Elisabeth Sladen: The Autobiography

Theatre boss David Neilson. ‘Come down,’ he enthused. ‘You won’t be disappointed.’

If David’s name seems familiar, you’ll probably recognise him as Roy Cropper from Coronation Street. Roy’s one of the comedy staples in Corrie and David’s hysterical in real life – but in a completely different way to Roy. There’s none of the pushover about him. He’s utterly in control; a really, really great director and a terrific actor.

As well as being with Brian, the big draw for me in Bristol was the chance to do Twelfth Night again. That was the play in which we’d met. What a perfect play in which to share the stage again?

Then Brian’s agent rang and said, ‘You’ve got a part in a TV series’, and all that romanticism flew out the window.

‘You’ve got to take the telly – it’s four times the money and half the work,’ I conceded.

So that was the end of our little commemoration.

Brian had been slated to play Feste while I was offered Olivia or Viola. I have always wanted to play Viola. If I’ve got any dreams in acting, that would be one. Then I looked at the rest of the cast. If I was being honest, there was another girl in the company who was born to play her. The idea of her playing Olivia was laughable, really, whereas I could get away with either. So that was the end of another dream. I took one for the team and donned my Olivia frock. Thirty years later my chance of playing Viola has probably sailed.

I faced another casting conundrum with the next play. It was a new piece, called Comic Cuts, by Steven Mallatrat (who as a Corrie writer would go on to recommend David Neilson for the show). The advantage of being in a company is you get the pick of the parts. I would never be cast as June in an open casting and by the time Comic Cuts reached the West End I’d been replaced by Janine Duvitski, Angus Deayton’s wife in One Foot in the Grave. I can’t have any complaints – if she walked through the door now you’d think, Yes, she’s June.

Then it was time for panto. Steven had written a modern-day Robin Hood update that was genuinely hysterical. I played Mrs Ross, a podgy thing with twenty children, so I was padded up to the eyeballs. It was just as well because I had to learn a fight sequence with Tim Stern, who played my husband. We rolled all over the stage in a proper slapstick wrestling match. Each night I got up covered in dirt and dust, sweating from the padding. I loved it!

Despite the high calibre of production, the Little Theatre was in financial difficulties – there was actually talk of Robin Hood not making it on to the stage. Then David and his backers came to us with a proposal: if we could all work unpaid for a month, that would provide enough cash to fund their next production, an adaptation of Raymond Briggs’ When the Wind Blows. No guarantees but they were confident the show would be snapped up for the West End – and the money would start flowing in then.

So that’s what happened. We worked for nothing so that the money could go into sets for When the Wind Blows. How many other professions are asked to do these things? Sure enough, it was quickly chosen for a London run and our cheques arrived within weeks. When you know the people involved it makes gambles like that less scary.

*   *   *

Occasionally, of course, knowing the people involved can evoke quite different emotions. I nearly froze when I got a message that John Nathan-Turner was trying to contact me. Haven’t you banged enough nails into Sarah Jane’s coffin?

Of course if I’d paid attention to the letters I’d been receiving, then I would have known what he wanted. For months, fans had been writing to me to ask, ‘Is there going to be anything to mark the twentieth anniversary of Doctor Who?’ and I had duly replied, ‘Nothing that I’m involved with.’ But I forgot how rapidly the BBC works. Almost knee-jerky, you might say! It was as though they woke up one morning and thought, Christ, we need to do something!

So that was what Nathan-Turner wanted to speak to me about. They were doing a Special called The Five Doctors – featuring all incarnations of the Doctor, with their companions, being plucked out of time to compete in the deadly game of Rassilon in the spookily named Death Zone on Gallifrey. In order to make it work they were trying to reunite as many of the main men and their sidekicks as possible. The late William Hartnell was to be replaced by Richard Hurndall, but otherwise we were all on board. Tom Baker’s companion would be Lalla Ward – whom he’d recently married – and so I would tag team with Jon Pertwee.

Now that, I would be excited to do: me, Tom and Jon – my two Doctors and me onscreen at the same time – that could be special! Even so, K-9 and Company had left a sour taste in my mouth.

‘Come on, Lis,’ John urged in his usual enthusiastic manner. ‘Everyone else is doing it! You don’t want to be the one who said “no”, do you? Think of the fans.’

That was so typical of John, playing the guilt card. ‘Think of the fans’ might have been his catchphrase. I thought of everything that went wrong with our shoot in the Cotswolds, but then I remembered some of the good times I’d had with Jon and Tom.

‘OK, you’ve got me,’ I said. ‘When can I see a script?’

Ah, now there’s a question. One of these days I’ll learn to ask for a script before I give my answer! In the end I think that’s what Tom did because by the time shooting commenced he was nowhere to be seen. They had to use clips from an unbroadcast serial instead. It didn’t help, I suppose, that by then he and Lalla had separated.

Terry Dicks was given the task of writing a script that incorporated all these changing elements: myriad Doctors, companions and villains. His only stipulations were that there were to be no Daleks – and no K-9. I knew exactly how he felt.

Poor Terry got neither of his wishes. A solo Dalek does appear inside the tower, in a Benny Hill-style chase with the First Doctor and Susan. It was a welcome return for my old friend Roy Skelton as its voice. Then, to tie in with K-9 and Company, my part in The Five Doctors began with the dog warning me of danger. Obviously I then ignored him and got spirited off to Gallifrey. At least he didn’t have to come as well, although it was nice to see John Leeson again so soon. There’s a certain supermarket near my house where I often hear this cry of ‘Mistress!’ Honestly, jumping out of your skin in the frozen meats aisle isn’t all that becoming.

Despite my misgivings, by the time shooting started in March 1983 I was thrilled to be part of such an illustrious cast. Only people who’ve been in Who can really know what it’s like – and here