Village Day - A Personal View

    After the difficulties of pre-production, I was more than happy to finally get to film on location at Portmeirion, no matter how daunting the prospect was. However before then the assistant director was promoted to director, who then had a sudden brainstorm! He told me that we could complete the filming at Portmeirion in a day and a half. I said a day and a half?! We would be taking advantage of people in village costume and therefore filming during a Prisoner convention! He didn’t know what he was talking about! Besides he told me the pair of cameras he was supplying, he would have to take back with him on the Sunday afternoon when he was due to leave, leaving me high and dry! It was over another matter that he offered his resignation, which I believe he was under the impression that I would not accept. He was wrong! I didn’t think twice about accepting his resignation, and as Executive Producer I made myself director, because I didn’t want to be messed about anymore! As it happened filming at Portmeirion began at 7 am on the Saturday morning of the Prisoner convention, and we only just completed at 5pm on the following Friday.

    So on a very personal level, there I was the writer, Executive Producer, and director, and it all lay on my shoulders to see the job done! I could not help it, and you reading this my call me arrogant to say it, but I truly felt that I was walking in Pat McGoohan’s footsteps. Many day visitors to Portmeirion thought that was who I was, McGoohan as he was at the time of the Prisoner. That gave me a buzz, and it did allow me strong control over the crowds of day visitors who were only too pleased to stand watching the filming.

A few asked if they could appear in a scene, which I was pleased to allow. One woman wanted to pay £20 just to stand next to the “big man” as she put it, meaning Patrick McGoohan…….meaning me! And someone heard in the Prisoner shop saying that they had seen McGoohan’s son filming down on the Piazza.

    Eventually we had to film on location in London, the chief location was Buckingham Place. Bill Lonnen had brought his Caterham 7 up from Bournemouth especially for the film. Not an exact replica for the Lotus 7 used in ‘the Prisoner,’ all I could do was to accept it. Bill had already crashed his 7 magnificently for the film, but now I was to get behind the wheel. Dressed as the Prisoner I climbed in the car behind the wheel, fired up the engine, engaged first gear, and drove off turning left into Palace Street, left again, left once more, and at speed along Buckingham Place just as the Prisoner does during the opening sequence. That was another personal achievement for me. I could allow myself to enjoy such personal goals simply because I was the man in charge, and had to be able to enjoy myself when the going was good.

    I have watched several Prisoner based films produced by enthusiasts, and although ‘Village Day’ has its production faults, it does stand out for one particular reason. I was determined that my film would have an interior set of the Green Dome, and ‘Village Day’ is the first film to achieve that since the production of ‘the Prisoner.’ But the Green Dome is another story, one reserved for the summer edition. Although ‘Village Day’ delivered me some very personal achievements and pleasure as I performed the role of the Prisoner-No.6, the film also brought a good number of people together, people who also gained pleasure from being involved with the film. Once the film was produced and had received it premier I was asked when I was going to produce another? I replied in the words of Mr. X, “One of those is quite enough!” And it was at the reception at the premier event in 1999 I got rather drunk. I think it was the relief, the relief that it was all over, done and dusted you could say!

Be seeing you

Thought For The Day

    Number 6 came across Number 86 in the woods high on drugs. One might almost be forgiven for thinking the woman had dropped out, and was caught picking flowers in the woods! She told Number 6 that she was higher than Number 2, well that would be the drugs talking I expect. However her drugged state of mind made her susceptible to Number 6’s attempt to hypnotize her, I mean doesn’t Number 6 just make you annoyed? He annoys me, because it seems he can just about turn his hand to almost anything, amongst his many other accomplishments the man’s a damned hypnotist now! I blame the scriptwriters, there being far too many of them. Had there been but a couple writing the scripts for ‘the Prisoner’ then Number 6’s abilities could be toned down, and he’d have been unable to get away with so much. Why? Because it would have made the man more human, open more to failure than success. Altogether the scriptwriters made Number 6 too good to be true.

Be seeing you

Village Life!

   No.242 “Well you’ve watched the video evidence for yourself. The Mk1 doesn’t work.”
    No.243 “Not now it doesn’t, it’s at the bottom of the estuary!”
    “We can retrieve it once the tide has gone out.”
    “It’s very disappointing.”
    “Its performance lacked a great deal.”
    “It was fine on the road.”
    “Yes but it was supposed to be an all-terrain vehicle, on land, on the sea, in the sea.”
    “It was supposed to go up walls.”
    “Well that was never going to happen was it?”
    “How do you mean?”
    “Well it behaved like a Dalek when it came to the steps.”
    “You mean it couldn’t climb them.”
    “It went down them alright.”
    “My biggest regret is 256.”
    “Ah yes, poor 256 I dread to think what kind of state he’s in.”
    “We won’t know what’s happened to him until we’ve retrieved the Mk1.”
    “We know the tractor beam works.”
    “Do you think he could still be in the machine?”
    “He was just absorbed by the blue light, he must still be inside it!”
    “How?”
    “If you don’t know, I cannot possibly tell you.”
    “That’s not good enough, after all we developed the Mk1.”
    “We simply have to try again that’s all.”
    “But it doesn’t work we’ve proved that.”
    “We retrieve the MK1, find out what happened to 256, then carry on from there.”
    “Mechanics isn’t the solution to the problem.”
    “You tell me what is?”
    “Well as a matter of fact I’ve been working on a new bio-mass.”
    “Bio-mass?”
    “I’ve managed to grow synthetic membrane in a Petri dish.”
    “Let me see.”
    “Its here. Just a minute the lid’s come off. Where……”
    “Look…on the floor.”
    “It’s a sphere!”
    “A sphere made of living tissue.”
    “Living membrane.”
    “Look it’s moving, rolling about on the floor.”
    “It’s roving about, that’s it, we’ll call it Rover Mk II.”
    “Well we had better catch it before it gets out of the laboratory.”
    “It already has, through the mouse hole in the skirting board!”
    “We had better tell Number 2.”
    “He’s not going to like this!”
    Somewhere, it’s not clear where, but somewhere there behind the skirting board a mouse is going about its business, when it encounters a sphere of living membrane. The thing emits a roar, a roar mixed with the sound of someone breathing through an aqua lung, a bicycle pump, and Gregorian chant. The mouse sniffs the air, its squeaks, turns, but the sphere is on it almost immediately. The mouse is suffocated to death, its body is absorbed by the Rover, its membrane taking on a pinkish hue.

