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Tuesday 15 November 2011

It's Inexplicable!

    Whether or not you subscribe to the idea that John Drake is the Prisoner's identity does not really matter. The fact is that no-one in the Prisoner series is allowed to utter No.6's name, not even those who knew him personally like his fiancee Janet Portland, which has always been something of a puzzlement to me. And when it comes to names in the Village, they are used very rarely, Cobb was one, Nadia was another. Then there was Alison, Gunther and Ernst, Roland Walter Dutton, and Monique. But what is really exceptionally inexplicable is the changing of a name in a childrens nursery rhyme "See saw Marjory Daw, Jacky shall have a new master......."  it should be "Johnny shall have a new master" so I wonder why the name change, unless of course it is so no-one would misconstrue Johnny Drake for the Prisoner!That is the only reason fans in the past could construe the reason for the name change.    Be seeing you.
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6 comments:

  1. Moor Larkin16 November 2011 at 22:06

    I happened to watch the ending of the last monochrome episode of Danger Man and a character towards the end says of another character, "she wouldn't say boo to a mouse!"

    I thought to myself, shouldn't that be *goose* ?

    ReplyDelete
  2. David Stimpson17 November 2011 at 10:42

    Hello Moor,

    You are perfectly corRect, it should be 'Wouldn't say boo to a goose.' perhaps they just got it wrong, or the actor saying it got it wrong. But then perhaps a point was being made, that a mouse is a frightened little creature, yet Susie is even more frightened than a little mouse - just a thought - what think you?

    Best wishes
    David
    BCNU

    ReplyDelete
  3. Moor Larkin17 November 2011 at 15:52

    I must check out the original script....... ;-D

    Heeeres.......Johnny !!
    "A common modern version is:

    See Saw Margery Daw,
    Jacky shall have a new master;
    Jacky shall earn but a penny a day,
    Because he can't work any faster.[1]

    The name Jacky is often replaced with Johnny or Jack."
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/See_Saw_Margery_Daw

    ReplyDelete
  4. David Stimpson18 November 2011 at 11:09

    Hello Moor,

    In my past researches into related items to 'the Prisoner,' I never once found the name Jacky used in the nusery rhyme, perhaps I was looking back too far, but at the time I was looking at origins of things. As for Wikipedia, no matter how good the information there, I always check it against other sources. This is because anyone can put any information on Wikipedia, and edit, and such information is not always correct.

    Heeers Johnny! I like it.

    Have a good weekend
    David
    Be seeing you

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  5. Moor Larkin18 November 2011 at 11:29

    I checked out the script and indeed *mouse* was scripted, and not *goose*, so it was no slip of the tongue in that Danger Man episode. I would say your suggestion of WHY is probably a good one. A good writer would like to to tweak something proverbial into something unexpected and more original I guess.

    There's a good page about the see-sawing of history here:
    http://www.mamalisa.com/?t=hes&p=1362

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  6. David Stimpson19 November 2011 at 10:33

    Hello Moor,

    I say, you have the script, do you have many, if not all the scripts for 'Danger Man?' And did you relise that at least two of the scripts such as 'Under The Lake' and 'Don't Nail Him Yet' are actually steeped in fact?

    Thank you for the link, I'll check it out when I get a minute.

    Have a good weekend
    David
    BCNU

    ReplyDelete

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