News

We all heard the news that Christopher Eccleston may be starring in the forthcoming remake of The Prisoner. Now The Independents Pandora reports that CE may have had a bust-up with the producers and Sky are getting cold feet.

“Christopher did contact Granada earlier this year, when talks about the project began,” they say. “But since the casting process has only just begun, we are also looking elsewhere.”

Quelle surprise. Odd that he should have initiated contact with the producers, as he did with Doctor Who, and then mess everything up himself (assuming Pandora’s right). But it seems that if there’s a way to sabotage his own career, Eccleston will find it every time. Let’s hope he can pull himself together again and get back into the game.

Christopher Eccleston – remember him? – is being hotly tipped to take the lead in Sky One’s remake of The Prisoner. Every few years, there are rumours that the classic 60s series about a spy abducted and imprisoned in a ‘village’ will get remade. Mel Gibson was going to make a movie of it for a while; Granada was hinting at it last year, but dropped it. But this appears to be officially official – another interesting move by Sky’s new director of programmes, Richard Woolfe, who’s actually going to get Granada to make it for him.

I think Eccleston would be a good choice for the role. He may have been miscast as the Doctor, but Eccleston suits the role of “Number 6” perfectly. As played in the original series by Patrick McGoohan, 6 was a shouting, angry man, constantly on the prowl, sarcastic, untrusting, always getting into fights. Eccleston can do all of those things and do them well. Given Eccleston is now persona non grata at the Beeb and many other networks are wary of working with him in case he buggers off after five minutes, a major role in an iconic series would rehabilitate him no end and might help him shed the image of the Doctor.