Originally posted by gr8scott
Many people would say it was cheezy... because it looked fake. But that would have changed if it had more viewers and therefore a bigger budget.
I'm not sure that is totally true. There were many elements within the BBC, including the Controller Michael Grade, that hated SciFi, and Dr. Who in particular. They just wanted it to go away.
According to Sydney Newman, Head of BBC Drama in the early sixties, it began life, simply as a filler children's programme between the afternoon sporting results with a huge adult audience and
Juke Box Jury with a large teenage following. It was never intended to be simply a children's programme, but something that would appeal to people who were in a rather child-like frame of mind.
It was certainly never expected to become a cult. When it did, they found it was too expensive to make. Science Fiction is always expensive, but looks 'cheezy' even when large sums are spent on it. Increasingly it was taking money that could be spent on other drama. Although it became popular in the USA, they didn't seem to market their products as well then. And I think they wanted to free up that Saturday evening slot for something else too.
Moving it to midweek was a death blow. I know it made it impossible for me to watch it. (no video back then)
Originally posted by gr8scott
So, IMO, the only thing left that was truely something they could have avoided was the bad acting. Most acting was good, but some was just bad - expecially the sidekicks.
I think someone eventually realised what a mistake they had made. Hence Sylvester McCoy, some better scripts, and a whole host of big name guest actors. But the damage had already been done. Bonnie Langford and Nicola Bryant were terrible though, I admit that.
