Yes.Would YOU listen to Janet Fielding?
she sounded great in "For your eyes Only"
John Nathan Turner (Producer 80-89)
- Thread starter Chris227
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she sounded great in "For your eyes Only"
The Two Doctors were a reworking of Holmes' script for The Five Doctors.
Sort of. Some of the ideas, like the Rassilon Imprimateur, were carried over from Holmes' "The Six Doctors" story. However, that story, as I understand it, never got as far as a script, as Holmes felt, not unjustifiably, that the story was being sacrificed to the needs for a crossover. And then Dicks was brought in to write "The Five Doctors."
More ideas from Holmes' "The Six Doctors" surfaced years later in "Dimensions in Time," in particular the way the Doctors and companions regressed into earlier or later counterparts.
As noted above, JNT wasn't keen to work with writers from previous eras of the show. Eric Saward had to fight to get Holmes, and after Holmes walked away from "The Six Doctors" Saward had to fight to bring him back to write "Caves."
"The Two Doctors," as far as I know, wasn't heavily rewritten, except to change the New Orleans setting to Seville.
But the original point is accurate: Nathan Turrnenr was very reluctant to use writers who predated his time as producer.
His first story was written by David Fisher, who'd contributed to the previous two seasons, but that script was already in the works and Fisher was never used again.
Terrance Dicks wrote State of Decay for his first season, but that was a revamp of a script that had been pulled three years earlier - and again, it was the second script into production, when Nathan-Turner just had to use anything which was already around, as there wasn't enough time to get new scripts commissioned.
After that, a pre-JNT writer didn't work on the series until The Five Doctors, when script editor Eric Saward (as an excuse for hiring Robert Holmes, whose old stories he admired) insisted that they had to hire someone who'd written for the earlier Doctors. When Holmes dropped out, Dicks replaced him for the same reason.
Having got Holmes' foot through the door aleready, Saward persuaded JNT to let him hire him for Peter Davison's last story. And then again the next year, and for Trial of a Time Lord. But... those three are the only established writers ever to work on the show during the Nathan-Turner era.
An edit addition: as for the man himself, he was more generous and aware of his own failures as producer than you'd expect. I first met him in 1994, and after a bit he clicked that he was talking to someone who'd been pretty caustic about his later years on the show.
His other half, Gary Downie, was very hostile to me for that reason, but John treated it as a 'Well, that's out of the way, let's enjoy the bar for the evening' and was always welcoming any time I ran into him at a con after that (as was Gary, who, reading between the lines, was devoted to John, but felt he had to provide his confidence when it was waning, so would sometimes be overtly hostile to John's critics).
There's a lot I dislike about his (that's JNT) time on the show (though seasons 18/19 are two of my favourites ever), but ultimately, I think he only ever did his best. Somebody else's best might have been better, but... there wasn't anyone else going to turn up at the time.
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Except that this was pretty much true for all the previous producers too, with exceptions like Terry Nation, Terrance Dicks and Robert Holmes few of the writers continued one from one producer to another and the same can said for RTD's era as well. I'd say it's more a matter of getting new blood on the show to keep it current, rather than any ill feelings towards writers from a previous era.
Yes, but how many of those prior writers are still writing for television nowadays anyways? (Or perhaps more importantly, how many of the good ones?
Stephen Gallagher
Ben Aaronovitch
Marc Platt
Bob Baker
To name a few.
Yes, but how many of those prior writers are still writing for television nowadays anyways? (Or perhaps more importantly, how many of the good ones?
Stephen Gallagher
Ben Aaronovitch
Marc Platt
Bob Baker
To name a few.
Platt received partial story credit for "Rise of the Cybermen"/"The Age of Steel."
Wikipedia doesn't list any TV credits for Aaronovitch since 2001.
Yes, but how many of those prior writers are still writing for television nowadays anyways? (Or perhaps more importantly, how many of the good ones?
Stephen Gallagher
Ben Aaronovitch
Marc Platt
Bob Baker
To name a few.
Platt received partial story credit for "Rise of the Cybermen"/"The Age of Steel."
Wikipedia doesn't list any TV credits for Aaronovitch since 2001.
Marc Platt only got a thanks for the Cyberman story but in reality he hasn't written any for television since Dr. Who ended and the video relese of Downtime in 1995.
So why give him a free pass and not Aaronovitch? In any event both are perfectly capable for writing on the new show which was my original point.
Erm, it's not about giving someone a "pass." I listed Platt because his story "Spare Parts" was the basis for "Rise of the Cybermen"/"The Age of Steel;" he got a "thanks" and a fee, but in the US, he would have probably gotten a "Story By" or "Based Upon" credit. But it's not a "pass;" I'm not ranking them or judging their capacities. I'm just noting the recent TV credits I could find.
