The Life And Scandalous Times Of John Nathan-Turner

[StCoop]

Oh dear. Let's hope the Daily Mail don't get a look at this book. Hardly the publicity the BBC would be looking for in the 50th Anniversary year.

http://www.sfx.co.uk/2013/03/10/jn-t-the-life-and-scandalous-times-of-john-nathan-turner-review/

 

[JoeZhang]

Sounds like a good book, I'll look out for it.

 

[DalekJim]

Can't say I care about the man's sex life one way or the other, everybody has their demons and society's obsession with celebrity's sex lives is trivial and warped. He produced Seasons 18, 25 and 26 which are three of my favourites so he'll always be somebody I admire. Under him the show took a harder science-fiction edge which is preferable to the light, celebrity-orientated entertainment under RTD.

 

[Eliczo]

Dead men cant defend themselves, I don't see any point in that kind of book. Their might have been issues with his tenure as producer, but like DalekJim said under his reign we got classics like Remembrance of the Daleks, Ghostlight, Curse of Fenric & Survival. And probably others I've not watched yet.

 

[DalekJim]

Yup. Season 26 is my favourite Doctor Who season and I trust Ian Levine about as much as I'd trust Emperor Palpatine on his period.

 

[Christopher]

Doesn't sound significantly worse than the way Gene Roddenberry behaved. He cast actresses on the show for no other reason than that he wanted to sleep with them (notably the yeoman in the second pilot who was featured in publicity photos as if she were a major cast member but whose entire speaking part consisted of only four syllables), and had multiple affairs going on at once. And he had his share of objectionable behavior on the production side of things as well, like taking credit for other people's work. The only real difference is that Roddenberry's sexual preferences weren't as stigmatized or outside the mainstream at the time.

I hadn't known JN-T was gay. Interesting that both the last producer of the original series and the first producer of the new one were gay. It makes me wonder if other producers were. There is arguably something "queer," to use that term in the sense embraced by the gay community, about the Doctor -- a flamboyant outsider with an unconventional lifestyle, associating mostly with young women but showing no romantic interest in them. (Though it might be belaboring the point to attempt an analogy between the TARDIS and a closet.) The entertainment industry has historically attracted a lot of GLBT talent, and it stands to reason that a lot of them might've found Doctor Who particularly appealing. But since that sort of thing wasn't openly discussed back then, there may be a lot of that aspect of DW history that remains hidden.

 

[JoeZhang]

To be fair to the writer, if the review is right that aspect of the book is quite small.

 

[StCoop]

To be fair to the writer, if the review is right that aspect of the book is quite small.

That won't stop Murdoch and the Tabloid Scum from having a field day with it. Anything to attack the BBC with and as the Jimmy Savile saga showed it doesn't matter how many decades in the past it happened.

 

[JoeZhang]

To be fair to the writer, if the review is right that aspect of the book is quite small.

That won't stop Murdoch and the Tabloid Scum from having a field day with it. Anything to attack the BBC with and as the Jimmy Savile saga showed it doesn't matter how many decades in the past it happened.

Yeah? And? If people self-censor their creative endeavours because of the Daily Wail and Sky, we really are fucked.

 

[StCoop]

Yeah? And? If people self-censor their creative endeavours because of the Daily Wail and Sky, we really are fucked.

Or JNT could have kept his dick in his pants when he was at work. Or is that too radical an idea?

 

[JoeZhang]

Yeah? And? If people self-censor their creative endeavours because of the Daily Wail and Sky, we really are fucked.

Or JNT could have kept his dick in his pants when he was at work. Or is that too radical an idea?

But he didn't, so it is irrelevant to the discussion.

 

[DalekJim]

Or JNT could have kept his dick in his pants when he was at work. Or is that too radical an idea?

John Barrowman could have too.

 

[DWF]

I admire. Under him the show took a harder science-fiction edge which is preferable to the light, celebrity-orientated entertainment under RTD.

JNT was also critized for bringing in big name guest stars and that hard edged science ficiton ended when Bidmead left teh show IMO.

 

[Starkers]

Although in Barrowman's case it's a whole different kind of willy-out-ness...

 

[DalekJim]

JNT was also critized for bringing in big name guest stars

I actually thought Nicholas Parsons in Curse of Fenric was terrific.

 

[DWF]

JNT was also critized for bringing in big name guest stars

I actually thought Nicholas Parsons in Curse of Fenric was terrific.

How about Beryl Reid and Rula Lenski then or Leee John?

 

[Iamnotspock]

Can't say I care about the man's sex life one way or the other, everybody has their demons and society's obsession with celebrity's sex lives is trivial and warped. He produced Seasons 18, 25 and 26 which are three of my favourites so he'll always be somebody I admire. Under him the show took a harder science-fiction edge which is preferable to the light, celebrity-orientated entertainment under RTD.

I'm a fan of the later McCoy era too, but I think that owes more to Andrew Cartmel than JNT, and while I can enjoy most of the Davison era I think overall he did far more harm than good, with some truly baffling creative decisions (I'm with RTD in calling Colin Baker's coat “the greatest mistake in the history of television”). To be fair though, he'd wanted to move on for many years before '89, while Colin Baker had wanted to stay for many years, so naturally the Beeb sacked Colin and kept JNT.

 

[DalekJim]

I'm a fan of the later McCoy era too, but I think that owes more to Andrew Cartmel than JNT

Well, JNT hired Cartmel and cast McCoy and Aldred.

(I'm with RTD in calling Colin Baker's coat “the greatest mistake in the history of television”)

That would be Voyage of the Damned.

 

[Rarewolf]

I admire. Under him the show took a harder science-fiction edge which is preferable to the light, celebrity-orientated entertainment under RTD.

JNT was also critized for bringing in big name guest stars and that hard edged science ficiton ended when Bidmead left teh show IMO.

JNT and RTD both appointed Doctors (rather than audition) cast a former child star/singer as companion, and saw the advantage of stunt casting guest roles. It's weird how it all worked for the later.

 

[diankra]

I hadn't known JN-T was gay. Interesting that both the last producer of the original series and the first producer of the new one were gay. It makes me wonder if other producers were.

IFAIC, Nathan-Turner's eight predecessors were all straight.
Certainly, Peter Bryant, Barry Letts, Philip Hinchcliffe and Graham Williams were all married with young children, while Derrick Sherwin was married to the actress who played Lady Jennifer in The War Games. Not proof that they didn't swing the other way on the quiet, of course, but I'll take it at face value.
ISTR mention of a widow and children in Innes Lloyd's obits, but that's 20 years back so can't be certain. If John Wiles had been gay, I'd suspect someone might have mentioned it as a possible explanation for the well-documented bad relationship between him and the somewhat intolerant Hartnell. As for Verity Lambert, she was married briefly in the 70s: could be any number of reasons why it didn't last, but I suspect that we probably don't need to look for anything more than her being a strong-willed, acid-tongued career obsessive...