financially viable director, as Le spie vengono dal semifreddo (the Italian version of Dr. Goldfoot and the Girl Bombs) had been a commercial success. Writing and pre-production The initial treatment for Danger: Diabolik was written by Adriano Baracco, which was then adapted into a full screenplay by Dino Maiuri, who had previously scripted the Eurospy comedy Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die for De Laurentiis. The script was later revised by the British writing team of Brian Degas and Tudor Gates, who were hired by Bava due to their positive collaboration on the aborted giallo project Cry Nightmare (later filmed by Antonio Margheriti as The Young, the Evil and the Savage). The final screenplay, which is credited to Maiuri, Degas, Gates and Bava in the English version of the film, and only to Maiuri and Bava in the Italian version, was based on three separate Diabolik stories: Sepolto vivo! () from August 1963, Lotta disperata (Hopeless Battle) from March 1964, and L'ombra nella notte (The Shadows of Night) from May 1965. Degas and Gates' script bore the working title of Goldstrike! for Paramount to consider as an alternative title for the film's international release due to the fumetti being little-known outside of Italy; the film's English title was announced by Parmount's publicist Chuck Painter to be Danger: Diabolik on November 29, 1967. De Lautentiis was so enthusiastic towards Degas and Gates' work that he hired them to provide additional material for Barbarella. In analysing Degas and Gates' Goldstrike! script (dated December 5, 1966) compared to the film, Bava biographer Tim Lucas notes that the former includes details not featured onscreen, such as Diabolik being implicated as the mastermind behind the 1963 Great Train Robbery (a reference to Julius No's implied theft of Portrait of the Duke of Wellington in Dr. No), sequences that were staged differently to what was filmed, and lacks scenes that were entirely Bava's invention. Among the differences include the opening heist — which was scripted as concerning an armoured car carrying gold, compared to the film's depiction of a diversion in which cash is transported in a Rolls-Royce accompanied by a police motorcade — a police raid on a casino instead of a discotheque, Eva injuring herself while using an exercycle rather than while helping Diabolik set up a trap, a second conversation between the Minister of Finance and being substituted with a televised plea