1. "What is the Doctor's plan for the Tardis?
Why is he haunted by the Distant Stranger?
What terrible fate lies behind the Blue Door?"
(Radio Times)Copy !req
2. This episode was first shown on 28 February 1981.Copy !req
3. It was seen by 7.1 million viewers.Copy !req
4. We begin with what the script calls
"a quaintly old-fashioned vignette
amid the rush of passing traffic".Copy !req
5. "The Constable is in a jovial mood,
obviously embarking on a lengthy friendly chat
with a colleague."Copy !req
6. For many years, the last surviving police box
in the south of England was on
the Barnet by-pass in Hertfordshire.Copy !req
7. That piece of trivia was Christopher Bidmead's
starting point for this part of the serial:
He even visited the box.Copy !req
8. But between scripting and pre-production,
it was demolished,Copy !req
9. so this box is BBC-supplied.
As indeed is the Barnet Borough Council notice.Copy !req
10. In the end, the scene was filmed
somewhere else entirely,
on the A413 in Buckinghamshire.Copy !req
11. The location no longer exists:
The lay-by was replaced by the leg of a road bridge
for the M25 motorway overhead.Copy !req
12. Christopher Bidmead originally envisaged
the cloisters, the Doctor's thinking room,Copy !req
13. as an open-air environment inside the Tardis.Copy !req
14. Accordingly, he proposed shooting these scenes
on location at a Cambridge college.Copy !req
15. He wrote 'Logopolis' in October 1980,
after he'd revised the scripts
for the previous adventure, 'The Keeper of Traken'.Copy !req
16. The first outline scenario is dated 1 October,
and the draft scripts were delivered on 25 October.Copy !req
17. In the outline, the Doctor wants to repair the TardisCopy !req
18. because, in 'The Keeper of Traken',
he saw how well the Master's was working.Copy !req
19. The Second Law of Thermodynamics,
which the Doctor summarises,
was first propounded by Rudolf Clausius in 1850.Copy !req
20. In the outline he phrases it differently:
"The more you organise,
the more things get slowly more unmanageable."Copy !req
21. In fact, a grampus is a large fish,
and doesn't wheeze.Copy !req
22. It does puff, though, when it ejects a waterspout
from its blowhole.Copy !req
23. Earlier in the 1980-1series,
the Time Lords ordered the Doctor
to bring Romana back to Gallifrey.Copy !req
24. She didn't want to go,
and forced the issue by staying behind
in a different universe, E-Space.Copy !req
25. Since their inception in 1969,
the Time Lords were observers of the universe
who would never intervene in its affairs.Copy !req
26. Gallifrey, E-Space, and Romana are part
of an ongoing story arc devised by Bidmead
as the series' script editor,Copy !req
27. which culminates with all the different threads
being gathered together here in 'Logopolis',
the year's final serial.Copy !req
28. In the script, the Doctor feels a draught
and asks Adric to close the door.Copy !req
29. The house is a private address in Battersea.Copy !req
30. Tegan's forgetfulness was
an unscripted, last-minute addition,
and Aunt Vanessa's muttering was an ad-lib.Copy !req
31. In the script, Aunt Vanessa looks rather different:
Frail and spindly, grey-haired and bespectacled.Copy !req
32. Most of the actresses considered
for the role were genuine Australians,
and most of them were too young.Copy !req
33. Dolore Whiteman, who got the part,
had been a stand-up comedian down under
as well as an actress.Copy !req
34. Tegan's "Rabbits" was devised to be
a transmittable swear-word.Copy !req
35. One of Janet Fielding's tasks
in the run-up to production
was to work on her accent.Copy !req
36. Though originally from Brisbane,
she'd worked in Britain since 1977,
and her native twang had almost disappeared.Copy !req
37. Australian voices were often heard
on British television in the early 1980sCopy !req
38. as the BBC sought to finance its drama series
(notably Tenko and Bergerac)
With Antipodean co-production deals.Copy !req
39. That's why Tegan's Australian:
To encourage a co-production deal
with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC).Copy !req
40. The proposal was first mooted in July 1980,
and Tegan's character brief compiled on 1 August.Copy !req
41. The ABC had rejected the offer
by the end of August,
though it continued to buy and transmit Doctor Who.Copy !req
42. In the script, Tegan also explains
to her imaginary passengers
how to operate the oxygen masks,Copy !req
43. and where to find the in-flight magazine
and sick-bags.Copy !req
44. Because Christopher Bidmead
was a BBC staff member,
he had to get formal permission to write the scripts.Copy !req
45. A request was submitted on 29 August,
but the clearance only came through on 5 January,
after he'd left the BBC.Copy !req
46. Adric was characterised by his frequent failure
to understand familiar Earth phrases.Copy !req
47. Bidmead was fascinated by the Tardis.Copy !req
48. He wanted to explore its internal architecture
(hence the cloisters), take it apart,
and find out how it worked.Copy !req
49. In part, this was an extension of his fascination
with his own new computer,
Vectorgraphic MZ System B.Copy !req
50. This was the very machine on which
he was writing the scripts for 'Logopolis' itself.Copy !req
51. The sound of the cloister bell was created by
striking a gong, then deadening the reverbCopy !req
52. by immediately immersing it in water.
