The original 1960s TV series of The Prisoner stands as an icon of classic television. A secret agent resigns, but finds himself imprisoned in the bizarre Village, where he is renamed ‘Number Six’ and oppressed by the authority figure of ‘Number Two’. Two wants to know why Six resigned — but Six refuses to divulge his reasons. And so a battle of wills commences, with Number Two employing all his increasingly outlandish and dangerous methods of persuasion to break Number Six’s will.

If you haven’t caught up with Volume 1 of our audio drama reimagining of The Prisoner yet, it’s still available at its pre-order price. If want to give it a try before you buy, you can find a free, half-hour teaser extract here (also available as an instantly playable free podcast here). There’s also a series of short, behind-the-scenes videos on our YouTube channel. Watch the first instalment below:

The Prisoner: Volume 2 will be released in January 2017 and is available to pre-order now. In the build-up to Volume 2, writer/director/producer Nick Briggs is giving us a monthly update on his behind-the-scenes progress. Currently, he’s working on storylines…

Dateline: 23rd March 2016 — 14.10

As I mentioned last time, I’ve already planned out which stories I’ll be adapting from the original TV series of The Prisoner. I’ve also worked out a title for the ‘original’ episode I’ll be writing too. But as the overall storyline for the box set develops in my head, I can see that the adaptations will depart from their source material even more.

I’ve just completed the storyline for the first episode of the second box set. It’s an adaptation, but I’m not yet giving away its title, mainly because I haven’t sent it to ITV yet. The title isn’t the same as that of the episode from which it has been adapted. It’s that different!

I’ve been trying to fathom some sort of cryptic clue I can give to the nature of the story. But the fact of the matter is that Prisoner fans are so knowledgeable about the series that literally anything I say will give it away. So instead, I’ll just try to tease you with the impossibly obscure clue of… ‘Robin Redbreast’. If you can guess which episode I’ve adapted from that clue, then you truly have incredible powers of deduction. It’s an impossible clue!

In other news, Mark Elstob, our superb new Number Six, has emailed me to let me know about his availability. As happened last year, he’s up in Scotland doing some theatre, so it’s going to be really rather difficult to get hold of him. But Mark is very committed to the series, so we should be able to work something out.

Oh, and I’ve also met another veteran actor who I want to cast as a Number Two. He’s actually great friends with Michael Cochrane and conveyed Michael’s best wishes to me when I was working with him (this ‘mystery’ actor) on our Sherlock Holmes range recently.

I’ve been a little distracted by other Big Finish duties of late — not least an adaptation of H.G. Wells’s War of the Worlds — so I really must head back to the Village.

On that theme, it’s probably worth mentioning that I’ll be having a short weekend break in Portmeirion over Easter (my first ever visit). If you’re there, I’ll…

Be seeing you!

The Prisoner: Volume 2 will be released in January 2017, and is available to pre-order now for just £25 on CD or £20 to download – containing four new stories inspired by the original TV series.

If you 'd like to ask Nick any questions on his work on The Prisoner, email us at enquiries@bigfinish.com – and Nick may be able to answer them in an upcoming edition of Nick's Notes.