TV Gold

Well after the feast of content that is 'The Key To Time' what else can 2007 offer us in 'classic series' DVD releases.

I see this month that season thirteen favourite 'Planet of Evil' puts in an appearance, less than two weeks away and here is another 'interview you might have missed' from me...

Turning my attention to the October 2007 release here another ‘mini-interview that you might of missed’ this one culled from the October 1995 debut issue of Cult Times. With its subtitle of ‘Frederick Jaeger plays the transforming Professor Sorenson’ Peter Griffiths has a brief chat with the guest star of “Planet of Evil” which read as follows…

In between leading the Elders against the Doctor on the planet of the Savages back in 1966, and building K9 in 1977 because he missed his dog, Frederick Jaeger became a wild, slobbering anti-matter beast in the 1975 Doctor Who story Planet of Evil.

So what do you need to be cast as a monster??
There wasn’t any particular reason. I’d worked with the director, David Maloney, on Z Cars a few years before. My previous Doctor Who had been in 1966, so I suppose they felt my turn had come around again nine years later.”

There were shades of Jekyll and Hyde in Professor Sorenson.
Well, I don’t want to get into hot water with the writer, but The Planet of Evil was remarkably like a film with Walter Pigeon called The Forbidden Planet. When I read the script, I said to my wife, ‘I think I’ve seen this before!’ The central theme, the release of the id, the evil that is in everybody, was more or less exactly the same. If you stripped off the many layers of civilization, the animal shape came out. David said, ‘Be as animal as you possibly can’, so there was a lot of roaring and snarling to be done.
It was very dramatic. The whole idea of a scientist getting infected by the material he is working on, turning into a monster and losing the antidote, is meat and drink to actors, particularly a ham like me!

What about the makeup required?
It wasn’t just one big metamorphosis, the character changed into this creature in degrees. I spent days in what is called the East Tower at the BBC. It houses a sort of laboratory where they make wax face masks – bulging foreheads and cheekbones, exaggerated jaws and so forth. It took quite a long time. You lie on your back on a sort of operating table and several make-up girls pour hottish wax into a mould on your face. When it cools, they have a cast which they later colour and stick on for the various bits. It’s not a thing which often happens to one in television.
I recall most of the others would be having lunch in the restaurant while I was in the make-up room having the next stage put on! One time I’d spent the entire lunchtime having my face and hands covered in coarse hair, and then discovered I needed to get to the gents. There was no way I could undo my pants, so a friendly and very discreet dresser came to my assistance! Of necessity, you can’t have the studio air-conditioning on when you’re actually shooting, so with several layers of plastic skin and a wig, it got very hot.

What was director David Maloney like to work with?
He was very good. He does it all. He’s a mate, as it were – he’s not one of the German-style directors who comes on in riding boots and a whip. He gives you credit for being a professional actor, and it’s great fun working with him. I don’t know what he’s doing now, but in those days he was very busy, a regular director for the BBC.

And the cast…?
Oh, very good. I knew Tom Baer previously, although I hadn’t worked with him, and Lis Sladen was sweet and very nice to me. We used to laugh a lot, frequently between takes, sometimes during. But everyone was very professional, and I thin we got it done on time, which is always important to a television service. It wasn’t quite, ‘We don’t want it good, we want it Thursday’, but nearly!
One of the story’s distinguishing features is the jungle set, on film at Ealing. It’s drawn a lot of praise over the years.
I can’t remember who the designer was, but it was very good. In a very small studio space, they managed to make it look as if it was almost location filming. I was surprised when I saw the finished article. A series the BBC did years ago chronicling the history of Britain had a lot of jungle scenes which looked just like the studio with some netting and leaves. That was an example of how not to do it!

I guess one of those stories that I haven't seen for ages would be "The Power Of Kroll" and revisiting it on DVD yesterday evening as part of the "Key To Time" box set its not difficult to see why. Even the presence of Tom Baker and John Leeson on commentary duties did little to lift a fairly average 'primatives vs scientists' tale.

