Doctor Who - Documentary s02e10 Episode Script

Dennis was very into football.
He had once been a professional footballer.
He was with Leyton Orient for a while.
MAN: He was a stand-up comedian.
RUSSELL: Dennis made you laugh.
Doctor Who ought to always be funny, because it is, at its essence, ridiculous.
NARRATOR: Dennis Spooner was born in Tottenham, North London, on the 1 st of December, 1932.
From humble beginnings he went on to entertain millions of people between the 1960s and 1980s, creating and writing for an astonishingly varied array of television shows.
In 1964, after working for Gerry and Sylvia Anderson on the puppet series Thunderbirds, he wrote his first script for Doctor Who.
Dennis could take it all in his stride.
And that's a wonderful thing, when you are conscious and there are people in the control room who are going to have the confidence to know that it's all going to come out and it's going to be all right.
It's understandable that any new series is going to try and struggle to find a template for what it's doing.
Every story in the first series of Doctor Who is trying to work out who the audience is and they try and experiment with different things.
And although Terry Nation's Dalek story is the big hit, it's actually Dennis Spooner's Reign of Terror which sets the format for what the show will become in future years.
Well, if you're going, be off with you.
Maybe you have succeeded.
Maybe we are where you say we are.
But I remember an occasion when you took us home once before.
- Yes, and we met Marco Polo.
- Entirely different circumstances.
The Reign of Terror sees people actually having an emotional bond to each other.
There's a scene in Reign of Terror which, if it only existed in the archives, I think people would recognise is up there with all the really great powerful dramatic scenes of Doctor Who.
Which is in episode 5, and Ian and Barbara are arguing, because Leon Colbert, whom Barbara has had a bit of a shine to, has been shot by Ian's friends.
And they argue about what history means.
And Ian says, and it's brilliant, he says, "It doesn't matter.
We come here, we get involved, "these people are our friends, and that's the important point.
" And that is the important point for Dennis Spooner.
Where The Reign of Terror falls down a bit is in the final episode, which having had the Doctor and his friends get involved in these different adventures, suddenly ends with a historical meeting between Paul Barrass and Napoleon, whom we've never seen in the story before.
And the Doctor and his crew, just watching them, it feels wrong because that isn't what Reign of Terror is about.
But what happens at the very end of that episode is sensational.
Which is, because it's the last episode of that series, we have a sort of star background, and we end up on an idea that the Doctor's saying that their destiny is in the stars.
DOCTOR: Well, unlike the old adage, my boy, our destiny is in the stars, so let's go and search for it.
Which is mirrored by what Dennis Spooner does in the end of Series 2 as well.
Which has no words, but has the faces of the Doctor, Steven and Vicki also fading against a star backdrop.
And what Dennis Spooner seems to be saying in both stories at the very conclusion is we can go anywhere and we can do anything.
It's beautiful.
NARRATOR: With original story editor David Whitaker leaving Doctor Who after its groundbreaking first year, producer Verity Lambert found her ideal replacement in Dennis Spooner.
He also had a real ease of dialogue, which we hadn't had always before.
Sometimes it was a bit mechanical.
Look at the joins in the blocks, Ian.
Yes, clear mortar.
Must have been built with tremendous accuracy.
He could fill those moments.
He could make them humorous.
Now, close your eyes and Nero will give you a big surprise.
Pardon? RUSSELL: And I think Dennis was very clever at doing that.
Because it's a show always trying to find its feet, Dennis Spooner, more than anybody else, seems to be the one who's guiding it towards finding out what it can be.
The second series of Doctor Who, which is the one he story-edits, seems to be this whole array of different styles, and different ways of trying to approach things.
Typically in the colour days of the '70s, it tries to find a formula.
You are going to expect a sort of gothic horror thing from Philip Hinchcliffe.
You will expect a sort of UNIT-based story from Barry Letts.
What Dennis Spooner is sort of doing always, he doesn't ever let you ever feel quite at ease with what the star of the show can be.
He's always teasing you along.
NARRATOR: Dennis' second script for Doctor Who took the series in a direction it hadn't explored before.
It was quite a grim story.
And certainly my storyline through The Romans, I'm sold into slavery, I end up rowing in the galleys and then tossed into another prison.
And I'm going to end up as a gladiator fighting in the Colosseum.
But Dennis found moments when you could relax.
The scene with Barbara and I at the beginning and that sort of thing.
