10 Most Unusual Demands Made By Doctor Who Guest Stars
When the opportunity to travel in time and space just isn't enough.
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00 Due to Doctor Who's very nature of travelling anywhere in time and space,
00:04 different stories and locations each week, it has had an ever-expanding roster of guest stars
00:10 over the past 58 years. Some actors take a role on the show out of love and nostalgia,
00:15 others like John Simm take the role so that their children will actually be able to watch
00:19 their parents' work without fear of bad language or sexy scenes.
00:24 Not everyone holds the show in such esteem, however, and there have been a fair few guest
00:29 actors who aren't overly thrilled to take part in the show. And even those that are sometimes
00:34 have particularly strange requests in order for them to get into character as all manner of alien
00:39 weirdos, historical figures and intergalactic tyrants. This list collects a range of actors
00:45 who've appeared in the show over the past five decades, charting their unusual requests,
00:50 vanity, eccentric motives and incredibly demanding performances.
00:54 With that in mind, I'm Ellie with WhoCulture, and this is 10 Most Unusual Demands Made by
00:59 Doctor Who Guest Stars.
01:01 Number 10. Vi Del Mar negotiated a separate contract for her teeth in The Pirate Planet
01:07 Vi Del Mar was an English character actor who'd pop up in everything from Carry On Cowboy to
01:12 Doctor Finley's Casebook. Born in 1902, Del Mar was in her mid-70s when she was cast as the aged
01:19 Queen Xenaxia in the closing two parts of Douglas Adams' Doctor Who debut, The Pirate Planet.
01:25 Queen Xenaxia, of course, was the true villain of the story. In an attempt to remain youthful,
01:30 she plunders the galaxy for rare minerals to power the time dam that sustains her.
01:35 Trapped in the final few moments of her life, she is defeated by the Doctor,
01:39 who warns her that there's not enough energy in the world to sustain her existence forever.
01:44 In order to better portray this wise and old queen, Del Mar was asked to remove her false teeth
01:49 by director Pennant Roberts. She refused to do so, and ended up negotiating an extra fee to appear on
01:56 screen without her falses in. According to IMDb, this was her final on-screen credit as an actor,
02:01 but Del Mar lived on until 1994. The fate of her false teeth is unknown.
02:07 Number 9. Nicholas Briggs disagreed with how the Daleks were written in Doomsday
02:12 Nicholas Briggs is so entwined with the Daleks now that a whole nation responded to the
02:17 executioner's line "I am not Nick" with "Yes, you are". On top of this, he's the voice of the
02:23 Cybermen, the Jadoon, the Zygons, Skaldak the Ice Warrior, not to mention his extensive work with
02:29 Big Finish. Briggs is one of the few figures to have been with Doctor Who since 2005. He's the
02:35 monster guy. He has a ring modulator. He's the Dalek expert. So much so that during filming of
02:41 the series 2 finale Doomsday, he disagreed with how the dialogue was written. Reading the script,
02:47 Briggs felt that Dalek Sek sounded like he was jarringly in conversation with himself,
02:52 and that the lines would be better split between Sek and another Dalek. Director Graham Harper
02:56 agreed, and they sought permission to change the script as written. Is Briggs paid by the Dalek,
03:01 or just a flat rate for voice work? If the former, then this was a sneaky little move for some extra
03:06 cash. But it's more than likely to be the latter, and he just really knows his Daleks.
03:11 Number 8. John Cain's method acting nearly barred him from filming in Planet of the Spiders. John
03:18 Cain's performance as Tommy in 1974's Planet of the Spiders is a bit of its time. It's not a
03:24 particularly nuanced portrayal of a character with learning difficulties, though the script does have
03:28 its heart in the right place. When Sarah exclaims "You're normal!" after his miraculous interaction
03:34 with the Great Crystal, Tommy simply replies "I hope not." Cain was predominantly a theatre actor
03:40 at the time of filming, and would get into character on his way to the first day of shooting.
