As the good Doctor
himself once said, you can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies,
and the villains are certainly one of magic ingredients that have helped to
make Doctor Who such an enduring success. However, while pages and pages are
devoted to the glory of his most alien adversaries (Daleks, Cybermen, Weeping
Angels), what stands out most for me are the more human villains (or
human-ish, at least), those smooth talking psychopaths who are all the more
chilling for the fact that they could be sat across the room from you at this
very moment.
We had the pleasure
of talking with two very memorable guests stars, David Collings and Maurice
Roëves.
David Collings
David Collings
Image: Martin Parsons/Fohnhouse |
David Collings first
appeared on the show as the villainous Vogan Vorus, under some knobbly
prosthetics, in 1974 adventure Revenge of
the Cybermen.
Tom Baker – we got on terribly well. He was fairly
outrageous and quite naughty! We spent a lot of time in the pub. He just made me laugh, and I think I made him laugh too.
His next appearance
was in 1977 with The Robots of Death,
and we won’t spoil the whodunit plot by saying whether or not he’s a baddie in
this one! This was directed by Michael Bryant, who had also made Revenge. The BFI Screened The Robots of Death in April 2013 for
the 50th anniversary…
Did they? They must be mad! Tom Baker was a very good Doctor
Who, wasn’t he? Louise Jameson [who played companion Leela] and I are still
very good friends. She’s a sweet, sweet lady.
It has a very interesting
Art Deco design, and costumes.
I think I was dressed in a very camp way…
Michael Briant has
said that he didn’t think the script was up to much…
No-one ever thought the scripts were up to much, whether
they were or not!
Had Tom Baker changed
by this point?
No, he was completely the same. Totally mad. Totally off the
wall! He still is…I worked with him not long ago, actually.
Collings’s final Doctor
Who story on television was the title role in 1983’s Mawdryn Undead.
Oh yes, that was a hoot!
One memorable
cliffhanger sees him with his brains exposed.
That was pretty embarrassing, I can tell you! Going for
lunch in the BBC canteen with a plate of spaghetti on your head!
Did you know what was
going on in the scripts?
No, of course we didn’t! The rehearsals for that one were
hilarious, because the director [Peter Moffatt] was a terrible giggler. He said
‘the producers are coming in today, we must be serious, don’t send it up,
please!’, so we played it terribly seriously. That seems to have been another
popular one. I’ve not seen it, I have to be honest!
Collings has also
done work with Big Finish, in both Doctor Who and Sapphire and Steel audio
plays, though he admits that he doesn’t remember much of the ones he’s done.
It only takes a couple of days…they’re great fun to do! It’s
a lovely little studio, lovely lunches.
The first story he
did with them, Full Fathom Five, saw
him playing a darker version of the Doctor, one who believe that the ends
justify the means.
The evil Doctor! I was apparently, at some point, one of the
favourites for playing the Doctor.
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Collings as The Doctor |
As a final question, I asked Collings why he thinks the show has achieved such longevity.
Well, the kids like it, I suppose. Well, it’s not just kids who like it. It is quite bizarre…the queues that you get at these Doctor Who conventions! Some of them are a bit sad, but most of them are perfectly alright. And the ones who are sad, it’s giving them pleasure. I just think it gives pleasure, that’s all. It’s amusing. As Noel Coward said, it’s a talent to amuse. Nothing wrong with that!
Maurice Roëves
Maurice Roëves only
appeared once on the show, playing nasty gunrunner Stotz in Fifth Doctor Peter
Davison’s swansong, and firm fan favourite, The
Caves of Androzani.
I was the first British actor to do Doctor Who and Star Trek.
Nobody else had ever done it! The Doctor
Who was Graeme Harper [director of several Who stories, both classic and new], wonderful guy. You have a scene
where the gang fall out with me, Stotz, and I go ‘are you coming, are you not coming?’,
and they say ‘no, we’re going to stay here’. I had to say ‘I’m going to count up
to ten’ or something like that. I said to Graeme, ‘this is old hat! Let’s just
shoot them!’ He said ‘you can’t do that!’, I said ‘why not? Just shoot them!’ Some of it was banned in Australia because it was too violent! Especially the
bit with the knife and the guy on the cliff top...So I walk out of shot, and
there’s a shot of me leaving, but then I come back in and I do it.
With a horrible grin!
It’s great! The kids love it! I get letters now from
children whose parents taped it, and they say they love that one, and that it’s
better than the modern ones.
It’s so brutal, for
what is effectively a kid’s show.
Well, the so-called monster (the Magma beast) was terrible! Glove
puppet! Fortunately you didn’t see much of it…I think it was because it was so
adult. Apparently Caves of Androzani
is still voted as the best episode of the series [in 2009, out of 200 serials,
it was voted best story].
Were you surprised by
Robert Holmes’s script, which was quite dark?
No, not really, I just thought it was a good role.
Do you think playing
the villain is more fun?
Well, in some ways. I don’t know how I started getting
villains, because I wasn’t playing villains. I used to play romantic roles! For
the good guys, I always look to see if there’s anything bad in their character,
and for the bad guys I always look to see if there’s any good in them. The bad
guys are really interesting to play.
Maurice’s
appearance in one of Doctor Who’s greatest cliffhangers:
Click here for Part I of our full interview with Roëves
MP
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