The sound was then slowed down
to give it weight and a lower pitch.Copy !req
53. It's a yellow car in the script.Copy !req
54. That's not Janet Fielding driving:
It's her stand-in, Pat Roy.Copy !req
55. In an earlier draft, it was Aunt Vanessa who drove.Copy !req
56. Dolore Whiteman was a hit with the film crew.
Afterwards, director Peter Grimwade wrote to her,Copy !req
57. "I think that one or two of your fellow artistes
are quite relieved that you die
at the end of Episode 1."Copy !req
58. Tom Baker married Lalla Ward, who played Romana,
the Saturday before the start of production
on 'Logopolis'.Copy !req
59. Romana's outfits from 'Nightmare of Eden'
and 'The Leisure Hive' are on the left.Copy !req
60. Romana was given K9 as a leaving present,
but public interest secured the metal mutt
his own spin-off, K9 and Company.Copy !req
61. These scenes were scheduled for shooting on
17 December, the Wednesday of the filming week.Copy !req
62. At three weeks' notice, filming was rescheduled,
to make way for a remounted studio session
on the previous serial.Copy !req
63. Tom Baker and Matthew Waterhouse,
needed in the studio,
weren't due on location that day.Copy !req
64. But the producer wanted to see
both studio and filming,
and couldn't be in two places at once.Copy !req
65. So the location shoot was moved
to Monday 22 December.Copy !req
66. In the very first Doctor Who serial,
the Tardis was found in a Totter's Lane
junkyard owned by a "totter"
(or rag-and-bone man).Copy !req
67. The time column wasn't wheezing like a grampus,
but it was making a noise.Copy !req
68. It hissed constantly,
and thumped as it reached the top and bottom
of each cycle.Copy !req
69. The design is based on a carpet sweeper.Copy !req
70. Some of the dialogue scenes in the console room
had to be reblocked in the studio to be played
without the console.Copy !req
71. This was originally planned as a model shot
rather than a computer graphic.Copy !req
72. The image was created using rudimentary
1981 computer technology: A BBC Micro.Copy !req
73. "Can't get away from it," says the Doctor
in the script as the shape on screen stubbornly
reverts to being a police box.Copy !req
74. "A friendly sight to look at," ventures Adric.
"And a sight too easy to look for,"
replies the Doctor.Copy !req
75. On the first transmission,
the Doctor's lines were out of synch
because of the problems with the noisy console.Copy !req
76. Tom Baker had to re-record them afterwards,
and they were dubbed on in post-productionCopy !req
77. They've been re-synched for this DVD edition.Copy !req
78. The business with the car manual
was a late addition.
In the script, Aunt Vanessa
just stands there in silence.Copy !req
79. Coming up after this subtitle
is the first shot to be filmed.Copy !req
80. Aunt Vanessa's house was under a flight path.Copy !req
81. This gave them a choice of five different planes,
but also lots of other shots ruined by aircraft noise!Copy !req
82. With no real police box on location,
the BBC had to use both
the current Tardis prop and its predecessor.Copy !req
83. Producer John Nathan-Turner believed that
the Doctor's sidekicks were a central feature
of the series' appeal.Copy !req
84. This was partly because he became producer
at the end of a period in which these characters
had been very strongly written and cast.Copy !req
85. Concerned to ease the transition
from Tom Baker's Doctor to Peter Davison's,Copy !req
86. he planned to reintroduce an old friend
from the Doctor's past,Copy !req
87. so that the audience would have a familiar lady
to watch while getting used to the new leading man.Copy !req
88. The lay-by remained open
to the public throughout the filming:
Anyone could have come and parked there
if they liked.Copy !req
89. Nathan-Turner had no set ideas about
which character he wanted to bring back.Copy !req
90. He considered both Sarah Jane Smith and Leela,
the Doctor's two travelling companions
before Romana,Copy !req
91. but neither actress was interested in the offer,
so a new character had to be created: Tegan.Copy !req
92. "I'm so sorry," says Aunt Vanessa in the script.