Be seeing you

ROVER

    The Mk II Rover we know is made of membrane, and it may be presupposed that it has a form of intelligence. It might be suggested that such an intelligence is artificially induced in the creature, if indeed the membrane was scientifically created by chemists and biologists. The MK I however was a mechanical Rover consisting of metal, fibreglass, rubber, wires and electrical circuits. Supposedly to have been able to go on the sea as a hovercraft, in the sea as in submarine, able to go up steps and climb walls. It is however unlikely to have any kind of intelligence, artificial or otherwise. Being mechanical most likely the MK I was nothing more than a droid. Operated remotely by an operator in the Control Room, as in the way the helicopter in ‘Arrival’ was flown remotely from the Control Room, the jet boat brought back to shore in ‘Free for All,’ as well as M. S. Polotska in ‘Checkmate.’ I’m not surprised it failed its first test. Noisy, cumbersome, unable to scale walls, go on the sea, and was as bad as a Dalek for not being able to climb steps!

Be seeing you

Departure

    The sliver grey Allouete helicopter was flying over the hills, ahead of it the estuary, and beyond that the village. This was just one of many journeys the pilot has made, there was nothing special about it, quite ordinary, mundane even.
   In the Control Room the helicopter had been picked up on radar. The supervisor picked up the yellow ‘L’ shaped intercom.
    “Get me Number 2.”
    “Yes what is it, what’s the matter?”
    “The helicopter has been picked up on radar, and is due to arrive in a few minutes.”
    “And you are telling me this why?”
    “I….I thought you would want to meet it.”
    “And what makes you think that?”
    “Because…..are you alright sir?”
    Number 2 did not reply.
    The helicopter flew over the estuary and circled the village before landing on the triangular lawn by the sea wall. The pilot sat in the Perspex cabin, the rotor blades still spinning. But when no-one appeared the pilot cut the engine and the rotor blades slowed to a stop, and the pilot continued to wait.
    “I’m sorry sir, I don’t know what’s happening, there should have been someone here to meet you. I’ll contact control” the pilot told his passenger.
    In the Control Room the Supervisor contacted the central area “Have Number 2’s transport standing by at the steps to the Green Dome.”
    Almost at once a taxi left the rank and drove along the road to the Green Dome, reversing into the cobbled square opposite in order to turn round. The driver then parked the taxi at the base of the steps, turned off her engine and waited.
    The steel doors opened, the Butler stood framed in the open doorway. Number 2 looked up from the relative comfort of his globe chair.
    “What do you want?”
    “He doesn’t want anything” Number 12 said stepping by the diminutive Butler and into the office “Its time, the helicopter is waiting.”
    “I know, but know the time has come I don’t want to leave, it’s as simple as that.”
    “Your successor is waiting.”
    “Then let him wait!” Number 2s voice echoed round the domed chamber, “let him wait.”
    “But why delay the inevitable sir, your term in office is up.”
    “I know that Number 12, better than anyone.”
    “Well then?”
    Number 2 sat in his chair thinking, turning things over in his mind.
    “He humiliated me!”
    “I realize that sir.”
    “I want another bite at the cherry.”
    “Sir?”
    “I was wondering if it were possible to reset Number 6’s mind. To wipe all the unpleasant memories of the village from his mind and begin again from the day of his arrival?”

    The pilot of the silver grey Allouete helicopter flicked switches and started the engine. The rotor blades began to turn, rotating ever faster and lifted off the triangular lawn by the sea wall and flew out across the estuary leaving the village behind.
    “I trust you will help me settle in Number 12.”
    “Yes Number 2.”
    “Now as for this Number 6” Number 2 said settling himself into the black globe chair.
    “A new approach has been suggested sir.”
    “Really” Number 2 said opening Number 6’s personal file “and what might that be?
    “To rest his mind, to wipe all unpleasant memories from his mind, and take him back to the day of his arrival here.”
    “To begin with him all over again.”
    “Yes Number 2.”
    “And that will get us where?” Number 2 asked closing the file “well?”
    “File Number 6, page one, subsection one, paragraph one, line one……..back to the beginning!”
    “Precisely. So why go to all that trouble when we can ask the Bureau of Visual records to put the tape in the machine and simply watch it from the beginning!”
    “Where will that get us?”
    “If we watch the tapes enough times we might just come to an understanding.”
    “Of what?”
    “The Prisoner……what else?!”

Be seeing you

Mind The Fall Out!

    If one sets aside the final few moments of ‘Fall Out’ instead of ‘the Prisoner’ beginning all over again, what do you have? A man having recently returned to London having been incarcerated for 14 months in a place called the village. Yes he’s on his way back to that underground car park, and I can imagine him returning to that office somewhere in a building on Whitehall, pacing up and down ranting and raving. Because he has to release his anger on someone, what’s more he has questions he wants answering, possibly he wants compensation because of what has been done to him. No return to the village, but eventually he will return to his house and learn to live with what he has been put through for the past 14 months, and decide what he’s going to do with the rest of his life. Mind you there would be limitations for an ex-secret agent! And yet, this ex-secret agent now knows too much, too much about the village, such a man cannot be left to roam at large. So what do you do with a man who knows too much about The Village - you put him in it!

