After Don kills the suspect in a hostage situation, he calls Charlie down to the crime scene to tell Charlie that the suspect lived in the original hot zone but moved three weeks earlier. This revelation proves that Charlie's models are correct.
Original pilot
Two pilots were filmed. Fascinated by mathematicians, creators Cheryl HeutonCheryl Heuton
Cheryl Heuton is an American television writer and producer. Along with her husband and writing partner Nicolas Falacci, she co-created the television series Numb3rs.-External links:...
and Nicolas Falacci
Nicolas Falacci
Nicolas Falacci is a television writer and producer. Along with his wife and writing partner Cheryl Heuton, he co-created the television series Numb3rs. His only directing credit is the season 6 finale of the program. Falacci also wrote the story and screenplay for the 1991 horror film Children of...
decided to create a show about one. With the encouragement of CBS development executives, they wrote several pilots revolving around mathematicians and scientists, including the pilot for Numb3rs, over the course of 14 years. Knowing that mathematics would not be readily accepted by the general public on its own, Heuton and Falacci in 2003 decided to use the police procedural format to facilitate the acceptance. When Falacci and Heuton pitched the pilot, CBS agreed to produce it about halfway through their presentation.
Although they had considered several story ideas, creators Cheryl Heuton
Cheryl Heuton
Cheryl Heuton is an American television writer and producer. Along with her husband and writing partner Nicolas Falacci, she co-created the television series Numb3rs.-External links:...
and Nicolas Falacci
Nicolas Falacci
Nicolas Falacci is a television writer and producer. Along with his wife and writing partner Cheryl Heuton, he co-created the television series Numb3rs. His only directing credit is the season 6 finale of the program. Falacci also wrote the story and screenplay for the 1991 horror film Children of...
wanted to feature a case in which math was used to solve a traditional type of crime. They decided to base the episode on a real-life serial rapist case in which police asked Dr. Kim Rossmo to assist them in the investigation. In 1998, Rossmo, then with the Vancouver
Vancouver
Vancouver is a coastal seaport city on the mainland of British Columbia, Canada. It is the hub of Greater Vancouver, which, with over 2.3 million residents, is the third most populous metropolitan area in the country,...
Police Department, was called in to help Lafayette, Louisiana
Lafayette, Louisiana
Lafayette is a city in and the parish seat of Lafayette Parish, Louisiana, United States, on the Vermilion River. The population was 120,623 at the 2010 census...
, police investigator McCullan Gallien find the South Side Rapist. Rossmo and Gallien visited the crime scenes, and Rossmo used criminal geographic targeting
Geographic profiling
Geographic profiling is a criminal investigative methodology that analyzes the locations of a connected series of crimes to determine the most probable area of offender residence. By incorporating both qualitative and quantitative methods, it assists in understanding spatial behaviour of an...
, a mathematical model
Rossmo's formula
Rossmo's formula is a geographic profiling formula to predict where a serial criminal lives. The formula was developed by criminologist Kim Rossmo.-Formula:...
used to find the area in which the suspect would most likely reside. Together, Rossmo and Gallien developed a map indicating the most likely location of the rapist's residence. After DNA cleared everyone living in the area, Gallien learned that a sheriff's deputy in a neighboring department, Randy Comeaux, was a potential suspect. He had lived in the area during the time frame of the rapes but moved to a residence in the neighboring jurisdiction some time later. DNA on a cigarette butt left by Comeaux confirmed that he was the rapist, and Comeaux was arrested.
The pilot was originally filmed in Boston, which was selected because of Falacci's familiarity with the area and because of the contrast between academia and the working class. Filming began in the spring of 2004. Although the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
(MIT) refused to allow filming on campus, the cast and crew spent two days filming in the city. Dr. Tony Chan of UCLA's physical science department consulted on the original pilot episode. Although initially hesitant about auditioning, David Krumholtz
David Krumholtz
David Krumholtz is an American actor best known for playing Professor Charlie Eppes in the television series Numb3rs. He appeared as Seth Goldstein in Harold & Kumar Go to White Castle and its two sequels, Harold & Kumar Escape from Guantanamo Bay and A Very Harold & Kumar 3D Christmas...
was the first person cast and won the role of Charlie Eppes. Other original cast members were Len Cariou
Len Cariou
Leonard Joseph “Len” Cariou is a Canadian actor, best known for his portrayal of Sweeney Todd in the original cast of Sweeney Todd, the Demon Barber of Fleet Street...
