Sladen, Elisabeth - Elisabeth Sladen - The Autobiography

* * *

The older you get, the more often you have to deal with loss. When my father died, on Boxing Day 1994 – aged 94 – I thought my world had collapsed. We’ve always been alone down here in London but at that moment I suddenly realised it was Brian, Sadie and me against the world.

The tragedy of being associated with such a long-running show is that, inevitably, people you worked with, people you loved, will die. Some, like Jon, will be quite old. Others, like John Nathan-Turner (who died in May 2002, aged 55) are taken much too soon. Tom Baker was hilarious at JNT’s memorial. It feels so unnatural attending the ceremony of a man as young as Nathan, but Gary, his partner, insisted his life should be celebrated. We were at St Paul’s, the actors’ church in Covent Garden. Tom gazed up at the heavens and said, ‘Sorry, John – it’s this St Paul’s’, which broke the ice. Then he brought the house down when he said: ‘What would John, looking down, be thinking now? Well, I can tell you …

‘He would be thinking, I would rather it were Tom up here than me! ’

Chapter Sixteen

That’s The Last I’ll Be Hearing From Them

I ENTERED THE restaurant thinking, I’m going to lose my agent over this!

I was in central London, at a very swish venue, and about to meet Russell T Davies and Phil Collinson. Russell, of course, was the creative head of the newly regenerated Doctor Who and Phil was the show’s producer. They’d asked my new agent, Roger Carey, if we could meet and I’d duly gone along with it. I wasn’t hopeful. Approaching my sixtieth birthday and thoroughly enjoying my retirement, my thoughts were so far away from Who you’d need a telescope to spot them.

Still, it’s always polite to attend these meetings and hear what people have to say. And a meal at an expensive restaurant with wonderful company is never to be sniffed at. The trick is not being afraid to turn offers down – which we, as actors, find notoriously hard to do. There’s always this fear: ‘What if nothing else comes along?’ I’d lived with the spectre of ‘what if’ most my life but that was all behind me now – being a full-time wife and mother was quite enough, thank you very much.

But I wasn’t daft. I knew Russell and Phil wouldn’t have called just for the sake of it. They were obviously planning to propose something – just as I was planning to turn it down. It wasn’t that I thought their new series with Chris Eccleston and Billie Piper didn’t look amazing – because it did; it was marvellous – but my time on Who was so precious to me that I wasn’t prepared to spoil it again for a cheap ratings-boosting, blink-and-you’ll-miss-me cameo. If Russell wanted someone from the ‘classic series’ to fill a few screen seconds then there would be no shortage of others who I was sure would leap at the chance.

And so, a little guilty that I was wasting my hosts’ time, I decided to just relax and enjoy my afternoon.

From the moment I sat down I knew I was in the company of two men who cared more about their programme than anything else in the world. They weren’t in it for the money or the ratings – although of course these would come – they truly, deeply sweated and bled Doctor Who . And not just Who . Towards me they were so warm and welcoming, and charming and funny, and … I could go on all day. It was a really unforgettable dinner. Russell will have anyone hooting with laughter in seconds, but he’s so sharp and serious as well.

Out of the blue he placed a script on the table and said, ‘We’d like you to do this story.’

* * *

It was back in 2003 that I began to hear things. Just rumours at first, idle gossip, really. At one time they were making another movie, then there was a programme about a new Time Lord. Each whisper was as fanciful as the next. Then, on 26 September 2003, the head of BBC1, Lorraine Heggessey, announced to the press one simple fact.

She was bringing back Doctor Who .

I remembered the ill-fated attempt to relaunch the show in 1997 with the lovely Paul McGann. I hope they treat it better this time , I thought, but my interest ended there. It had nothing to do with me – not as an actor or even as a fan.

‘Classic’ Who – as people started calling it – was still calling on my time, however. When I joined the show I’d just missed out on its tenth anniversary but I’d been involved in the twentieth and thirtieth celebrations. Even so, I was surprised to get an invite to the Houses of Parliament to celebrate Who ’s fortieth. It was quite a low-key affair. Peter Davison was the only Doctor present, but there was a big cake and K-9 put in an appearance as well. It never fails to astound me how wherever you go, fans appear. I was told MPs were leaving the Commons chamber just to come over and say ‘hello’, before darting back in to vote.

‘Hi, I’m Glasgow North! Any time you want a chat just pop up there.’ Bizarre.

As usual, I was upstaged by the bloody dog! All the MPs wanted to have a word with him. Ann Widdecombe, of all people, absolutely adored him. She came running over for a hug and a photo.

The biggest celebration for the fans, of course, was the news that Who was being given the kiss of life by the Corporation that had killed it off in the first place. Was I bothered?

Not in the slightest, actually.

Barry always said they could never bring it back, its time had passed, and I was inclined to agree with him. I hadn’t watched the programme before I joined and I’d barely seen more than a few minutes since I’d left. Doctor Who for me is the relationships I built up during those couple of years in the 1970s: Jon, Tom, Barry, Terry ( all the Terrys, in fact), Robert, Chris … everyone who made it such a special time. Maybe the show itself had run its course.

Television had moved on since we’d run around wobbly sets with Plasticine dinosaurs. I thought, If this show is to stand a chance it will need serious investment . You can’t skimp. Modern audiences won’t stand for it. In the end, you have to say it was backed to the hilt: the money is there to see on the screen.

As soon as I get home from an event such as the Parliament party, I become Mrs Miller. Elisabeth Sladen, star of TV’s Doctor Who , is hung up in the hallway with my coat – I’m not interested in carrying on that life unless I’m working. Even so, word from the new production occasionally filtered through; you had to be impressed with the calibre of personnel they were assembling. From what I was hearing, they had the imagination and the passion – and the budget. What impressed me most was they had the manners as well. Barry and Terry Dicks were both invited down to Cardiff by Russell T Davies. That just proves how much he cares – he’s as much of a fan as anyone. Barry hadn’t been there long when he signalled a big ‘thumbs-up’ to Russell (just as he had to hire me all those years ago). That would have meant everything to Russell.

There was such a buzz about the programme from people like Barry that I did find myself sitting down in March 2005 to watch Rose , the first episode. Five minutes later I was reaching for the ‘off’ button. Not that I didn’t like it – I was just too nervous on their behalf. I just thought, It’s their first night, they’re going to be pulling out all the stops, trying to tick so many boxes to prove it was the right thing to bring it back. I could almost feel their anxiety from Cardiff – I’ve been in that position. So I decided to wait a few episodes and tune in when they’d hit their stride. I’m actually glad I did. Chris Eccleston was tremendous, magnificently dark, and it was a shame he didn’t continue longer.