Be seeing you

The A B C Files

   No.2 believed No.6 was going to sell out, and wanted to know what he had to sell, and to whom he was going to sell it. He’s had the Prisoner’s whole life researched and computed, and it boiled down to three people, A B and C. The Prisoner was then to have met each one in turn, and they would know what would have happened had they not got to him first. Well we know how all that went!
   Both the A and B files contain a thin file on each person, along with a photograph, and a piece of film.

   ‘A’ made world news when he defected about 6 years previously, that would have been in 1961. It would seem that defections were rife in the 1960’s, Chambers who became “late” of the Foreign Office I suspect was another defector. He and ZM73 used to be friends, with a great deal in common, they do the same job, but for different reasons. They used to be on the same side, but no longer. He ended up abducting ZM73, this way he was saving himself money. It appears No.2 wasn’t the only one who thought No.6 was going to sell out, because he wanted to buy whatever it was he had to sell. But in having ZM73 abducted, he could get his henchmen to force ZM73 to give them the information!  

    A tall man in his early forties perhaps, with black hair and thin moustache, weighting some 180 lbs.
    Nationality: British.

    As a defector he crossed from one side to the other, one who draws in news of old friends from far and wide. And news of old friends travels quickly!

     Once a friend of ZM73 and possible colleague, now he finds himself on the opposite side, but yet still doing the same job, but for different reasons!

    He is convinced that his old friend has something to sell, and he is in the market to buy it. Whatever it is, he is eager to find out.

    So unscrupulous is this man that he doesn’t even draw the line at kidnapping his old friend and colleague. Besides this way he is saving himself money!

    He is a man used to getting that which he wants and will go to any lengths in order to obtain it. However on this occasion, he misses out, being beaten by a better man than he! It has been a long time since the two have met, but not long enough in the prisoner’s case.

And that is why ZM73 despises him, treating him with disdain. But perhaps for some reason of his own, will not take action against him. The only real thing ‘A’ and ZM73 have in common now is they both attended Madame Engadine’s celebrated parties. But this was the first time that they had met at these parties.

   As for ‘B,’ she even looks like a spy, a very good one from a long line of spies. Perhaps she was created in a school for spies. Apparently secret agents work for the good guys, and spies work for the other side!
   ‘B’ is a widow, her husband having been dead 4 years. She has a son, but that’s not in her file because No.2 didn’t know about her son.

      She is an old friend of the ZM73, indeed they seem very much at ease with one another.

    She is a very attractive female spy, Perhaps it runs in the family, or came from a line of spies developed by the Russian’s perhaps! Wears a very garish dress, and speaks with a very pronounced foreign accent.

Nationality…Unknown!

Aged in her mid thirties

Hair…. Long dark brown

Height….. 5 feet 7 inches {approx}

Weight…. 130 lbs {approx}

   So much is her friendship with ZM73 that he will help her, she knows that! But exactly what was her relationship with him?

    The last time they met was in Switzerland. But it seems that she ran out of whatever the situation was at the time.

To ‘B’ ‘A’ is an enemy!

   She is a very good dancer, but so then was Marta Hari!

   Death to her is an occupational hazard. But when it comes down to it, she is as frightened as anyone would be, in that situation! She desperately tries to get the secret of ZM73’s resignation so that she has something to bargain with. However she is quickly seen through by ZM73, she not being the woman that she pretended to be!

In the end ‘B’ is left to her own fate!

    ‘A’ was a defector and it appears that there was a good deal of that about, I’ve always thought Chambers was a defector, that chap ZM73 was going to meet, and try to stop him doing what he was going to do before the “big boys” found out. So ‘C’ for Chambers, no, perhaps not!

   Now we come to C, there’s no close-up of C’s box file, there isn’t a file, in fact there’s no photograph of ‘C,’ just a sheet of paper with a vague description. This is all they have, is known to be French, known to have attended Engadine’s parties, probably disguised. Known to have been in contact with No.6. So with the diluted 3^rd dose of the drug, No.6 was able to turn the tables on No.2. The question is in making it look as though No.2 is ‘C’, who was No.6 protecting?

   The first indication is that ‘C’ is in fact Engadine herself, and No.2 is quick to latch onto that, she will now be brought to the village! Because what better person to have as a spy and who better placed, with so many foreign agents, diplomats possibly Ambassadors and various celebrities of all kinds attending her celebrated parties. Gathering information through bribery and black mail? However Engadine is only a contact, she is not ’C.’ Or is she, perhaps in the way No.6 manipulated his own dream he was protecting Engadine!

Be seeing you

A Favourite Scene In A Change of Mind

    “All charmingly domestic…I think I’d like some tea,”

    Number 6 cannot stand girls who can’t make a decent cup of tea, and gives Number 86 a lesson in brewing a proper cup of tea. He can also boil eggs for his breakfast when push comes to shove, unless he has someone like Nadia to boil them for him! In fact for breakfast in ‘Arrival’ the Prisoner has two fried eggs with bacon, along with toast and marmalade, tea with lemon, yet touches none of it. I expect he wasn’t hungry. And yet No.6 only appears to enjoy a hearty breakfast when it’s brought to him on a tray by a maid. And yet since that privilege had been rescinded he just has two boiled eggs for breakfast and in the day a ham sandwich, as seen in both ‘Hammer Into Anvil’ and ‘Do Not Forsake Me Oh My Darling.’ Perhaps it’s always the way with bachelors who cannot be bothered to cook for themselves. Other meals could be eaten out at the café.

Be seeing you

Who’s That On The Telephono?

    “Shopkeeper here ……..fresh orders, very good sir does it concern Number Six……..I see sir, half a pound of bacon, a tin of corned beef, half a pound of demerara, aspirins, two pound of potatoes…….and a cauliflower.”

