Doctor Who- The Lost Stories

[Lissa]

A strange marketing move considering all anyone, anywhere knows about "The Space Whale" is that it's called "The Space Whale" and that the story called "The Space Whale" is the most frequently unmade story in history. It's not "the one with the Ice Warriors" or "the one with the Toymaker" or even "the one they didn't make because they made The Daleks". It's just "the one called 'The Space Whale' that never got made over and over again". Now it's not even that. Odd plan.

[Si Hunt]

The only thing going for it was that it's title is well known in Who lore. So it's an odd move.

And the new title is even worse than the old one.

Si.

[Simon R]

I thought it was called "Song of the Space Whale" which shows how much I know.

I could never manage to get through the article on it in DWM many years ago. Sounded like a load of old Betty Bobbits to me.

[Jonno]

There's some "missing" Hartnell, Troughton and McCoys on the way - the latter being what would have been S27 and the middle including Prison In Space which had Jamie in drag!

[Rob McCow]

Oh good grief, the wretched 'Jamie In Drag' story. Wasn't it rejected at the time for it's ludicrously sexist script? How that's going to come across now is hard to imagine.

[Si Hunt]

I'm highly dubious about the other "lost" Hartnell they're doing (it has a bizarre title, something about a fragrance). Has it really never been found before? Despite all that digging by Hearn & co in the '90's? And if it's been found now, why haven't we heard about it? Why isn't it HUGE news?

Or is this another cheat of some kind?

Si.

[SiHart]

Details:

Big Finish can now reveal that it will be releasing a further series of Lost Stories – audio versions of scripts that were intended, but never produced, for television. The original run of eight lost Colin Baker stories begins this month, with The Nightmare Fair, which is set in Blackpool and features David Bailie (Robots of Death) as The Celestial Toymaker.
For a limited period only the second series of Lost Stories will be available at a special discounted price only from www.bigfinish.com.
The first release is a four-disc box set titled The Hartnell Years, which will feature two unmade stories by Moris Farhi: Farewell Great Macedon (a six-part historical tale featuring Alexander the Great) and The Fragile Yellow Arc of Fragrance (a one-part science fiction story set on an alien world).
“Sadly both William Hartnell and Jacqueline Hill passed away some time ago,” comments Richardson, “so we never considered making the production with a full cast. Instead Moris Farhi’s original scripts have been adapted as an enhanced audiobook, which will be performed by William Russell and Carole Ann Ford, with a guest actor portraying Alexander the Great.”
This production will be recorded over four days at the start of December, and is scheduled for release in November 2010.
Next up is another four-disc box set The Troughton Years, the centerpiece of which will be Prison in Space, performed by Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury, with Susan Brown (Torchwood) guest starring as the villainous Chairman Babs. The adaptation is by Simon Guerrier, working from Dick Sharples’s original scripts that were written in 1968. It is scheduled for release in December 2010.
“There’s also a very exciting bonus story in this box set,” adds Richardson. “Big Finish has been granted the rights by the estate of Terry Nation to produce an audio version of the unmade US TV Dalek pilot, The Destroyers. This adaptation will be a full cast drama, starring Nicholas Briggs as the voice of the Daleks.”
Moving forward two decades, the remaining productions are drawn from what would have been Doctor Who’s twenty-seventh season in 1990.
“Doctor Who was cancelled in 1989,” says Richardson, “but the production team already had plans for the following year. It’s been my pleasure to collaborate with script editor Andrew Cartmel, who is rebooting those original storylines together with the writers who had been pencilled in for the season. Script writing is underway – in fact, the second story is nearly finished - and we hope to record these in the early months of 2010.”
The season also introduces a brand new Doctor Who companion – the young, sophisticated safecracker Raine.
“We’ll probably start recording these stories in January 2010,” reveals the producer, “but I can reveal that the role of Raine has already been cast. More news on that, and the story details, will be revealed in the New Year.”
Richardson reveals that ‘Season 27’ actually came together very quickly.
“It seemed like it was meant to be. I was at the Regenerations convention in Swansea, and Sylvester McCoy came over and suggested that Big Finish should make his Lost Stories. Sophie Aldred was in the next room, so I texted her on my mobile, she joined us and committed to the idea instantly. Big Finish executive producer Jason Haigh-Ellery was there and gave the green light, I contacted Andrew Cartmel on Facebook and he said yes, and a representative from the BBC was in Swansea too, and gave us the go-ahead instantly. The whole project came together in about two hours!”

