My first actual exposure to the works of Patrick McGoohan must have come in the form of references to them. I’m sure I had heard talk of
The Prisoner
before, but my first memory of anything relating to it is from an episode of Lew Stringer’s Combat Colin when it was running in Marvel UK’s Transformers comic. The episode turned into a serial, set in ‘The Village’ and spoofing many of the concepts found in The Prisoner itself. Seeing as I was in the target demographic when it was running and that the show hadn’t been shown on terrestrial television for close to a decade, quite how many of us reading it got the reference is hard to say, but mention was certainly made of it, if not in the letters page, then I certainly recall a mention next to the artist’s signature saying something along the lines of ‘with apologies to Patrick McGoohan’.
It was many years before I finally got round to seeing the show itself, but Mr. McGoohan’s face had impinged onto my subconcious beforehand, though I wasn’t to realise this until some years later, cunningly disguised under a layer of facial hair as it was. It was during my phase of videoing anything that the TV guide in the Torygraph described as ‘horror’ that I ended up first seeing Cronenburg’s Scanners. Like many youthful gore afficianados, I was quickly hooked by the sight of a bald man with a ‘tache’s head violently exploding within the first twenty minutes (my brother and I watched it through frame by frame on a few occasions, which still didn’t spoil the magic weirdly). The beardy doctor was of course integral to the plot, but had none of the spectacular psychic abilities of the rest of the cast, so I didn’t pay him an awful lot of heed. It wasn’t until I actually bought the film on video that I realised that it was actually McGoohan putting in the facework in the role. It wasn’t one of his best roles by a long shot, but it was my first real exposure to the man in motion.
It must have been the late eighties when Channel 4 finally got round to showing The Prisoner again. By then it had acheived an almost mythic status in my mind and I must have tuned into every episode. I don’t think I videoed any, and with it being shown at ten at night I must have ended up watching them on the dubious black and white television I had in my bedroom by that time. So ancient was the set that it had no channel buttons and I had to manually tune to any station I could manage to pick up on the weak internal aerial. Surprisingly I could normally get all four, even living at the bottom of a valley as we did. I was hooked from the opening titles and still consider them to be the greatest opening to any show ever. Ron Grainer’s music (from a tune whistled by McGoohan allegedly) is probably close to being one of my Desert Island Discs and I would consider taking up driving again if I could get one of those lotuses. Such was my fascination that in later life a friend and I managed to read the street name that appears for a split second outside McGoohan’s London pomme de terre and made a pilgrimage there. It’s a lawyer’s office now, but still overlooks the skyscrapers that swirl through Mcgoohan’s vision as he’s gassed.
I don’t remember my reaction to many specific episodes, with a couple of exceptions. Living in Harmony, which aside from having the show’s normal opening credits, was ostensibly a western for forty of it’s forty-five minutes amazed me with how it played with the formula the previous episodes had built up. The Girl Who Was Death played with the format too, with it’s manic Boy’s Own antics, only to cop out with a slightly annoying ending.
And then there was Fall Out.
Much has been made of the last episode by many and I doubt very much that I can add anything else to the debate. I have my own theories of what has happened at the end of those gloriously psychedelic three quarters of an hour, but have no desire to impose them onto you. I think everyone should have their own take on them and I certainly believe that everyone should watch them, even if they have to have their peepers forced wide, Alex style. Of course it wouldn’t have the impact of watching without all the prior parts, but I still consider it to be a pinnacle of televisual acheivement that nothing else has ever quite lived up to.
My love for the show continued after Four had finished showing it. I caught it again when they repeated the whole lot again a year or so later. A few years after that, when I was in steady employment, I forked out for the whole series on video in a couple of boxsets on the day of release. I don’t know how many times I’ve watched these now, but rarely a year passes without my sticking at least an episode on. As I say, I made the pilgrimage to the street from the opening credits and a few years later finally saw my ambition to visit Portmerion come to fruition. Lovely place, but an awful lot smaller than they managed to make it look.
Of course I realise that Patrick McGoohan did an awful lot more work than just The Prisoner. Some of it I’ve seen – Danger Man, Ice Station Zebra and several mighty fine episodes of Columbo being the first that spring to mind – most of it I haven’t – much as I love him, I’m still not going to sit through pissing Braveheart just to see his contribution. The world at large will probably remember him best for that little show he did at the end of the sixties and, more importantly, that is how I’ll remember him.
Running down a beach, persued by a roaring weather balloon.
Seriously, does it really get any better that that?
Be seeing you, Number One.
SUPPLEMENTAL – A couple of other tributes I’ve run across on t’internet that I thought I might share. The genius that is Brendan McCarthy uploaded this picture, which I really quite like. Witticist extraordinaire Evan Dorkin manages to sum up everything I’ve rambled on about up there far more succinctly and movingly than I’ve managed and also provides us with this strip as a little farewell. Enjoy.