Be seeing you

MindGames

    If one sets aside the final few moments of ‘Fall Out’ instead of ‘the Prisoner’ beginning all over again, what do you have? A man having recently returned to London having been incarcerated for 14 months in a place called The Village. Yes he’s on his way back to that underground car park, and I can imagine him returning to that office somewhere in a building in Whitehall, pacing up and down ranting and raving. Because he has to release his anger on someone, what’s more he has questions he wants answering, possibly he wants compensation because of what has been done to him. No return to the village, but eventually he will return to his house and learn to live with what he has been put through for the past number of months, and decide what he’s going to do with the rest of his life. Mind you there would be limitations for an ex-secret agent, a private detective perhaps working for £300 a week plus expenses, or ma by a motor mechanic, after all he did build his Lotus 7 kit car with his own hands!

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The General

   “No more wastage in schools. No more tedious learning by rote...... A brilliantly devised course, delivered by a leading teacher, subliminally learned and checked by an infallible authority....... and what do you have?”

    “A row of cabbages!”

    Well we might have met with this "row of cabbages" previously during the dissolution of the out going council at the Town Hall during the election period of ‘Free For All.’ And as the candidate Number 6 observed, what a bunch of "tailors dummies" they all turned out to be. And as far as I can see, a more suited "row of cabbages" you would not wish to meet.

     "Can you laugh, can you cry, can you think? In your heads must be the remnants of a brain. In your hearts must be the desire to be a human being again.”  {Number 6 Free For All}

     Is this what happens to those "Rotten cabbages" in the village? Brainwashed imbeciles, who might once have been former No.2's who have now been sub-divided, and who now sit upon the Town Council without a voice, and without power to act. A puppet regime, a twentieth century Bastille which pretends to be a pocket democracy. It's all a farce really, as Number 6 observes. Solitary confinement would be more effective in getting what "they" want, as are truth drugs. But then that might prove to be too easy, as No.2 and the village administration do like to play their games, but not to "damage the tissue."

   Had ‘Free For All’ been different, as well as the village's administrations attitude towards Number 6. That the rigged elections had actually proved to have been democratic after all, with Number 6 having been duly elected as the new Number 2. Then might not Number 6 himself one day, have found himself a member of the Town Council. A brainwashed imbecile, with no heart or brain, nor the desire to be a human being again.

Be seeing You

A New Arrival!

   It was a bright sunny morning as a new arrival in the village drew back the net curtains of his cottage. He stood shocked and bewildered. It was sure some party at Maxine’s last night, but where is he, this isn’t London. Sure, he was in what looked to be his own room, but something wasn’t right, in fact it was far wrong!
   McGill found the door to his cottage and went outside. The architecture was a mixture, mostly Italianate suggesting he was somewhere on the Mediterranean. In the Bell Tower a bell tolled the hour of nine O’clock. There looked to be no-one about, save for a waitress unfolding table parasols at the café, and a gardener hosing down the patio. He spun round and made for the door and took his first steps into his new surroundings. Disoriented and confused he made his way down steps, across a road, through an arch, across the Piazza, through another arch, and across the road to the café.
    “Good morning sir, would you like breakfast?” the waitress asked.

    “Look I’m a bit confused. I don’t know where I am, or how I got here” he told her.
    “You’re in the village?”
    “The village?”
    “Do you want tea or coffee, being an American you’ll want coffee” the waitress suggested.
    “No, tea will be fine” he said.

   The waitress was about to go inside when he grabbed her arm.

    “Look, I have no idea why I’m here, but it would help if I knew where I was. What’s the name of this place?”
    “The village.”
    “Yes the village” he said now beginning to get annoyed.
    “It’s the village” the waitress told him.
    “Alright you win lady, can I make a telephone call?”
    “We don’t have a telephone” the waitress told him.
    “Now why doesn’t that surprise me!”
    “There a phone box just around the corner” she said “I’ll get your tea.”
    The man smiled, and taking a pack of Pall Mall cigarettes from his pocket and striking a match, he drew hard on the cigarette leaving a trail of smoke in his wake as he made his way to the telephone booth. For information lift and press said a notice in the booth. There was a shelf on which sat a grey and black ‘L’ shaped telephone, McGill picked it up and pressed the chrome button.
    “Number please” the female operator asked.
    McGill looked at the phone, and around the booth “There isn’t a number” he said the cigarette in the corner of his mouth “Look I want to make a call to….”
    “What is your number sir?” the operator asked.
    “I haven’t got a number” he said in frustration.
    “No number, no call” the operator told him and hung up.
    McGill put the telephone down and moved away from the booth, taking the cigarette butt from his mouth he dropped it on the ground. There was an information board by a tree, and he was just about to walk over to it when a white Mini-Moke with a candy-striped canopy suddenly pulled up.

