The New Doctor! A Doctor Who Alternate History Story

Part 43 - Barry Letts - Panel discussion, Convention, 1994

LETTS:   David said that? No, I don't think that's quite right. Here's what really happened.

We were sitting around in the first couple of production meetings, throwing around ideas. Not just for the first season. We were thinking at least three seasons, and how to fill them.

The idea of a recurring nemesis was floated, someone like the Master. But of course, we couldn't use the Master. That had been specifically excluded. Daltenreys had first crack at him, I believe.

But that was along the lines of what we were looking for. Someone who would be essentially a dark reflection of the Doctor, that we could keep bringing back in a second or third season. It was a long term planning thing.

An evil version of the Doctor. Someone else at the meeting, I think it was Paul or David, said 'why not an evil version of the Doctor, just that.'

The inspiration came from the evil Spock of that episode from Star Trek. You remember when Spock goes to the other universe and meets his evil counterpart... who is wearing a goatee?

I distinctly remember the goatee being talked about. So we were thinking of that episode of Star Trek, that's where it was from. Of course, David's quite fair, so a goatee wouldn't work for him. Ian suggested an eye patch, and that's when we thought of Inferno.

There was some talk of that serial, and I think I made the point that there was no evil Doctor in that one. A pity, Jon would have had fun with that, but really, there was no room in the story.

It was Ian then who suggested that maybe the evil version of the Doctor had been elsewhere, doing something else, when Jon showed up. Otherwise occupied. Assuming that he was trapped like Jon was, his mandate would be to get off the planet before it blew up, desperate to do that, and that lead to some speculation about his unseen role in getting it to blow up in the first place. And perhaps, he would be seeking to entrap David as part of his escape plan. It took shape from there.

QUESTION:   You weren't concerned about copyright?

LETTS:   Oh of course we were. Very concerned. Or at least I was. Paul and Ian were gung ho, as they always were, quite ready to leap into the lions mouths. But we went over it, and it seemed to us that we could do this without actually making it an explicit sequel that would involve rights issues. The 'Evil Doctor From the Alternate Universe' didn't exist in Inferno, or anywhere in the BBC. He might be implied from Inferno, but you can't copyright implications. Alternate universes? Star Trek had trod that territory before Doctor Who, the concept was well established. So what were we infringing on. We had a story that could be viewed as a sequel, or prequel, or sidequel to Inferno, but which was technically unrelated.

QUESTION:   You came a lot closer than that, didn't you though? Character's names and such?

LETTS:   Ah, but you can't copyright names per se. Well, somewhat. Sherlock Holmes is an owned name. But you could have a Sherlock Weinstein, or a Josiah Holmes with impunity. Stahlman, Benton... Those were names you could get out of a phone book. Benton was explicitly not the same character, we implied he was the father of Sargeant Benton, but it wasn't explicit. Stahlman never appeared as a character, just a voice on the phone.

I admit, we did get mischievous. We got carried away. We brought John in to do a character who was essentially his father. It had been twenty-one years since Inferno, and he was older, he couldn't play the same character, so it actually worked quite well. Same with Richard Franklin, although we were less explicit. Some of our references became quite direct. But we stayed in the good graces of our lawyers.

QUESTION:   Was Jon Pertwee considered for the role? David Burton says that Pertwee was the first person you approached.

LETTS:   Yes and no. By that, I mean that Jon is a dear friend and I have great respect for him. When we were developing the idea, he was the first person we went to. But Inferno was 21 years before, Jon was well into his seventies, and it was going to be a huge strain on him. I think we all understood that he wouldn't be doing the part. I suppose it might have been different if he up and announced he wanted it, I can't see how we'd deal with that. Might have given it to him. But Jon was semi-retired by then, and he really didn't want the bother and work of it all.

QUESTION:  Then why did you approach him?

LETTS:  Courtesy and respect of course. If we were making a sequel to one of his performances, if we were creating a character who was essentially going to be an evil version of his Doctor... Well, you want to sit down with the man and discuss it. If he had been offended, then the idea would have been dropped then and there.

QUESTION:  I take it he wasn't offended?

LETTS:   Quite tickled with it actually. He was the one who actually suggested Ian McKellen.