WEBVTT 00:00.000 --> 00:05.640 You're quite ready for this task. You think I can do it? Yes I do and you're 00:05.640 --> 00:12.000 the only man who can my boy. So Peter tell us about events that led up to becoming an actor. 00:12.000 --> 00:22.760 There was no event that led up to me becoming an actor. I was brought up in 00:22.760 --> 00:26.960 Blackpool. I went to see a lot of shows and I always wanted to do it. I always 00:26.960 --> 00:32.520 thought it was great. I used to do radio plays from behind the sofa and do all 00:32.520 --> 00:38.480 sorts of stuff when I was a little kid. And when I went to school, the first time 00:38.480 --> 00:45.000 we had a school play, I think I was nine, I was cast in the lead in The Pied Piper 00:45.000 --> 00:49.440 of Hamlin. I thought that was great. It's showing off isn't it. I just loved it. 00:49.440 --> 00:52.960 And the following year I was cast as Robin Hood in Robin Hood so you got the 00:52.960 --> 00:57.400 lead part twice. That was good going. And the third year, this was still in junior 00:57.400 --> 01:03.320 school, I played, I can't remember the name of the character, in Kidnapped, Alan 01:03.320 --> 01:11.040 Breck, which is the hero character in Robert Louis Stevenson's Kidnapped. So I'd 01:11.040 --> 01:17.600 always wanted to do it and I took part in whatever opportunity I had to act 01:17.600 --> 01:20.880 when I was in senior school. It was a boarding school. We used to do plays every 01:20.880 --> 01:25.440 year at Christmas just to entertain ourselves really. So I used to organise 01:25.440 --> 01:28.800 those and get involved in that right from the start, from the age of about 12, 01:28.800 --> 01:33.960 13, 14. And I always wanted to be an actor. That was my ambition. I was going to be 01:33.960 --> 01:42.160 an actor come what may. And having left school and failed to get into university 01:42.160 --> 01:46.480 because I really didn't do any work, certainly right really, but that wasn't 01:46.480 --> 01:51.880 where my interests lay. I went to Teachers College where I wasted two years 01:51.880 --> 01:55.760 running the Dramatic Society there and playing in my own band, we had a band 01:55.760 --> 02:03.160 called Group 5. There were four of us. And that was quite fun. And I did a lot of 02:03.160 --> 02:09.160 plays there, a lot of generally mucking about I guess, and enjoying it. And during 02:09.160 --> 02:14.000 the holidays I went to the local repertory company and auditioned and 02:14.000 --> 02:19.880 did a couple of plays in the summer break for the wonderful princely sum of 02:19.880 --> 02:26.280 five and a half quid for a week's work. It was good going. And then qualifying as a 02:26.280 --> 02:29.960 teacher I decided I'd get my qualifications just in case. So I taught 02:29.960 --> 02:37.800 for a year in London teaching maths, which was crazy, and then gave it up, just 02:37.800 --> 02:43.760 resigned and wore a lot of shoe leather out in London going seeing various agents, 02:43.760 --> 02:48.840 not getting anywhere. Finally got a telegram, you remember telegrams? Finally 02:48.840 --> 02:52.920 got a telegram from the theatre in Barrow-in-Furness where I'd done my 02:52.920 --> 02:58.520 summer plays saying look if you're serious about this there's a job for you 02:58.520 --> 03:03.640 here, you can come up and be an actor. So I did and I went and did weekly rep for 03:03.640 --> 03:09.440 two years, did 96 plays in two years, learnt my trade really, and that's how it all began. 03:09.440 --> 03:14.320 Can you remember what your first television appearance was? First television appearance 03:14.320 --> 03:20.240 was Z Cars, episode of Z Cars. I played the bus conductor who gave some very 03:20.240 --> 03:26.640 valuable evidence to the police. Z Cars, that was live, that was quite exciting, 03:26.640 --> 03:33.560 first television was live. Have you got any specific memories of Z Cars or your early 03:33.560 --> 03:39.480 days in television? I don't have any particular memories of Z Cars, it was a 03:39.480 --> 03:43.720 simple episode, did that, did an episode of Softly Softly at one point, did there 03:43.720 --> 03:48.920 