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Sunday 14 June 2015

The Blazer Effect!

    I was going through my issues of ‘Number Six’ magazine looking for a particular item, when I came across something in “Whys and wherefores.” A contributor to the magazine {the name is known} wrote the question “Why does Curtis wear the No.6 badge in The Schizoid Man when the real No.6 would refuse to do so?” The author of the question also provided an answer “This is probably to make it easier for the viewer to identify who is who – which is still confusing the first time around anyway.”
   Never mind the badge, what about the blazer? Was it so confusing the first time around? I do not recall it being so. In fact the difference in blazers made it too easy to distinguish between the real Number 6 and the economy pack! In my book it would have been far better to have kept the original idea of having both Number 6’s wearing identical blazers. That way it would have been far more difficult for the viewer to distinguish between the 6’s, and that would have remained right up until the moment when Number 6 was caught trying to escape The Village in the guise of Curtis!
    As it is, the change to have Number 6/Curtis wearing a cream blazer, makes a mockery of that Polaroid picture Alison took of Number 6. That picture should have discredited Curtis the moment Alison saw it, except she was betraying Number 6 at that point. And yet it is a point Number 6 himself never picked up on. The fact that Number 6 in the Polaroid is wearing a dark blazer, when Curtis is quite clearly wearing a cream one!

Be seeing you

15 comments:

  1. I’m convinced that having the double, Curtis, dressed in reverse colours isn’t a fault or something. Because it isn’t about confusing the viewer in the first place, is it! To me it’s a clever, a bit of a Hitchcockian move perhaps, thus letting the viewer know more than the hero where the real No. 6, for a certain period of time, is heavily in doubt of his own personality. And that’s what they were up to. Further investigation into the matter required, though. – BCNU!

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    1. Hello Arno,
      Good to hear from you as always.
      Its a good interpretation regarding how Curtis was dressed in the reverse blazer to Number 6. The possitive and negative effect as I once called it. However originally both Number 6's were to be dressed in identical dark piped blazers. Then Patrick McGoohan said that to do that would make it far too complicated for the television viewer {at the time} to tell them apart. {I think on this occasion McGoohan underestimated the audience} So the idea of having Curtis wearing the cream blazer was introduced to make identification easier. That's how I have always understood it to be. I would have to seach for the reference to it, either on paper on in a video interview.
      There are production photographs of McGoohan and Frank Maher wearing identical dark blazers in both No.6's cottage, and in the gymnasium when they are doing the target shooting.

      Very best regards
      David
      BCNU

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  2. Without hesitation I believe you! It may well be the reason why both the double and No. 6 wear different colours, in order not to be too confusing for viewers. However, as it frequently happens with works of art, not everything goes or is according to plan, the way the artist had thought it up. Things happen, artistic receptions as well as general perception changes and things take on a life of their own thus, in return, changing the object of interest, its meaning. The reverse colours black = white, white = black not only symbolise, they visualise the antagonism between GOOD and EVIL thus giving a new "twist" in meaning, or let's say: interpretation to the plot that otherwise may have been simply confusing. Thereby allowing viewers to keep their fingers crossed for their hero because he remains clearly distinguishable.

    As early as in silent films like "The Student from Prague" it isn't about mixing up the characters because, in the end, that's only a screwball comedy, isn't it. Still further thinking required. - BCNU!

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    1. Hello Arno,
      I enjoyed reading your comment very much, and I take the point you are making. But a point I should like to make myself regarding the following taken from your comment:
      "The reverse colours black = white, white = black not only symbolise, they visualise the antagonism between GOOD and EVIL thus giving a new "twist" in meaning,"
      I can understand the interpretation of the struggle between good and evil. But It struck both Morag and I, that in having Number 6 wearing the black blazer, that makes him the evil antagonist!
      But then at the end, going along with your suggested interpretation, symbolically, "evil" overcomes "good," but then he dons the white blazer. Does that make "evil" becoming "good," or is "evil" masquerading as "good?"
      It's certainly an original idea that you have come up with.

      Very best regards
      David
      BCNU

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    2. The least, good and evil aren't things from 2 separate worlds. - BCNU!

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    3. Hello Arno,
      Sorry, I don't quite understand what you mean, as I wasn't aware that either of us had implied good and evil are from two separate Worlds.

      Very best regards
      David
      BCNU

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    4. Hello David, sorry, I may have been disorientating. I meant good and evil are merely two sides of one and the same coin.

      You say, "having Number 6 wearing the black blazer, that makes him the evil antagonist!" - No, I don't want to imply that the colour black equals "evil". Not at all. Black for No. 6 (well, actually a very dark brown, nobody, incl. myself, knew at the time and many years later) rather is a or: the existentialist colour. No. 6's strong personal and moral convictions add to this. The rest is clever playfulness in turning the colour scheme upside down. I say, there may have been the plan to make both characters appear alike but the decision not to do it in the end was very wise. - Hope this clears up a bit. - BCNU!

