The New Doctor! A Doctor Who Alternate History Story

Part 26- David Burton Interview, 2002. 'The Draconians...'

Interview with David Burton, 2002

The Draconian? That was Ian being sentimental. After he started working on Bob's creatures, the Sontarans, he got the idea to get the rights for the Draconians as well.

Paul, you see, had directed Frontier in Space, with Jon, about twenty years ago. That was the first and only appearance of the Draconians. But they where Jon's favourite monster. He was always bringing them up. So ... Literally ... Ian thought to himself: 'Why not get the Draconians' for Paul.

They were a one off, it shouldn't be too hard, and it wasn't. He just rang up Malcolm Hulke's heirs. Three phone calls, and pop! It was done. Went for nothing really. I mean, someone calls up Malcolm's grandson, and says 'I want to use one of your grandad's characters which hasn't seen the light of day in two decades, we'll pay you a nominal sum, and credit you and your grandad...' What are you going to say? Are you going to start dickering?

He got the Draconians just like that.

It took a lot longer to get the rights for the Sontarans. I'm surprised he managed that. They'd been on with Jon, they'd done a couple with Tom, they'd been on that Two Doctor's thing with Patrick and Colin. They'd even been on Fix It with Jimmy Saville. Jimmy Saville! The Daleks and Cybermen were the big ones. But the Sontarans were right up there, a close third. Later, they showed up in that Shakedown thing, and Mindgames, by the same people. They were up there.

Poor Ian. He thought he had pulled off such a coup. And he had! No question, it was a coup! But the way it blew up in his face. Terrible. It came around, but

I don't think he was ever the same after. I think it broke his heart a little.

Bad timing. That was all. Everyone was under a lot of pressure, everyone was frustrated. Vienna, 1913, had gone completely off the rails. There were a lot of reasons for that. But it was hurting the subsequent serials. There was a lot of tension, trying to figure out our next step.

Just bad timing.

He could have, should have been the hero. But wrong time, and he turned out to be the goat.

Getting back to it though. Two things made the difference, I think, that let Ian get the Sontarans. One was that the BBC certainly had no plans for them. I think if the BBC or Daltenreys had even crooked their little finger, said 'we might have some plans' we'd have never gotten them. But it was all up on the shelf.

The other thing, and I hate to say it this way, because it sounds so cold blooded: Bob was dead. He wasn't writing any more. So there was no worry about blacking his name at the BBC. He wasn't having any concerns that if he licensed the Sontarans to us for this show, that he'd have trouble getting jobs. Not at all. For Bob and Malcolm, it was that we were dealing with estates.

I don't know what we would have done, if we didn't get the Sontarans. Gone ahead with the original script I guess. I suppose we had the Draconians, but you know, twenty year old one shots? Who cares. The Sontarans fit the story, the Draconians, you'd have had to work a lot harder to get them in as replacements. Don't think it would have worked. Maybe one Draconian, which is what we did. Maybe that.

Just to level with you here, I think Ian did the right thing. I always have. I mean, the old script - what were we doing? Acting with bugs? With puppets? Poor old stuntmen, I would go over in props and look at the contraptions they were sticking people in - it looked like it hurt. They could hardly move. And I'd be looking at this fiberglass bug face, and thinking 'how the hell am I going to perform off of that?' I would have, don't get me wrong. No question, but that I would have.

Do you know why Jon loved the Draconians? Half masks. The costumes were these half masks, left the mouth and eyes free. It gave actors tools to work with, an actors tools are their face, their eyes, their mouth. You can emote, you can respond, react, you can express. And that's important not just for the actor in the suit, but for the the actor that is working with them. I'll tell you that when you're on stage, or on the set, performing, you're at your best, you do your best work when someone is giving you something. If it's just a big rubber or fiberglass mask, that doesn't give you much. But if they're expressing, you can take that, work off that, express back. I don't know how much of that you see, but if you're an actor, you appreciate that.