"What a thing to happen on your first day."Copy !req
93. The script describes
"a shadowy and faintly translucent figure".Copy !req
94. The Head of Serials, Graeme MacDonald,
thought an alien wouldn't measure things in metres.Copy !req
95. John Nathan-Turner disagreed:
The Doctor has spent enough time on Earth.Copy !req
96. He was also mindful
that schoolchildren were always told
to "state the units" when measuring.Copy !req
97. In the script, the Doctor explains further:
"The dimensional interference patterns
will shake the thing loose."Copy !req
98. In the first draft,
the Doctor obviously knows less about it
than he pretends.Copy !req
99. "Academic interest," says the Doctor in the script.
"Very few uses."Copy !req
100. These shots were filmed silent,
and the noise of the traffic dubbed on afterwards
from a wildtrack.Copy !req
101. At least one viewer was bamboozled into thinking
they filmed by the real police box at Barnet.Copy !req
102. After the episode was shown,
Miss A. M. Bradbury of Enfield
wrote to the Radio Times.Copy !req
103. She drove past the box from time to time, she said,
and was interested to see it featured on Doctor Who.Copy !req
104. But on a recent trip she noticed it was gone.
Had it been reclaimed by the police?Copy !req
105. Or maybe the BBC had bought it
for use in a future Doctor Who series,
she speculated.Copy !req
106. Or perhaps, just perhaps,
it had really dematerialised!Copy !req
107. Location filming in mid-December
was bound to be a chilly business.Copy !req
108. Everyone involved was asked to wear
woolly hats and your warmest underwear.Copy !req
109. Cuddles will be provided on request,
offered Peter Grimwade.Copy !req
110. The production team was keen to get away
from typical Doctor Who titles like
'The Wanarks of Terror'.Copy !req
111. 'Logopolis', as both a name and a title,
was the very first element of the serial
that came to Bidmead's imagination.Copy !req
112. In the outline, he describes it as the City of Logic,Copy !req
113. but it literally means "city of the word" in Greek.Copy !req
114. Matthew Waterhouse was particularly happy
with the balance of intelligence and stupidity
in Bidmead's portrayal of Adric.Copy !req
115. "You've got a lively, inquiring mind, Adric,"
says the Doctor in the script. "Explain this."Copy !req
116. That inquiring mind was the central quality
that Bidmead wanted to bring out,Copy !req
117. because he wanted to enthuse younger viewers,
who identified with Adric, about science.Copy !req
118. Tom Baker's roadside scenes were filmed,
as scheduled, on Friday 19 December,Copy !req
119. whereas this is Monday, with different weather.Copy !req
120. The sight of the watching figure
has a stronger effect on the Doctor in the script.Copy !req
121. He "leans against the Tardis door,
almost white-faced,
his two hearts beating a little faster.Copy !req
122. "Something quite extraordinary seems
to have happened to him."Copy !req
123. Back inside, he tells Adric urgently not to touch
the police box lock.Copy !req
124. "Yes, I know," replies Adric. "Heisenberg."Copy !req
125. In quantum mechanics, the Uncertainty Syndrome
proposed by Werner Heisenberg in 1927Copy !req
126. holds that an observed object is affected
by the presence of the observer.Copy !req
127. This is the same console room set, differently lit.Copy !req
128. "Perhaps it is the yellowish tinge to the light
that makes it feel inhospitable,
somehow sterile and dangerous territory."Copy !req
129. Shifting the shoot meant
booking a second film crew,Copy !req
130. because the men due to film on the Wednesday
weren't free on the Monday.Copy !req
131. The second crew went uncredited,
but watch out for their names
during the closing titles of this episode.Copy !req
132. This is another piece of Tegan's forgetfulness
added at the last minute.Copy !req
133. Janet Fielding (born 1957)
Made her first professional acting appearance
with the Queensland Theatre Company.Copy !req
134. She was reading drama
at the University of Queensland at the time.Copy !req
135. She came to Britain in 1977,
and worked mainly in the theatre.Copy !req
136. Her only television experience before Doctor Who
was a bit-part in Hammer House of Horror (1980).Copy !req
137. "It's some kind of... flying saucer!"
