My Life as a Dalek (BBC Radio 4)

[Dave]

Did anyone listen to this? It was on last night at 1030 GMT. I missed it

from BBC Online

Radio 4 to broadcast Dalek documentary.

To celebrate the 40th year of the Daleks, Mark Gattis is to present My Life As A Dalek, to be broadcast on 22nd February at 10.30am.

During the documentary Mark talks to the actors, designers, creators, fans and enemies of the Daleks.

There are interviews with actors Terry Molloy who played the role of Davros, Dalek operators John Scott-Martin and Cy Town, and famous names who have acted opposite the metal meanies, Frazer Hines, Alexei Sayle and Rula Lenska.

Doctor Who's original producer Verity Lambert talks about how BBC executives nearly turned the Dalek design down because it was 'just another bug-eyed monster' and sci-fi writer Kim Newman talks about its fascist overtones.

BBC News talks to John Scott Martin about breathing life into those metal meanies.

'My life as a Dalek'

Get behind the sofa!

It's 40 years since the Daleks first menaced Doctor Who. Here, actor John Scott Martin recalls his time as an arch-enemy of the Time Lord. I've done 110 Dr Who episodes in my time, and seen off five incarnations of the Doctor.

I joined the series in Bill Hartnell's days, he was the first Dr Who, and my last was with Sylvester McCoy. When I joined the team, the Daleks had already done one episode; one chappie dropped out and I popped into that slot as an operator.

The director knew me from Z Cars, in which I'd played a crook the previous week. We met in the BBC lift and he asked me if I wanted to play a monster in a children's programme.

Still a jobbing actor at 75

'Yes,' said me, a jobbing actor. 'I don't mind, I'll be the back end of a horse if necessary'. And thereafter I stayed. They kept using us because we knew what we were doing and it saved a lot of time.

In the early days, the costume was made of wood with a fibreglass dome. The right hand was the famous kitchen plunger and the left hand was a gun.

When I first got a look at the costume, I was amazed. It worked so well because for the first time looking at a monster on telly, you couldn't tell there was a bloke inside.

Even in the studio, I could trundle up to a make-up artist or a producer and if I spoke, they'd jump with fright because they'd forget anyone was inside. Other times, I got left in the costume when it was tea break.

Stumped by stairs

To make the Dalek live, I'd sit on a seat inside and tie myself in with a seatbelt. There was no floor so I'd propel myself after the Doctor with my feet. I certainly couldn't go up and down steps, and it wasn't feasible to work outside very much as even a stick could stop me in my tracks.

Lo-tech, high thrills

Once I was chasing Dr Who - who could run much faster than me - down a corridor, around the corner, up the other side, and then down the same corridor. He got so far ahead of me that he was round the back chasing me. Noel Edmonds picked up on it and awarded me the Golden Egg blooper award for that week.

It was a very basic, simple effect - just a chap in a costume waving his arms about and someone else saying 'Exterminate!'. And yet it worked. It worked very well indeed.

Run for the hills

I do find it rather strange when a great big hulking rugby player tells me that as a child, he was terrified of me. All I can say is that there's little harm I can do him now.

Daleks proved hard to exterminate

When my family moved out of London to a village in Essex, word got around that I was 'Doctor Dalek' and I was invited to take part in a school fete.

All the little boys of about eight, as soon as they got a stick in their hands, they wanted to hit the Dalek. I had to be rescued from a fate worse than death. They soon cottoned on that there was nothing to be frightened of.

I shouldn't think I'll don that costume again. I'm longer in the tooth than a Dalek now.

 

[ray gower]

I missed it too!

But all is not lost. You can listen to it over the internet http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/atoz/ and find 'My Life as a Dalek'

You need Real Player, but otherwise it works quite well, even over an ordinary modem link.

 

[ray gower]

Managed to catch this a little earlier.

It sounds as if the Dalek operators had some real fun in them!

What did really stick in the mind was a comment they made:-

After 40 years, no other programme has come close to providing a [bad] alien that has ever had such an effect [of terror] on its audience, or epitimised the notion of pure evil, so completely or for so long.

I admit the early shows did push the boat to make them look and sound evil and the trailer for when the Daleks invaded earth showed ominous pictures of Daleks rising out of the mirky depths of the Thames and I hid behind the sofa with the best of them. But I have to admit, I can not think of any show that has an alien half as extreme as Doctor Who

 

[Dave]

Thanks for that link Ray, I just listened to it. It was very good. I learnt some things I didn't know.