NARRATOR: With Mawdryn Undead,
the first instalment of the Guardian trilogy complete,
attention turned to the second.
This was the much troubled production of Stephen Gallagher's script,
Terminus.
The inspiration for Terminus, I suppose was
in some of the reading into Norse mythology.
The Vanir who, in the drama,
are the guardians of the Terminus hospital
are named after a set of Norse gods.
The Garm, which was the giant dog, which was
realised in slightly more detail than I have to say
I ever anticipated when I was scripting it.
But the Garm was the dog that guarded the gates to hell.
There's obviously something running through all mythologies
in which, you know, dogs and hell are associated.
We have Cerberus, the three-headed dog in Greek myth
and we have the Garm in Norse myth.
And so I stole liberally from that kind of reading
to make my story.
-Where are you sending her? -I don't know.
But if she stays in the room, she'll die.
I didn't mind it that much.
I think the end result is not, you know, great.
But I didn't mind it. I just felt it kind of didn't go anywhere in the end.
It just seemed to sort of, just lose its way.
I thought it was fine.
I just realised I was going to spend most of the next four weeks
following Janet Fielding around corridors
in some studio somewhere and looking at Janet's nether quarters.
(CHUCKLING) How can I put it?
I quite liked the idea of Terminus. I think it was a really good story.
I think it would be interesting to see how it would be done nowadays.
I think, as a concept, it's quite a nice story.
There's something very strange about this.
What?
DOCTOR: Well, it could be pure coincidence,
but Terminus seems to be at the exact centre of the known universe.
The idea that Terminus created the universe,
I know it sounds like a clever idea, but I think, you know,
if you've got this wonderful instrument called Doctor Who
where, you know, you can trigger the Big Bang
or you can dodge the Big Bang,
why not do it? There is no other show on television,
or there, certainly at that time, was no other show on television
where you were
allowed, nay, encouraged to be quite so you know, thematically ambitious.
NARRATOR: The presence of so many companions aboard the TARDIS
provided Gallagher with the solution to the basic problem
posed by the character Turlough,
that of keeping him away from the Doctor.
The good thing about having three companions altogether
is, if you divided up the cast,
then at least you had two sets of two people
who could talk to each other.
Going into Terminus, I was very aware that now we're on
Turlough's second story.
Okay, he's trying to kill the Doctor. How do we keep this story going?
Without you thinking either Turlough is stupid
or the Doctor's stupid.
If this character is trying to kill you, you have to stop him doing that.
You have to lock him away.
Janet, the only way you can keep her there without going (TUTTS)
is to lock her up.
-It's stuck. -It can't be.
If a show like this is going to proceed basically
on the strength of the conversation between characters,
you've got to have at least two characters in any given scene.
So splitting up the Doctor and Nyssa, and Tegan and Turlough
gave me two lines of plot that I could juggle with.
NARRATOR: To direct the story, producer John Nathan-Turner
hired Mary Ridge who had previously helmed episodes of Blake's 7.
Ridge was to findTerminus, her first and only contribution
to Doctor Who, a whole different ball game.
Mary was one of the first directors I worked with
when I was production manager.
And she was very, very meticulous.
She planned everything right down to the last detail.
And she was very generous.
She didn't keep the cards up to her chest.
She explained why she was doing things.
And probably I looked at Mary and thought, "One day I can do that."
She was almost a classic example of the safe pair of hands.
Now I hate to think what would've happened
if a less seasoned director had been subjected
to the pressures that she was subjected to.
Because even she had a really tough time of it.
I think she had similar problems that I did, actually.
I was very surprised how quick the schedule was on Doctor Who.
And Mary was very used to working in soap opera
and maybe thought you'd have much more time in,
or slightly more time even, on Doctor Who
and you didn't, it was even worse.
She wasn't really equipped to do a Doctor Who.
She didn't really have any interest in it.
Now other directors who didn't have the interest in science fiction
like Peter Moffat could get away with it,
because, you know, they'd done so much before
and they didn't really care that much, you know, about...
They would do their best as a director
but, you know, if they didn't understand a thing,
Peter Moffat would go "I don't understand this bit. It's fine."
Whereas Mary would just get into a tizz.
Whereas other directors, it would be far pacier,
it would be, you know, this is what we want, more urgency.
And I did notice when, again when we were reviewing Terminus,
there were long reaction shots.
And I was thinking at home, watching and thinking
you know, "Okay, now we need to cut. ''
DOCTOR: The centre of the universe.
