Doctor Who 18x23

Directed by

Geoffrey Beevers as Melkur (voice) • Matthew Waterhouse as Adric • Anthony Ainley as Tremas

With Tremas falling under suspicion, due to his association with the Doctor, a new Keeper Nominate is named. Now, with everything in place, Melkur has only a short wait before his full malevolence can unfold.

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1. "Who will succeed The Keeper? What are the Doctor's dangerous thoughts? What is Melkur's evil surprise?" (Radio Times)

2. This episode was first shown on 14 February 1981.

3. It was seen by 5.2 million viewers, the serial's lowest audience.

4. Three of this serial's four episodes came in over-length and needed to be cut.

5. This was mainly done by topping and tailing the scenes: Removing their first and last lines.

6. Part 3 was the exception.

7. Initially it looked as if it would be too short for Doctor Who's standard 25-minute length.

8. At the preliminary read-through, it was timed at just sixteen minutes.

9. That's less alarming than it might seem:

10. Scripts always stretch in performance when actions are added to words.

11. But it was still 90 unstretched seconds shorter than Parts 2 and 4.

12. In consequence, there were very few cuts from this episode,

13. not to mention an unusually long reprise from the end of Part 2, amounting to a minute and a half.

14. John Black was engaged to direct 'The Keeper of Traken' on the recommendation of Amy Roberts,

15. a friend of his who was one of Doctor Who's two regular costume designers on the 1980-1 series.

16. He started work on 1 September, just as Christopher Bidmead was embarking on a full-scale rewrite of the scripts.

17. "The cell is intimidating," says the script.

18. There are "a couple of rough bunks, no windows, and a strong door with the small barred section."

19. As you've just heard, the door is secured with an electronic bolt,

20. in line with the planet's juxtaposition of the medieval and the technological.

21. "The whole area is neglected, showing signs of long disuse."

22. The serial had an eight-week pre-production period before the start of rehearsals on 25 September.

23. The rehearsal rooms in the BBC's Acton block were booked on 2 September,

24. and there was a preliminary planning meeting on 18 September

25. at which the various designers (sets, costume, effects)

26. Worked out what they would need to provide.

27. Katura's line was scripted as part of Kassia's speech.

28. In the script, "The Doctor fingers his neck and looks about distastefully."

29. The implication of the gesture is that he realises he's in the condemned cell.

30. In the first draft, they get even closer to execution:

31. Mogen contrives to frame Adric for murder,

32. and all three of them are sentenced to be crushed to death between metal plates.

33. The death sentence is postponed because of an even more pressing matter: The Keeper's demise.

34. Geoffrey Beevers (born 1941) plays the voice of Melkur.

35. He was known for his role as a boomerang- throwing Aborigine in a lager advertisement,

36. and had recently appeared as the murderer Lucianus in the BBC production of Hamlet (1980),

37. but much of his work was in the theatre, including Bequest to the Nation and Dandy Dick in the West End.

38. He had also written a science fiction play for the London fringe, Steak and Microchips,

39. and more recently, alongside work at the National Theatre and Shakespeare's Globe,

40. he has written several literary adaptations for the Orange Tree Theatre in Richmond:

41. Adam Bede (1990), which won a Time Out award, Père Goriot (1994), and Silas Marner (1998).

42. Though he also appears in the flesh,

43. John Black cast him primarily for the deep, mellifluous quality of his voice.

44. The design department allocated the production 46 days of Tony Burrough's time,

45. along with 294 hours' work from an assistant.

46. Burrough suggested lilies, gentians, and freesias for Nyssa's flowers.

47. In the script, the flowers "spill to the ground at the feet of the statue and are trampled as the two women fight".

48. Christopher Bidmead proposed a sub-plot in which Nyssa is the first to suspect Kassia's subversion,

49. but her father disregards her warnings, thinking it nothing but a stepdaughter's spiteful jealousy.

50. The jewelled box was made by the Visual Effects Department, not Props,

51. because it was originally written as an instrument case, and so fell within the usual purview of Effects.

52. Peter Logan's brief was to make something that would fit the overall Art Nouveau look of the sets.

53. Luvic is played by Robin Soans, who has had a distinguished career in the theatre.

54. If the jovial consul represents one end of his range,

55. he can also play seedy nastiness at the other,

56. notably as a convicted murderer in Jonathan Creek (1997).

57. He too is a playwright, the author of A State Affair (2000),

58. The Arab-Israeli Cookbook (2004), and Talking to Terrorists (2005).

59. At rehearsals, he suggested that his character sounded like a brand name for

60. a lavatory cleaner.

61. Kassia is played by Sheila Ruskin, who wasn't on John Black's short list.

62. Like many actors recommended by John Nathan- Turner, she had appeared in The Pallisers (1974),

63. playing the wayward, self-willed daughter of a wealthy lawyer.

64. She had also worked with Nathan-Turner in How Green Was My Valley (1975), as a coal owner's sister.

65. He introduced her to John Black in September

66. while she was making the steamy drama series, Mackenzie (1980),

67. in which she played the title character's lover.