    “Taxi sir?” the attractive blonde taxi driver asked peering out of the side of the Moke.
    “Well you’re a sight for sore eyes” he said taking a bundle of pound notes from his jacket pocket “look I’ll pay you to take me to the nearest town.”
    “We’re only the local service” the girl told him.
    “Well take me as far as you can” McGill told her climbing into the front passenger seat.
    The taxi moved forward passed the café, round the corner, up the road, passed the Green Dome, along the road, under two arches and appeared to leave the village. The road wound through the woods, over a bridge, through a yellow and white triumphal arch, and back into the village. Then down the hill passed the Town Hall, towards the Old People’s home. McGill realized he was being taken for a ride both literally and metaphorically. The taxi driver smiled at him, reversed the Moke and drove back up the hill, taking a right hand fork, round a statue of Hercules and up a cobbled lane. Left into a square, then left coming to a stop in the road.
    “What kind of taxi driver are you, don’t you know the way out of this place?” this was the second time McGill felt frustrated.
    “I did tell you we’re only local” the girl said “That will be two units.”
    “Units, what the hell are units, I’ve only got Pounds!”
    “Oh well, pay me later, be seeing you” the girl saluted him, then drove off down the road looking for another fare.
    McGill stood in the middle of the road watching the white Mini-Moke disappear around the corner at the bottom of the road. The General Store now took his attention, glancing in the bay window he walked round to the door and opened it.
    Ting-a-ling-a-ling
    “Ah good morning sir, and what can I do for you?” the stout shopkeeper asked from behind the counter.
    “Do you have a map?” McGill asked.
    “A map, colour or black and white?” the shopkeeper asked.
    “It doesn’t matter, I just want a map.”
    “Very good sir.”
    The shopkeeper turned and opened a cabinet, from which he produced a map and dropped it onto the counter. McGill read the words Map of Your Village on the cover and unfolding it studied the black and white map. The woods, the mountains, the sea, the cliffs and caves, the beach, the Old People’s home, the ship, tower.
    “This isn’t what I meant.”
    “Really sir, what did you mean.”
    “I meant a larger map.”
    “Only in colour, much more expensive.”
    “That’s okay, that’s fine, I can pay” McGill said throwing a number of pound notes onto the counter.
    The shopkeeper looked at the notes on the counter and turning his back he returned to the cabinet and produced a second map. McGill took the map, the words ‘Map of Your Village’ were embossed on the leather cover. Unfolding the map he found it was larger, yet identical to the other one, but in colour.
    “Now look I’m fed up with being given the run-around!” McGill shouted banging his fist on the counter “I want a map of a larger area.”
    “I don’t have any, there’s no call for them” the shopkeeper said nervously.
    “Can I get hire a car here?”
    “No sir, only taxis” the shopkeeper told him.
    “What kind of town is this?”
    “It’s not a town sir, it’s the village.”
    “Yeah, well you can keep it. If I can’t drive out of here, I’ll walk!”

    Ting-a-ling-a-ling

    McGill returned to his cottage but only to collect his suitcase. The telephone began to ring, he picked up the receiver.
    “Hello.”
    “Is that Number 6?”
    “Oh it’s you again” he said recognizing the operator’s voice.
    “Is your number 6 sir?” the operator repeated.
    He glanced down at the telephone “That’s the number on the dial.”
    “I’ve a call for you.”
    He suddenly felt lifted “A call, who is it?”
    “Come and join me for breakfast, Number 2 the Green Dome.”
    McGill left his cottage and made his way to the Green Dome, he climbed the steps, and hung about on the balcony for a few moments before walking under an arch and stood at the front door. There was a wrought iron bell pull, he pulled it, and from somewhere a deep sounding bell tolled. The front door to the Dome opened and stepping into the foyer he was greeted by a diminutive butler in black tails who directed him through a pair of open French doors. McGill walked through and up a couple of steps where a pair of steel doors slid open to reveal the large domed chamber beyond. He paused in the open doorway before stepping forward, the steel blast-proof doors sliding shut behind him.
    “Do come in” bid the man from the relative comfort of a black globe chair “breakfast is ready.”
    He stepped forward, down the ramp and across the floor taking in his surroundings.
    “You’re not thinking of leaving us already are you Number 6?”
    He put his suitcase down “Look, I don’t know who you are, where I am, how I got here and why…..what did you call me?”
    “Number 6” the man told him.
    “My name is McGill” he shouted, his voice echoing round the chamber.
    “I know your name McGill, but we do not use names here. I am Number 2, you are our Number 6, and your breakfast will be getting cold.”
    McGill walked over to the small side table. Lifting the silver plate cover he found a plate of ham and eggs, there was also toast, marmalade, with both tea and coffee. He slammed down the cover back over the plate.
    “What the hell is all this about?”
    “You have an impressive file” Number 2 said “you were certainly good at your job in American Intelligence. But then it all went wrong for you, accused of treason you were forced to resign.”

    “This is old history, it’s not worth raking over again” he said taking a pack of cigarettes from his jacket pocket, and striking a match he lit it.
    “I’d rather you didn’t.”
    “I’d rather I did” McGill said blowing out smoke and demonstrating an air of non-conformity.
    “You’ll learn McGill, and if you don’t we’ll teach you.”
    “That sounds like a threat.”
    “A promise” Number 2 told him.
    McGill walked around the chamber “If you’re Number 2, who’s Number 1? he shouted.
    “As far as you’re concerned I’m in charge.”
    McGill looked at the large wall screen which displayed a lava lamp affect, wax rising and falling in globules and long streaks in hot oil. He turned his attention back to the man seated in the chair.
    “So why have you had me brought here?”
    “An ex American Intelligence agent working as an unlicensed private investigator for hire at a rate of 300 Pounds or Dollars a week, plus expenses.”
    “What, you want to hire me?” McGill said sarcastically dropping his cigarette butt on the floor and putting it out with his foot.

    “What at 300 Credit Units a week plus expenses?”
    He walked briskly over to the desk leaning across it said “Then what do you want from me?”
    “Your knowledge, and your expertise” Number 2 said with a smile.
    “Me work for you, let me talk to your boss” McGill said angrily.
    “I’ve told you, as far as you’re concerned I’m in charge” Number 2 repeated.
    “Well I’m not working for you, and you can’t make me! I’ll break out of here, and when I do I’ll go straight back to American Intelligence….”
    “It might interest you to know McGill, that it was those “good old boys” of American Intelligence who had you put in here.”
    “You’re lying!” McGill shouted.
    “I’m not, they did, and here you are. I suggest you settle yourself in, and we will talk again Number 6.”
    “I’m no number, my names McGill” he shouted his voice again echoing around the chamber.
    “Of course it is, the Butler will show you out Number 6. Be seeing you.”
    The pair of steel doors at the top of the ramp slid open. McGill picked up his suitcases and ambled up the ramp and through the open doors sliding shut behind him. In the foyer the Butler stood waiting to show the visitor out.
   “What number do they call you?”
   The Butler looked up at the visitor and said nothing.
   “That’s right my friend, you mind your business and let others mind theirs. I’m not going to be around long enough to care either way. As the man said, be seeing you!”

