50 Fun Facts About Numb3rs

A lecture by which TV science educator gave the creators of Numb3rs the idea for their crime drama?

Bill Nye's talk on getting children excited about math sparked the series. He later turned up in several episodes himself, playing an engineering professor.

Which actor, once head elf Bernard in The Santa Clause, plays math prodigy Charlie Eppes on Numb3rs?

David Krumholtz beat more than a hundred actors to the part, helped by his knack for making the math sound natural. He later admitted that he had failed math in high school.

Rob Morrow, FBI agent Don Eppes on Numb3rs, first found fame as a New York doctor on which series?

Northern Exposure made Morrow a star as Joel Fleischman, a city physician startled to be posted to an icy, isolated Alaskan town. The part earned him three Golden Globe nominations.

Judd Hirsch, father Alan Eppes on Numb3rs, won two Emmys as Alex Rieger on which classic sitcom?

Taxi ran from 1978 to 1983 with Hirsch in the lead. His Numb3rs role was a recasting: another actor played the father in a first pilot that never aired.

Which American broadcast network aired all six seasons of the crime drama Numb3rs on Friday nights?

CBS launched the series in January 2005 with a short first season of thirteen episodes. After a Sunday premiere it moved to Fridays and stayed in that slot for the rest of its run.

Numb3rs follows Don Eppes's FBI violent crimes squad as it works cases in which American city?

Los Angeles is home to both the squad and the Eppes family. Exterior shots of the FBI offices were filmed on a distinctive bridge at a downtown studio lot.

CalSci, where Charlie Eppes teaches on Numb3rs, is a fictional stand-in for which real university?

Caltech let the producers film academic scenes on its campus. One of its own math professors, Gary Lorden, became the show's mathematics consultant.

Which Blade Runner director served as an executive producer of Numb3rs alongside his brother Tony?

Ridley Scott and his brother designed the look of Charlie's moments of inspiration, including the ash-yellow tint that floods the screen when an idea lands.

Before their Numb3rs romance, what was Charlie Eppes's academic role in Amita Ramanujan's studies?

Charlie was her thesis adviser while Amita earned a doctorate in computational mathematics in season one. A CalSci division chair later disapproved of the pair dating.

In season three of Numb3rs, Larry Fleinhardt takes leave from CalSci to spend months working where?

The International Space Station trip was written in because the actor playing Larry left for much of the season to film another series. Larry flew as a payload specialist.

Which La Bamba star has a recurring Numb3rs role as Ian Edgerton, the FBI's top sniper and tracker?

Lou Diamond Phillips was hired for a single closed-ended story. Cast and crew liked Edgerton so much that the show brought him back in five of the six seasons.

Which Happy Days star guest-stars on Numb3rs as Roger Bloom, a veteran FBI bank robbery agent?

Henry Winkler's agent loses his badge after stealing $10 million to draw attention to a small theft at his sister's store. He comes back twice to help crack old cases.

Before joining the FBI, Don Eppes of Numb3rs spent time as a minor league player in which sport?

Baseball took Don through college on a scholarship and into Single-A ball as a utility player. The day after deciding he would never rise higher, he signed up for the FBI entrance exam.

Which Hollywood labor dispute cut the fourth season of Numb3rs to just eighteen episodes?

A writers' strike halted production after twelve episodes had been made. Once it ended, the network ordered six more, which aired in April and May 2008.

Which real moonwalker makes a silent cameo on Numb3rs to wish physicist Larry Fleinhardt well?

Buzz Aldrin appears as himself without speaking a word. The scene comes as Larry sets off on the adventure of his life, leaving Charlie the most emotional of his friends.

Which Top Gun actor guest-stars in the Numb3rs season four premiere as torture expert Mason Lancer?

Val Kilmer played the interrogator in the episode Trust Metric, in which the team races to rescue a colleague from Chinese spies aboard a ship heading out to sea.

On Numb3rs, physicist Larry Fleinhardt goes through spells of eating food of only which color?

