Patrick McGoohan

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Patrick Joseph McGoohan (born March 19, 1928 in Astoria , New York - † January 13, 2009 in Los Angeles , California ) was an Irish - American actor , screenwriter and director . Although he was born in the United States, he is best known for his English films and television series . He later took on American citizenship.

biography

McGoohan was born in Astoria, Queens , New York City to Irish couple Thomas McGoohan and Rose Fitzpatrick. The parents went back home to find work. Seven years after moving to Mullaghmore, County Leitrim , Ireland, they moved to Sheffield , England.

McGoohan attended St Vincent's School in Sheffield. During the Second World War the family was evacuated to Loughborough , Leicestershire. Here he attended Ratcliffe College .

McGoohan was supposed to be a priest according to his mother's will. After high school in Ratcliffe, where he excelled in math and boxing , he first became a chicken farmer, bank clerk and truck driver until he got a job as a stage manager with the Sheffield Repertory . He got his first role through the illness of an actor for whom he stood in. Here he met his wife Joan Drummond , whom he between a sample of The Taming of the Shrew ( The Taming of the Shrew married) and the evening performance.

He was also in great demand as a stage actor. Orson Welles was so impressed by his portrayal of a priest accused of homosexuality in a London West End production that he engaged McGoohan as Starbuck for his York stage version of Moby Dick . While McGoohan still stood in as a substitute in film productions for screen tests, he signed a contract with the Rank Organization , which was known as the production company for B-Movies . Here he was mainly used as a villain, as in Duel at the wheel ( Hell Drivers , 1957) or in Demon Woman ( The Gypsy and the Gentleman , 1958). After only a few films, he terminated the contract.

Then the British film producer Lord Lew Grade contacted him for a television role in the black and white series Secret Order for John Drake ( Secret Agent , also: Danger Man , 1960). Having become wiser through the experience of the Rank contract, McGoohan set a few conditions in advance this time: all fist fights that occur should be different from one another, the character John Drake should primarily use his brain and only in exceptional cases reach for the gun; Above all, however - to the horror of the producers - any exchange of tenderness between the sexes should be avoided. Still, he got the contract. The series itself only ran for a year. When asked by a reporter if he would not have liked to continue the series, McGoohan said, "I would rather make twenty television films than go through what I had to do on a Rank contract - for which I blame no one but myself . ”The series soon proved to be a long-running hit in syndication and achieved a certain cult status.

After spending some films, including for Disney , as The Three Lives of Thomasina ( The Three Lives of Thomasina , 1964) or Dr. Syn - The Scarface ( The Scarecrow of Romney Marsh , also 1964), rotated role offers for James Bond - and Simon Templar had rejected -copies, Lew Grade contacted him again with the offer, once again the role of John Drake to take over. McGoohan agreed after the stories were extended to 50 minutes and the script quality improved. The new series episodes were immensely popular and it made McGoohan one of the highest paid actors in England for a while. Nevertheless, he gave up the role after the fourth season, of which two episodes were filmed in color.

Other famous movies with Patrick McGoohan are Ice Station Zebra ( Ice Station Zebra , 1968), Silver Streak ( Silver Streak , 1976), Escape from Alcatraz ( Escape from Alcatraz , 1979), Braveheart (1995) and Hysteria (1997). For the television series Columbo with Peter Falk , for which he was very involved, McGoohan also acted as director and co-producer. In addition, he himself appeared as a perpetrator in four episodes of the series: In the episodes Des Teufels Corporal ( By dawn's early light ), Tod am Strand ( Identity crisis ), Mord nach Termin ( Agenda for murder ) and Das Aschenpuzzle ( Ashes to ashes ) he can be seen as a murderer.

Patrick McGoohan died after a brief illness on January 13, 2009 in Santa Monica, California.

Number 6

When Lew Grade asked whether McGoohan wanted to continue working for him after the end of his secret assignment for John Drake , the latter was prepared; he had already prepared an exposé for a new seven-part series. A secret agent who is no longer active is kidnapped and wakes up in a prison that is disguised as a vacation spot. The series was expanded to seventeen parts as the mini-series did not exist at the time. The series had the title number 6 ( The Prisoner , 1967) and was filmed in the surreal setting of the North Welsh hotel complex Portmeirion . McGoohan was both the lead actor and director of this production. The series was very controversial and McGoohan was forced to leave England temporarily after the controversial final episode.

Over the years, The Prisoner also developed into a cult. In the meantime, events relating to the series take place every year in Portmeirion. The fans dress up there as residents of the village of number 6 . In Germany, the series was broadcast on ZDF in 1969/70 and repeated in 1991 and 1992 on ProSieben , but only shown in full and in chronological order in 2006 on Anixe HD and in summer 2010 on Arte .

Filmography (selection)

As an actor

As a producer

  • 1967: number 6
  • 1998: Columbo - (TV series, episode 10x67 The Ash Puzzle )
  • 2000: Columbo - (TV series, episode 10x68 murder by bars )

As a director

  • 1961: Secret assignment for John Drake
  • 1965: Danger Man
  • 1967: number 6
  • 1975: Columbo - Death on the Beach
  • 1976: Columbo - The old man and death
  • 1990: Columbo - murder by appointment
  • 1998: Columbo - The Ash Puzzle
  • 2000: Columbo - murder by bars

As a screenwriter

  • 1967: Number 6 (6 episodes, 1967–1968)
  • 1998: Columbo - (TV series, episode 10x67 The Ash Puzzle )
  • 2000: Columbo - (TV series, episode 10x68 murder by bars )

Awards

media

  • DVDs with all episodes of the series The Prisoner have been available in boxes since October 2006. The box contains a total of 17 episodes as well as so-called alternative versions of two known episodes. The four episodes not dubbed by ZDF in 1969 are also represented as originals with German subtitles. In addition to a new DVD edition, a Blu-ray Disc has also been available since November 2010. The four episodes, which were only subtitled in 2006, were dubbed for the first time by the Franco-German television station Arte . The new voice actor for Patrick McGoohan is Bernd Rumpf instead of Horst Naumann .
  • Sound carrier with the film music for the series The Prisoner
  • Book biography: Patrick McGoohan - danger man or prisoner? by Roger Langley, foreword by Peter Falk, Tomahawk Press 2007 (English); ISBN 978-0-9531926-4-9
  • Michael Striss: Columbo - the man of many questions. Analysis and interpretation of a cult figure. Büchner-Verlag, Marburg 2019, 512 pages, ISBN 978-3-96317-176-5 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Patrick McGoohan , The Daily Telegraph . January 15, 2009. Retrieved September 11, 2010. 
  2. ↑ Langley, R: Patrick McGoohan . Tomahawk Press, 2007.
  3. ↑ Langley, R. Patrick McGoohan , pp. 12-13. Tomahawk Press, 2007.
personal data
SURNAME McGoohan, Patrick
ALTERNATIVE NAMES McGoohan, Patrick Joseph
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Irish-American actor, screenwriter and director
DATE OF BIRTH March 19, 1928
PLACE OF BIRTH Astoria , New York
DATE OF DEATH January 13, 2009
Place of death Los Angeles , California , USA