Patrick McGoohan

Early career

In 1955, McGoohan featured in a West End stage production of Serious Charge, as a Church of England vicar accused of being homosexual.^[10]

"Intimidated" by McGoohan's stage presence, Orson Welles cast him as Starbuck in his York theatre production of Moby Dick—Rehearsed.^[11] Welles said in 1969 that he believed McGoohan "would now be, I think, one of the big actors of our generation if TV hadn't grabbed him,"^[12] reflecting that he had "all the required attributes, looks, intensity, unquestionable acting ability and a twinkle in his eye".^[4]

McGoohan's first television appearance was as Charles Stewart Parnell in "The Fall of Parnell" for the series You Are There (1954).^[13][14] He had an uncredited role in the movie The Dam Busters (1955), standing guard outside a briefing room. He delivered one line, "Sorry, old boy, it's secret—you can't go in. Now, c'mon, hop it!," which was cut from some prints of the movie.^{[citation needed]}

After a series of small roles in films, he was the lead in "The Makepeace Story" for BBC Sunday Night Theatre (1955) and appeared in Welles' movie version of Moby Dick—Rehearsed.

Rank Organisation

While working as a stand-in during screen tests, McGoohan was signed to a contract with The Rank Organisation. They gave him mostly villainous parts in films, including High Tide at Noon (1957) and Hell Drivers (1957).^[15]

He had frequent roles in television anthology series such as Television Playwright, Folio, Armchair Theatre, ITV Play of the Week and ITV Television Playhouse. He was given a leading role in Nor the Moon by Night (1958), filmed in South Africa.^[16] After some disputes with Rank management, the contract was dissolved. He then worked in television, winning a BAFTA in 1960.^{[17][clarification needed]}

His favourite part for stage acting was the lead in Henrik Ibsen's Brand, for which he received an award ^{[clarification needed]}. Michael Meyer, the play's translator, wrote of the last act "McGoohan suddenly unleashed all his terrifying power, and from then until the final moments... the audience was gripped as seldom happens in a theatre."^[18] He also played the role in a BBC television production in August 1959.^[19] Michael Meyer, who translated the stage version, thought McGoohan's performance was the best and most powerful he had seen.^[18] It was McGoohan's last stage appearance for 28 years.^{[citation needed]}

Danger Man

Lew Grade soon approached McGoohan about a television series where he would play a spy named John Drake. Having learned from his experience at Rank, McGoohan insisted on several conditions: all the fistfights should be different; the character would always use his brain before using a gun; and—much to the executives' horror—no kissing. The show debuted in 1960 as Danger Man,^[20] a half-hour programme intended for American audiences. It did fairly well, but not as well as hoped.^[21][22]

Production lasted a year and 39 episodes. After the first series was over, an interviewer asked McGoohan if he would have liked it to continue. He replied, "Perhaps, but let me tell you this: I would rather do twenty TV series than go through what I went through under that Rank contract I signed a few years ago and for which I blame no one but myself."^[23]

Post-Danger Man

McGoohan was one of several actors considered for the role of James Bond in Dr. No. While McGoohan, a Catholic, refused the role on moral grounds,^[24] the success of the Bond films is generally cited as the reason for Danger Man being revived. (He was later considered for the same role in Live and Let Die, but refused again.)^[25]

McGoohan instead worked for The Walt Disney Company on The Three Lives of Thomasina (1963) and The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh (1963). A staid English vicar, Dr. Christopher Syn (a reformed pirate captain - played by McGoohan) disguised as a scarecrow and mounted on a magnificent black stallion thwarts King George III's Revenue officers in daring night-time smuggling adventures on the remote Kent coast.

Return of Danger Man

After he refused the role of Simon Templar in The Saint,^[25] Grade asked McGoohan if he wanted to give Drake another try. This time, McGoohan had even more say in the series. Danger Man (Secret Agent in the US) returned in 1964 as a one-hour programme. The scripts allowed McGoohan more range in his acting. Because of the popularity of the series, he became the highest-paid actor in the UK.^[26][27]

After shooting the only two colour episodes of Danger Man, McGoohan told Grade that he would quit the role.^[28]

The Prisoner

McGoohan pitched a miniseries about a secret agent who quits and is abducted to a surreal, cheerful holiday resort village. Grade asked for a budget, McGoohan had one ready, and they made a deal over a handshake to produce The Prisoner.^[20] In addition to being the show's protagonist, McGoohan was its executive producer, forming Everyman Films with producer David Tomblin, and wrote and directed several episodes, in some cases using pseudonyms.^[29][30] The originally commissioned seven episodes grew to seventeen.

