On the inside they rioted, bashed each other senseless and used language that relegated them to a "mature audience" timeslot.
Twenty years on, and this time on the outside, the Prisoner cast haven't changed - although now they get to wear dresses and makeup.
They were four of the strongest characters to grace the Eighties hit drama series: top dog Bea Smith, who gave advice over the stream press in the laundry, throwing punches at those who ignored her; born victim and teddy-bear-hugger Doreen Burns; soft-hearted lesbian taxi driver Judy Bryant; and grim-faced prison officer Colleen Powell, who kept her own heart under padlock and key.
And, true to Prisoner form, we were in for a riot...
Typical of the good-hearted but catty banter between the four of them on the day was when we asked the makeup artist if she'd like a glass of the champagne on offer to the gang. Judith, looking in the direction of who was sitting in the makeup chair at the time, purred: "Darling, she'll need two champagnes if she's doing her face!"
And Betty, when asked by our photographer to cross her legs for a shot, replied, "Dear, I haven't been able to cross them since I was 16", drawing a predictable response from the others.
In fact the lines were flying so thick and fast over lunch that we managed only to get one question in...
TV Week: What's your favourite Prisoner story?
Val: Oh I'm going to use the teeth one. That's my favourite.
Betty: What's the teeth one,
darling?
Val: (The late) Sheila Florance
(left) had to remove her teeth and it was a very early episode because
the character played by Carol Burns - Franky Doyle - had stolen Lizzie's
teeth. She's in the dining room eating bread soaked in milk, that's
all she could get down without her teeth in. She was making a lot
of noise and it was pathetic. Sheila, of course, is playing it for
all she could, and Fiona Spence (who played Vera) is supposed to walk past
and say, "You're a pig, Birdsworth". And rehearsals were fine, but
on the take she says, "You're a bird, Pigsworth". We couldn't get
ourselves together for quite a while after that.
Judith: My favourite? Well, we were filming this riot scene outside the Nunawading studios (in Melbourne). We were all out in the grounds. It is freezing. I'm holding a rifle, with these gloves on and someone says, "You've got to take those off", and I say, "No, I'm jolly well not!". It's 10.30 at night and in this scene, Sheila had to come out with a pair of bloomers on the end of a broom - you know, "Surrender!". And the only line she had was something like, "Alright, it's all over". Well, she blows the line. So we had to set it all up again. She comes back and blows the line again - four times in fact. By the fifth, we were all getting quite tetchy, saying, "Oh come on, Sheils. Get it out." She opens the door, steps out, and you could see she'd lost it again, and she just looks around and says in despair, "Nuna-*@!#ing-wading". She never did get the line out. That was one of my favourite moments on set.
Betty: I remember when we
had shower scenes - they made us wear these strapless, little
flesh-coloured bits of...
Val: Lycra.
Betty: For modesty. So we could walk from the dressing room on to the set. But when they got wet they stretched, and they'd hang down and, if one of the actresses had big breasts, one of them would fly out! I remember seeing some of the soundmen on the platforms above the set staring down.
Val: Do you remember the very last scene that was shot one year before Christmas? It was a shower scene and they deliberately used to do them last because they had no proper plumbing and the water was syphoned down into these 44 gallon drums. It was the last day of the year, and we were still in the shower and I was saying, "Why haven't they called cut?", and all of a sudden all the cameramen and crew took off their shirts and left the cameras running and all jumped into the shower with us! Well, there were screaming women and soap everywhere!
Colette: My favourite Prisoner story. Oh, God, I don't know!
Betty: You know the story that always makes me laugh? When you go on about all the awful things that happened to you as Doreen. You were raped, beaten up...
Colette: And that was all in one episode!
Betty: What about the "Get your priorities straight" line?
Colette: I can't even remember that one.
Betty: You were going through a very complicated divorce...
Colette: Yes. It was very complicated.
Betty: ...and you had to go to court... and someone in authority at the channel...
Colette: Yes, someone in authority...
Betty: And you asked him if you could be excused from filming to go to court and he said, "No, you have to..."
Colette and Betty (together): "Get your priorities straight"!
Betty: Here's another story. At one point, when Colette wasn't married to anyone, she developed a crush on someone in the crew. We were doing an outdoor scene and we had mikes in our pockets.
Judith: His name was Mike?
Betty: We didn't know the mikes were still on and we went into the toilets, Colette and I, and she's saying, "This guy is so gorgeous. He's so heavenly, so divine", and it's going out for everyone to hear, and they're all outside going, "Who is it? Who is it?".
Judith: I don't remember that at all. She made it up.
Betty: No, we actually had all our clothes off...
Val: And who was it who announced, "I'm going home to find..."