And you're teasing, mocking each other in a very gentle and loving way, really.
He got that absolutely dead right.
What's the matter? My slip showing? No, I was just thinking what a splendid-looking Roman you make.
(CHUCKLING) Oh, well, yes.
If I wasn't so modest, I'd agree with you.
I think The Romans is the best Doctor Who story of the '60s probably.
It's not a very popular view.
But I do think it's extremely clever and I think it has a farce story, and it has a serious story, which is Ian and Barbara's story.
- Caesar Nero, don't drink! - NERO: Why not? I have every reason to believe that drink is poisoned.
And it keeps the two deliberately separate.
In fact, that's part of the joke of it, is that the Doctor and Vicki won't ever quite encounter the other more serious storyline.
It's like Dennis Spooner is juggling different tones around.
It is quite remarkable what The Romans is actually up to.
And it succeeds in being genuinely very, very funny.
Not only by having lots of farce elements, but also a wonderful streak of black humour.
Tigelinus, who is the first comedy death in Doctor Who.
He was right.
Nero himself, Derek Francis is quite brilliant at making Nero very, very funny.
But he will undercut it with something which is terribly cruel and callous.
And actually makes Nero genuinely quite frightening.
I feel like seeing someone hurt myself tonight.
Come.
NARRATOR: With William Russell leaving towards the end of Doctor Who's second year, Dennis had to create a new, young male lead.
Space pilot Steven Taylor.
Dennis, you know, he took me through the character.
We talked about the character, how he might be, and what his strengths were and what his weaknesses were and so on.
And so I suppose I could have changed things then.
But I thought, "No, I've got a grasp on this character.
"He sounds quite fun.
" If Dennis had stayed as story editor, there's no question that Steven's character would have remained.
But he came back.
I remember he was strong when he left in The Savages and he was quite strong in The Celestial Toymaker.
He was a bit wet in The Gunfighter.
I mean, it was up and down time with all these things.
DALEK: The Dalek Supreme has ordered they are to be pursued through all eternity.
DONALD TOSH: Dennis loved chases.
All the great Doctor Who and Dalek chases, whether they were attributed to Terry Nation or anyone else, they were nearly always Dennis'.
He was awfully good at them and could spin the variety.
I remember in the one that I think was calledThe Chase, when he did the answer to the desertion of the Mary Celeste, was the fact that the Daleks landed on it and frightened the crew away.
DALEK: There is no one on the vessel.
Come, we must continue our pursuit course.
NARRATOR: Dennis' next story not only introduced the idea that the Doctor had contemporaries who time travelled, but completely changed the direction of the series.
Ever since he began writing Doctor Who, Dennis Spooner has been trying to agonise, it seems, about just how much the Tardis crew can really affect what's going on.
And what are you trying to get up to this time? I'm sure you'll approve, Doctor.
And The Time Meddler is really the place where he puts his colours to the mast and says, here is a person, he is changing history, he is of the Doctor's race, he's not evil, he's having fun, this is actually what we could be doing.
The Doctor could be this character.
The Doctor could be someone who's going around, going to wonderful historical locations on a holiday.
Listen! "Met Leonardo da Vinci and discussed with him "the principles of powered flight.
" It's hard to imagine, in some ways, the shock towards the end of episode 1 when William Hartnell goes on to try and investigate all these monks singing and doing choral numbers, and opens the door and finds a gramophone record playing.
It's almost actually like he's wandered off set and found the people who do all of this sort of stock footage and incidental music for the show.
And his reaction is one of great amusement.
And it's the first time that the show is breaking down the barrier, I think, between doing these sort of rather staid historicals and saying it's a television programme.
And Time Meddler is acknowledging all the way through that actually there is something sort of artificial about what's going on.
What Dennis Spooner is saying, "We can do anything.
" It's like a complete open book.
Daleks' Master Plan is in some way the sort of the key example of that, when the open book will happen within even the same episode, where you'll have these moments of extraordinary comedy.
And then you'll couple it with moments of great jeopardy in Daleks and a huge body count of people that we think are actually even companions.
Some of the jokes are quite extraordinary.
There's the bit where I think episode 7 or 8.
8, I think, where the Doctor arrives on a cricket field and then departs, and the whole thing is done as an observation by two cricket commentators, which you can only imagine Douglas Adams must have seen when he was a kid and put in Life, The Universe And Everything, 'cause it is exactly the same joke.