White food, he reasons, helps him maintain supersymmetry, a focus of his research. After a life-changing trip he vows to live without such obsessions.

In the Numb3rs pilot, which backyard object inspires Charlie's formula for locating a criminal?

A sprinkler on the family lawn gives Charlie the idea: the pattern of its drops points back to the source, just as a string of crime scenes can point back to where an offender lives.

Which Nobel-winning physicist did the creators of Numb3rs name as the inspiration for Charlie Eppes?

Richard Feynman, noted as both a genius and an eccentric, was the model for Charlie. The show also makes him a former acquaintance of Charlie's mentor Larry.

Which actress, known as Theresa Diaz on The O.C., plays mathematician Amita Ramanujan on Numb3rs?

Navi Rawat nearly lost the part to a clash with another series, so Amita began as a recurring guest. She joined the main cast in season two.

Amita Ramanujan of Numb3rs is torn at the end of season two by a job offer from which university?

Harvard offered Amita a three-year assistant professorship. She took a similar post at CalSci instead, though she told Charlie it would be arrogant to think she had stayed only for him.

As Numb3rs ends, Charlie Eppes and Amita Ramanujan leave California to teach at which university?

Cambridge offered Charlie a visiting professorship, a long-held academic dream of his. The couple moved their wedding date forward so they could make the move to England together.

Charlie Eppes of Numb3rs enrolled at which Ivy League university at just thirteen years old?

Princeton is where the young Charlie took a quantum physics course taught by Larry Fleinhardt, who became his mentor and best friend. He graduated at sixteen.

Alan Eppes, the father on Numb3rs, is retired from which career that later proves useful to the FBI?

Urban planner Alan knows infrastructure inside out. He ends up advising his son's team on traffic engineering and even on how a building's elevator system works.

At which game do Alan and Don Eppes need to team up, plus a distraction, to beat Charlie on Numb3rs?

Chess is one of Charlie's great talents. Spelling is not, which is why his father prefers to take him on at a word game instead.

On Numb3rs, Charlie Eppes loses his security clearance after sending research to which country?

Pakistan was where Charlie sent genetic research to help clear a colleague accused of terrorism, knowing the cost. He was arrested and, for a time, shut out of his brother's cases.

Which Numb3rs agent is jailed as a spy for China, then revealed to be a loyal triple agent?

Colby Granger had been working for American counterintelligence all along, but the one handler who could vouch for him was dead. Cleared, he turned down a Washington job to stay.

The actor behind Larry Fleinhardt left Numb3rs mid-season three to play Tom Lennox on which series?

24 cast him as Tom Lennox for its sixth season. He appeared in only the first eleven Numb3rs episodes that year before returning near the end of the run.

What part does Larry Fleinhardt play when Charlie Eppes weds Amita Ramanujan in the Numb3rs finale?

The minister is Larry himself, ordained by the Universal Life Church just for the occasion. His address links the fundamental forces of the universe to the couple's love.

Which famous unsolved case does the Numb3rs episode Old Soldiers reopen with ex-agent Roger Bloom?

D. B. Cooper hijacked an airliner in 1971, parachuted out with the ransom and was never identified. The episode makes Roger Bloom one of the agents who once worked the case.

Which Ally McBeal Emmy winner plays Larry Fleinhardt, mentor to Charlie Eppes, on Numb3rs?

Peter MacNicol won his Emmy as the eccentric lawyer John Cage. One critic called his stargazing professor the most original character on Numb3rs.

Which Sister Act star plays Mildred Finch, the CalSci chair who dates Alan Eppes on Numb3rs?

Kathy Najimy was booked for two or three episodes, but the part grew when a regular cast member left mid-season. Millie becomes boss to both Charlie and Amita.

Which actor from a famous Hollywood family plays Marshall Penfield, Charlie's archrival on Numb3rs?

Colin Hanks, son of Tom Hanks, plays a fellow prodigy who needles Charlie with the nickname Eppsy. Penfield once challenged the Eppes Convergence, the paper that made Charlie's name.

