The Rockford Files the series. Frequent directors included William Wiard (23 episodes), Lawrence Doheny (10 episodes), and Ivan Dixon (previously a regular on "Hogan's Heroes") (9 episodes). Veteran actor James Coburn directed an episode. Coburn had co-starred with Garner in the classic movies "The Great Escape" (1963) and "The Americanization of Emily" (1964). Other actors who directed episodes include Jackie Cooper (3 episodes) Richard Crenna and Dana Elcar (1 episode each). Co-creator Stephen J. Cannell directed several episodes; series regular Stuart Margolin and executive producer Meta Rosenberg each helmed 2; and James Garner directed one episode in the second season, "The Girl in
The Rockford Files the LAPD, Sgt. Dennis Becker (Joe Santos), a homicide detective struggling to advance in the department under a series of overbearing lieutenants. The two most notable are Alex/Thomas Diehl (Tom Atkins) during the first, second and fourth seasons and Doug Chapman (James Luisi) in the third to sixth seasons. Those higher-ups invariably dislike Rockford (and private investigators generally) 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