NARRATOR: Patrick Troughton took over as the Doctor in the Power of the Daleks in October 1966.
With the story's author, David Whitaker, out of the country, it fell to Dennis to tailor the scripts to suit the new Doctor.
POLLY: It is the Doctor, I know it is.
I think.
BEN: It's not only his face that's changed.
He doesn't even act like him.
You can't help but wonder whether watching Patrick Troughton be the sort of impish, quite sort of edgy comic, whether there's a bit of Peter Butterworth in there.
Whether this is in fact the Meddling Monk.
Not that I'm saying that the Doctor has become the Meddling Monk, but in some ways what Dennis Spooner was actually writing was this sort of fun, quite anarchic Time Lord.
NARRATOR: As the 1960s continued, Dennis' work rate became even more prolific.
He originated and wrote for five series he and producer Monty Berman made for Lew Grade's Incorporated Television Company, ITC.
He was very close to Lew Grade.
Very much admired by a number of people.
You know, important people.
You wouldn't know it from his attitude or his manner or whatever.
He would still bring along his dad to meet Lew Grade.
His dad and Lew Grade went off together at some wing-ding and they were inseparable for about two hours.
And with his dad telling him what was wrong with Lew Grade's programmes.
But Dennis could get away with that, you see.
NARRATOR: At the same time, his working relationship and friendship with The Avengers' producer Brian Clemens deepened.
What did I like about Dennis' writing? Well, I think it's because he was as whacky as I was.
And he came out with whacky ideas like The Avengers.
"Look, Stop Me If You've Heard It, But There Were These Two Fellows" And that, incidentally, is The Avengers with John Cleese in it.
And he was very good at taking criticism and taking re-writes.
And it didn't matter if he sent me something and I re-wrote it and said, "Wouldn't it be better like this?" He would say, "Oh, that's great, yeah, super.
" Because there was no rivalry between us.
We were that close, actually.
NARRATOR: Throughout the 1970s, Dennis turned his hand to a variety of genres, writing for Kit Pedler and Gerry Davis' science-fiction drama, Doomwatch, and Brian Clemens' anthology series, Thriller.
By this time, Dennis and Brian were best friends.
Dennis was best man at Brian's wedding in 1979.
At the same time, their creative partnership continued to flower.
When we wrote a play, he usually came here in the mornings and went home late afternoon.
And sometimes he would put this on his head.
Like that, just like that.
The idea being that if neither of us could think of anything funny at least one of us looked funny! NARRATOR: One of Dennis' recreational pursuits was amateur dramatics, a hobby he threw himself into with his usual enthusiasm.
He was a stand-up comedian some years before.
And I think he fancied treading the boards again, so I sort of bent his arm and said, "Perhaps you'd like to come and join my little group "and have a little fling.
" My friends, I say again, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.
NARRATOR: During the late 1970s and into the 1980s, Dennis' work was as varied as ever, with commissions for such series as the revived Avengers, gritty action shows and detective dramas.
What is Dennis' best piece of writing? Well, I think it's something that's never been made, actually.
I think it was called Escape from Storm Mountain.
And it involved three kids who discovered an alien spaceship, but the thing is that this spaceship held all the technology of 1,000 years hence.
And gradually the kids started to be able to unearth that technology and utilise it.
I mean, in boldest terms, it means that if they got to push the right button, they could cure cancer.
And I thought that was a very good stepping-off point for a very interesting series.
Dennis Spooner makes Doctor Who what it is now.
He says you can make a difference.
And Doctor Who, which is a tremendously optimistic show, feeds off Dennis Spooner immeasurably, even now.
I think he told me once, he finished school at 12 or something like that.
He was kicked out, you know.
He was too naughty or something.
It was some story about his education, which was completely lacking.
So he's completely natural, his gift.
NARRATOR: Sadly, Dennis'prolific writing came to an untimely end on 20th September, 1986.
And I miss him every day.
He's been dead a long time.
I miss him every day because what would happen is that if we weren't working together or kicking something round together, he would always phone me.
And he'd phone me and say, "I've got no news.
" Then one terrible day the phone went, it was Pauline and she said, "I've got terrible news.
Dennis is dead.
" He went just like that, which is good for him and terrible for everybody else.
I'm looking forward to meeting him again soon anyway.
No, not soon, sometime!