What Are Facts Behind Town Hall? asks our own reporter

    The Town Hall is the nerve centre for the Villages Administration department, the council offices, the council chamber from which the elected Town Council administers the village, making decisions on behalf of the community, for the good of the community. A place where one might go before the committee before being posted as unmutual.

    One might be forgiven for thinking that No.2, Chairman of the Village, has carte blanche over every aspect of village administration, Only that does not appear to be the case especially when it comes to The General. No.2 himself has to report to the board of Top-Hat officials, the Board Room in the Town Hall. As it the Professors study, the Generals office and television studio. The cipher room, projection room,

    The Town Hall is also choosey about who it lets in, almost as though its a living organism! Certainly its well protected by an electrical force-field, as No.6 found our during ‘Dance of the Dead.’ And once inside the Town Hall security is of the highest level. Everywhere you go is controlled by check-points at which you are challenged by a disembodied voice through a speaker. Progress through any such check-point is strictly controlled via the use of 'Security Pass Discs.' Should one attempt to pass through a check-point without first using a security pass discs, then you encounter the same electrical force-field as at the entrance of the Town Hall. Any second attempt to pass without a security pass disc is fatal! Which is rather apt really, as the village Mortuary is situated within the depths of the Town Hall, and as far as that goes, so too is the control room. But hardly, one might have thought, a place for entertainment. Any such entertainment as the Ball during the evening of ‘Dance of the Dead,’ such entertainment should in our opinion be reserved for The Palace of Fun. However seeing how the occasion allowed No.6, and that everyone was to have died, but No.6, then it would have been handy for the mortuary! and we see that No.2 is not just restricted to contact with No.1 by telephone. For No.2 of ‘Dance of the Dead’ enjoys a very elaborately decorated room, sends her reports and receiving orders by Teleprinter! No.2 admitted as much to the Doctor-No.40, as she was about to enter that very same elaborately decorated room;

"You're late!" the doctor announces.

"There’s a lot to do" No.2 responds

"You're going in?"

"To make my report" No.2 informs the doctor.

"I need a directive about Dutton, he's being rather difficult!" requests the doctor.

    So all in all we know a great deal regarding the facts behind the Town Hall, and those we do not remain safely, and securely locked away somewhere with its vaults. Or failing that, in that long room of filing cabinets on the way through to the Mortuary. But surely the Mortuary should be in the hospital!

Be seeing you

The Therapy Zone

Number Six - An Accomplished Character

    He's a very accomplished, and talented man, our friend No.6. He excels at boxing, fencing, and shooting. He was Captain of the boxing team at school, and Olympic fencing athlete. He enjoys classical music - literature he can easily discuss and quotes from Shakespeare and German and Spanish classics, such as Goethe and Cervantes.

   He's adept at carpentry, and is a modest artist. A naturally gifted secret agent, able to survive by his wits alone. He is a more than capable navigational skills are enviable when it comes to sailing. Makes himself a homemade compass, even an ancient Greek navigational aid a “Triquetrum.”

  He is articulate, and charming when he wants to be. He can socialise with the best of them. But when push comes to shove he can survive on his own, at times preferring his own company to that of others.

  Physically he keeps himself in superb shape, and mentally No.6 he is razor sharp, has a dry wit, and a strong sense of identity.

   He is agile, and fiercely independent, and inventive.

   He never relaxes, always watching, waiting, ready to make the most of any given opportunity.

   A man of steel who is magnificently equipped to lead the village. You could call No.6 a "chosen man," as there are not so many of his type around.

    At the end of ‘Living In Harmony’ No.22-Cathy, as she lay dying in No.6's arms said "I wish it had been real." The thing is I'm not sure of No.22's meaning. I mean is she talking about wishing it had been real between her and No.6 in the episode. Or is the actress, Valerie French, wishing it had been real between her and Patrick McGoohan? If she did, she would not have been the only woman to fall for Pat McGoohan's good looks. Not that he ever reciprocated being the married man that he was/is. But isn't it true, that we always want the things we cannot have?

