The Prisoner v.2

An interview fresh from Digital Spy…

The Prisoner is returning to screens next year more than 40 years after the original in a new joint remake from ITV and American broadcaster AMC.

Jim Caviezel (The Passion of the Christ) takes on the iconic role of Number Six, a man who is kidnapped and held as a prisoner in a strange village. Veteran actor Sir Ian McKellen stars as Number Two, the villainous chief of the village.

How faithful will the new version be to the original? Will Rover be bounding back too? Tube Talk spoke to Executive Producer Michele Buck to find out.

Does this new version have the same overarching plot as the original?
“The original series was 17 hours and we’re only making six, but it does have an overriding story. He’s in the village and he wants to get out of the village – that was the conceit of the original series and that’s the same with our version. Why is he in the village and how is he put in the village? All of that you’ll have to watch to find out. But the overall rules are same, yes.”

How do you think fans of the original will take to the new version?
“I hope really well! We’d be bonkers if we thought we were going to make something they wouldn’t like. We have obeyed the rules of the first series so I’m hoping it will work for them… in an updated way.”

Was it difficult trying to juggle the expectations of what The Prisoner should be with trying to make the new version feel fresh and distinctive?
“I think if you’re a drama maker, you’re always reinventing the genre or trying to find the next turn. Even in classic adaptations you’re trying to do something different. This isn’t just a classic adaptation, this was an iconic series originally and actually to have another spin of the dice is a huge challenge. The Prisoner has no rules; it’s unconstrained in that way. It was modern and rule-breaking in its time and hopefully we’ve done the same here.”

Perhaps the most iconic part of the original series was the giant blimp. Is it returning?
“Ahh, you mean Rover? I’m not going to comment on Rover. You’ll have to watch to find out! What I will say is that I hope in our version of The Prisoner, we’ve identified the trigger points from the first run of what the audience wanted and liked, where it was surreal, where it was weird, and have reinvented those same beats.”

The cast is led by James Caviezel and Sir Ian McKellen. What characters do they play and what do the actors bring to the roles?
“Jim is clearly playing Number Six, the Patrick McGoohan part. Ian is playing Number Two, who’s in charge of the village and is the big baddie, really. The thing with this is that we’re making it for both the American audience and the British audience. Jim is very much an applauded American actor that we’re really lucky to get. He’s a good looking alpha male. Ian McKellen is the other half of the casting for the British audience. He’s probably our most important British actor. To get him to commit to do a TV series is a fantastic achievement.”

Were they both familiar with the original audience?
“Ian knows it very well and clearly wanted to do it because it resonated with him. I think the premise for Jim was a new thing. I would be very surprised if he was familiar with it before we gave him the call. But we gave him the call, he read the scripts and was very excited.”

Originally this project was in development for Sky1 and Christopher Eccleston was a rumoured Six. What changes resulted from the move to ITV/AMC?
“It was never going to be with Christopher Eccleston. At the time we announced we were doing The Prisoner, as with Doctor Who previously, the press was always second guessing and decided Christopher Eccleston was doing it. I can categorically say it’s never been him. It was always going to be an American lead, because it’s an American-British co-production and the split we decided on was an American Number Six and a British Number Two.”

Have you planned beyond the first series?
“The original Prisoner was 17 one-hours and we’ve made six. Let’s see whether the audience will accept it or not. I’m hoping they will and believe they will!”

Show 37: Doctor Who – The Time Meddler

It’s Boxing Day!

So what better way to occupy yourself whilst finishing off all those leftovers (and copious amounts of alcohol) than by listening to our final show of 2008. Not only that, but the final story of Doctor Who’s second series.

Notable for being the first story to feature just one of the original cast members and the first to introduce to us to another of the Doctor’s own race!

As usual, you can download the episode via iTunes or the podcast feed, or directly by clicking here.

 

We’ll be back in a fortnight, starting 2009 with the first story of Series 3 – Galaxy 4…

Enjoy the rest of your Christmas break – and we wish you all a Happy New Year!

“And a Merry Christmas to all of you at home!”

It’s that time of year again and the three of us have escaped the C2 Pod for Christmas and will be watching The Next Doctor in three separate locations. Trust me, the phone lines will be on fire immediately afterwards…

So we’d like to wish all our listeners and readers the very best seasonal wishes. Thanks for tuning in and we hope you’ll stick with us throughout 2009!

And don’t forget that our final show of the year is available on Boxing Day! Unlike all these other podcasts that do “Best of”s, we actually give you a proper show. Aren’t we lovely?

 

 

Don’t get trampled in the rush to answer that, will you…? Bah Humbug.

Climb Aboard, Captain…

RTD has been talking Companions to The Times…

Doctor Who showrunner Russell T. Davies has dropped a few hints about the Time Lord’s sidekicks in the 2009 adventures.

“What everyone’s missing is that there will be a new companion,” Davies told The Times, referring to the intense speculation about David Tennant’s successor.

[No, we're not, because you've said MANY times that he won't have one, he'll have several]

“We’ve got a young female companion at Easter,

[Original]

and then a much older woman next Christmas – someone in her fifties or sixties. I love that.”

[So have Big Finish for the last 7 years]

Davies also revealed that he has to be careful about the actresses he uses in case it disadvantages his replacement Steven Moffat.

“It’s made casting next year’s four specials difficult because we’re going, ‘Well, that’s an interesting actress, but they might want her for series five’,” he said. “We don’t want to ruin anyone’s chances of being the new companion by casting her for a one-off.”

God forbid Britain runs out of interesting actresses! How many can you cast in four specials? And shouldn’t the two showrunners be talking to each other about this sort of thing…?

I’m starting the campaign now for the wonderful Hattie Morahan to be the Season 5 companion.

Survivors Survives!

Also announced by the BBC Press Office this weekend…

The BBC has commissioned a second six-part series of Adrian Hodges’ post-apocalyptic drama Survivors before the first run has finished.

The first series has been a ratings success for the corporation, averaging 5.9 million viewers and a 23% audience share in its Tuesday 9pm timeslot.

Like the original 1970s version, scripted by Daleks creator Terry Nation, the Hodges series was set in the UK after a virus had wiped out at least 90% of the world’s population. The original Survivors series first aired in 1975 and ran for 38 episodes over three series.

The final episode in the current series, which follows the disparate group of survivors trying to build a new life, screens on BBC1 on December 23rd at 9pm.

Hodges, who was also behind Primeval and Charles II, will return to executive produce the second series of six episodes next year.

The cast including Julie Graham, Max Beesley and Phillip Rhys will return, with “further casting to be announced next year” according to a BBC spokeswoman.

Survivors, made by BBC Drama Productions, was recommissioned by the BBC 1 controller, Jay Hunt, and the BBC drama commissioning controller, Ben Stephenson.