...Er, yes, an appropriate time
to turn the recorder off. We'll just let them catch up on their Prisoner
days by themselves.
"THEY HAVEN'T CHANGED!"
Our reunion shoot contained a surprise for Val, Colette, Betty and Judith - one of the hair and makeup artists we used for the shoot was a pal of theirs from Prisoner days.
Maggie
Kolev (left, with Betty) started her traineeship in makeup on Prisoner
in the early Eighties, which, by her own admission, wasn't the most glamorous
of beginnings!
"There was no makeup on Prisoner," she says. "Our job really was to remove makeup. Although there were always a lot of bruises and cuts to create and that was fun."
Maggie, who worked on Prisoner for almost four years, is a well-known face around Melbourne television studios. She is currently working on The Panel and Good Morning Australia, and has worked on a multitude of dramas and series.
"But it all started on Prisoner. It was an educational grounding. And I loved working with an all-female cast," she says.
And how was it catching up with "the girls" again?
"Great. They haven't changed, any of them," Maggie says.
"It was really good working on Prisoner because they were
always professional and always a lot of fun. And they still are!"
WHY FANS WANT TO ESCAPE INTO PRISONER
Two decades on and Prisoner remains almost as popular as it was when it first went to air on February 27, 1979.
Colin
Gerrard (right), president and founder of the Official Prisoner: Cell Block
H Fan Club (Australasia), says membership of his club - 400 people at present
- is the highest it's ever been.
As to why the show has reached cult status remains a puzzle even to him.
"I think it's to do with the all-women cast and the show's uniqueness," the 38-year-old New Zealander says.
"I have interviewed 50 of the actresses from Prisoner over the years for the fan club magazine and I've asked some that very question. But even a lot of them don't know the answer."
The club's core group of dedicated fans (which Colin estimates as about half the membership) are more wrapped up in trading information about episodes, spotting Prisoner actresses in other TV shows and inventing storylines that "might have happened" than worrying about the reasons for their obsession.
In fact, some are so obsessed, they even have trouble defining the line between reality and fiction.
"Oh yeah," Colin says, "we get a lot of members writing letters to us addressed to the characters, as if they are real.
"I never went that far though. Originally I'd say, yes, I got obsessed with it. I was hooked. But once I started seeing behind the scenes - I actually went to the studio and watched a rehearsal and the filming of an episode - I got beyond that.
"But I loved interviewing the actors and finding out what they liked about it."
If you'd like to contact the Official Prisoner: Cell Block
H Fan Club, write to: PO Box 24 - 165, Manners Street, Wellington 6034,
New Zealand.
MEANWHILE, BACK ON THE INSIDE...
We caught up with some former Prisoners and asked them
who they would like to be re-cast as if they had the chance to go back
behind the walls of Wentworth Detention Centre...
Kerry Armstrong
(prisoner Lynn Warner)
"I'd like to be Franky Doyle, because it was such a wonderful
role. She was the first major lesbian character on Australian TV
and a deeply scary woman. She was almost as scary as Anthony Hopkins
in Silence of the Lambs. I'd love to do a Hannibal Lecter role." 
Jane Clifton
(prisoner Margo Gaffney)
"Lizzie Birdsworth - because it is almost 20 years ago,
so I would be about the right age now!"
Lisa Crittenden
(prisoner Maxine Daniels)
"I really was very happy playing Mad Maxine - she was
a lot of fun and I loved playing her. I don't really think there's
another character I'd like to play - except maybe Chrissie 'cause she got
to wear makeup and a dress with a short hemline!"
Patsy King
(Governor Erica Davidson)
"The riots, the fires, the escapes, clashes with 'the
department', the wounding of the 'Gov' and her kidnapping - somehow Davo
survived them all, serenely sailing on to head 'the department'; then to
Canberra (probably now Prime Minister and/or Governor General)! Who
knows, she could be the next head of state. I'll stay with Erica
- besides, I don't think the fans would approve of a change of character!"
Joy
Westmore
(prison officer Joyce Barry)
"A serial killer who is fond of poisoning all my friends
and relations. The main thing I would insist on is that I am deaf
and dumb, thus saving me the awful drudgery of learning lines."
Amanda
Muggleton
(prisoner Chrissie Latham)
"Although I'm a 'little' older now, I would still like
to play Chrissie. She was comical and 
dramatic
at the same time. I remember Prisoner with great affection.
Australia needs another series where women dominate as actors."
Sigrid Thornton
(prisoner Ros Coulson)
"Good old Lizzie - because she was just such a feisty
character."
[Article written by Geoff Shearer and taken from TV Week
magazine - 22nd May 1999]
Thanks to Karris
Abrams for providing this article.