The Prisoner: Episode 14 Living In Harmony Written by David Tomblin & Ian L Rakoff
Directed by David Tomblin
Mexican Sam "Welcome to Harmony"
No.6 "Harmony? Never heard of it"
A sheriff resigns, throwing down his badge and guns. Kidnapped to the town of Harmony, run by a corrupt Judge, with the help of his psychotic murdering gunman The Kid. There, he's offered the job of sheriff, but refuses. Kathy, a bar saloon girl, befriends him. When her brother is lynched, No.6 agrees to be sheriff, but refuses to wear guns. The Judge and The Kid plan to make him change his mind.
This was another of the three filler episodes. Showing that McGoohan & Tomblin had run out of ideas, they actually canvassed the crew for any plot suggestions. Ian L Rakoff was a humble associate editor and new to the profession. He suggested a Western and McGoohan, who'd always wanted to appear in one, agreed. It also obviated the need to return to Portmeirion for what would have been expensive location shoot. According to Rakoff, he wrote the script, but when it was aired the credit showed it was written by David Tomblin, from an idea by Tomblin and Rakoff. As Tomblin also directed, and this was commissioned while McGoohan was still in America, I think this shows that Tomblin was the major force in the show for these three filler episodes, McGoohan reserving his energies for acting and writing the final episode.
The show must have confused an already confused viewing public on first screening. We don't get the usual opening credit sequence, indeed we don't get The Prisoner title card, merely the episode title card "Living in Harmony". Actually, it's quite an accurate Wild West pastiche of the opening sequence, horseman galloping forward from a distance, the resignation No.6 throws down his sheriff's badge and unhooks his guns on The Marshall's desk. He gets beaten up rather than gassed, and dragged by rope to the town called Harmony. It's quite clever, stopping where No.2 normally gives his speech.
What can one say about his bizarre episode? It neither adds nor detracts from the story arc as it's yet another attempt by The Village, using psychotropic hallucinogens and hi-tech audio system to create a 'virtual' reality, in yet another attempt to break No.6 by showing him the futility of resistance. I'm not a huge fan of British attempts at the peculiarly American genre of the Western, see my review of the Doctor Who serial The Gunfighters. This is better than most, but it suffers like all the others from the British countryside unconvincingly standing in for the Wild West, some poor Yankee accents (Pat does his 1960 Danger Man transatlantic accent which is fair if not entirely convincing), obvious British character actors standing in for Yankees and Mexicans, and too much dialogue in too many interior scenes. It also has all the TV Western genre's weaknesses, e.g. inaccuracies about gun wounds. The sets here are also not very convincing. The concept is a good one, Rakoff was clearly right in his idea that a Cowboy who refuses to wear a gun would fit in quite nicely with the show's concept. Given the drug and technical resources of The Village, it's also quite credible, with one exception, which I'll go into more detail later.
Now onto the weak points. Why doesn't Will shoot The Kid when he has the chance? He's already drawn his gun, whilst The Kid's is still holstered. So considering he's facing death, why doesn't he shoot? Fear, or perhaps an awareness that this is merely a scenario played out for the benefit of No.6, so he can't kill The Kid. But what evidence is there that there are other participants in the role play scenario other than the main four? And if he was a normal villager, how would he be able to differentiate fantasy from reality when the others like No.2 couldn't?
Another weak point, more a laziness on the creative side already noted earlier, perhaps due to creative fatigue. There's yet another use of No.8 again - for the third time! First was Nadia in Chimes, then Wanda Ventham in Funeral. There are other numbers, but like character names The Colonel and Potter, it's used more than once and adds confusion. There are other numbers not mentioned in the series, so why not use them?
The major plot hole are those cardboard cut-outs of the characters No.6 sees at the end, they're far too specific. For example, we see a cut-out of The Kid shot dead where he was indeed shot by No.6. There's no way they could have foreseen how the scenario would play out, and they admit this in No.2's room at the end, so they couldn't have mocked up the photos. Again, a laziness in thinking through the concept, something noticed in the later episodes.
There are however some good points in the episode. The acting is good, especially ITC regular Bauer as The Judge. As a native Chicagoan, his American accent is perfectly natural. Also Alexis Kanner as The Kid, notice his change when he becomes No. 8. There's also some nice directorial touches from Tomblin. Particularly two nice POV tracking shots, first the hanged man sequence, which nicely avoids having to show a lynching on television. and No. 6's attack on the guard by swinging on the rope. Good camerawork by Stafford and camera operator, here Len Harris.
Apart from the obvious pacifist theme, there's also an interesting theme on how virtual realities can become addictive, so that one can no longer discern reality from fantasy, and the danger that they can unwittingly bring out darker antisocial impulses, like lust and murder, that might otherwise have not surfaced in the individual's psyche. This was quite a novel concept in the 60s, almost Ballardian in its prescience, as virtual reality and video games did not exist then, merely imaginative immersion in film and TV productions, played out by children in their games. It has become far more apposite now with a slew of increasingly more violent video games and the beginnings of commercial home use for VR.
Incidentally, this episode was never shown by CBS during its networked summer run in 1968. The ostensible reason given was the use of hallucinogens. Since they're shown to be bad here, and are used in other episodes of the show, this would seem rather hypocritical or nonsensical. It's more likely that as the Vietnam War was intensifying, the idea that such a very American hero template as The Cowboy, who would be seen to be avoiding wearing guns, would be deemed as too political and pacifistic, seemingly siding with the anti-War peace movement, and American TV networks were extremely wary of any political content in their shows, particularly any that might alienate their commercial sponsors.
In the end, an interesting concept, well conceived and mounted, but which suffers from being too British, poor saloon set, the lack of Portmeirion, and from some glaring plot holes. It's also clearly a filler, marking time until the finale.
Village rating (out of 6): No.3
Incidental Music
The Prisoner .................................................................. PATRICK McGOOHAN
The Judge/Number Two ................................................ DAVID BAUER The Kid/Number 8.......................................................... ALEXIS KANNER
Kathy/Number 22 ......................................................... VALERIE FRENCH
Town Elder .................................................................... GORDON TANNER Bystander ...................................................................... GORDON STERNE Will ................................................................................ MICHAEL BALFOUR Mexican Sam ............................................................... LARRY TAYLOR
Town Dignitary .............................................................. MONTI DE LYLE
Horse Dealer ................................................................. DOUGLAS JONES
1st Gunman ................................................................... BILL NICK
2nd Gunman .................................................................. LES CRAWFORD
3rd Gunman ................................................................... FRANK MAHER
1st Horseman ................................................................. MAX FAULKNER
2nd Horseman ............................................................... BILL CUMMINGS
3rd Horseman ................................................................. EDDIE EDDON
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