    I’m nor even sure if No.22 was actually strangled to death at the end. If she was, would 22 have been conscious at the end to tell No.6 that she wished it had been real?

Mrs. Butterworth

   Mrs. Butterworth’s attitude towards No.6 during the episode of ‘Many Happy Returns,’ on face value appears to be genuine, especially when he leaves to go and she tells him "No! You mustn’t go like that." and offers no.6 the use of her bathroom, some of her late husbands clothes. Indeed Mrs. Butterworth is very convincing, and it is not until the last few moments of the episode that we learn the truth.

   Mrs. Butterworth not only looks very much at home behind the wheel of the Lotus Seven KAR 120C. But also in what used to be the Prisoners home, in better times. Because up until the moment you realise the truth, Mrs. Butterworth is a very believable character. Who is only the second person to show the Prisoner any act of kindness, since his abduction the Village. The young gypsy woman earlier in the episode being the first.

   But of course Mrs. Butterworth had an earlier encounter, if ever so briefly, during the episode of ‘A B & C’ "Number six. I just know its your lucky number." she tells him.

Be seeing you

I Helped Patrick McGoohan Escape - Video

  Live at the Cavern Club in Liverpool in May 2000.

Just clik on the link below
http://youtu.be/ydYdQrAafjE

The following article appeared in 'In The Village.'

   To be perfectly honest, I only prepared for the set itself. I was totally unprepared for the five minutes that was to folllow after the song, as the band continued to play. Ed Ball did not tell me that he was going to leave the stage, leaving me alone with the band The Times. I suppose I could have just stopped and walked off the stage. But something told me Ed expected me to go on, and so I ad-libbed those fives minutes, five minutes which seemed a life-time on the stage, as I desperately tried to remember lines from 'the Prisoner.' This while Ed was amongst the audience strumming away on his guitar, happy to leave me on stage.
   Once we got backstage, I asked Ed why he had left me front of stage with the band? He said "Because I knew you could do it!"

   {Footnote, I wanted to put the video on Blogspot itself, but after wasting half the morning trying to do that, and failing, I reverted to Youtube, and above is the link.}

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Quote For The Day

    "Number Two.......yes sir..........yes sir, everything's under control........no sir, no problems........assistance?..................oh no sir, I can manage.......yes sir of course.........be seeing you."
                                  {Number 2 - Hammer Into Anvil}

   What does Number 2 mean he doesn't need assistance? He's got Number 14 for assistance. The trouble with this Number 2 is, he's so paranoid, he doesn't even trust the one person who is close to him, who can really help - Number 14!

BCNU

Who's That On The Telephono?

“Yes, what do you want?”
“Don’t be like that. Number Two here. I’m on this over-sized, red, curved telephone.”
“You can’t be!”
“Why?”
“Because I am Number Two, and I’m on the over-sized, red, curved telephone.”

“We can’t both be?!”
“I think we must.”
“Well how did this happen?”

“The telephone rang, I thought you were Number one.”
“So did I.”

“It’s ridiculous don’t you think?”
“Yes.”

“You do realise that we are the only two actors in ‘the Prisoner’ to have to use this damned thing?”

“No I didn’t!”
“I’m Colin Gordon.”

“I’m Patrick Cargill.”
“How do you do.”
“I do very nicely thank you.”

“I think that Pat McGoohan has been making us look ridiculous!”

“Why would he do that? After all Derren Nesbitt isn’t forced to use this telephone.”

“No, but Kenneth Griffith might have had to!”
“Really?”

“It’s on his desk, but Kenneth said he didn’t have to use it in his scene.”

“Scene?”

“As Number Two.”

“Oh I see. He was only in one scene.”
“No, in one complete episode, but he had two roles, the other is Napoleon Bonaparte.”

“I was in two episodes.”
“Did you succeed against Number Six?”
“No, I, well it wasn’t all my fault!”
“I understand completely, I underestimated Number Six.”
“Why, did you fail as well?”
“Yes. So Did Kenneth.”
“Oh!”