BCNU

Measure For Measure

   Measure for measure. Meaning that is, when a person commits a crime (or sins), he or she should be made to pay, either by making some sort of restitution or by suffering an amount that's equal to the suffering he or she has caused. Something akin to “an eye for an eye.”  
    Number 6 extracted his vengeance on no fewer than two separate occasions. The first for the suicide of Number 73 seen at the beginning of ‘Hammer Into Anvil, for which he holds Number 2 responsible. In that he hounded Number 73 until she could not stand any more of his interrogation, driving her in fact to commit suicide by jumping out of that hospital window.

   Then in ‘Living In Harmony’ Cathy/No.22 a saloon girl who was brutally strangled to death by the Kid, twice! This made the stranger, the man with no name – Number 6, put on his gun and face the Kid in a gun fight who he out-draws and guns down in the street.

    On both occasions Number 6 takes the law into his own hands. Although he doesn’t kill anyone in ‘Hammer Into Anvil,’ he does manage to drive Number 2 to a nervous breakdown. And ironically Number 8 {above} is driven to commit suicide, not by Number 6, but by the Judge because of his abuse towards the Kid!

Be seeing you

Quote For The Day

    “I think we have a challenge.”
                            {No.2 – Arrival}

    That’s all very well but will any Number 2 be up to the challenge? After all the Number 2 who said that at the time was coming to the end of his term in office. In fact he had already been replaced by the time he was in the manager’s office of Labour Exchange. Mind you his successor seemed to have the right mettle, if Number 6 doesn’t give them what they want they take it! And yet his hands were tied, no extreme measures to be used yet! How can any Number 2 operate under such restrictions? And those who do not, simply fail. Generally Number 2 isn’t up to the challenge, either that or Number 6 finds himself in lucks way more often than not. “I think we have a challenge.” It was alright for that particular Number 2, he was on his way out having dealt with Chambers then late of the Foreign Office. I should think he proved to be an altogether different kettle of fish to Number 6. I suppose that’s why Number 2 said what he did, in that Chambers didn’t prove much of a challenge at all!

Be seeing you 

Watching The Prisoner Series

    Last week I posted a blog entry regarding how it is high time I watched ‘the Prisoner’ again, seeing as how I’m always writing about the series, picturing every day life in the village though my mind’s eye. You may have read the entry I am referring to. I’m always fascinated by the fact we never see No.2 actually being replaced. By the time we see the new No.2 his or her predecessor has already left the village, or has been absorbed back into administration. And yet once, just once we witness No.2’s successor riding a bicycle on his way to take up office in Green Dome. There he goes cycling passed the Labour Exchange just as No.2 is taking the Prisoner inside. You will recall how No.2’s successor is dressed identically to Number 6 we see that when he pays a call on No.2 after being discharged from hospital. Well that cyclist is dressed like No.2. Anyway even if he isn’t the new No.2, it’s who I like to think he is.
    So later this year I intend to watch a screening of the Prisoner, as I said before, and according to the screening order found in my book ‘The Prisoner Dusted Down.’ I worked out that screening order a good few years ago now, and I have never watched the Prisoner in that order. It will be interesting to see how it works out, it will have no effect on Number 6 of course, it will still work out the same for him, but in a slightly different order of events.

    Then I had another thought, to take this a stage further, not to watch an episode once a week over 17 weeks as I usually would, but to watch the17 episodes over a period of 14 months, commencing in October with ‘Arrival.’ Then continuing at intervals with ‘Free For All,’ Dance of the Dead’ and ‘Checkmate.’ Then ‘The Schizoid Man’ February 10^th or 11th, and in March ‘Many Happy Returns,’ and ‘Hammer Into Anvil’ at some point in spring. And when it comes to ‘Its Your Funeral’ it is to be watched on a Thursday, because Appreciation Day falls on that day of the week. The remaining episodes to be watched over intervals during the ensuing months, concluding with ‘Fall Out’ in December next year. That’s because the series did have to end in December 1967, and for a very good reason, and is an argument which cannot be denied. The reason why is documented in my book. The series thus covering the 14 months of the Prisoner’s incarceration in the village. Of course watching the series in such a way, although an interesting experiment, viewing the series in this way will of course leave long gaps between some of the episodes, which is only natural and cannot be helped. To my mind those gaps however long or short, go to make up what we are not privy to in ‘the Prisoner.’ In a couple of spaces between episodes in the series could be filled by simply reading the two unused scripts ‘Don’t Get Yourself Killed,’ and ‘The Outsider,’ although to do that might be stretching a point. Describe me as an extremist if you like. But to the best of my knowledge no enthusiast for ‘the Prisoner’ has watched the series in this way.

Be seeing you

Who’s That On The Telephono?

      

    No.6 “Put me through to the local chip shop please…….local chip shop?”
    No.263 “Yes sir.”
    “I’d like to plaice an order.”
    “Certainly sir.”
    “I’d like cod and 2 penny-worth of chips.”
    “Yes sir.”
    “Now I don’t want any soggy chips.”
    “No sir.”
    “I want chips crisp and light brown.”
    “Yes sir, would you like salt?
    “Yes salt please.”
    “Vinegar?”
    “Yes vinegar as well, but add the vinegar before you sprinkle the fish and chips with salt.”
    “Don’t want much do you, I expect you want the order delivered!”
    “Oh good you deliver!”

    “You know what you want mate!”
    “No, what do I want?”
    “Jam on it that’s what!”
    “Hello……hello…..oh he’s hung up!”

Be seeing you

You’re Making A Mistake!

    “You’re making a mistake!”
    Yes they all say that!
    I should not be here!
    Yes they all say that as well.

    If I knew where here is!
    You’re in the Village.

