Category: The Doctors
Tom Baker: The Eccentric Alien Infant
by HTPBDET
Posted by Craig in HTPBDET’s absence
Just before Christmas in 1974, I won a scholarship to a prestigious London drama school and, in my mind, made my pact with my Nanna complete. She had been gone for 2 years, but I still missed her a lot.
At the final round of auditions for the scholarship, there was this girl who had my Nanna’s name. She was slightly taller than me, with flaming red hair that cascaded down her back and tickled her thighs. She had a laugh that would dazzle and a voice that crackled with challenge and assuredness. She was Scottish. And gorgeous.
We had to do several audition scenes together, including the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet and the handbag scene between Lady Bracknell and Jack from The Importance of Being Earnest.
Playing opposite her was both the scariest acting I ever did – and the easiest. She just lit me up.
Pertwee: The Patrician Gadget-loving Showoff
by HTPBDET
Posted by Craig in HTPBDET’s absence
To be fair to him, Pertwee never really stood a chance with me.
I finally understood all those schoolmates who had initially thought of Troughton as a usurper, an imposter, a new face that didn’t cut the mustard. This feeling was not helped, at all, by Pertwee’s first appearance seeing him staggering out of the TARDIS and collapsing… in Troughton’s clothes.
Several things conspired against him. We could not afford a colour television set, so I either had to watch in Black and White or watch with an acquaintance from my drama classes who was, well, a bell-end, and I did not want to “owe him”. So, I missed out entirely on the one thing Pertwee had going for him (in my view) – colour.
Troughton: The Paternal Magician
by HTPBDET
(Posted by Craig in HTPBDET’s absence)
My sister was always a temperate, sweet and beautiful girl and the death of my brother, her twin, younger than her by a minute or so, affected her profoundly. Not in any classic way: her grief turned into energy, determination and a kind of fierce devotion – to him, to enjoying her life and making sure she seized every moment to live.
I saw her on and off, for short periods, when my mother came to visit, as my sister was living with Mother, while Father had gone North with my remaining (older) brother to his Mother and elder Brother to cope with his own grief and guilt.
It was a fractured time for us all but my Nanna held it all together. I did not see Father much at all, for over a year, although he wrote every week. Short letters, awash with pain and self-hatred, but always with kind words for my lost brother and good wishes for me and my Nanna.
Regeneration
by HTPBDET
SIDRAT: Some Idiosyncratic Diverse Ramblings About TARDIStimes
Quite a lot happened in my life on 30 October 1966: my youngest sibling died in a tragic accident which saw my parents split up and me, temporarily, sent to live with my maternal Grandmother while the adults sorted things out.
The accident happened the day after Tenth Planet finished.
Hartnell: The Unpredictable Scientific Wanderer
by HTPBDET
My earliest memory in life is of my baby brother peering up out of his cot, having been brought home from the hospital aged 3 days. He was a troublesome baby, always mewling, always wanting to eat whatever I had in my hand, whatever it was.
My second earliest memory is of my Father saying in a very confused and outraged tone “What the bloody heck is this?” as Ian and Barbara pushed their way into the TARDIS for the first time. The ensuing row between my parents over language in front of little me drowned out the next few minutes ( thank God for that repeat a week later or I would have waited a while to know what TARDIS meant ) so my earliest memory of Hartnell’s era is this : confusion, a juxtaposition of the ordinary with the bizarre and a sense that I never had any idea what would happen next. How apt.
