Elisabeth Sladen: The Autobiography

anniversary celebration of Doctor Who at the Houses of Parliament, he was such a scream. ‘When does the bar open? I wouldn’t have come if I’d known …’

With Terry and Barry, the lynchpins of the show, leaving so soon after Katy Manning and following the tragic death in a car accident of Jon’s close pal on the show, Roger Delgado, who played fellow Time Lord the Master with such sinister class, I was apprehensive as to the future of the programme. Audiences don’t always embrace change. Mess with the ingredients too much and viewers start disconnecting. At least we’ve still got Jon, I thought.

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North Acton was such a divine environment to work in and by our third serial Jon and I were in a comfortable groove. The regimented rehearsal/recording demarcation was quite liberating, actually. On day one Jon and I would arrive and we’d go through our scenes, script in hand, working things out. Gradually over the course of the session the lines just seep into your memory. It’s a lovely way to work, actually, very organic. You block sections out, work on them, have fun experimenting and don’t even realise sometimes that you’re memorising quite large chunks of text. And as changes get made as you go, you’re not lumbered with having to re-learn something in a different form. I wish we still had that system now. On The Sarah Jane Adventures we’re expected to have the whole episode in our heads from day one. You’ve got to be good to go on the first day – it’s more like cramming for an exam.

Rehearsals at the Acton Hilton began in the last week of November after a hurried trip back to Dorset for some extra scenes. Script under my arm, I met Jon in the canteen and we had a guess at what the day would hold. It turned out we were wrong. Michael E. Briant declared right at the start that we would not be working on Episodes 1 and 2, as expected. Instead, we would work through the script on a strict set-by-set basis. In other words, all tunnel shots from all episodes were done at once, TARDIS shots bundled together, Dalek ship scenes paired up, etc., regardless of where they fell in the serial. My initial reaction was, OK, whatever. Let’s go. Jon, on the other hand, wasn’t happy at all. And when Bagpuss wasn’t happy …

But it was no good arguing. Briant had decided to try and avoid wear and tear on the sets by not using them, storing them, then digging them out again. Get a set in place, film everything, put it away – it made sense but only if you treated the actors as chess pieces.

It was the filming equivalent of completing a jigsaw puzzle before you’ve got the edges in place. After one day my script was littered with notes. ‘O.O.B.’ didn’t begin to cover it. Running, walking, happy, sad, chatty, quiet, close to Jon, coat on or off, hair neat or messy … And, of course, it wasn’t just me I was trying to keep track of: Jon was completely at sea filming in this way. In five seasons I think this was the first time he’d been asked to do anything like it.

I didn’t envy the person in charge of continuity on Death to the Daleks, although I didn’t exactly make that particular job any easier. There is a scene where I’ve been captured by the Exxilons and am being prepared for sacrifice. In the script I think I should have been hung from the ceiling. In reality I was told to stand, arms above my head, with my hands tied to a pole – which was actually a broom handle. That’s how thought out this particular scene was. I can’t remember if it was the floor manager or the assistant studio manager, but he was the one who held the sweeping head out of shot while I was dangling away. What I do remember, however, is that this scene went on for bloody ages while the Exxilons danced around their fire.

As soon as they stopped pointing the camera at me I unhooked myself from the broom handle and tried to shake some life into my arms. ‘I need to have a sit down,’ I told Chris D’Oyly-John.

As floor manager Chris was the director’s voice on the studio floor, so he said, ‘Fine. Just don’t wander off.’

So off I went to find a piece of scenery to rest on while they got on with preparing for another angle shoot of the sacrifice set-up. I was so busy trying to massage some feeling back into my wrists where they’d been tied that I didn’t notice another camera angle change. The new angle focused on the Exxilons – but the camera was pointing exactly where I should be dangling in the background.

Oh Christ, I thought, pulling myself up, I’m in this scene!

‘Chris,’ I said, but he just waved a hand dismissively and called, ‘OK, everyone, action!’

‘But, Chris …’ I persevered.

‘Not now, Lis,’ he hissed.

Well, sod it then, I thought. You’re not having me.

So I sat back down.

To this day I don’t know if anyone has ever noticed but look carefully and there you see me – and there you don’t.

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As I mentioned, I really think Death to the Daleks is one of the forgotten classics. It had everything – impotent, double-crossing Daleks, a mysterious alien planet, a pretty tense chase scene – even a bit of Venusian hop-scotch. Acting with the Daleks in the studio was a lot more satisfying than out in a glorified sand pit. For a start they were designed to roll around on a flat studio surface, so their mobility wasn’t an issue but up close, in the right setting, they really did look intimidating. I’m no sci-fi fan, as I’ve said, but within context they are damn scary, I can assure you.

At least they are in the studio. In the rehearsal room it’s quite a different story.

Obviously John, Cy and Murphy didn’t want to be lumbered with the whole Dalek paraphernalia at North Acton but neither was it any use if they simply wandered around normally. So they would learn all their lines, bless them – because obviously they were dubbed by Michael for broadcast – then hop into just the bottom half of the Dalek suit. Watching these three wheel around the room, using their hands as the sink plunger and whisk, took a bit of getting used to before the laughs stopped but it was the perfect compromise, really.

I don’t know if Terry Nation ever saw one of these rehearsals. Maybe that’s where he got the inspiration for the look of Davros.

When it came to the studio days, Michael sat there at the side with headphones and a mic so we could hear the words in real time.

I say ‘studio days’ – that was another thing Briant meddled with. Rather than shoot on both Mondays and Tuesdays as was tradition, he decided to dedicate Monday to rehearsals and Tuesdays to all-day filming. What an