were various other things that I did, all the things that jobbing actors did, 03:48.920 --> 03:52.560 all the serials that were on at the time like Red Cap, Court Martial, The Saint, 03:52.560 --> 03:58.480 Gideon's Way, World of Wooster, played little parts in all those, nothing very 03:58.480 --> 04:03.640 significant. And then I went and saw a director called Alvin Rakoff who was 04:03.640 --> 04:09.160 married at that time to Jacqueline Hill, who of course was one of the original 04:09.160 --> 04:17.080 cast of Doctor Who, and he cast me as a beach photographer in Blackpool in a 04:17.080 --> 04:22.400 play, they used to do a show called Armchair Theatre on Sunday nights on ITV, 04:22.400 --> 04:27.120 became Thames, but it wasn't Thames now, I think it was ATV, anyway, doesn't really 04:27.120 --> 04:32.600 matter. Armchair Theatre was the title of the, the overall, the umbrella title, and 04:32.600 --> 04:36.240 this show was called The Girl in the Picture, I played the lead in that, and my 04:36.240 --> 04:40.280 co-star in that was Nicola Padgett, and for both of us it was our first 04:40.280 --> 04:46.080 television roles, first proper television roles, leading parts, and I absolutely 04:46.080 --> 04:51.840 loved that, we filmed in Blackpool and we did this in the studio, what became 04:51.840 --> 04:58.680 the Thames studios at Twickenham, and yeah, it was great, suddenly I was a 04:58.680 --> 05:02.880 proper actor. Of course you don't get these, you do these jobs and no one sees 05:02.880 --> 05:07.360 them for a while, because they don't go out the following week, they go out weeks 05:07.360 --> 05:12.880 later, and so no one had seen it, so I didn't get any other work out of that. 05:12.880 --> 05:17.680 It so happened that I did get another job within a month, which was playing the 05:17.680 --> 05:22.280 lead in a part, in a show called The Villains for Granada, up in Manchester, 05:22.280 --> 05:27.480 and that was another leading part with a great actor called Mike Pratt, who played 05:27.480 --> 05:33.200 my brother in that, Mike Pratt did Randall and Hotkirk Deceased, as I'm sure 05:33.200 --> 05:39.000 you know, and that was a great experience, I mean good actors around me, and 05:39.000 --> 05:43.640 suddenly I was being a proper television actor, so two leads played, and 05:43.640 --> 05:48.200 then desperately broke, tried to get a part in Doctor Who with Richard Martin, 05:48.200 --> 05:53.920 casting for the Monoptera and whatever the other things were called, in a serial, 05:53.920 --> 05:57.400 and he wouldn't cast me, because it so happened that the day before I went to 05:57.400 --> 06:03.160 see him, he saw the girl in the picture, and said, no, he said, I'm sorry, you're 06:03.160 --> 06:06.720 far better actor than this, these are easy, there's nothing to play in these 06:06.720 --> 06:09.320 parts, so I don't want to cast you in this, he said, but I promise I'll cast you 06:09.320 --> 06:14.280 in something in the future, when I'm casting proper actors in acting parts, 06:14.280 --> 06:18.040 you know, which was nice to think he thought I was a proper actor at least, 06:18.040 --> 06:22.640 and I took it with a pinch of salt, I didn't think anything would come of it, 06:22.640 --> 06:29.000 but a couple of months later he was doing The Chase, and he needed someone to 06:29.000 --> 06:32.800 play Morton Dill, this hillbilly in New York, I didn't even have to read for it, 06:32.800 --> 06:38.000 he said, would I like to play it, I said, yes please, of course I would, and so I did 06:38.000 --> 06:43.520 that, and well, the rest is history, they called me into the pub afterwards and 06:43.520 --> 06:46.600 asked me if I'd like to take over from Bill Russell and Jackie Hill, because 06:46.600 --> 06:49.560 they liked my performance, I mean the character Stephen was nothing like 06:49.560 --> 06:54.800 Morton Dill, but they saw something in me that said I could play this part, so I 06:54.800 --> 07:01.040 was both flattered and excited, and they obviously accepted it, and played Stephen 07:01.040 --> 07:03.760 Taylor for a year. 07:03.760 --> 07:13.680 I like Bill, I got on