68. In the 1960s she worked extensively in children's theatre, and co-wrote two plays with her then husband, David Wood:

69. The Owl and the Pussycat Went to See (1968) And Larry the Lamb in Toytown (1969).

70. Her other television appearances include an alien in Blake's 7 and a deranged wife in Strangers and Brothers (1984).

71. Johnny Byrne wrote the part of Nyssa as a reaction against what he perceived as a tendency among television scriptwriters

72. to portray young women in roles that were merely decorative or functional.

73. In the script, "Neman shrugs, a little too elaborately."

74. This scene was written to take place across a table,

75. on which Nyssa places her bribe and Neman the keys.

76. This line was Tom Baker's ad lib.

77. Sarah Sutton (born 1961) was best known for her role as a blind girl in the children's serial, The Moon Stallion (1978),

78. but she had behind her a substantial career as a child actor, playing, among others,

79. a child murderess in Menace (1973),

80. the title role in the James MacTaggart version of Alice Through the Looking Glass (1973),

81. a posh little girl in the Dennis Potter adaptation of Late Call and a schoolgirl in Oil Strike North (both 1975).

82. She trained at the Elmhurst Ballet School.

83. She originally came from Basingstoke,

84. and Tom Baker used to tease her in rehearsals by calling her "Miss Basingstoke".

85. Tom's Doctor would often absent-mindedly misappropriate gadgets that appealed to him.

86. Sarah Sutton and Matthew Waterhouse were briefly released

87. from studio recording on 21 November

88. for a press photo call introducing Sarah as a new regular character in Doctor Who.

89. Neman and the Fosters have tonsures, a relic of their original conception as monks.

90. Their contracts stipulated that "hair adjustments" would be required.

91. Some journalists' inaccurate typing fingers

92. meant that in a few newspapers Nyssa was introduced as "Byssa" or "Myssa".

93. Fortunately most of them managed to hit the "N" key, which lies between "B" and "M"!

94. In the script, the Doctor asks the Fosters, "Have you met the Ion Bonder?"

95. "Nimble little weapon. If you like that sort of thing."

96. Not quite such good thinking in the script:

97. "Nothing like the obvious to mislead and confuse," he says.

98. Casting took place in late September and the first week of October.

99. John Black had several abortive first thoughts.

100. He considered engaging a second actress to play the teenage Kassia seen in Part 1,

101. but in the event Sheila Ruskin proved able to handle both.

102. He also mooted casting the same actor to play both Tremas and the voice of Melkur.

103. The cast received their scripts in mid-October.

104. Meanwhile, the costumes were being made.

105. Most of the actors had three fittings. Sarah Sutton, for example, was fitted on 9, 13, and 30 October.

106. Because there was no pre-filming, the two continuing members of the regular cast

107. had a longer than usual break between one serial and the next: Three weeks off.

108. Tom Baker spent his last day off before rehearsals being photographed at Madame Tussauds,

109. where his waxwork was being unveiled to the press.

110. Tussauds was about to open a special exhibit, The Doctor Who Experience,

111. which included, to Tom's considerable satisfaction,

112. not one but two effigies of him, one in his regular costume

113. and the other in full prickly monster make-up as seen in 'Meglos'.

114. But the press had got hold of another story about Tom: His imminent departure.

115. The production office seized back the initiative by turning the Tussauds photocall into a press conference.

116. A few hours later, Tom dropped into the Nationwide studio,

117. where presenter Sue Lawley announced "good news for Daleks everywhere", and Tom remarked,

118. "I'm going into oblivion."

119. Recording paused after this shot

120. while the scenery crew set the CSO panel into the set wall.

121. In the script, there is a crackle of energy as Tremas puts his hand into the safe.

122. There was still work to be done before Tom Baker could enter oblivion.

123. While he was getting his last taste of the Doctor Who limelight, more mundane tasks were in hand.

124. The Acton rehearsal room was being marked up with tape

125. to represent the studio sets which the actors would first see ten days later.

126. Cast, director, and scriptwriter assembled there at 10 a.m. On 25 October,

127. a Saturday morning on which Doctor Who and its departing star had made the front pages.

128. For the next two-and-a-half hours, they did a full read-through of the script,

129. while production assistant Alan Wareing took precise timings with a stopwatch.

130. The production was divided into two blocks, each of three days' recording.

131. The scenes were covered on a set by set basis rather than in story order.

132. The first block included the scenes in the courtyard,

133. the Tardis, the grove, and the consuls' quarters,

134. and the second was devoted to the Sanctum, the vault, the Master's Tardis, and the cell.

135. Each block of recording was preceded by nine days of rehearsals,

136. covering the periods 25 October to 4 November and 10 to 19 November (with Sundays off).

137. A rehearsal day typically ran from 10 a.m. Until 4.30 p.m.

138. Though John Black always took care to release actors early if he'd finished with them.

139. In the script, "a faint electronic moan" can just be heard from inside the Keeper's chamber.

140. Most of the sets had to fit into Studio 6 at Television Centre, which measured 70 feet by 92.

141. The Sanctum was shot in the slightly smaller Studio 8.

142. To enhance the scale, Tony Burrough used composites.

143. The corridor is a case in point, made from four scenery towers,

144. which were roughly ten feet square and fourteen feet high.

