Doctor Who: The Smugglers (TV Soundtrack) (BBC Radio Collection)

Über die Autorin bzw. den Autor

THE PROGRAMME: The Smugglers is a self-contained historical tale, the like of which was rapidly becoming extinct in Doctor Who in 1966. With Innes Lloyd now at the helm as series producer, the programme's direction was increasingly characterised by monsters and science fiction settings. Where stories set in Earth's past did occur, the original production team's brief - to include a strong, educational history element - had been distilled into a more basic requirement: to entertain first and foremost, with a 'rattling good yarn' being set against an often semi-authentic background. In this capacity, director Brian Hayles' second script for the programme (he had earlier penned The Celestial Toymakers) succeeds admirably. Location filming for the story took place on the southern coast of Cornwall, a surprisingly far-flung place for Doctor Who in those days, during one week in June 1966. Nanjizal Bay played host to the TARDIS's arrival, while exterior scenes aboard the Black Albatross were filmed on a suitably re-dressed fishing vessel just off Newlyn. Other scenes were recorded in the vicinity of Helston and Trethewey. One exterior location which wasn't filmed in Cornwall, that of the graveyard, was actually created along with the story's interior scenes, when recording continued in July at the BBC's Riverside studios in London. Episode One's extended opening theme tune played over a visual recap from the end of the previous season's The War Machines (showing the TARDIS' departure from Fitzroy Square). The serial name and writing credits were then superimposed over the swirls of the title sequence - which in this case appeared on the Ship's interior scanner screen. As the first serial of Doctor Who's first season, The Smugglers is itself an oasis of calm in the midst of great change for the programme. For the two new travellers who boarded the TARDIS at the end of The War Machines (hence their state of bewilderment at the start of this story), this bout of Cornish excitement would still leave them ill-prepared for the ensuing events of The Tenth Planet; for 'at the coldest place in the world' their beloved Doctor, which they and the audience had always known, would vanish - apparently for ever.