The Prisoner And Me - Me And The Prisoner

    I once followed in the footsteps of Patrick McGoohan, not only acting, writing, editing. Was the Executive Producer, director, and to the point of actually sweeper-upper on set. I bet Patrick McGoohan didn't sweep the floor! That was for my art-house film Village Day which was produced in 1998. By the time the film was finished I certainly knew what Patrick McGoohan must have felt like by the end of producing the Prisoner.
   I never set out to have overall control of the film no not at all. When the idea of producing a film based on the Prisoner was suggested, I saw my involvement as being the guy playing the role of the Prisoner, and nothing more than that. But that's not the way it turned out, the guy whose idea it was bailed out and I was left holding the baby so to speak. And of course once I assumed responsibility for the project, well there was no going back.
    Village Day was a very ambitious film project, and run on a tight shoestring budget. Yet having said that, it is the first film to have a life-size interior set of the Green Dome since the original series was produced, with working steel doors and wall screen.
   We filmed at the same London locations as in the Prisoner series, as well as Portmeirion where we had a week to film. Filming at Portmeirion commenced at 7am on a Saturday morning, and over the following week, and was not completed until the following Friday evening at 5pm.
   The production was not without it's many problems. But then there were a number of great achievements, the construction of the interior of the Green Dome, the music to the film is completely original, composed and produed by Australian musician Bruce Stringer. We even made a successful controlled crash of KAR 120C on a long and deserted highway in the county of Berkshire, or at least it was until we commenced filming. Then the world and his wife came driving along that road, I couldn't believe it! Anyway, after we had crashed the car, I was slumped over the steering wheel with blood flowing from an open wound. Suddenly a white van drew up, the driver asking if everyone was okay, and did we need an ambulance? Well I was both gratified and delighted. Because if we could fool a memeber of the general public, then the car crash was as authentic as we were ever likely to get it.
   For myself, and on a personal level. When we were busy filming at Portmeirion, members of the general public actually thought that Patrick McGoohan had returned to Portmeirion and was making another series. One woman visited the Priosner shop and asked if she paid twenty pounds could she go and stand next to the man himself......meaning me, and meaning me as Patrick McGoohan looks in the Prisoner series, not as he was then in 1998. But I was flattered nonetheless for that. Members of the general public we taking photographs and filming us filming scenes, and some even asked if they could be involved as extras. Well I thought why not, as long as they were dressed in Village costume. Well they were delighted. the only trouble was, that when I called for extras for a scene to be filmed down on the lawn of the hotel {Old people's Home} only two people came forward. I suppose no-one was going to admit they were old enough to actually be in the Village's Old people's Home. But I didn't see why it should have been a problem, as in the Prisoner series there are middle aged citizens sitting at tables on the lawn of the Old People's Home. Anyway, we got round it in the end.....we filmed in another location at Portmeirion!

I'll be seeing you