The character of Ellery Queen is the product of the imaginations of two mystery writers who sign themselves "Ellery Queen." The Ellery of the books is also a mystery writer who writes about a character called "Ellery Queen." That sort of infinite regress leads to a speculative void into which any lapses of continuity in the saga can easily fit. What is important is that despite the changes, the Ellery we read about is always Ellery, filled with logic, passion, and compassion, and his father is always the same Inspector Richard Queen.

When he is first introduced in The Roman Hat Mystery (1929), Ellery Queen is a junior edition Philo Vance, a fairly recent Harvard grad wrapped in shapeless tweeds and sporting pince-nez, lecturing everyone in sight, and patronizing his gray, birdlike police inspector father. The obvious affection between them, however, makes Ellery likable in a way Vance never is. Later, Ellery changes; he admits what the reader has known from the start - that the human factor in his cases is as important as the logic and deduction - and begins to lighten up. The pince-nez disappears, and there's more humor in the books, peaking with the two novels set during Ellery's (frustrating) stint as a Hollywood writer: The Devil to Pay (1938) and The Four of Hearts (1938). It also provides Ellery with his only real love interest, Hollywood columnist Paula Paris.

In Calamity Town (1942), two important elements are introduced. The first is the New England town of Wrightsville (although The Murderer Is a Fox, 1945, unmistakably identifies it as being in upstate New York), where many of Ellery's novel-length and short story adventures of the next three decades take place. Also introduced is the angst that infuses the series - especially the Wrightsville novels - of the same period. No more are these "problems in deduction," as the earliest works were defined. Ellery suffers over his cases and their consequences now. He even fails, at times.

The series was supposed to end with The Finishing Stroke (1958), which begins in Ellery's youth in 1929 and ends with his finally solving the case in late middle age in 1958. Frederic Dannay (see Ellery Queen) had further ideas, so in 1963 The Player on the Other Side appeared. This book was written from a Dannay outline by science fiction writer Theodore Sturgeon and then revised by Manfred B. Lee, the other half of the Queen author team. The next two novels, And on the Eighth Day (1964) and The Fourth Side of the Triangle (1965), were again written from Dannay outlines, this time by science fiction writer Avram Davidson and revised by Lee. Lee, who had had a heart attack, resumed the writing chores for the rest of his life, after which there were no more novels about Ellery or his father, just a short story ghosted by Edward D. Hoch.

The last period of the Queen career tended to return to puzzle aspects, setting the mysteries in artificial, restricted environments, and explorations of new facets of themes Queen had dealt with in earlier books.

Ellery Queen was most often portrayed on screen as just another wisecracking private eye type. The first film, The Spanish Cape Mystery (Republic 1935, directed by Lewis D. Collins), starred smooth Donald Cook in a story based on the Queen novel of the same title. The plot concerned an otherwise nude corpse found clad in an opera cape.

Eddie Quillan was the first of the brash Ellerys in The Mandarin Mystery (Republic, 1937, directed by Ralph Staub), an adaptation of the 1934 Queen classic, The Chinese Orange Mystery.

In 1940, Columbia Pictures began a series of Queen movies starring Ralph Bellamy. Charlie Grapewin played Inspector Richard Queen, James Burke was Sergeant Velie, and Margaret Lindsay played Nikki Porter, Ellery's secretary and love interest. The films were Ellery Queen, Master Detective (1940, directed by Kurt Neumann); Ellery Queen's Penthouse Mystery (1941, directed by James Hogan); Ellery Queen and the Perfect Crime (1941, directed by James Hogan); and Ellery Queen and the Murder Ring, (1941), based on the 1931 novel The Dutch Shoe Mystery, directed by James Hogan. After this, Bellamy left the part, to be replaced by the smaller, tougher William Gargan. Columbia continued the series, all directed by James Hogan, with A Close Call for Ellery Queen (1942); A Desperate Chance for Ellery Queen (1942); and Enemy Agents Meet Ellery Queen (1942).

In 1972, French Director Claude Chabrol turned one of the darkest of the Queen novels, Ten Days' Wonder, into an art film described by film critic Leonard Maltin as "erratic but moody." Orson Welles starred as a brooding millionaire, Anthony Perkins played his disturbed son, and Marlene Jolbert played the woman they both wanted. Ellery was transmogrified into college Professor Paul Regis and was played by Michel Piccoli.

In a rare development, the character of Ellery Queen was adapted to radio by its creators. Dannay and Lee, as former advertising writers, knew the promotional power of radio. The authors brought to the new medium the "challenge to the reader" from their earlier books. This said, in essence, "You now have all the clues; can you solve the crime?" On radio, this took the form of the fictional Ellery stopping the action and delivering the challenge in person to the listener at home and, in some incarnations, to a celebrity sleuth there in the studio.

The Queen radio show ran in one form or another on CBS, NBC, and ABC. Scripts were by Dannay and Lee, and later by Lee assisted by others, most notably Anthony Boucher. Ellery was played by Hugh Marlowe (who would later take the role on television, as well), Larry Dobkin, Carleton Young, and Sidney Smith. Marion Shockley was the first actress to portray Nikki Porter, Ellery's secretary and low-key love interest. This character appeared in films, short stories, and novels, but was created for radio.

As with the radio Queen, television versions of the "logical successor to Sherlock Holmes" appeared on three networks (as well as in syndication) in a twenty-six-year span.

Richard Hart, big and strapping and sporting an incongruous Errol Flynn moustache, was the star of "The Adventures of Ellery Queen." Florenz Ames played his father, Inspector Richard Queen. The show appeared on the Dumont Network beginning in 1950. Less than a third of the way through the season, Hart died and was replaced by Lee Bowman, older, suaver, and slimmer. This version lasted until 1952.

In 1954, Hugh Marlowe, one of the radio Queens, starred in a syndicated version of "The Adventures of Ellery Queen." This version was filmed instead of being aired live and aired in some markets as "Mystery Is My Business." George Nader began as the star of 1958's "The Further Adventures of Ellery Queen" on NBC with Les Tremayne as the inspector, but nothing about this version lasted long. The production moved from Hollywood to New York and was switched from live to tape, Nader was replaced by Lee Philips, Inspector Queen was eliminated altogether, and the title was shortened to "Ellery Queen." Queen remained off the home screen for thirteen years, returning in a TV movie called Ellery Queen: Don't Look Behind You. Peter Lawford's Ellery was a mod British swinger; Harry Morgan played Inspector Queen, Ellery's uncle in this version, a step taken, no doubt, in an attempt to reduce the level of absurdity. This was a pilot for a possible slot in the original NBC mystery movie wheel, but it lost out to McMillan and Wife. The script, by Richard Levinson and William Link (billed as "Ted Leighton" because they disapproved of changes made), was based on the classic Queen novel Cat of Many Tails.

In 1975, Levinson and Link, lifelong Queen fans, were allowed by NBC to do Queen the way they wanted. The result was "Ellery Queen," a show that ran one full season. For their inspiration, the producers went back not to the original novels (although the pilot was based on a Queen novel and one episode on a short story), but to the radio show, setting this series in 1947 and reviving the challenge to the listener. Jim Hutton played Ellery as a good-natured, absent-minded young man. Frederic Dannay said Hutton's portrayal reminded him not so much of the fictional Ellery, but of himself at about Hutton's age. David Wayne was excellent as Inspector Queen.