I did think that the accompanying incidental music for the photo gallery was very effective especially when showing photos from the 'stretching' sequence in the story. With no main 'making of' story feature on offer its largely left to the "in Studio" and "Variations" features both of which have their intriguing aspects. I liked the candid brief relaxed onset interviews with both Tom and Mary quite appealing during the "Variations" local news feature however the main thought regarding the green painted, tea cosy wearing swamies was how cute they are, ah bless them! I guess we are now rather familiar with "In Studio" recording features and this one focuses around episode three and four scenes set in the oil refinery. Most enjoyable was the latter stages of this where you see Tom and Mary joking and offering suggestions as to how to play the scene which indicates the actors participation, in particular Tom (with his waggiling his duck lapel badge) in offering suggestions as to how a scene could be played.

Although welcome the "There's Something About Mary" feature was fairly perfunctory and very much 'does what it says on the tin' with, I felt, the minimal references to her six stories. Doesn't Mary look marvellous for her age in these features!

My favourite of this disc is undoubtedly the "Philip Madoc - A Villain for All Seasons" feature which covers the actors work during the series and ofcourse the second 1960's feature. He is very apprecative towards Peter Cushing and William Hartnell (although not appearing on screen with him). Understandably he was less than enthusastic regarding both "The Krotons" and "The Power of Kroll" with is fair enough although he enjoyed his War Lord character in the epic "The War Games" which he enjoyed the basic premise. Let's not forget his appearance in "The Brain of Morbius" which he says was very well written, something that I certainly agree with, a true classic indeed. An appreciative nod towards Tom's interpritation of the fourth Doctor is another aspect he conveyed in a very enjoyable nine odd minute feature that was a worthy extra on a fairly patchy story disc within the "Key To Time" box set.

I've always been a big fan of the 'making of' documentaries featured on the latter Red Dwarf releases and that level of pleasing professionalism is emulated in "A Matter of Time", the flagship documentary of Doctor Who's "The Key To Time" box set.

I've watched it a couple of times and its well directed, pleasingly designed and the narrative is fascinating aided by a wealth of participant memories matched to pleasing incidental music, sci-fi type backgrounds and relaxed delivery style over a pleasurable hours duration.

Aside from this marvellous extra I've always found it a positive delight watching "The Ribos Operation" due to its imaginative period setting, wonderful cast performances and sparkling dialogue narrative and an engaging central premise but then you'd expect nothing less from writing genius Robert Holmes. Tom (Baker) and Mary (Tamm) are a pleasing commentary duo but apart from a comforting presence there wasn't that much insight into the making of this rather neglected classic.

"The Ribos File" essentially 'does what it says on the tin' by effectively covering the making of this story over its twenty odd minutes duration and is another polished bonus feature which further enhances an appealing story that launched this unique umbrella format season.

Some people no doubt find it easy to set aside loads of time to wade through the entire contents of the Doctor Who – Key To Time DVD box set but for me at least seven discs packed with story and a huge wealth of extra features it takes me some considerable time to wade through it all.

I’ve cleared the “Power of Kroll”, “Androids of Tara” and “The Ribos Operation” discs and on Monday of this week my attention finally turned towards “The Stones of Blood”

Now lets deal with the extras first. I wasn’t too keen on either the Blue Peter or Nationwide features, the latter with Frank Bough being particular irksome especially to Tom Baker but I certainly begrudge their inclusion on this disc. Of the main three extras although it was nice to see Mary Tamm as a features reporter I found the “Stones Free” rather unengaging and certainly personally speaking wouldn’t provoke me in visiting the Rollright Stones. More teasing glimpses of stories yet to be released on DVD feature in the more pleasing “Hammer Horror” feature which convincingly conveyed the links between Doctor Who and the iconic film genre. Perfunctory as ever but with pleasing backgrounds and interesting ‘talking heads’ (especially the welcome participation of Susan Engel (Vivien Fay) whom despite the passing of the years you can clearly see the same facial features endemic with her onscreen character) the “Getting blood from the stones” features covers all the bases regarding the actual making of this story.

Now the reason I’ve held back from watching this disc is the matter of having to double dip due to its two commentary tracks. Well I elected to listen to the four-hander second commentary on Monday and aside from the Tom Baker/Mary Tamm pairing the bonus of Susan Engel and (writer) David Fisher (in for most of the story) this is a thoroughly enjoyable ‘comfort blanket’ experience, like having friends sitting on the settee next to you, just how it should be! Although there are a few nice moments between Mary Tamm and (director) Darrol Blake on the first commentary it did, for me, fail to reach the same comforting heights achieved on the more recent ‘around the microphones’ chat.

Anyway sometime in the future I must get round to exploring the “Pirate Planet” and “Armageddon Factor” discs.