Patrick McGoohan, TV's 'Prisoner' Number Six
Patrick McGoohan - In addition to starring in the series, Patrick McGoohan wrote and directed several episodes of
Emmy-award-winning actor Patrick McGoohan died in Los Angeles Tuesday. He was 80.
McGoohan was an accomplished stage actor who starred in a number of films, but he is best remembered for The Prisoner, the innovative television series he helped create in the late 1960s.
The Prisoner was remarkable for its time. Its opening sequence, which featured McGoohan speeding into London in a Lotus Seven, was more like a film than TV.
(Authenticated News/Courtesy of Getty Images)
In that sequence, McGoohan's character — known only as "Number Six" — exits the car, stalks down a dark tunnel and throws open massive double doors. He pounds on a desk, slams down a piece of paper and storms out.
But insubordination has a price: McGoohan's photograph is X-ed out and his file dumped into a drawer labeled "reassigned." The character is then gassed and wakes up in a bucolic, empty village.
All of this happens before the name of the show even appears onscreen. Film critic David Thomson says it was remarkable for commercial television in Britain in the late 1960s.
(Patrick McGoohan, credit: Getty Images)
"It was an extraordinary show, which I think led the way ... in showing just how powerful, how profound a TV series could be. I think it's still breathtaking," Thomson says. "It's as if James Bond material had been given to Harold Pinter to write, to some extraordinary, surreal designer to design and Hitchcock to direct."
A Man Without A Country
Patrick Joseph McGoohan was born March 19, 1928, in Astoria, Queens. His parents returned to Ireland when he was 6 months old and later moved to England.
Thomson says that when McGoohan first appeared onstage in England, he was thought of as an Irish actor: "He sort of came from not anywhere in particular. ... He was very much his own man."
Early in his career, McGoohan starred in the popular British TV series Danger Man, which was rechristened Secret Agent by the American network CBS.
Though the show was a hit, the actor felt constrained by the format and detested the violence. When he was approached to do a follow-up, he insisted on setting his own terms. The resulting series was the The Prisoner, for which McGoohan co-created, starred in and also wrote, directed and produced a number of episodes.
His character in The Prisoner spent all 17 episodes trying to figure out where he was — and trying to escape the candy-colored village where everyone was watched by hidden cameras.
McGoohan was also a noted stage actor. Thomson, who saw the actor in a London production of Henrik Ibsen's Brand in the 1950s, says it was one of the greatest performances he has ever seen onstage. But he also says McGoohan's insistence on doing things his way cost him.
"This was a man who very easily, I think, could have been up there with Olivier and Gielgud in terms of being that famous an actor," Thomson says. "He was handsome. He had a great voice. He was a tremendous actor. But as he admitted himself, he was difficult. He wanted to do things his way and he had his own vision. And that meant he did much less."
Even before McGoohan became a TV star, he made the transition from stage to screen, starring in the classic 1962 jazz film All Night Long alongside Dave Brubeck and Charles Mingus, among others. More recently, McGoohan starred opposite Mel Gibson in Braveheart, playing the evil King Edward Longshanks.
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RENEE MONTAGNE, host:
One of the most innovative television programs of the 1960s was "The Prisoner." There weren't many episodes, but it became a cult classic, and the man who helped create it was actor Patrick McGoohan. He has died in Los Angeles at the age of 80, and NPR's Tom Cole has this look back at his most famous work.
TOM COLE: "The Prisoner" opens ominously on storm clouds and thunderclaps.
(Soundbite of thunder)
COLE: Behind the wheel of a racecar, Patrick McGoohan speeds across a barren landscape and into London. He stalks down a dark tunnel, throws open massive double doors, pounds on a desk, and slams down a piece of paper. Then he storms out. His photograph is X-ed out, and his file dumped into a drawer labeled "reassigned." He's then gassed and wakes up in a bucolic, empty village.
Mr. DAVID THOMSON (Author, "The New Biographical Dictionary of Film"): It was an extraordinary show which I think led the way, in many ways, in showing just how powerful, how profound a TV series could be.
COLE: David Thomson is the author of a biographical dictionary of film.
Mr. THOMSON: It's sort of as if James Bond material had been given to Harold Pinter to write, to some extraordinary surreal designer to design, and Hitchcock to direct.
(Soundbite of TV show "The Prisoner")
PATRICK MCGOOHAN (As Number Six): What's the name of this place?
Unidentified Woman: You're new here, aren't you?
PATRICK MCGOOHAN (As Number Six): Where?
Unidentified Woman: Do you want breakfast?
PATRICK MCGOOHAN (As Number Six): Where is this?
Unidentified Woman: The village?
PATRICK MCGOOHAN (As Number Six): Yes.
Unidentified Woman: I'll see if coffee's ready.
PATRICK MCGOOHAN (As Number Six): Where's the police station?
COLE: Patrick McGoohan was assigned the number six, and spent all 17 episodes of "The Prisoner" trying to escape the candy-colored village where everyone was watched by hidden cameras. The number was perhaps a reference to a line in the title song of the series that launched him as a secret agent.
(Soundbite of song "Secret Agent Man")
Unidentified Vocalist: Secret agent man, secret agent man, they've given you a number and taken away your name.
COLE: When Patrick McGoohan was approached to do a follow up, he insisted on setting his own terms. He co-created "The Prisoner" and wrote, directed, and produced a number of the episodes. McGoohan was also a noted stage actor and starred in the classic 1962 jazz film "All Night Long," and more recently opposite Mel Gibson in "Braveheart." The single-mindedness that produced a series about an individual resisting authority earned Patrick McGoohan an intensely devoted following. TV Guide once ranked "The Prisoner" as number seven in a list of the 25 top-rated cult shows ever. Too bad it couldn't make it to number six. Tom Cole, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright National Public Radio.
