Patrick McGoohan, creator and star of cult classic TV show ‘The Prisoner’
March 19, 1928 — Jan. 13, 2009
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Patrick McGoohan, the Emmywinning actor who created and starred in the cult classic television show “The Prisoner,” died Tuesday after a brief illness. He was 80.
He won two Emmys for his work on the Peter Falk detective drama “Columbo” and appeared as King Edward Longshanks in the 1995 Mel Gibson film “Braveheart.”
But he was most famous as the character known only as Number Six in “The Prisoner,” a sci-fi-tinged 1960s British series in which a former spy is held captive in a small enclave known only as the Village, where a mysterious authority named Number One constantly prevents his escape.
Mr. McGoohan came up with the concept and wrote and directed several episodes of the show, which has had a devoted following in the United States and Europe for four decades.
Born in New York on March 19, 1928, he was raised in England and Ireland. He had a busy stage career before moving to television and won a London Drama Critics Award for playing the title role in the Henrik Ibsen play “Brand.”
He starred in several Disney films, including “Dr. Syn, The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh” and “The Three Lives of Thomasina.”
One of his first forays into TV was in 1964 in “Danger Man,” a spy show that lasted one season but was brought back for three more when its popularity— and Mr. McGoohan’s — exploded in reruns. In the United States, the show was called “Secret Agent” and carried the famous Johnny Rivers theme “Secret Agent Man.”
Weary of playing the show’s lead John Drake, he pitched to producers the surreal and cerebral “The Prisoner” to give himself a challenge.
The series ran just one season and 17 episodes in 1967, but its cultural impact remains. He voiced his Number Six character in an episode of “The Simpsons” in 2000.
The show is being remade as a series for AMC that premieres later this year.
“His creation of ‘The Prisoner’ made an indelible mark on the sci-fi, fantasy and political thriller genres, creating one of the most iconic characters of all time,” AMC said in a statement Wednesday.
He won Emmys for guest spots on “Columbo” 16 years apart, in 1974 and 1990.
He appeared as a warden in the 1979 Clint Eastwood film “Escape From Alcatraz” and as a judge in the 1996 courtroom drama “A Time to Kill.”
His last major role was in “Braveheart” as the brutal king who battles Scottish freedom fighter William Wallace, played by Gibson.
In his review of the film for the Los Angeles Times, critic Peter Rainer said, “McGoohan is in possession of perhaps the most villainous enunciation in the history of acting.”
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