Patrick McGoohan: The Spy Who Started It All

Susan King at the Los Angeles Times offers a piece on one of my favorite actors and one of my favorite TV programs, Patrick McGoohan and The Prisoner.

There's never been a TV series quite like "The Prisoner," which premiered in England in 1967 and debuted in the U.S. the summer of 1968 on CBS.

Best described as James Bond meets George Orwell filtered through Franz Kafka, the cult series revolved around a British secret agent (Patrick McGoohan) who wants to resign from the service. Deemed too dangerous to retire, they kidnap him and send him to an idyllic, though completely isolated, seaside resort called the Village.

There residents are assigned numbers instead of names and their every movement is followed by monitoring systems and security forces. And if someone tries to escape, they encounter a mysterious white balloon called Rover.

For 17 brilliant, surreal episodes, McGoohan's No. 6 was in constant battle with No. 2, a revolving door of henchmen who did the bidding for the unseen leader, who is naturally No. 1.

 "At the time, it was so original and unique," said McGoohan's daughter, actress Catherine McGoohan. "It completely took the secret agent spy story to a different level."

You can read the rest of the piece via the below link:

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/showtracker/la-et-st-the-prisoner-20140426,0,3274542.story?track=rss#axzz301hdF2xr

You can also read an earlier post on Patrick McGoohan via the below link:

http://www.pauldavisoncrime.com/2013/09/patrick-mcgoohan-reliving-work-of.html

Note: I'm also a huge fan of Patrick McGoohan's earlier TV series, Secret Agent (Danger Man in the U.K.). I purchased the DVD complete collection and over the course of this past year, I watched all of the Secret Agent episodes. Secret Agent is an intelligent, cool and clever show that holds up after all these years.

John Wayne's Personal Items Are Up For Auction

Susan King wrote an interesting story about the placing of iconic actor John Wayne's personal items up for auction.

Though the actor most widely known for his westerns died of cancer in 1979 at the age of 72, his popularity remains unparalleled. A Harris poll released earlier this year listed Wayne as America's No. 3 favorite actor after Johnny Depp and Denzel Washington. Wayne won the lead actor Oscar as the wily one-eyed marshal Rooster Cogburn in 1969's "True Grit," and starred in some of the most respected films of the 20th century working with John Ford on such acclaimed movies as 1939's "Stagecoach," 1948's "Fort Apache," 1949's "She Wore a Yellow Ribbon" and 1952's "The Quiet Man." He also appeared in director Howard Hawks' "Red River" in 1948, 1959's "Rio Bravo" and 1962's "Hatari."

You can read the rest of the story via the below link:

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/news/la-et-john-wayne-vault-20110907,0,723317.story