Escape line to Dr Who

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• Publication: The Age
• Date: 1978-09-22
• Author:
• Page: Green Guide, p. 6
• Language: English

Science fiction series audience keeps growing

ACCORDING to BBC records TV's redoubtable Dr. Who should be celebrating his 760th birthday this year.

The good doctor, space traveller extraordinary and galactic fixer has been monitored by the BBC for the past 15 years and by the ABC for 14 years to the delight of a steady, loyal following of young and not-so-young.

Last year the ABC recorded a 50 per cent, increase in the number of people switched on to Dr. Who, and this year the programme a mixture of first-run series and repeats looks like picking up more followers.

The signs are that this could be Dr. Who's big year on Australian television, a standard-setter for local producers being encouraged at last to make shows for older children.

After years of shunting from time slot to time slot by the ABC (for programming reasons only programmers can fathom) he appears set for a stay in the 6.30 pm weekday, the time he was originally introduced.

The science fiction series stands apart from any other attempted on television. It has grown on a mixture of imagination, magic, plausability in the face of Daleks, space monsters, time warps, and dimensions outside the march of science and technology.

Tom Baker is the fourth Dr. Who. Though the latest of a line of actors to play the part he is also the youngest, a mischievous, flamboyant character trailing a scarf which he uses to trip up his enemies.

The first Dr. Who was much older, pigheaded and irascible, but with an element of magic about him, said actor William Hartnell who played the part. for three years.

Dr. Who Mark II was Patrick Troughton. He turned up to continue the war against the Daleks wearing an extraordinary hat. Viewers will recall him as an arch, puckish kind of space hobo in baggy check trousers.

Dr. Who wore the Troughton mask until 1970, when the Time Lords arranged for the doctor to have a new face "to save him embarrassment when exiled to Earth". When viewers picked up the thread of the story again the doctor was unconscious outside the Tardis in the person of Jon Pertwee.

Pertwee imposed his own character transformation. "I didn't see Dr. Who as such a clown as a pixilated character

more as a folk hero. I suppose. He did not believe real-life space dramas. would affect the programme's appeal. and has been proved right. "If anything." he said. "they've made it more appealing. They've stimulated imaginations."

This week Dr. Who loses assistant Sarah Jane Smith. She has had enough of space travel and monsters. In a series, The Face of Evil (6.30 pm, starting Friday, September 26) he is joined by Leela, played by Louise Jameson, a girl he find during a trip back in time

Caption: Dr. Who (Tom Baker) and new assistant Leela (Louise Jameson).

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• APA 6th ed.: (1978-09-22). Escape line to Dr Who. The Age p. Green Guide, p. 6.
• MLA 7th ed.: "Escape line to Dr Who." The Age [add city] 1978-09-22, Green Guide, p. 6. Print.
• Chicago 15th ed.: "Escape line to Dr Who." The Age, edition, sec., 1978-09-22
• Turabian: "Escape line to Dr Who." The Age, 1978-09-22, section, Green Guide, p. 6 edition.
• Wikipedia (this article): <ref>{{cite news| title=Escape line to Dr Who | url=http://cuttingsarchive.org/index.php/Escape_line_to_Dr_Who | work=The Age | pages=Green Guide, p. 6 | date=1978-09-22 | via=Doctor Who Cuttings Archive | accessdate=18 May 2025 }}</ref>
• Wikipedia (this page): <ref>{{cite web | title=Escape line to Dr Who | url=http://cuttingsarchive.org/index.php/Escape_line_to_Dr_Who | work=Doctor Who Cuttings Archive | accessdate=18 May 2025}}</ref>