03:45 Adopting Tommy's voice, he asked the taxi driver to take him to "where they made the television
03:50 programmes" because he was on his way to meet his friend Doctor Who. On arriving at TV centre,
03:55 the taxi driver alerted a security guard who told Cain that the TARDIS had left,
04:00 and Doctor Who would wave to him next time he was on telly. Cain turned down the driver's offer of
04:04 a lift back home, and eventually had to remonstrate with the guard to be allowed inside to start
04:09 filming. Number 7. Simon Callow insisted Dickens be treated with respect in The Unquiet Dead
04:16 Actors will sometimes avoid roles that may damage their reputation, often by being connected with
04:21 work that doesn't appear worthy of their talents. Simon Callow is slightly different, and was
04:26 reticent to appear in The Unquiet Dead because he was fearful that it would sully the reputation of
04:31 Charles Dickens. Having written about the author and having played him in a one-man show, Callow
04:36 is a proper Dickens scholar, and was uncomfortable with the idea of him being a guest in a Doctor
04:41 Who story. His fears were rooted in the idea that the author is often deployed as a cheap way to add
04:46 some Victorian character to a ropey old period piece. He'd clearly seen what Doctor Who did
04:52 with H.G. Wells in Timelash. So Callow was adamant that the script be respectful to the Dickens
04:57 legacy. He was therefore pleasantly surprised when he realised that Gatiss was almost as big a
05:02 Dickens fan as he was. Callow was drawn to the script that saw the author worry about his legacy
05:07 and his value as he nears the end of his life. It's one of the great Doctor Who performances,
05:12 and was perfect to relaunch the series' historical adventures.
05:16 6. Kate O'Mara Swapped Hollywood Sunshine For A Damp Gravel Pit For Time And The Rani
05:22 Kate O'Mara always brought a bit of Hollywood glamour to Doctor Who in the 1980s. She only
05:28 appeared twice, but the character was such a hit with fans that any time a big-name female actor
05:33 is cast as a villain, she's immediately rumoured to be the Rani. Keely Hawes and Michelle Gomez
05:38 were certainly speculated to be new incarnations of the villainous Time Lady. To date, she's not
05:43 made a return, perhaps due to how Kate O'Mara made the role her own. Indeed, O'Mara was very keen to
05:48 return to the role for 1987's Time And The Rani, in spite of her success in the USA in popular soap
05:55 Dynasty. She also had a few requests for executive producer John Nathan-Turner when she wrote to him,
06:01 "I can't stand the eternal sunshine. You've got to help me. I want to be in a gravel pit
06:06 somewhere in the pissing rain, changing in a caravan in front of 20 nosy crew members."
06:11 Whilst the hours and hours of location footage on the new Blu-rays don't dwell on her changing
06:16 room arrangements, she certainly gets her wish for a soaking wet gravel pit.
06:20 Number 5. Paul Darrow was out for revenge against Colin Baker in Timelash
06:26 Actors take on roles for all manner of reasons. For Paul Darrow, he accepted the role as Tecca
06:31 in Timelash purely out of a thirst for revenge. Back in 1980, Colin Baker had made a scene-stealing
06:38 appearance as the villainous Babin the Butcher in the Blake's Seven episode,
06:42 "City at the Edge of the World." Darrow felt that Baker's bombastic performance upstaged him on his
06:47 own show. He's not wrong. It's a role that lives long in the memory and has now spawned a big
06:52 finish spin-off. Darrow decided to return the favour five years later on the set of Timelash.
06:58 Nathan-Turner had cast him to play the role of the collaborator Malin Tecca in the same cool,
07:03 anti-heroic manner that he played Avon. Darrow declined this offer and instead decided to
07:07 perform the part as if he was Shakespeare's Richard III, hump and all. Director Pennant
07:12 Roberts declined the hump, but Darrow proceeded to exaggerate his performance in what is one of
07:17 the most memorable Doctor Who guest turns. And at least Colin Baker got some good convention
07:21 stories out of it. After all, it could have been worse. Stephen Berkhoff was also in contention
07:26 for the role of Tecca, but much more about him later.
07:30 Number 4. Anthony Ainley's Bald Cap Mishap in Time Flight
07:34 If you believed Tom Baker, and thousands wouldn't, then master actor Anthony Ainley
07:38 was bald as a kneecap. The master's jet black hair was unsurprisingly a wig.
07:43 Anecdotally, he was very sensitive about his baldness and would insist on his makeup being
07:48 done in private. Ainley's sensitivity over his baldness reached ludicrous heights during the
07:53 production of 1982's Time Flight. For reasons that are never made clear, the master is disguised as
07:59 the mystical Khalid, a bald racist stereotype for the benefit of seemingly nobody. Of course,
08:05 to wear the heavy latex and makeup used to cover up his appearance, Ainley would have to remove
08:10 the wig. No deal. He insisted that the makeup artist fit the bald cap over his luxurious black
08:16 wig. Christopher Lee was similar. He refused to remove his wig for his role as Mycroft Holmes in
08:21 the private life of Sherlock Holmes, until he was eventually convinced to by the director,
08:26 Billy Wilder. Ron Jones, the director of the much derided Time Flight, had no such luck with Ainley,
08:31 despite warning of the unbearable heat he'd have to deal with.