145. There was a different shaped arch on each elevation,

146. so that they could be reconfigured in various permutations to look like a number of different sets.

147. These scenery pieces were nicknamed "elephants", because of their resemblance to howdahs.

148. See if you can spot the three different styles of archway: One with a half-hexagonal top, another with a rounded top,

149. and the third, in the background here, tilting off the vertical plane like the Leaning Tower of Pisa.

150. Each elephant had two "leaning" arches on opposite sides,

151. creating the illusion of a long, continuous passageway when the camera looks through them.

152. The Fosters' miscellaneous guns were all re-used from earlier productions rather than specially made.

153. Johnny Byrne's original objective was to stress the Doctor's alienation,

154. and to emphasise what he is rather than what he does.

155. In practice, this meant making him a far less proactive character than was usual with Tom Baker's characterisation:

156. He would witness the events as they unfolded, but not interfere with the other characters as they dealt with the situation.

157. The Keeper's dissolution draws on the Renaissance belief, epitomised in Macbeth (1606),

158. that the death of a national ruler is accompanied by immense cosmic and meteorological disruption.

159. Nylon fishing line was attached to the foliage to create the effect of it whipping about in the storm.

160. Two hurricane lamps were used to simulate the lightning,

161. and two BBC wind machines moved the air around.

162. It was intended to show Kassia with glowing red eyes here.

163. "The Source is almost out of control," says Kassia in the script, "and soon it will be ours."

164. Katura and Luvic were directed to move in unison in this sequence.

165. The wind machines, blowing at full blast, made their task especially difficult.

166. Preparation for a day's studio recording always started in the small hours of the morning,

167. when the overnight scene crew would put up the sets.

168. The studio began to fill up at 9 a. M: The newly erected sets would be dressed and lit, ready for the cast's arrival at 10.30.

169. By then, most of the actors were in full costume and make-up for the day's camera rehearsals.

170. The exception was Tom Baker: He used to rehearse in his shirt sleeves.

171. "Kassia is glowing faintly inside the chamber," says the script.

172. On some studio days, there were six-and-a-half hours of camera rehearsals, broken only by lunch at 1 p.m.

173. On others, the afternoon was spent working on a rehearse-record pattern.

174. Everyone broke for dinner at 6 p. M,

175. and recording began, or continued, in the evening from 7.30, after half an hour's line-up (testing the equipment).

176. The scheduled end of the evening was at 10 p. M, by which time everyone had worked at least a twelve-hour day.

177. In the script, Kassia's neckband starts to glow.

178. Geoffrey Beevers watched the episode with his family. This bit gave his 3-year-old daughter Daisy a scare.

179. The flames at the back of the Keeper's chamber are gas burners.

180. The gaskets didn't always perform on cue, which caused delays during recording.

181. Luvic's line was originally written for Katura.

182. Although the serial depends on a very clear-cut distinction between absolute good and evil,

183. Johnny Byrne found this an uninteresting way of portraying the characters.

184. Instead, he tried to represent their behaviour in shades of grey.

185. In the script, the Doctor says to Adric: "A materialisation? Just like... You heard that whirring noise."

186. The scripted episode ends with an exclamation from the Doctor:

187. "Melkur himself!"

188. Also seen in this episode were:

189. Pat Gorman, Stuart Myers (Fosters)

190. Uncredited production contributors included:

191. Jacqueline Morrish (Floor Assistant)

192. John Morin, Peter Pearse (Lighting Chargehands)

193. Sally Warren (Make-Up Assistant)

194. Nansi Davies (Artists Booking) 19:47,233 He is gone!

195. The Keeper is dead.

196. The Source, has it survived?

197. All will be well, Consul.

198. All will be as it should be.

199. Consuls, you are witness to my acceptance.

200. Instruct the Source the transition may be completed.

201. - Come on. Doctor.

202. So you survive after all.

203. Oh, yes, yes, we're still here. Don't write us off yet, will you?

204. Look into my eyes all of you.

205. There is nothing more that you can do, Doctor.

206. So, look, and you will die swiftly.

207. A merciful death.

208. Refuse and you will regret it.

209. No, no, we know what you're up to, Melkur. And we'll stop you, that's a promise!

210. But it's too late, Doctor. The Source is mine!

211. And soon, very soon, you will feel its power!

212. Now this Traken web of harmony is broken,

213. I am free!

214. By this act, Kassia, you are physically confirmed as Keeper.

215. Prepare for access to the Source.

216. May you bring peace and blessing for all your time, Keeper.

217. Consul, don't do it!

218. - You again? - Fosters, these traitors have no business here!

219. Consul Kassia has betrayed you all. Don't complete the transition.

220. Do your duty, Katura, complete transition!

221. - Don't listen to her, Consul! - Complete transition!

222. No, Katura! - Transition complete.

223. You now have access to the Source, Keeper.

224. - The Keeper! - We warned you, Consuls!

225. It's our only chance. Secure the Tardis, take Nyssa with you and wait outside!

226. It's too late, Tremas, far too late.