I remember thinking in my early years of being an actor
even through All Creatures Great and Small,
and through Doctor Who, you know, I could do, I could direct.
I could direct. It's not that hard.
You just have to understand the story and you just have to sort out the shots
you want to do and you have to do it.
It's not until you then work with a good director,
I mean, a really good director, that you suddenly realise,
"This is not as easy as I thought."
NARRATOR: Problems started appearing two weeks before
Mary even commenced work on the show,
with the early cancellation of one of her studio days,
due to the rescheduling in light of threatened industrial action
by BBC electricians.
I think directors are amazing, how they orchestrate the whole thing,
even when things are going well.
But to have something like that, something as disastrously wrong as that.
She must have been under a lot of pressure.
If you even got slightly behind, you were dead.
And I think that's what happened.
You could never catch up.
And that must have been incredibly stressful for her.
NARRATOR: Having carefully planned her schedule,
Mary was immediately thrown off course
by a two-hour power failure on her first day in the studio.
If there was a two-hour delay at the beginning,
and everything was geared, Mary particularly would know exactly
where she should be in the schedule at the bottom of which page,
at the bottom of which half hour.
So two hours would be death and transfiguration.
Mary was a very hard worker and a bit uncompromising.
And, with regular scenery, I would always,
having discussed with the director... I'd read the scripts,
discuss with the director and then go away and make some proposals.
And I gave Mary these rough plans,
went out to her home, delivered them to her home.
And talked them through with her and she said,
"Thank you, thank you very much. Leave them with me."
And the next day or two days later, she came into the office.
And on my rough plans, she had marked all the actors' positions
and all the camera positions for all of the episodes.
And I just couldn't believe it.
As a rough plan, I'd put... Suggested a bridge.
And it was 18 feet long. There's no way I could build it.
Without doing an enormous scaffolding structure,
you couldn't support the weight of everything on that.
And I knew it would have to be reduced, but that would arrive during discussion.
But she'd already planned it all and wasn't going to move.
NARRATOR: Recording was further delayed after it was discovered
that not only were the prop circuits beneath the TARDIS console
at Longleat Safari Park as part of their permanent Doctor Who exhibition,
but that one set had been erected three inches off its mark.
The sets would often be composite sets.
And the health and safety issue comes into it as well.
So if one set is three inches off its mark
that would then push the next set three inches off its mark.
And when you've got a studio that's absolutely choc-a-bloc with setting,
that three inches might just push the final set into the fire lane.
Well it's a big problem because of the lighting
and the fixed bars above and that you can't really change
the lighting easily without lowering the bars
which, if the set is in the wrong place, you can't lower.
And it all builds up that way from that point of view.
If you've planned your shots, and remember that Mary came
from the era that had actually a turret to move,
you weren't actually zooming on zoom lenses.
So Mary knew what lens to use for each shot
and how long to leave between getting from one shot to the other.
So, for a set to be three inches out, would alter her shots.
NARRATOR: With two studio sessions having overrun,
John Nathan-Turner promised Ridge
an extra hour at the end of her final recording block
to complete work that had been abandoned.
However, at the last minute, he withdrew this offer
in favour of a full remount.
It would have upset her because she was so professional.
And the only reason I can think that John, if he'd promised it
to her and took it away, I think there must have been
somebody leaning very, very heavily on him.
He was a very enabling producer.
I suppose, you know, the extra degree of tension
that came from trying to get, you know, two hours of drama into
a nanosecond of shooting in television time, as it seemed,
ramped up by a matter of degree, but certainly it seemed to be
you know, that was how the television industry was run at the time.
She had been put in a position that she felt
she wasn't being true to herself.
Her motivation was to bring a show in
to the best of everybody's ability, her own included.
And on time, on budget, and it would have been...
And I fully believe that she never did, on any other show, go overtime.
People would pace themselves.
But, for some reason, it didn't happen. On this, we got into a terrible mess.
And again I think, I don't know, for you to put the...
You know whether there is anyone to
specifically blame, but we never kind of got the momentum going.
There was a kind of, just a general feeling of...
I don't think morale was down, but we just got a bit relaxed maybe.
So it would have been devastating for her
and I would imagine that...
I mean I've worked on shows and said,
"I will never do that again."
And once you've put yourself into a situation
that you feel is unacceptable, I'm glad she didn't.
NARRATOR: The costume designer allocated to Terminus was Dee Robson,
who had contributed to the story
Arc of Infinity at the start of the season.