Which How to Train Your Dragon voice star plays self-taught math whiz Oswald Kittner on Numb3rs?

Jay Baruchel was suggested for the one-off part by the show's lead actor. Fans liked Oswald so much that he returned, this time as a Canadian like Baruchel himself.

Which future Suits star was cast as Don Eppes in the first, never-aired pilot of Numb3rs?

Gabriel Macht filmed the whole pilot, but a test audience could not believe the three actors playing the family were related. The episode was reshot with a new brother and father.

The first Numb3rs pilot, later scrapped and reshot, was filmed in which East Coast city?

Boston was picked for its contrast between academia and the working class, with Charlie teaching at MIT. The university refused to allow any filming on its campus.

The 3 in the title of Numb3rs is borrowed from which style of online writing with hacker roots?

Leetspeak is a form of computer jargon that replaces letters with numbers. One newspaper critic refused to type the 3, likening it to the backwards R in Toys R Us.

The lead actor of Numb3rs argued that the 3 in its title should be replaced by which Greek letter?

Sigma, he pointed out, is a mathematical symbol that looks like an E, and he called the numeral annoying. In math the capital letter stands for summation.

On Numb3rs, Larry Fleinhardt and Amita Ramanujan join a real experiment hunting for which particle?

The Higgs boson search with the DZero team delighted the real researchers, who set up an office for the fictional Larry in their assembly building.

After his long leave on Numb3rs, a changed Larry Fleinhardt retreats to live in what kind of place?

A monastery in Altadena is his stepping stone back to ordinary life. He grows a beard and enjoys the quiet, but the monks finally turn him away, the only resident who gets visitors.

The Numb3rs pilot drew about 25 million viewers when it aired straight after which kind of broadcast?

An NFL playoff game, the AFC Championship between the Patriots and the Steelers, led straight into the pilot. It beat the debut of Desperate Housewives by about four million viewers.

Charlie Eppes of Numb3rs is a nominee for which mathematics honor, given only to those under forty?

Fields Medal hopes follow Charlie through the series. Amita jokes that her father will accept him once he wins it, and she believes he has the potential to do so.

In season five of Numb3rs, Don Eppes surprises his family by starting to explore which faith?

Judaism was the family's own heritage, but Don was raised in a secular home. He kept his visits to temple from Charlie at first, and his father later offered to help him with the prayers.

Which unsolved math problem did Charlie Eppes of Numb3rs obsess over during his mother's illness?

P versus NP, one of the Millennium Prize Problems, kept Charlie shut away for the last three months of his mother's life. His absence stayed a sore point between the brothers.

Which company, maker of Mathematica, reviewed Numb3rs scripts as the show's chief math consultant?

Wolfram Research supplied the background mathematics for each script. From season four it also ran a companion website with the network on the math behind the show.

Amita Ramanujan of Numb3rs wins which honor for her dissertation, handed over by Charlie Eppes?

The Milton Prize came as a surprise to Amita. She put the money toward a trip to India with her grandmother and the schooling of two girls she had met through an FBI case.

After her first doctorate on Numb3rs, Amita Ramanujan begins a second one in which subject?

Astrophysics brought Amita a new supervisor, and when he fell ill she took over his course on the structure and dynamics of galaxies.

Amita Ramanujan of Numb3rs was born to a South Indian family that speaks which language?

Tamil was also the heritage of Srinivasa Ramanujan, the celebrated self-taught mathematician whose surname the character borrows.

After selling his house on Numb3rs, Larry Fleinhardt sometimes sleeps in which part of CalSci?

The steam tunnels nearly cost Larry a NASA assignment when a rival reported his odd living arrangements. Charlie vouched for him as eccentric but brilliant.

Before coming home on Numb3rs, Don Eppes ran the FBI office in which Southwestern city?

Albuquerque was Don's own office as Special Agent in Charge. He accepted a demotion to move back when his mother fell ill, leaving behind a woman he had nearly married.