You were Number 6

Posted By: Kathleen DavidPosted On:

Kathleen here posting on Peter’s site.

Patrick McGoohan has passed away at the age of 80.

obit here

The Prisoner is a series that has shaped my life in ways that I can’t even imagine. For years I thought the image of the Rover and other odd visuals was just a bizarre dream that I had as a child until my parents informed me that no, that was a TV series that I saw when I was child.

He was describe by a friend of mine who worked with him as an actor’s actor and I have to agree.

I always enjoyed his performances and I am sadden at his passing.

29 comments on “You were Number 6”

  3. 80 is a long life but it’s still sad to lose him. He was brilliant even in one of his last roles, as longshanks in Braveheart.

  4. Interesting little tidbit – playing the “six degrees” game, i am no more than one or maybe two from McGoohan, through an SF author, no less – F. Gwynplaine MacIntyre, whom i have met once or twice, worked on The Prisoner and, i understand, operated the “Rovers”.

  5. That’s sad news, and my condolences to Mr. McGoohan’s family. Ironically, I was thinking about him earlier today, hours before I learned of his death.

    Also ironically, while he lived a long and full life, 80 still feels young to me. But then, we just celebrated my Grandmother’s 100th birthday.

    I never met Mr. McGoohan or communicated with him in any way, but there’s one question I would liked to have asked him, had I the chance. In 1977, he was interviewed by Warner Troyer, with additional questions from students at Seneca College, and at one point, someone said that The Prisoner had anticipated Watergate and the enemy within, and asked McGoohan if he were to make the series again at that time, looking ahead to the 1980s, who did he see as the real enemy (not the storybook one)? McGoohan replied that it would be progress, which he described as the biggest enemy, apart from oneself.

    The question I would have initially asked him, when I first heard the interview sometime in the 1980s, was whether he still felt the same now that we were in that decade. More recently, I would have asked what themes he’d have addressed in The Prisoner that may or may not have been addressed in the 1960s, were he to make the series in the present day. As well as whether he still views progress as one of the real enemies we face.

    And my thought about McGoohan earlier today (and I’ve no idea why it popped into my head)? Given that he has in some ways become a prisoner of The Prisoner (it is what he’s best known for, after all), I wondered what he would do if he could travel back in time to the period when he was first considering doing the series. If his younger self asked whether he should go ahead and do this series, would he say yes or no?

    I’d like to think McGoohan would have advised his younger self to say yes; that he felt whatever drawbacks of having done The Prisoner were outweighed by the positive things he achieved.

    Rick

    P.S. McGoohan did more than The Prisoner, of course, and one project I look forward to getting on DVD is his turn as Dr. Syn, the Scarecrow of Romney Marsh.

  6. At least he got to see his first great-grandson; i really don’t anticipate living till Maggie or Natalie present Helen with a grand-daughter.

  7. I looked on CNN to see if the news made it to their website and discovered that Ricardo Montalban (Wrath of Khan / Fantasy Island) just died as well. Such a shame!

  8. I just refreshed my CNN screen and now it says that Steve Jobs is taking leave of Apple due to health reasons…..geeeez

  9. Don Galloway also passed away recently. It’s true that celebrities die in three, then.

    In France, we just lost Claude Berri. A loss for french cinema.

    BTW, I know it’s an easy one, but Patrick McGohan will always be number one for me.

  10. Ðámņ…

    The Prisoner is iconic of course, but I also loved his work in ‘Rafferty’,a TV series that pre-empts ‘House’ by about 30 years! (“McGoohan was superb as cantankerous, grouchy Dr. Sid Rafferty. Rafferty has just retired as a colonel, after 20 years in the army. He is now entering private practice. Rafferty is a brilliant diagnostician, and most of the episodes are more like detective stories than medical soap operas, as he tries to figure out what is wrong with his patient.”)

    My favourite movie of his was “Kings and Desperate Men”, screenplay and direction by Alexis Kanner, who was also in The Prisoner…

    And Ricardo Montalban too.

    Sheesh.

    2009, coming in hard and fast with maximum ‘suck’ factor… 🙁

    Cheers.

  11. Manoman … what a crappy day for deaths. Montalban and McGoohan in the same day.

    My condolences to both families — but one bright side, I suppose, is that both of them can certainly expect to have some of their words live on until the sun goes red giant.

    Looks like a memorial viewing of both TWOK and The Prisoner is in order sometime soon.

    Ðámņ.

    TWL

  12. Incidentally – for all “Prisoner” fans, i must recommend this video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_0BoRMuEh2c

    The funny thing is that, accordint to something David Lindsay told me years ago, the band {who were born in 1962 and 1963 – the song was a 1982 release, so they were like 18 or 19; thus, too young to remember the first run, and grew up before VCRs were common} had never heard of “The Prisoner”, and had no idea what the hëll the video producer was up to, why they were in Wales, or why they were wearing those costumes…

    *After* the video was finished, he showed them some episodes.

    Keep an eye out for Number 1/2. Sorry the video quality is so low…

  13. I recently watched a handful of seasons of Danger Man, and what stood out to me was

    1. how timeless the quality of the shows were, they never lost my attention, and
    2. unlike any other show I could think of for its time period, a substantial number of its episodes wouldn’t have been approved by the Comics Code Authority, from how the show criticized first-world governmental policies

    Never mind how awesomely The Prisoner capped-off that show.

