AMC expands on 'The Prisoner' for modern remake

If ever there was a show ripe for a reimagination, it's "The Prisoner."

Despite the fact that few people in the U.S. have seen it - and even fewer have fully understood it - the show's impact on pop culture has been significant, with references to the series popping up in widely viewed entities such as "The Office," "The Simpsons," "Battlestar Galactica," "Fight Club" and "Watchmen." And though it ran for a fairly generous 17 episodes, one could argue that "The Prisoner" left many viewers wanting more.

The original series debuted in the U.K. in 1967, starring Patrick McGoohan as a British spy who, after quitting his post, is whisked away to a mysterious seaside village, assigned the number 6 as his only means of identification and subjected to a variety of schemes to extract information regarding his resignation. Keeping a watchful eye over Number Six is Number Two, a person whose position as second in command to an unseen Number One held vital importance but little job security - more than a dozen Number Twos were outwitted and outlasted by Number Six during his stay in The Village. Most episodes featured a similar plot, with McGoohan's character trying and ultimately failing to escape from The Village. Near the end of its run, though, the series got a little weird, ending with a bizarre finale that left much up to the viewer's interpretation. And in the end, we still never really found out why McGoohan's character resigned.

The AMC version of "The Prisoner," a six-part, six-hour miniseries airing Sunday through Tuesday, Nov. 15-17, promises to be bigger, faster and - dare we say - better. Not to slight McGoohan, but his modern counterpart is an established film star, Jim Caviezel, whose breakthrough performance in Mel Gibson's controversial "The Passion of the Christ" helped gross more than $370 million at U.S. box offices. And rather than cast several actors in the role of Number Two, the producers of the new version landed one really big one in Ian McKellen, the two-time Oscar nominee known to millions of moviegoers from the "Lord of the Rings" and "X-Men" trilogies.

"First thing I said was, 'What's he doing this for? Send it to me,'" Caviezel says of McKellen's early involvement in the project. "And, of course, I read the material, and I'm like, 'Oh, wow. I see why he's into this.'"

The material to which Caviezel refers was written by Bill Gallagher, who offers a fleshed-out yet somehow more concise version of "The Prisoner." In just six episodes, he tells a linear tale complete with back stories and a fully realized conclusion. "You will know more about this guy's life before he got into The Village at some point," Caviezel says of his character. "They really build the relationships in this with the other characters. There's no wasted dialogue between us, either. There's always a meaning to what's going on."

"I'd enjoyed what I'd seen (of the original series)," McKellen adds, "but I felt it was a little bit repetitious in that each episode had basically the same intent: Will he or will he not escape? And, of course, the answer was always no, and the fun and games was working out why he couldn't escape - but, actually, you never knew because the writers of the show didn't know. Bill Gallagher really knows what The Village is all about."

Don't mistake Gallagher's efficiency for the hallmark of a small-time endeavor, though. Those who have seen both the original series and the extended trailer for the remake will note that AMC's version of "The Prisoner" looks immense by comparison. Whereas the confines of The Village circa 1967 seemed quaint and quirky, the present one is expansive and awe-inspiring. The ambition of the new project is no less impressive, with a simple spy story being replaced by more global themes of liberty, family and religion.

Despite AMC's modifications to "The Prisoner," longtime fans are unlikely to cry foul -- especially since the endeavor carries the approval of McGoohan, who gave his blessing to the project before he passed away in January.

"I'm a big fan of his. I wouldn't want to be doing anything that he didn't approve of," McKellen says. "So it was a bit of a relief that he gave it his blessing. I think more than that, there's a character right at the beginning of the new series which would have been very appropriate for him to have played. When he turned that down, he said the only part he would consider playing was Two - but that had already been banked by me."

While casting McGoohan would have been a nice nod to the source material, his absence allows for a fresh start - which is precisely what McKellen wants.

"There will be, of course, many people who remember and are passionate about the original, and I hope they'll want to now visit this version of it,'' he says. "But most people will not be relating back to the original or will be seeing (the story) for the first time, so there's no special point in trying to copy what other people did."