with him very well, I mean I knew he could be awkward, and I 07:13.680 --> 07:16.840 watched him be awkward with people, he was never awkward with me, he was 07:16.840 --> 07:21.800 always helpful with me, he was very kind, very generous, he used to take me out 07:21.800 --> 07:24.920 for lunch at least once a week, he'd go across the road from the rehearsal room 07:24.920 --> 07:28.280 at Shepherd's Bush, there used to be a Bertarelli's restaurant on the Green, he'd take me 07:28.280 --> 07:33.040 over there, and he sort of got me into eating raw steak, and I think that's 07:33.040 --> 07:38.640 probably where he gets his gritty earthiness from, but he said, 07:38.640 --> 07:43.480 rare steak, I used to have them cremated, you know, and I got into eating it 07:43.480 --> 07:47.760 properly, and wonderful, and so I will always remember Billy for that. 07:47.760 --> 07:53.640 Well he was very good fun, he could be totally irascible, he could be 07:53.640 --> 07:57.320 really nasty to people, he could be a bully, he could be all of those things, 07:57.320 --> 08:03.400 and he was all those things, but not in my personal experience, I was never at 08:03.400 --> 08:07.880 the receiving end of anything unpleasant from Bill, he was always very kind, very 08:07.880 --> 08:11.360 generous, and he became a good friend of my wife and I, my first wife, 08:11.360 --> 08:16.680 and I would go and have a curry with him in Ealing, or he 08:16.680 --> 08:23.240 would come over to our flat in Gloucester Road, and he would have a meal 08:23.240 --> 08:28.120 with us, so he was sociable and friendly and nice, though in spite of that I 08:28.120 --> 08:29.120 didn't really know him. 08:29.120 --> 08:33.960 When was the last time you saw your fellow travelling companions, 08:33.960 --> 08:37.480 and all we know Brian and Jackie Lane? 08:37.480 --> 08:42.960 Neither of them have I seen in years. 08:42.960 --> 08:50.680 I don't think I've seen Jackie in 30 years, and I hadn't seen 08:50.680 --> 08:57.400 Maureen in a long, long time, we never socialised afterwards, we did for a 08:57.400 --> 09:04.240 very short time, but it didn't last, I don't know why, but I mean I've 09:04.240 --> 09:07.560 followed Maureen's career and I've seen her do some wonderful things, and of 09:07.560 --> 09:12.880 course she's a very good writer now, and successful, but no I haven't seen 09:12.880 --> 09:15.720 her, I'd like to see her again, nice lady. 09:15.720 --> 09:21.000 Your particular era of Doctor Who has now become a bit of a golden age, did 09:21.000 --> 09:23.600 you consider it to be that at the time? 09:23.600 --> 09:29.320 Well it was, the whole thing about Doctor Who was, it was a very popular 09:29.320 --> 09:33.280 serial, I mean we were getting 8.5 million viewers, which ain't bad, though 09:33.280 --> 09:35.840 that was at the time when there were only two channels, but it was Saturday 09:35.840 --> 09:40.240 night, and Saturday night was not television watching time, people didn't 09:40.240 --> 09:43.760 watch, certainly not early on Saturday night, I didn't watch, I never saw 09:43.760 --> 09:47.840 any of these shows, and you couldn't record them, so if you missed them, you 09:47.840 --> 09:51.920 missed them, I never saw them, I was out, or I might be opening a Fate or 09:51.920 --> 09:56.200 whatever, you know, because you had all the spin-offs that go with the 09:56.200 --> 09:59.680 success of the series, so they bounced off on you a little bit, or I'd be 09:59.680 --> 10:04.200 playing cricket, or what, in the summer, you didn't get a chance necessarily to 10:04.200 --> 10:08.920 see them, I never saw most of these shows, but I could appreciate that it was 10:08.920 --> 10:14.600 popular, and as I say, we used to have regular audiences of 8.5 and more. 10:14.600 --> 10:20.440 Certainly for the more sci-fi ones, the audiences were bigger, apparently, and I 10:20.440 --> 10:27.800 didn't know this until very recently, Verity Lambert was saying that the 10:27.800 --> 10:32.120 audiences were always better for the science fiction ones than for the 10:32.120 --> 10:35.680 historical ones, and I find that sad, because I thought the historic ones 10:35.680 --> 10:40.840 were by far the best scripts, were by far the most imaginative, clever, and better 10:40.840 --> 10:45.720 characters to play, it was a better piece, it didn't draw the audiences in the 10:45.720 --> 10:50.200 same way, it was something like 2 million more would watch the sci-fi ones rather 10:50.200 --> 10:51.200 than the historic ones. 10:51.200 --> 10:56.200 So the stories on Massacre and Myth-Maker is your personal favourite? 