    Yes the Village. You want information.
    Yes information.
    Well you want to ask him!
    Who?
    Him the one in the mirror.
    Who is he Number Five?
    Oh you can’t miss him. He knows it should be him here, and not me. I see him every time I look into the mirror, I shout at him and he shouts back, but I do not hear a word he says. He smiles kindly at me, and yet I detect a smirk when he turns his back upon me.

    Well just relax.
    Why am I strapped to this table, what are you going to do?
    Trust me, I’m a doctor.
    Doctor, no, no what’s in that syringe?
    Just a relaxant.
    No, you’re making a mistake.
    Yes.

    I’m Number Five.
    Yes that’s right.
    Five that’s me!
    Do you remember the Village?
   The Village……no, I don’t know why I was brought here, I want to leave!
    But you have only just come back to the Village.
    Back?
    You were sent out from the Village to gather information. Now you’ve been brought back to have that information extracted. But we made a fundamental mistake.
    Mistake?
    We wiped your mind of all unpleasant memories of the Village, so it is understandable that you reacted the way you did. But we shall not be making that mistake a again.
    Wh….what are you doing…..you can’t….no….no…..not that!
    Feel free to scream………there is no shame. Soon it will all be over, and you’ll have told us all we want to know.

Be seeing you

A Favourite Scene In The General

   When No.6 is down on the beach, in the sand dunes digging in the sand for the Professor’s tape recorder, which he buried earlier that the day. However the tape recorder has gone…what was that, a twig snapping….someone skulking in the bushes……and No.6 is on whoever is there in an instant! Dragging the man out by the lapels of his jacket we see its No.12. He doesn’t look very happy does he, this John Castle. Probably because he’s just received some rough treatment at the hands of Pat McGoohan!
    “Is there anything I can do for you?”
    “You want to get out of this place don’t you?”
    “So?”
    No.12 reaches into his jacket pocket and produces the Professor’s tape recorder. This indicates that he was on the beach earlier in the day, and observed where No.6 had buried the tape recorder which No.6 came back to retrieve, only No.12 beat him to it. Which is an indication that the tape recorder was originally meant for him!
    “Here is your passport” No.12 tells him.
    No.6 takes the tape recorder, but there’s a look of distrust on his face.

    “No.2 offered you a deal didn’t he, or don’t you trust him?”
    “I don’t trust No.2, I don’t trust you, and I don’t trust your tame Professor.”
    “Who do you trust No.6?”
    “I trust me.”
    “Join the club” No.12 turns to leave, then turns back “Oh, what was the treaty of Adrianople?”
    “September 1829.”
    No.12 shakes his head “Wrong. I said what, not when….you need some special coaching.”
    No.6 is left alone on the beach to listen to the Professor’s message on the tape recorder.
   “Ladies and gentlemen, fellow villagers, students this is the Professor speaking. I have an urgent message for you. You are being tricked Speed Learn is an abomination, it is slavery. If you wish to be free there is only one way, destroy the General. Learn this and learn it well, the General must be destroyed,”

    So why did No.12 give No.6 the Professor’s tape recorder? Presumably so that he could gain that “special coaching” No.12 spoke of. Also perhaps he thought No.6 would be the better man to make good use of the Professor’s message, or at the very least make him intrigued enough to go poking his nose in, and make an ally of him. Perhaps 12 thought No.6 would find a way to return the tape recorder to him, so he could have the Professor’s message micro reduced in readiness for having it transmitted to the villagers. But as we know No.6 gave the tape recorder to No.2, so No.12 must have somehow got it from him in secret. No.12 is a dissident, and the first true ally No.6 has found up to now.

Be seeing you 

Thought For The Day

     It has been many a year since I was last in The Village, and yet I’m there every day in my mind. I imagine the citizens going about their daily lives, the buildings, roads, streets, cobbled paths, and the woods, the beach when the tide’s out. I see it all with my third eye, what people are doing, the ordeals Number 6 is put through on an almost daily basis. Only it’s not on a daily basis is it? There has to be some kind of respite, even if only to allow Number 6 to recover from the bruising he took towards the end of ‘Free For All’ for example. And he had to be allowed time to recover from worse ordeals than that. And at time a respite might be incurred due to the waiting time it took for a new Number 2 to arrive in The Village. Although there was one occasion when a new Number 2 took up his term in office, whilst his predecessor was still on the job so to speak.

    Later this year I intend to watch a screening of the Prisoner but to the screening order found in my book ‘The Prisoner Dusted Down.’ I worked out that screening order a good few years ago now, and I have never watched the Prisoner in that order. It will be interesting to see how it works out, it will have no affect on Number 6 of course, it will still work out the same for him, but in a slightly different order of events. I sometimes wish it were possible to change the penultimate episode, instead of ‘Once Upon A Time,’ I would replace it with ‘The Girl Who Was Death.’ After all ‘The Girl Who Was Death’ does give the impression that it’s the last throw of the dice against Number 6, or scraping the bottom of the barrel might be a better phrase. A frustrated Number 2 who thought Number 6 might give something away, well I suppose it was worth a try. And after that, what would have been left, but a confrontation with Number 1. How that might be brought about, well that’s open to speculation.

Be seeing you

Who’s That On The Telephono?

    “Good morning, good morning, any complaints?”
    “A maid brings me my breakfast every morning.”
    “Yes I know, think yourself lucky!”
    “Lucky? By the time the maid gets here my breakfast is always cold!”
    “Yes, well you’re not the only one to enjoy such a privilege you know.”
    “Lucky me!”
    “Do you know what I had for breakfast this morning?”
    “No, do tell me.”
    “A slice of toast!”
    “Well just make sure the maid gets here a bit sooner will you!”
    “I shall see to it personally.”
    “What. you’re the maid today?”
    “No, it’s my day off. How do you like our new telephone video system by the way?”
    “You can see the person you’re speaking to.”
    “Yes, it will be all the rage one day. We hope to miniaturize it into a single handset so that people will be able to carry it with them wherever they go.”
    “A mobile telephone video system.”
    “Well yes, but I’m toying with the idea of calling it a mobile phone.”
    “That’s quite catchy. A personal mobile telephone people will carry with them, so that you can call up anyone at anytime no matter where they are.”
    “Good idea isn’t it?”
    “No, you’ll also know where everyone is at any time of day, and track them through the day, and for as long as you like. It’s called unobtrusive surveillance!”
    “Thank you Number Six, I hadn’t thought of that! See you soon.”