    I was astonished to hear who some of the actors in early-consideration for the role of Gandalf were, like Sean Connery (who turned down 15% of the box office because he didn’t understand the material), Tom Baker, and McGoohan.

  14. I was already kicking myself for not pre-ordering Dr. Syn: The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh (starring McGoohanan) dvd, since it’s already sold out on Amazon. Now I’m kicking with both legs.

  15. Other memorial viewings might include the 3 episodes of Columbo that he appeared in. One as the director of a military academy, one as a secret agent (with Leslie Nielson), and from the later series, the one as a funeral director.

  16. I heard it during a 10-hour shift tonight. Took me a moment to digest that it was “McGoohan” as opposed to “MacNee” following the “Patrick.” The one, true John Steed is also a death I’ll mourn when it happens — not for a while, hopefully.

    As for Montalban, when I heard the news, only one word popped into my head, though with more sorrow than the anger usually associated with it.

    Everyone, all together now:

    KHAAANNNNNNN!!!!!!

  17. I had just finished the Complete “Danger Man” series on DVD. Even though the show changed from the 1st season to the 2nd, and the format was tweaked a bit, the same elements character elements always came through; integrity, intelligence, and intensity. John Drake (Danger Man), could be dropped into a nasty situation with no weapons or backup and have to resolve the situation with a clever ruse and his bare hands.

    I am planning on starting my “The Prisoner” DVD’s tomorrow night.

    Be seeing you Number 6.

  18. The Prisoner had a rather odd but long-lasting effect on me: I modified my handwriting back in 1990 to look like the Prisoner font. I’ve since reverted on the g’s and w’s, but you can still see the signs in anything I write.

  19. The Prisoner is, in my mind, by far the best series of the 1960s. It’s a rare on a TV series where you can see so clearly a particular person’s vision. The Prisoner was unquestionably McGoohan’s show. Hopefully he’s found some sort of freedom wherever he currently i9s. As others have said, be seeing you.

  20. The Prisoner is, in my mind, by far the best series of the 1960s. It’s a rare on a TV series where you can see so clearly a particular person’s vision. The Prisoner was unquestionably McGoohan’s show. Hopefully he’s found some sort of freedom wherever he currently is. As others have said, be seeing you.

  21. Patrick McGoohan was marvelous in “Danger Man” and “The Prisoner” and very nearly as good in dozens of other roles.

  22. We were talking about Patrick on the B5 Moderated newsgroup, and I remembered reading on AICN that he’d turned down both Bond and The Saint, and wasn’t quite sure why. Bond, I learned, was because he didn’t like the character as written by Fleming; a stone cold killer and chauvinist bášŧárd, and McGoohan was nothing like him. Connery got the part, and when Sean left, they tried for Patrick again. And he turned them down. Again.

    Why he turned down The Saint I don’t know; Simon Templar was considerably more cuddly than Bond, but it’s possible that the crumpet du jour aspect of both characters might have been disagreeable to him. Anyway, in many ways Patrick was responsible for the careers of both Connery and Moore being where they are; his having walked away from both Bond and Templar made those two famous.

    Patrick was a hëll of an actor. As JMS said, the world has just become less interesting.

    Miles

  23. …it’s possible that the crumpet du jour aspect of both characters might have been disagreeable to him.

    I heard that he thought Drake actively dating was irresponsible of the character. Watching the show seasons at a time, my brother and I joked that Drake could only refuse the advances of all the women who threw themselves at him if he were gay.

    Also heard one of his conditions playing Drake was that the technology presented should more or less be commercially available, although he may have adopted the condition in the first place to distinguish Drake from Bond.

  25. Maybe he turned down “The Saint” because, while Leslie Charteris was actively involved, it couldn’t be done right for television on the Sixties – likely still couldn’t be, for that matter.

    While the Saint is a Good Guy, he’s really pretty much as cold a killer as Bond – though he usually pretty much follows the equivalent of the Texas “Needed Killin'” law – people with whom the world is much better off without who the law can’t touch.

    And he cheerfully admits that he lives off the proceeds of crime – though in the early days, he only kept ten poercent of what he stole and passed the rest on to worthy charities…

    Haven’t seen the Val Kilmer film – Kate has, and said it was pretty bad if you actually knew about the character…

    Also, McGoohan really wouldn’t have suited the Saint, physically (though Roger Moore didn’t, either) – the Saint is described as six feet tall (that was pretty tall for an Englishman in 1928 when Charteris created the character) and slender, with black hair and very blue eyes. George Sander played him once ot twice in films – these days i sort of visualise the “Remington Steele”-period Pierce Brosnan… (Ian Ogilvie wasn’t bad, but they still couldn’t – or wouldn’t – do a fully-accurate version.)

  26. “Who are you?”
    “The new number two.”
    “Who is number one?”
    “You are, number six”.

    The insertion of a comma in that last line, made all the difference in understanding that show.

  27. …and now Sir John Mortimer, creator of Rumpole of the Bailey, has stepped on a rainbow…

  29. Jesus Harold Christ on a warp-driven pogo stick… Well, it’s not like any of these guys had a short life that was totally wasted. They all gave us great works. And that makes them immortal.

    Miles

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