“Never mind, it’s only a job!”

“Yes, but there are limits!”
“Yes. That Pat McGoohan’s got a lot to answer for, treating actors like this!”

“I’m going to ring off and have words with Pat!”
“By the way, do you know what this series is all about?”
“Haven’t got a clue. I’ll just take the money and run!”

BCNU

Prismatic Reflection

    Let me begin by asking a question, every fan of ‘the Prisoner’ has questions regarding the series. The questions generally range from basic questions such as who is the Prisoner? Why did he resign? Where is the Village? Which side runs the Village? And what’s the Village Guardian? Then moving on to more complicated questions, for example, why was Roland Walter Dutton so surprised to meet his old colleague in the Village? Who were Cobb’s new masters? And why isn’t there a photograph of Janet Portland in No.6’s Village home? We all have questions you see. Oh your questions might be the same as the next fans, or different altogether. But the end result is the same, we all want answers. And the plain fact of the matter is, we don’t have that many answers. We have to rely upon the answers we gain for ourselves, because Patrick McGoohan didn’t supply answers nicely tied in pink ribbon. He wanted the television viewer to find the answers out for him or herself. And that’s how it’s been for the past, well for almost 46 years.
   So let us presume, and it’s not always a good thing to presume where ‘the Prisoner.’ is concerned. But let us say, for arguments sake, that you have arrived at the answers you were looking for. What then? Do you stop there, and say that’s good enough for me? If you do, then you are a better man than I, and many like me. Because I didn’t stop at the answers I wanted. I had been reading letters and articles in ‘Prisoner’ based magazines and newsletters for several years. Articles written by other fans of ‘the Prisoner.’ And I began to correspond with some of them, either directly, or via letters published in the newsletters and magazines to which I had contributed. They didn’t always agree with what I had to write on the subject of ‘the Prisoner,’ but readers always found my letters and points of view regarding the series of great interest. For my part I didn’t always agree with what others were writing about ‘the Prisoner’ series. And so we come to the question of interpretation, and are we right to interpret ‘the Prisoner’ any differently from how Patrick McGoohan visualised ‘the Prisoner’ series?
    I think we should continue with asking ourselves how McGoohan had originally envisaged ‘the Prisoner’ to be. He had the idea of having one man in isolation, and demonstrating the effects of that isolation. Take a man out of his normal environment, isolate him in an alien environment, and see how that affects him. Take away his identity, his individuality, and see how he reacts. Or words to that effect. That’s Mcgoohan’s original interpretation of ’the Prisoner.’ Another interpretation would be that ’the Prisoner’ is an action adventure, a spy series which is a sequel to ’Danger Man.’ Such was George Markstein’s interpretation of ‘the Prisoner,’ somewhat simpler than that of McGoohan’s. And yet by the time McGoohan had finished writing the script for ‘Fall Out,’ even his interpretation had changed. Now ‘the Prisoner’ had suddenly all been about No.6’s struggle against himself, against his alter ego No.1, who he had been trying to beat! Suddenly because of ‘Fall Out’ the game has changed, Patrick McGoohan had changed the game by reinterpretation. He had changed his idea of ‘the Prisoner’ to fit in with ‘Fall Out,’ and we the television viewer, the fan or aficionado, was supposed to believe that since the Prisoner’s abduction to the Village, that he as No.6, had been in a personal struggle with himself, against No.1. I wonder how many fans actually believed that when they first watched the series, I mean without having heard McGoohan’s explanation about ‘Fall Out?’ I never thought that the very first time I watched ‘the Prisoner.’ Yes there was No.1 in the background, intimated at by No.2, with No.6 occasionally asking the question who is Number 1? When it comes to ‘Fall Out,’ fans of the series have their own thoughts and ideas about the conclusion. My wife for example, she had seen ‘the Prisoner’ before I had met her, and she had something to say about ‘Fall Out,’ and asked me to include it in this article.
   “I felt very let down the first time I saw Fall Out. The Prisoner left the Village, but I didn’t feel that he’d actually escaped, it was neither one thing nor the other. I also felt that the episode seemed in a way to be making fun of everything that had gone before, that I’d taken very seriously.”
   So there you are Patrick, perhaps you were being too clever for your own good with ‘Fall Out!’ But really could there have ever been any other conclusion to ‘the Prisoner?’ For myself, I’ve felt that ‘Fall Out’ is the most logical conclusion to the series, despite any allegorical content, or that of a James Bond Style ending. It would seem, that even the conclusion, can be anything you want it to be.
   But really is that Number 1 who Number 2 is speaking to on the telephone? And if it is, why doesn’t Number 2 recognise the voice being that of Number 6? If indeed we are dealing with the alter ego of Number 6, being that of 1 as Patrick McGoohan suggested with ’Fall Out.’ You see, the deeper one delves into ‘the Prisoner,’ the more complicated it becomes, and that is something I have found with THEPRIS6NER-09.
    But are we supposed to delve into ‘the Prisoner’ as much and as deep as so many of us apparently do? Perhaps not. Perhaps we should accept ‘the Prisoner’ as it is, for what it is. With our interpretations of situations within the series, is there not the danger of making ‘the Prisoner’ what we, as individuals, want to make it? And yet, there is man’s enquiring mind, and women for that matter. Because ‘the Prisoner’ attracts the fairer sex to the series. It’s that enquiring mind that asks the questions, interprets situations. Take the opening scene of ‘the Prisoner.’ Dark clouds gather over a long and empty road that stretches into the distance. Wrong! That’s not a road, it’s a runway on an old World War II airfield! That would be called a spoiler today, and yet where is the advantage in calling it a road, when it’s as plain as the nose on your face that it is a runway? But road or airfield, the main question is, where is the Prisoner driving from? We know where he’s going, but where has he been? And what’s he been doing, this man who is to become the Prisoner?
   You see it’s up to the individual as to how much anyone delves into ‘the Prisoner,’ but remember the deeper one delves, the fewer the answers. Which in turn leaves more of ‘the Prisoner’ open to personal interpretation, but one has to be careful how one interprets any given situation, so as not to go into the realms of fantasy. It is all to easy to misinterpret, or to interpret something which can never be proven. But we still do it, don’t we? And for many that’s half the joy of ‘the Prisoner,’ encouraged as we were by Patrick McGoohan, to find the answers for ourselves.