08:35 Number 3. Anton Diffring preferred tennis to Doctor Who in Silver Nemesis
08:40 Anton Diffring was a prolific German character actor who had fled Germany in 1939 to live and
08:46 work in Canada, the US, and Britain. Often playing Nazis in the movies following the end of the war,
08:52 he appeared in genre classics like Where Eagles Dare and also starred in Jerry Lewis' infamous
08:57 little-seen concentration camp clown film The Day the Clown Cried. By the late 80s,
09:02 Diffring was in his 70s and very much still working. Doctor Who's 25th anniversary special
09:08 Silver Nemesis centred on a battle between the Cybermen, a Nazi and his private militia,
09:13 and two Elizabethans to obtain the mythical Nemesis statue. It's up to the Doctor and
09:18 Ace to stop them. And who did the Doctor Who production team have in mind for the ageing Nazi?
09:23 Why, Anton Diffring, of course. Diffring was completely unaware of Doctor Who and had never
09:28 seen an episode. He took the role on, though, not because he was a late convert to the magic of the
09:32 show, but because the shooting dates coincided with Wimbledon and he could watch the matches
09:37 between shoots from his hotel room. 2. Davros smokes inside a paper bag in
09:42 Genesis of the Daleks No disrespect to those who came after him,
09:46 but Michael Wisher was the definitive Davros. "Evil doesn't shout, it whispers," he famously
09:52 noted, and it's this hissing menace that brings the creator of the Daleks so chillingly to life,
09:57 a eugenicist who is absolutely convinced of the purity of his own race above all else.
10:04 The darkness of Davros and Terry Nation's inspiration from the dark subject matter of
10:08 the Holocaust is at odds with the frankly crazy way that Wisher prepared for the role.
10:14 Knowing that he would be encased inside a rubber mask to play the part,
10:17 he decided to rehearse his lines whilst wearing a paper bag on his head. The idea was that the
10:22 bag would prepare him for the restrictive experience of wearing the Davros mask.
10:26 Wisher was also a prolific chain smoker and cut two air holes in the top of the bag to allow him
10:31 to smoke whilst wearing the very flammable paper bag, something which would never in a million
10:36 years happen in an age of health and safety legislation. When it came to playing Davros
10:41 on set, Wisher had a peculiar costume decision. Beneath the black leather tunic, he wore a kilt
10:46 and knee pads in order to feel more comfortable in the Dalek shirt.
10:50 Number 1. Stephen Berkhoff's never-to-be-repeated role as the Shukri in The Power of Three
10:56 In an interview with SFX Magazine, The Power of Three director Douglas MacKinnon rather
11:01 diplomatically stated that "You could ask anyone on the cast or crew and they'll agree that his
11:06 participation was extraordinary." As the years have passed, some details have come out in various fan
11:12 circles that suggest this is code for "he was an absolute nightmare to work with." Allegedly,
11:18 he refused to act, delivered lines in bizarre ways, and threw numerous tantrums. The day's
11:23 shooting with Berkhoff was virtually unusable, and Chris Chibnall had to hastily rewrite dialogue
11:28 to work with what they could salvage. The Shukri was never originally intended to be a hologram,
11:33 but Berkhoff's stock-still performance necessitated such a rewrite. In an interview a few years later,
11:39 Berkhoff complained about being worked to death and spending the majority of his 15 hours in the
11:44 make-up chair. Perhaps by the time he'd been made up as the Shukri, he was ready to go home.
11:48 It's no excuse for unprofessional behaviour, though. The biggest laugh is that MacKinnon
11:52 had worked with Berkhoff before. One can only imagine how he'd have behaved with an unfamiliar
11:57 director. And that concludes our list of the most unusual demands made by Doctor Who guest stars.
12:03 If you can think of any others that weren't mentioned in this video, then comment them below.
12:07 And while you're there, like and subscribe, and tap that notification bell. Don't forget to head
12:11 over to Twitter to follow us there. I've been Ellie with WhoCulture, and in the words of River
12:16 Song herself, "Goodbye, sweeties."