Batman

This is the first time that the villains, The Penguin, The Joker, Catwoman & The Riddler, gather together to go up against the Caped Crusaders.

According to The Official Batman Batbook guide to the series, Burgess Meredith ad-libbed the line at the end of the scene where the Penguin dehydrated the pirates: "Careful! Every one of them has a mother!"

Much like Aunt Harriet, the series' narrator has a very limited part in the movie. He appears only at the beginning of the movie after the title credits.

People rarely died over the course of the Batman TV series, but, the movie scored a whopping body count of six! The Penguin's pirate who meets his end at the hands of the exploding octopus and the 5 dehydrated rehydrated pirates. Also in a rare turn, Bruce threatens to kill each member of United Underworld if they harmed Kitka.

Filmed April 25-May 31, 1966 at Fox Studios and on location in Santa Barbara, CA, and Los Angeles, CA.

On the audio commentary on the DVD, Adam West says that Batman is lying when he says he saw the foam rubber out of the corner of his eye after the helicopter landed safely.

Cesar Romero now wears a Joker wig which has a brighter shade of green. He would wear this wig throughout the remainder of the series' run. Also, this is the only appearance of The Joker wearing a red mask (matching his attire).

As the end credits superimpose over The Dynamic Duo lowering themselves by their Batropes, those aren't dummies being filmed! Nope, that really is our faithful Bat-stars Adam and Burt risking life and limb, performing their own stunts, 25 stories high above the city's din!!!

Aunt Harriet is seen in only 2 shots in the whole movie!

The President with whom Commissioner Gordon speaks towards the end of the film by phone is none other than Lyndon Baines Johnson himself...beagles and all!

The Batcopter was a real helicopter based on the Bell 47 design.

The Batboat was the creation of Glastron Industries in Austin, Texas---hence 20th Century-Fox's decision to premiere the Batman movie in the city.

Notice that all of The Batvehicles come complete with a red flashing Bat-beacon!

Commodore Schmidlapp was originally called Commodore Redhead.

The rubber shark that attacked Batman previously appeared as Peter Lorre's pet in the 1961 film version of Voyage To The Bottom Of The Sea.

Composer Nelson Riddle's musical cues heard in the Batman movie would be recycled in several second-season episodes.

This was Frank Gorshin's final onscreen appearance as The Riddler until the TV series' third season.

Contrary to Burt Ward's audio commentary on the DVD, Julie Newmar was not filming Mackenna's Gold at the time of the Batman movie's production; it wouldn't start filming for at least another year! A back injury was the true reason, and so ex-Miss America Lee Meriwether was cast as The Catwoman in Newmar's stead.

The Penguin's exploding octopus was preceded by a giant exploding umbrella in the screenplay's first draft.

A Compressed Steam Batpole Lift and an Instant Costume Change Lever, both introduced here in the Bat-movie, explained to Bat-viewers exactly how Bruce N. Wayne and Richard Grayson can change to and from Batman and Robin.

The jet-pack umbrellas originated in a February 1965 Batman comic story; an early first draft of Lorenzo Semple Jr.'s script had the packs worn on the villains backs, as opposed to being ridden. The umbrellas were also supposed to arouse attraction of The USAF, under the command of Colonel Terry, chasing down the villains in jet planes.

The movie was intended to aid 20th Century-Fox in selling the Batman TV Series to overseas markets. Its larger budget allowed the producers to create 3 new Batvehicles: The Bat-copter, The Bat-boat and a -Bat-cycle and then use them in the series. Due to financial limits of the TV series, the footage of The Batcopter and The Batboat was lifted directly from the film and edited into the episodes where needed.