Si xx

[Si Hunt]

The Season 27 stuff sounds fun but the unmade 60's stories sound awful! Scripts from 45 years ago that even the production team of the day wouldn't touch, performed by half a cast 45 years older. Dreadful idea.

I think me and Big Finish are over!

Si :mobile

[SiHart]

Join us Si! Join us!

Si xx

[Simon R]

Wasn't the safe cracker girl called Kate Tollinger when DWM did their Season 27 "What If?" thing? It's a nice idea but the scripts have have 20 years to form in the writers minds and be influenced by so many factors which wouldn't have been their at the time if you see what I mean.

I wonder why "The Masters of Luxor" hasn't been mentioned yet and do you think they'll do something with "The Dark Dimension" possibly for the 50th anniversary?

[Rob McCow]

I like Masters of Luxor, but it's a bit Derivatron.

[Andrew Curnow]

After reading the piece on the Lost Stories in this week's DWM, and although I think BF should be applauded for tracking some of this info down, it seems apparent that these are going to be a bit of a patchwork of things, and probably stretch the definition of 'Lost Stories'. The first two, and the Space Whale one, sound pretty much fair game, but some of the others - the PJ Hammond one is his episode but augmented by a whole new episode by Andy Lane; Barbara Clegg's outline, now scripted by Marc Platt, was never even commissioned; and The Macros is having part one reconstructed from a damaged hard drive and part two... well, I'm pretty sure that part two was famously never written, and the authors could not remember how it went anyway!!

I'm sure they'll be interesting though, but just some of them (the Clegg one in particular) seem too tenuous for the banner. I mean, crikey, many people will have sent in ideas to the production teams of the 60, 70s & 80s, probably without ever having a hope in hell of being commissioned - would those count?

But it'll be rather nice to hear the McCoy ones, albeit it they inevitably won't be as they would have been in 1990. Hopefully Alixion, which I think was pretty far advanced scripting-wise, will be included.

[Stuart Wallis]

It does sound as though Farewell Great Macedon and the other sixties ones could be as much Companion Chronicles as anything. Being Doctorless also makes me wonder they're concerned after the health of Geoffrey Bayldon these days, as much as not wanting to recast Barbara.

If they're going to recycle stories that didn't get that far off the drawing board, are there possibilities for Operation Werewolf?

[Andrew Curnow]

I notice the Troughton set is listed as a four-disc collection, so maybe Werewolf is planned to be one of those?

[Si Hunt]

On reading the DWM article, some of them ("In The Hollows of Time") sound good and worth doing. But I'm mystified at the logic of the stories they've altered - particuarly the one where they've changed the companion I think. In that, they've literally thrown the baby out with the bathwater; the only thing going for these stories, offset against the fact they wern't originally deemed good enough to make, was that they were lost scripts. By changing them, we actually have a new story weaved around the bones of something that wasn't very good to start with. It borders on insanity - it's like they've used up all the good original stories in the world and have nothing else to do but move onto the rotten ones.

Si.

[Simon R]

It's also a shame they can't afford Jayston and Bellignham for the "Trial" one. I can understand why they can't but still...couldn't they have hired them for something else and juggled the budget between this and another project?

[Andrew Curnow]

Has anybody bothered with/listened to The Nightmare Fair yet?

[Si Hunt]

We have it, but not listened as yet...

Si.

[kevinwho]

Has anybody bothered with/listened to The Nightmare Fair yet?

I did, it's okay. Faithful to the novelization, as far as my memory of the novelization can tell me. I did not care for the shift in the Toymaker's characterization. I understand the choice the actor made, I just don't agree with it. I prefer the imperious attitude Michael Gough's version had.

The story itself is almost okay, probably better than most of the dross from that time period. And let's face it, any story with a character named "Kevin" can't be all bad.

[Andrew Curnow]

And let's face it, any story with a character named "Kevin" can't be all bad.

[Si Hunt]

"Kevin and Perry Go Large"?

Si.

[Simon R]

We listened to Part One today.

It was as you'd expect. Colin and Nicola gave it their all and it was all okay but it was never going to be great given the quality of the scripts. The dialogue is fine but the plot is very lacking. The sound was okay but they could have gone to town a bit more on the pleasure beach scenes.

Not sure I approve of them changing the cliffhanger mind.

[Andrew Curnow]

Not sure I approve of them changing the cliffhanger mind.

What was it... and what is it?

[Si Hunt]

I don't know what it was but the new one isn't great... Just the Doctor talking to the Toymaker about something.

Si. :mobile

[Stuart Wallis]

"Kevin and Perry Go Large"?

Or should that be Kevin and Peri?