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    5. Hello Arno,
      Actually when I read your previous comment, I did wonder if you meant the different sides of the same coin, but I didn't wish to presume.
      Thank you, your comment did clear things up a bit, except for the colour of Number 6's blazer. Actually when Morag and I saw the dark blazer worn by McGoohan on display with other costumes at the 1994 Prisoner Convention at Portmeirion when Peter Jones still owned it, it was a little threadbare, faded, with a tinge of green about it because of its age. However the blazer that I saw in Portmeirion I can only describe as clearly once being black. I have been unable to find the colour of the blazer referrenced anywhere from the time. Certainly in the series the blazer does look brown in many shots but that's due to the lighting, it can also look navy blue in certain shots. The other blazer worn in 'The Schizoid Man' isn't white, its cream, but on television it looks white!

      Very best regards
      David
      BCNU

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    6. Well, David, I cannot insist on brown simply because that's what I once read. The blazer colour to me was always black even when I first saw it on a colour TV. At times it appeared to be not just black, that's true. One individual I know had one made in China when he was on a trip there. It's actually dark brown but it looks great and it is real wool as far as I know, not plastic. - BCNU!

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    7. Hello Arno,
      I've never read the balzer was brown, I've just gone by the colour on the television screen. But someone once did say to me once that it was a brown blazer, although the person wasn't in anyway connected with the actual production of 'the Prisoner.' It would be good if I could find documentation from the time about the blazers McGoohan wore.
      I know a chap who if I commissioned would make me a replica of the blazers as worn by Patrick McGoohan. He would track down the exact same material etc, but then there would be the question of price. A it happens he makes replice Doctor Who costumes.
      I have something else to say about the blazer, but will do so in an email, as its not for public discussion.

      Very kind regards
      David
      BCNU

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    8. Hello Arno, and to everyone who has been reading this article and the comments that have followed it.
      Regarding one of the blazers worn by Patrick McGoohan, my wife and I did see it once, at a Prisoner Convention, and have a clear memory of it being a faded black blazer. And I have always believed that Number 6's blazer being black looked to take on a brown hue in different lights. However after some reseach into the matter, I was utterly and completely wrong. Because it was the other way around! Brown, and taking on a black colour in different lighting. And I quote from the website

      http://www.the-prisoner-6.freeserve.co.uk/prisoner_video_02.htm

      "The blazer is a soft mohair material and surprisingly isn't black or even dark blue as it appears to be onscreen, it's actually a very dark but warm brown.
      Colours change and details get lost under harsh blue-white studio lights (even the outdoor scenes were shot with artificial light - believe me, Portmeirion isn't THAT sunny) and black is notoriously difficult to light - it just comes out as featureless. So, the dark brown blazer LOOKS black on film but the folds, backlighting and body movement effects don't get lost."

      So my apologies to Arno, and those of you who have been following the comments. No-one infallible.

      Very kind regards
      David
      BCNU

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    9. David, no need to apologise! For years I kept believing it was a black one, what else. Until I came across one source (not quite that one) who told me it was brown, dark brown. And now, on talking about "The Schizoid Man", my "conviction" was shaken, could it really be true... In the course of the discussion I thought of the effect one occasionally has on watching TV on a flat screen; and LCD flat screens by principle don't display real pitch black, they can't. So, that's when a supposedly black piece within the image isn't really black but shines a bit blueish, the black being disrupted. My thoughts went from there to 'couldn't it be the blazer worn by No. 6 wasn't black for technical reasons' becuase, as I was thinking, 'it would look like a hole in the image.' Well, it's almost the case here. I'm glad this issue could be settled. For peace of mind. Otherwise, I'd have had to resign... - BCNU!

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    10. Hello Arno,
      You write a very interesting comment, and you may well have the right of it. I too am pleased this matter has been settled, otherwise I may well have been in for a bout of therapy!!
      My conviction that the blazer was black is shaken, shattered, and lying on the floor like so many shards of broken glass! I said to Morag that in wearing a black blazer at Prisoner Conventions all those years was wrong. However she said no, it had been right. Because they used a brown blazer in order for it to look black on the screen, therefore Number 6's blazer was black, even though it was physically brown! So anyone wearing a brown blazer at Conventions would have to carry about with them their own personal lighting in order to make it look black! Ha, ha, ha, ha, I like that idea!

      Very kind regards
      David
      BCNU

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    11. Isn't that a veritable paradox!? A brown physical blazer to make the virtual one look decently black. Morag is absolutely right, No. 6s' blazer was to be black, nothing else. So we were right in saying and writing this all the time. Except of the technical background, it had to be brown. It's ironic, one of our group who had his blazer tailored in China chose a dark brown one because, after all, we at that moment thought it was correct. It's both. But the thing can't be both at the same time... - BCNU!

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    12. Hello Arno,
      Yes it is a veritable paradox. The right colour is wrong, and yet the wrong colour is right! During our comments I thought this is turning out to be wrong, but it was right all the time, and yes, we were right too in saying and writing this, And we were both justified.
      One of your group showed great enthusiasm for 'the Prisoner' by having such a blazer hand made the way he did in China. In all my days of attending Prisoner Conventions I don't think I ever saw any member of Six of One attending wearing a brown blazer.
      In the end, as you say, we were both correct. And I like very much your observation that the thing cannot be both at the same time....."

      Have a good evening, and enjoy the weekend
      Very best regards
      David
      BCNU

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