as Alan; Gabriel Macht
Gabriel Macht
Gabriel S. Macht is an American actor. Macht is known for playing The Spirit in the film of the same name, and lately for his role as Harvey Specter on the USA Network series Suits.-Personal life:...
as Don; Peter MacNicol
Peter MacNicol
Peter MacNicol is an American actor. He may be best known in films for his roles of Janosz Poha in Ghostbusters II, Stingo in Sophie's Choice, Thomas Renfield in Dracula: Dead and Loving It and David Langley in Bean...
as Charlie's mentor; Anna Deavere Smith
Anna Deavere Smith
Anna Deavere Smith is an American actress, playwright, and professor. She is currently the artist in residence at the Center for American Progress.-Early life:...
as Don's boss; Jennifer Bransford, Michael Rooker
Michael Rooker
Michael Rooker is an American actor.-Early life:Rooker, who has eight brothers and sisters, was born in Jasper, Alabama and studied at the Goodman School of Drama in Chicago, where he moved with his mother and siblings at the age of thirteen, after his parents divorced.-Movie career:He made his...
, and Alimi Ballard
Alimi Ballard
Alimi Ballard is an American actor. He is perhaps best known for his role as FBI agent David Sinclair on the CBS drama television series Numb3rs....
as FBI agents; and Navi Rawat
Navi Rawat
Navi Rawat is an American television actress, known for her roles as Theresa Diaz on the drama series The O.C. and math prodigy Amita Ramanujan on the drama series Numb3rs. She is the niece of Prem Rawat....
as a MIT
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
graduate student. When filming was completed, executive producers Ridley Scott
Ridley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
and Tony Scott
Tony Scott
Anthony D. L. "Tony" Scott is an English film director. His films include Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop II, The Last Boy Scout, True Romance, Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State, Spy Game, Man on Fire, Déjà Vu, The Taking of Pelham 123, and Unstoppable...
and producer Skip Chaisson added graphics and music to the footage. They also added transitions to assist the storytelling. To accommodate these changes, CBS allowed the producers to delay the delivery of the pilot to the studio by two weeks.
Second pilot
When previewed, the focus group liked the concept but hated the way the pilot was produced. Among the problems with the original pilot was the believability of the Eppes family in terms of both physical appearance and chemistry, with the chemistry of the actors being the larger issue. Although Heuton and Falacci liked Cariou, Macht, and Krumholtz, Heuton and Falacci did not know how the three actors playing the Eppes family would interact with each other until filming began.Since both the focus group and network executives liked the concept of the pilot, CBS decided to recast and reshoot it. Filming began again in September 2004. To accommodate the budget for the new pilot, the second pilot was set and filmed in Los Angeles. Administrators at the California Institute of Technology
California Institute of Technology
The California Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Pasadena, California, United States. Caltech has six academic divisions with strong emphases on science and engineering...
(Caltech) agreed to allow producers to film the academic scenes at Caltech. Dr. Gary Lorden, one of Caltech's math professors, served as math consultant of the second pilot. The producers kept Krumholtz, MacNicol, Rawat, and Ballard. Rooker and Macht left the cast, and Rob Morrow replaced Macht as Don. Other casting changes included the addition of Sabrina Lloyd as a FBI agent, Judd Hirsch as Alan, and Anthony Heald as Don's boss.
The producers rewrote the script to accommodate changes in story, characters, and basic idea of the series. They decreased the role of Don's boss to focus the main conflict on the brothers' worldviews. They rewrote the structure and composition of Don's team. They also revised the start of Charlie's involvement with the investigation to incorporate Heuton and Falacci's original idea of Don taking the work home with him. When the second pilot was presented to the focus group, the group liked it. CBS picked up the pilot three weeks after filming ended.
Previews
The second pilot was screened at Caltech on January 10, 2005, and Heuton, Falacci, Hirsch, Morrow, Krumholtz, and Lorden participated in a panel discussion after the preview. The students who saw the screening at Caltech enjoyed the episode. The pilot was then previewed during the Joint Mathematics MeetingJoint Mathematics Meeting
The Joint Mathematics Meetings are a mathematics conference hosted annually in early January by the American Mathematical Society and the Mathematical Association of America . Frequently, several other national mathematics organizations also participate...
in Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta, Georgia
Atlanta is the capital and most populous city in the U.S. state of Georgia. According to the 2010 census, Atlanta's population is 420,003. Atlanta is the cultural and economic center of the Atlanta metropolitan area, which is home to 5,268,860 people and is the ninth largest metropolitan area in...
from January 12 through January 14, 2005. Ed Pegg, Jr.
Ed Pegg, Jr.
