Elisabeth Sladen: The Autobiography by Elisabeth Sladen

Author:Elisabeth Sladen
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: kindle, doctor who, nonfiction, biography
Publisher: Aurum Press
Published: 2011-11-07T00:00:00+00:00

Robert’s money-saving drive in his first season hit upon the idea of having the same set used twice. I can see why this would be attractive. Somehow, though, he needed to conjure a plot that could make sense of revisiting the same place. By contracting Gerry Davis to reinvigorate his old creations, the Cybermen, he found his answer. More importantly, after a bit of a rummage down the back of the BBC sofa, Philip also found enough money for a location shoot. That’s how, on 18 November, just six days after Ark’s final studio date, I found myself on the bus down to Somerset.

Wookey Hole, in Somerset, is a series of caves supposedly inhabited by primitive man 50,000 years ago. It’s a major tourist attraction now and when you step inside you can certainly picture primaeval Britons scrabbling around. For the purposes of Who, however, the caves were designed to serve as the catacombs of the golden planet Voga in Revenge of the Cybermen.

Whereas Jon used to give me the heads-up on recurring monsters, there was no one around to plug the return of the Cybermen. When I first saw them, I confess, I wasn’t impressed. It was the only serial where I couldn’t pretend. Daleks, Exxilons, Zygons, yes, yes, yes. All plausible when you’re sharing the same stage – but Cybermen? You’d see them lurching around, huffing and puffing in their silver Wellington boots, and just think, Not very robotic, are they? I couldn’t see past the costume.

It’s possible I’m not the target audience, of course. Years later, when Sadie was about eight, I took her to my first Blue Box convention. As soon as she saw someone marching around in a proper Cyberman costume she just fell in love. She literally hung on to this poor guy for the whole day. I’ve got pictures of her going up steps clinging to his arm – they’re probably still her favourite.

Worse than the villains – and worse than Rodney Bennett – the director this time was Michael Briant. We hadn’t enjoyed the best relationship on Death to the Daleks, but I tried to be professional and give it a fresh go this time. You never know: maybe it was Jon’s presence that got us off on the wrong foot, as much as they liked each other. It turned out not to be so. Michael just isn’t what I’d call an actor’s director: his focus is on the story, the special effects and the scenery. He’s utterly professional, but those are his priorities. Get those right, he seems to believe, and the cast just slot into place. I don’t think it was that straightforward, but there you go.

Working in Wookey Hole should have been a fun experience. After all, it’s one of the UK’s premier tourist attractions. But no sooner had we arrived than things began to go wrong. It didn’t take long for us to believe the caves themselves had their own agenda.

The guy chaperoning us around the caves confirmed as much.

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