She says in the script.Copy !req
138. Bidmead conceived Tegan as sharing
his own fascination with the Tardis,
because she thinks of it as a futuristic aircraft.Copy !req
139. She was devised as an air stewardess in part
because, at a very early stage,
there was a possibility that her first serialCopy !req
140. might have an aeronautical theme,
based around the Anglo-French plane Concorde.Copy !req
141. The scripts were delayed, but Tegan kept her job,
and with it her love of foreign travel.Copy !req
142. "Tegan is torn between immense curiosity about
the craft and her fear of the unexpected,"
says the script.Copy !req
143. For her debut performance,
Janet Fielding gave a stronger emphasis
to the fear than the curiosity.Copy !req
144. She reasoned that Tegan responds to
uncertainty and discomfort
by going on the offensive,Copy !req
145. so in this serial she gets more and more aggressive
as she gets more and more terrified,Copy !req
146. to the extent that she fears she may be going mad.Copy !req
147. The name "Tegan" gets momentarily tangled up
with the word "name".Copy !req
148. With time at a premium
in a television studio session,
this kind of minor imperfection
was often allowed to stand.Copy !req
149. In the earliest version of the serial,
the order of events was different:Copy !req
150. First Aunt Vanessa mysteriously vanishes,Copy !req
151. and only after that does Tegan
go inside the police box looking for her.Copy !req
152. The plan was always for Tegan
to get involved with the Doctor
on her first day as an air stewardess,Copy !req
153. but one thing had to change: Her age.Copy !req
154. She was first created as a 19-year-old,Copy !req
155. but then they learned that the minimum age
for air stewardesses was 21.Copy !req
156. The final character brief compromised on about 20.Copy !req
157. One essential facility was overlooked when
the location shoot was moved to the Monday.Copy !req
158. Nobody booked a honeywagon
(the film industry term for a mobile toilet).Copy !req
159. The local garage, Phoenix Motors,
supplied facilities for a small consideration.Copy !req
160. Before becoming a director,
Peter Grimwade (1942-90)Copy !req
161. Worked as a production manager
for more than ten years.Copy !req
162. His credits in that capacity include
Lord Peter Wimsey (1975),
All Creatures Great and Small (1978),
Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (1979),Copy !req
163. and an awful lot of Doctor Who
(six serials, 1970-7).Copy !req
164. In the script, the Doctor already realises
who the "someone" is:
"He anticipated we'd come here."Copy !req
165. That's another reason why, in the earliest version,
he wants to repair the Tardis:Copy !req
166. He suspects the Master escaped from Traken,
so he needs his ship in perfect working order.Copy !req
167. No, says the Doctor in the script,
"I don't drive. Not a car, that is."Copy !req
168. The line was changed after
executive producer Barry Letts pointed out
that the Doctor does drive (or used to).Copy !req
169. The Detective Inspector
is played by Tom Georgeson,Copy !req
170. who is best known for a role
he played soon afterwards,
Dixie Dean in Boys from the Blackstuff (1982).Copy !req
171. He went on to be another solid, dependable DI,
with a touch more humour,
in the police series Between the Lines (1992-4).Copy !req
172. In the script, the cloister bell is tolling
throughout this scene, louder and louder,Copy !req
173. driving the panicked Tegan almost out of her mind.Copy !req
174. The episode ends differently in the script.Copy !req
175. After we see the shrunken corpses, the DI says,
"I think you'd better come with us."Copy !req
176. The three policemen close in on the Doctor,
ready to make an arrest.Copy !req
177. Also seen in this episode were:Copy !req
178. Ray Knight (Bicycle Policeman)Copy !req
179. Peter Roy, Derek Southern (Policemen)Copy !req
180. Adrian Gibbs (Distant Stranger)Copy !req
181. The alternative film crew were:Copy !req
182. Keith Burton (Cameraman)Copy !req
183. Graham Day (Camera Assistant)Copy !req
184. Geoff Tookey (Grips)Copy !req
185. Dave Brabance (Sound)Copy !req
186. John Collins (Lighting)Copy !req
187. Other uncredited production contributors included:Copy !req
188. Jane Hickson, Carl Levey, Vernon White (Dressers)Copy !req
189. Joan Welsh (Booker)Copy !req
190. Jo Day (Design Assistant)Copy !req
191. Sheila Hodges (Booking Assistant)Copy !req
192. Jane Judge (Production Secretary)
—> 00:21:27,322
We must be getting near to
the nucleus of the bubble.Copy !req
193. - What's causing it?
- Another Tardis.Copy !req
194. What?Copy !req
195. Materialising around the police box
just as we plan to do?Copy !req
196. Yes.Copy !req
197. And someone's been here before us.
Stay here, Adric.Copy !req
198. - Ah, good morning.
- Good morning.Copy !req
199. This your vehicle?Copy !req
200. - Which vehicle?
- The sports car.Copy !req
201. - No.
- Ah.Copy !req
202. I just wondered how you come
to be here. There is only the road, after all.Copy !req
203. It isn't easy to explain.Copy !req
204. Well, while you're trying to work that one out,
perhaps you'd like to explain this.Copy !req
205. So he did escape from Traken.Copy !req
206. I think you'd better come along with us.Copy !req
207. But he's still about somewhere.Copy !req
208. - "He", sir?
- Yes, the Master.Copy !req