This was despite John Nathan-Turner's express misgivings
as to her continued suitability for the programme.
And when prop builder Rod Vass delivered the Vanir armour
to the team for rehearsals,
he was aghast to learn that it would be required
for the actors to fight in.
A design consideration of which he had not been made aware.
This did nothing to improve relations.
Unlike Mary, she was not fazed by anything that he did.
So he could complain till he was blue in the teeth about Dee.
And Dee would just carry on.
Some of the work that she did maybe interfered
with other people's requirements on the show.
For example, the clanking of the Vanir costumes
was a terrible problem for the sound people
and they had to be padded up around the corners.
Sound of the armour clunking, it doesn't sound like
you know, I suppose we could pretend it was something far greater than steel.
But it didn't sound like that.
And there wasn't the opportunity... We couldn't do anything about it,
even in post production.
Andrew Burt explained why they were wearing the armour
and it was a protection against radiation, wasn't it?
I didn't think they looked bad, they were just impractical.
POTTER: But why bone you like a skeleton?
I mean, it could have just been... Anyway, that was obviously
to make it more exciting, to make it more mysterious
or horrible or nasty.
I couldn't see how on Earth those costumes,
had they been proper suits, could protect you from radiation.
Because half the time they were walking around
with them up anyway because you couldn't see through them.
Bor!
No.
Bor!
And I can distinctly remember the fact that when
the fascia was down, we couldn't hear a word they were saying.
And on reviewing the DVD, it just looks so silly
that whenever they speak, they lift up their visor.
But, actually, that was the only way we could hear them.
I think that the design job she did on the Vanir costumes
from the point of view of the dramatic look of them
and the effect that they had on the screen,
I think was entirely justified.
So from my point of view, you know, Dee could do no wrong.
Having said that, I did mention before that the Garm was a little bit more
fully realised than I ever anticipated.
When scripting the Garm, I was trying to be
a little bit sensitive to the design limitations of the TV studio.
What can be achieved, what cannot be achieved.
And I knew damn well that we could not achieve
you know, a massive special effect of a giant, hulking beast
on our kind of budget.
So what I did was, on the page, wrote it as
"Never appearing as more than a silhouette in the dark
"with two dark red glowing eyes," which I thought would be
an incredibly spooky and effective way of doing it.
What I actually saw when I came down to the studio floor
was that the Garm had been built absolutely in full, towering detail,
and didn't really work quite as effectively
as I'd rather hoped it would.
Well, the poor guy was baking in it. You know, it was such a heavy costume
that the guy must have lost stones in weight
just by walking around in the wretched thing.
Why are you doing this? You're torturing people.
I drive the disease from them. All would die, but most survive.
And people said, "Well let's... How can we make this work?"
"We'll give him a kind of strange wolf head
"and you know, have him walking round. We'll employ a very big actor."
It just doesn't work like that. It doesn't work, you know.
And I never quite understood, once you've found out
in other stories it doesn't work, why you then repeat the same mistake.
NARRATOR: First approached to play the pirate Kari,
was '60s fashion icon, Twiggy.
However, after she proved unavailable,
actress Liza Goddard stepped into the role.
Well, Liza is Liza, isn't she really?
Her enthusiasm, I remember about Liza Goddard,
she was just so enthusiastic about it.
Liza Goddard comes in and is Liza Goddard.
Advanced party to raider. Come in, raider. Come in.
DAVISON: And I suppose that's what John wanted.
I thought the outfits were bordering on the...
You talk about the outfits for the other people,
what were those two wearing?
I seem to remember her as being great fun.
She was married to Alvin Stardust at the time.
I remember him coming to lunch at the BBC.
I mean they're meant to be space pirates.
They looked like they were there for some kind of
rock tribute band of the '70s, don't they?
Yeah, I do remember them having those goldfish bowl things
on their head that didn't fit properly.
When we had all the dry ice and the smoke in the studio,
they all filled up inside.
So these poor actors, I mean, you really do need extra money
for working on Doctor Who because it's dangerous.
NARRATOR: Terminus was to be Sarah Sutton's final regular appearance
as Nyssa, bringing to an end her two years on the programme.
I think your final memories of Doctor Who, you'd like to think
everyone was sort of happy and jolly and making the most of it
and being very nice to you
and a bit like the birthday-girl type thing.
But, no, it was a shame.
And it was a shame that you know, you don't get to do
your last scene right at the end.
Doctor, talk to Nyssa.