I’ll be seeing you

The Therapy Zone

    As the Prisoner is taken into that locker room by the Supervisor at the commencement of ‘Fall Out,’ the Prisoner puts a hand to the effigy that is wearing his own suit of clothes. Sometimes when I watch this it appears that at one point the Prisoner wants to strangle the life out of it. Memories of Curtis perhaps, or to kill his own identity. But of course I'm wrong. the Prisoner has no such intention, as he calmly unbuttons the black polo shirt.

   I'm of the opinion that the Prisoner used his fiancée Janet Portland. Why, well he had resigned his job, and hadn't told her, otherwise she would have discussed that with her father Sir Charles. And at some point in time the Prisoner had given his fiancee a receipt for a roll of film, which he expected Janet to keep in case of trouble. Then when the Prisoner returned to London he only went to her birthday party to retrieve that receipt for a roll of film he'd had transformed into transparencies - slides.

   Somehow I don't think his fiancée Janet Portland, rated very high on the Prisoner's list of priorities!

   I read in an old magazine article that when he was finally confronted with the truth - that he was No.1, the Prisoner seemed to go berserk, bringing destruction to the Village before escaping with Number two, the butler and the youth.

   Well in my opinion the Prisoner didn't go berserk. To me he appeared calm and calculating, in the way he set the countdown for the rocket, and the way in which he was instrumental in commencing a bloody and violent revolution.

  As I see it, it was No.1 who went berserk, charging about the control room, and screaming wildly, clambering up the ladder into the nose cone of the rocket, when having been confronted with the truth that he was No.6!

Be seeing you