Be seeing you

MindGames

    The Professor in managing to get out of his house, and out of the clutches of his ever attentive doctor, and makes his way on to the beach. I think he had a rendezvous to keep with No.12. But before he could keep it, he only had time to hide his tape recorder in the sand dunes before the pursuing citizens caught up with him.
    It was No.6 who eventually stumbled across the buried tape recorder, and began to listen to the Professor’s urgent message, but was disturbed by the approach of two guardians and had to re-bury the tape recorder. No.12 must have been lurking in the bushes and saw No.6 bury the tape recorder, because later in the evening he returned to the beach and dug it up! So was it originally No.12 the Professor was trying to get his tape recorder to? The question is, would No.12 have had the ability to carry out the actions No.6 did in order to destroy the General and thereby putting a stop to Speed Learn? He was able to have the Professor’s message micro reduced, and he might have been able to have it transmitted under the very nose of No.2. But what of the General? No.6 is a clever man to have come up with the question that is supposedly insoluble for both man and machine, but would No.12 have been clever enough to have come up with something like that? Unlikely, and besides No.6 was only brought before the General because he was caught about to transmit the Professor’s message!

   No, it would be more likely that had No.12 been able to transmit the Professors message “ladies and gentlemen, fellow villagers, students this is the Professor speaking I have an urgent message for you. You are being tricked Speed Learn is an abomination, it is slavery. If you wish to be free there is only one way, destroy the General. Learn this and learn it well, the General must be destroyed,” the villagers with that message on the cortex of their brains would have been sent rampaging through the village looking for the General and smashing it to smithereens. Mind you if the General of ‘The Chimes of Big Ben’ was still about, I wouldn’t give much for his chances, if the villagers were to make a mistake and destroy him instead! But would the ordinary villagers know where to find the General {the computer} I wouldn’t have thought so, or even know what it was. But then they would have had No.12 to guide them, storming into and through the corridors of the Town Hall, as an angry revolutionary mob storming the Bastille, brushing everyone aside in their path until they reached the General’s office where they would smash the machine like so many angry Luddites! But at least this way Madam Professor would not have ended up as a widow, or would she? Because at the end of the episode when the computer is blowing a short circuit, even though the Professor wanted the General destroyed, he still did his best to save it. And probably would have done, as an angry mob stormed into the office. The Professor might still be there trying to stop them from destroying the thing he loved with a passion even though he probably hated it even more.

Be seeing you

No.6 And The Town Hall!

    “That’s Number Six.”
    “What about him?”
    “He’s going into the Town Hall, perhaps he works there.”
    “He hasn’t done a days work since the day he arrived here.”

    “That’s a bit unkind!”
    “He sponges off the welfare of The Village and gives nothing back. What’s more he’s a troublemaker!”
    “You’re in a bad mood this morning!”
    “Going to visit your mother in the Old Folk’s Home does that to me!”
    “Well she can’t live forever.”
    “She’s having a damned good try!”
    “I’m getting ready for my tea break. I’ll just finish trimming these old plants, then I’m off to the café.”

    “Up the steps, through the gates, across the street, and into the Town Hall.”

    “You alright mate?”
    “I wasn’t expecting that!”

    “You tried to go in, by mistake. Its fussy about who it lets in, this is the Town Hall.”
    “Yes I do know, I just wasn’t expecting…..”
    “The Spanish inquisition?”
    “No.”
    “That’s right, no one expects the Spanish inquisition.”
    “No, not them. It’s the electric force field I wasn’t expecting!”
    “You look rather flushed.”
    “I tingle all over…… I resigned because I became fed up with the repetitive scripts for Danger Man. It had seen its day, and had become state and stagnant. Something new and beautiful had to be created, The Village. Then take a brave man who had resigned his job from British Military Intelligence, and put him in that Village.”
    “That electric shock seems to have done you a bit of good. I wonder if Number Two heard what you just said?”

Be seeing you

Village Life!

    “I couldn’t sleep!”

    It looks like Number 2 had a rough night, perhaps his stomach ulcer was playing up. On the other hand perhaps he hadn’t drunk his nightcap of hot chocolate!

Be seeing you

Caught On Camera!

    As we know if there is one thing which lets ‘the Prisoner’ down on several occasions its continuity. Well how’s this for a remarkable piece of continuity. This first image is taken from ‘The General’. 

However it is actually from a piece of out-take from a scene in ‘Arrival’ when two guardians are despatched to pick up the escaping Prisoner. This short out-take was used in ‘The General’ just after No.6 has buried the Professor’s tape recorder in the sand dunes, and before two school prefects {guardians} arrive on the scene in a Mini-Moke as pictured below. 

    In order to give a more clarity of picture, below are the two guardians in the Mini-Moke racing to catch the escaping Prisoner in ‘Arrival.’

   It is a remarkable piece of continuity, the idea that time has been taken to dress the two guardians in ‘The General’ identically to the two Guardians in the piece of film {originally intended for ‘Arrival’} but later used in ‘The General.’ Well perhaps not quite, there is one difference, the guardian driving the Moke in the ‘Arrival’ footage is wearing light blue trousers, and the fellow driving the Moke in close-up in ‘The General’ is wearing grey trousers. But other than that continuity got it spot on, for a change.

Be seeing you