The title character, the otherwise-unnamed "Number Six", spends the entire series trying to escape a mysterious prison community called "The Village", and to learn the identity of its ruler. The Village's administrators try just as much to force or trick him into revealing why he resigned as a spy, which he refuses to divulge. The series' main exterior filming location was the Italianate resort village of Portmeirion, Gwynedd, Wales, which was featured in some episodes of Danger Man. Although the show was sold as a thriller in the mould of Danger Man, its surreal and Kafkaesque setting and reflection of concerns of the 1960s counterculture have had a far-reaching influence on popular culture and the series ultimately developed a cult following.^[2][3]

The Prisoner was created while McGoohan and George Markstein worked on Danger Man.^[31] The exact details of who created which aspects of the show are disputed, as there is no "created by" credit. Majority opinion credits McGoohan as sole creator, but a disputed co-creator status was ascribed to Markstein after a series of fan interviews were published in the 1980s.^[31]

MGM

During production of The Prisoner, MGM cast McGoohan in an action movie, Ice Station Zebra (1968), for which his performance as a British spy drew critical praise.

After The Prisoner, he was meant to star in an expensive adaptation of the James Clavell best-seller Tai-Pan but the project was cancelled before filming.^[32] Instead he made The Moonshine War (1970) for MGM.

1970s

Following his turn in Mary, Queen of Scots (1971), he directed a rock opera version of Othello, entitled Catch My Soul (1974), but disliked the experience.^[33]

McGoohan received two Emmy Awards for his work for the television series Columbo, with his long-time friend Peter Falk. McGoohan said that his first appearance on Columbo (in the 1974 episode "By Dawn's Early Light") was probably his favourite American role. He directed five Columbo episodes (including three of the four in which he appeared), one of which he also wrote and two of which he also produced. McGoohan was involved with the Columbo series in some capacity from 1974 to 2000; his daughter Catherine McGoohan appeared with him in the episode "Ashes to Ashes" (1998). The other two Columbo episodes in which he appeared are "Identity Crisis" (1975) and "Agenda for Murder" (1990).

As he had done early in his career with the Rank Organisation, McGoohan began to specialise in villains, appearing in Silver Streak (1976), The Man in the Iron Mask (1977), Brass Target (1978), and Escape from Alcatraz (1979), portraying the prison's warden.

In 1977, he had the main role of the television series Rafferty as a retired army doctor who moves into private practice.^[34]

1980s-2000s

In 1980 he appeared in the UK television movie The Hard Way, followed by the science fiction/horror movie Scanners in 1981 and a TV remake of Jamaica Inn in 1983. After seeing Jamaica Inn, McGoohan concluded he could no longer act and rejected offers from Michael Elliott to play Captain Ahab and Hotspur.^[35]

In 1985 he appeared in his only Broadway production, featuring opposite Rosemary Harris in Hugh Whitemore's Pack of Lies, in the role of a British spy.^[36] He was nominated for a Drama Desk Award as Best Actor.

McGoohan featured as Edward I of England in Braveheart (1995), revitalising his career, and was seen the following year as Judge Omar Noose in A Time to Kill.^[25]

In 2000, he reprised his role of Number Six for an episode of The Simpsons, "The Computer Wore Menace Shoes". In it, Homer Simpson concocts a news story to make his website more popular, and wakes up in a prison disguised as a holiday resort. Dubbed Number Five, he meets Number Six, and later betrays him and escapes with his boat; referencing his numerous attempts to escape on a raft in The Prisoner, Number Six splutters "That's the third time that's happened!"

McGoohan's last movie role was the voice of Billy Bones in the Disney animated film Treasure Planet (2002). That same year, he received a Prometheus Hall of Fame Award for The Prisoner.

Death

McGoohan died following a "short illness" at Saint John's Health Center in Santa Monica, California, on January 13, 2009, at the age of 80.^[39]

Television roles