-What is it? -I'm not coming with you.
When Nyssa came to leave the show, I think the scene
that you see on the screen was probably enhanced by Eric.
Nyssa's quite a caring and thoughtful person.
She tries to see everyone's point of view.
Although, sometimes I think she sees things a little bit black and white.
-He's got manners of a pig. -The Doctor?
-The brat, Turlough. -He'll settle down.
I felt sad that they had never really developed her character.
You know, too much attention was given to the superficial ways
of making companions interesting
rather than actually write a good part for them.
Janet and I had been briefed quite carefully about Sarah's departure.
In that...
I don't think at the point when Sarah departed
they knew how long they'd keep Janet in either.
It wasn't my decision to leave.
You know, you had three assistants. You had Adric, Nyssa and Tegan.
It's too many people. Nobody gets a part.
So everybody understood why you had to do something about this.
But that didn't make it any easier for Sarah.
Well, my agent said that my contract wasn't going to be renewed.
So that was it, really. Time to start looking for other work.
I've enjoyed every moment of my time on the TARDIS
and I'll miss you both.
But here I have a chance to put into practice
the skills I learnt on Traken.
-Please, Nyssa. -NYSSA: I'm adamant.
I enjoyed working with Sarah a lot, you know,
to me she was just very nice, very straightforward, very...
I think a good actress, too.
Doctor Who was cosy and comfortable and I was very happy
and I loved working with people I was with.
And it just never occurred to me to think, "Well, actually, now
"I want to go somewhere else," and that decision was made for me.
I mean, I think jolly good it was really because I'd probably have stayed
until I was old and wrinkly.
She'll die here.
Not easily, Tegan.
Like you, I'm indestructible.
Terminus isn't regarded as a classic story by most fans.
And it's cherished by a few.
And I've long given up trying to parse how that works.
Somebody once came up to me and said,
"Warriors' Gate, you wrote Warriors' Gate. That's the 2001 of Doctor Who.
"That's amazing."
I was once standing in a bar and I was standing behind some guy
that I'd never met and didn't know.
And just happened to overhear the conversation.
He said, "You don't get much good horror on TV," he says.
"You know the best horror I've seen in the last 10 years,
"was a Doctor Who called Terminus. ''
And I immediately kind of stiffened like that.
Some of the William Hartnell stories stand the test of time
better than Terminus because they didn't try to do anything.
Everything was atmosphere.
Everything was sort of, you know, some mysterious thing going on.
And so it actually works.
Is it the writer's job to make everybody else's job easier?
Or is it the writer's job to give everybody a challenge to rise to?
Somewhere in between the two I think lies the truth.
You don't give people impossible challenges,
but I think the history of Doctor Who is television professionals
rising to impossible challenges.
And, you know, getting a pretty good score
out of what they do.
Enlightenment is a great show.
Mawdryn Undead is an extremely professional
and well-written show.
And ifTerminus kind of fades into the shadow a little bit,
in comparison to the two of them because, you know,
it's got a giant on either side of it, well, so be it.
My lasting memories of Terminus is the injuries to my knees.
I'm not joking. When I watched it back
and you see all that stuff I did in the studio. It was a tiny set.
It was very, very painful to film in them.
I'm so unfit.
My lasting memories of writing Terminus
would be sitting in Eric's office
in that bloody awful Threshold House on Shepherd's Bush Green
which is this Kafkaesque building
from which most of Doctor Who was produced in those days.
A working environment which I would not wish upon anyone.
And from which the most incredible wonders issued.
Leaving.
Being actually very, very upset in that scene where I...
Janet and I hug each other. I really, truly was crying.
The strange thing was the programme became real
to all people who worked on it.
To the cast, to the crew, you know.
So when the goodbyes were said, they were emotional times.
You know, they were real tears.
The artists managed to become the characters.
And that transferred to the crew.
So there was absolute silence, you know.
During the goodbye sequences and the farewells where Nyssa,
decided to stay on Terminus.
It was, you know, they were real scenes.
That was real emotion and you could hear a pin drop.
In fact, when I watched the DVD for the first time in 20 years,
I was sitting on my sitting room floor and sort of watching it
and I cried again.
NARRATOR: Terminus, with Nyssa still aboard,
continues its voyage through the universe
as the Doctor, Tegan and Turlough depart in the TARDIS.
But the White Guardian will soon be paying them a visit
as the trilogy reaches an epic conclusion.
And the race for enlightenment begins.