Ed Pegg, Jr. is an expert on mathematical puzzles and is a self-described recreational mathematician. He creates puzzles for the Mathematical Association of America online at Ed Pegg, Jr.'s Math Games. His puzzles have also been used by Will Shortz on the puzzle segment of NPR's Weekend Edition...
, a member of the Mathematical Association of America
Mathematical Association of America
The Mathematical Association of America is a professional society that focuses on mathematics accessible at the undergraduate level. Members include university, college, and high school teachers; graduate and undergraduate students; pure and applied mathematicians; computer scientists;...
(MAA) who watched the episode at the conference, stated that he liked it and that he was impressed with the decision to depict the mathematics accurately. As for premiering on network television, the pilot initially was to air on January 21, 2005, but it was moved to January 23, 2005, after the AFC Championship game in order to be seen by a larger audience. When it premiered on TV on January 23, 2005, 25 million people watched the pilot episode of Numb3rs, beating the audience for the pilot episode of Desperate Housewives
Desperate Housewives
Desperate Housewives is an American television comedy-drama series created by Marc Cherry and produced by ABC Studios and Cherry Productions. Executive producer Cherry serves as Showrunner. Other executive producers since the fourth season include Marc Cherry, Bob Daily, George W...
by about 4 million viewers.
Reception
Reception of the pilot varied according to the audience in question. The pilot was very well received by the mathematics community. Within a couple of weeks of Pegg's article for the MAA, Keith DevlinKeith Devlin
Keith J. Devlin is a British mathematician and popular science writer. He has lived in the USA since 1987 and has dual American-British citizenship.- Biography :...
, another member of the association, gave the pilot a very favorable review.
As for the mainstream media, the reviews for the pilot were mixed. Gillian Flynn of Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly
Entertainment Weekly is an American magazine, published by the Time division of Time Warner, that covers film, television, music, broadway theatre, books and popular culture...
commented that, given that the case was about a serial killer, the pilot did not show the math in an original way. John Leonard of the New York Magazine called the cast "superb" but criticized the pilot for being too busy. Melanie McFarland, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is an online newspaper and former print newspaper covering Seattle, Washington, United States, and the surrounding metropolitan area...
s TV critic, asserts that the pilot's storyline was an "unfortunate choice" for the pilot episode. Robert Bianco of USA Today
USA Today
USA Today is a national American daily newspaper published by the Gannett Company. It was founded by Al Neuharth. The newspaper vies with The Wall Street Journal for the position of having the widest circulation of any newspaper in the United States, something it previously held since 2003...
stated that the pilot's storyline was unoriginal. Tim Goodman of the San Francisco Chronicle
San Francisco Chronicle
thumb|right|upright|The Chronicle Building following the [[1906 San Francisco earthquake|1906 earthquake]] and fireThe San Francisco Chronicle is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of the U.S. state of California, but distributed throughout Northern and Central California,...
, however, stated that the pilot and the cast were excellent but that the math was uninteresting.
DVD notes
On the Numb3rs season one DVDs, three features address both pilots. The bonus feature "Point of Origin: Inside the Unaired Pilot" on the Numb3rs: The Complete First Season DVDs highlights the differences between both pilots and features clips from the original pilot. In the feature, creators Heuton and Falacci, executive producers Ridley ScottRidley Scott
Sir Ridley Scott is an English film director and producer. His most famous films include The Duellists , Alien , Blade Runner , Legend , Thelma & Louise , G. I...
and Tony Scott
Tony Scott
Anthony D. L. "Tony" Scott is an English film director. His films include Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop II, The Last Boy Scout, True Romance, Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State, Spy Game, Man on Fire, Déjà Vu, The Taking of Pelham 123, and Unstoppable...
, co-executive producer David W. Zucker, casting director Mark Saks, and producer Skip Chaissom detail the changes in cast, filming, wardrobe, and makeup. On the audio commentary for the "Pilot", Heuton, Falacci, Morrow and Krumholtz discuss not only additional changes in the pilot but also additional production trivia from the second pilot. Although the bonus feature "Crunching Numb3rs: Season One" features clips and discussions for other episodes throughout the season, it also addresses the production of the second pilot.
External links
- Numb3rs: Pilot at TV.comTV.comTV.com is a website owned by CBS Interactive. The site covers television and focuses on English-language shows made or broadcast in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and Japan...
- Numb3rs: Pilot at the Internet Movie DatabaseInternet Movie DatabaseInternet Movie Database is an online database of information related to movies, television shows, actors, production crew personnel, video games and fictional characters featured in visual entertainment media. It is one of the most popular online entertainment destinations, with over 100 million...