Eccleston to revive The Prisoner

By Jason Heller | October 5, 2007 | 7:21pm

Aux Features Newswire

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Heroes' Christopher Eccleston has had great turns in everything from 28 Days Later to 24 Hour Party People. But the actor impressed lots of geeks–this A.V. Club dweeb included–with his portrayal of Doctor Who in Season One of the current revival of the series. Now, Britain's ITV has cast Eccleston to play the man known as Number Six in a reboot of the trippy, Simpsons-parodied classic The Prisoner. The 1967 program starred Patrick McGoohan as a secret agent held captive in a mysterious enclave called The Village, and ITV claims the new series will somehow be a "radical reinvention" of the original.

Useless factoid learned while "researching" this Newswire post: When asked in a 2005 interview for his opinion of Eccleston's Doctor Who, The Fall's legendarily cantankerous genius Mark E. Smith casually dropped this bomb: "10 years ago there was talk of me being the Doctor. I was down at the BBC, doing a session for Peel, and this bloke–he must have been a Fall fan–said a place on the short list was mine if I wanted it. 'Nah, I don't do acting,' I said. Well, could you see me fighting the Daleks?"