10:56.200 --> 11:02.080 Yeah, definitely. I think, I mean the Time Meddler was great fun, but that was a 11:02.080 --> 11:07.520 combination of the two, that was sci-fi and the Viking invasion in Tempest in 11:07.520 --> 11:14.040 66. I mean, how do you do a Viking invasion with six actors? Anyway, they did, 11:14.040 --> 11:17.720 they did get a long shot of the boat, and there's people rowing there, that looked 11:17.720 --> 11:22.440 like a big crowd, must have been a very expensive shot that one. 11:22.440 --> 11:32.000 Yes, the Myth-Makers, the Massacre definitely, they were, I think, my favourites. 11:32.000 --> 11:40.640 So I loved the Celestial Toymaker, and in retrospect, I now like the Gunfighters. 11:40.640 --> 11:44.920 I think the Gunfighters has quite a lot going for it, I didn't enjoy doing it. 11:44.920 --> 11:50.880 I'm not sure whether it was, I don't think Rex Tucker, the director, liked me, 11:50.880 --> 11:53.800 I don't think he thought I was any good, I also thought, got the feeling that he 11:53.800 --> 11:57.800 felt it was beneath him to be directing a Doctor Who, I don't know, I might be 11:57.800 --> 12:02.280 making that up, but that was just the feeling that I got. But I don't think 12:02.280 --> 12:06.920 Bill liked him at all, and probably it was mutual, and I think it rubbed off. 12:06.920 --> 12:10.520 So it wasn't a very happy experience, and I always got the feeling that Rex had a 12:10.520 --> 12:17.600 lot of time for the actors he brought in to play the gang, and much less to do 12:17.600 --> 12:22.080 with us, the regulars, he hadn't cast us, he was stuck with us, and he didn't 12:22.080 --> 12:28.560 like us much. And that I found rather sad. I could be absolutely wrong, I could be 12:28.560 --> 12:32.080 100% wrong with that, but that was the feeling I got. 12:32.080 --> 12:37.080 So if there had been a sequel to The Savages, would you have been up for that? 12:37.080 --> 12:41.480 If there had been a sequel to The Savages, I would love to have done that, I think it 12:41.480 --> 12:46.120 would have been, I think it's almost required, there ought to be a 12:46.120 --> 12:50.520 sequel to The Savages, it's an unfinished story. We don't know really what happened 12:50.520 --> 12:55.360 when they left, but of course when I was in Doctor Who, that year that I did, and 12:55.360 --> 12:59.680 the next year, and possibly a little longer than that, the TARDIS was always 12:59.680 --> 13:04.280 broken. He couldn't control where he went, the doctor didn't know how to control 13:04.280 --> 13:08.400 the darn thing. I mean he was either feckless, or the machine was 13:08.400 --> 13:14.400 broken, and that was never spelt out. But he couldn't actually control it. So it 13:14.400 --> 13:19.080 ended up wherever it ended up. He had no idea where he was going. Now you have 13:19.080 --> 13:23.000 this in the modern series, which I've got to say I think is updated wonderfully, 13:23.000 --> 13:27.080 I mean it's very clever, but they are in control of it, they can go wherever they 13:27.080 --> 13:30.880 like. I thought one of the great things about it was you never knew, so you look 13:30.880 --> 13:34.960 on the screen, where are we now? Wow, what's this? What's the atmosphere like? 13:34.960 --> 13:39.160 We got, yeah fine, we can live here. And then the story develops and we find new 13:39.160 --> 13:44.080 extraordinary things. That was really, I thought, really clever. And I think it's 13:44.080 --> 13:47.960 rather sad that that's lost. I thought that was one of the absolute bonuses. But 13:47.960 --> 13:52.680 as they can control it, they could come back and find me, couldn't they? 13:53.600 --> 14:01.800 Oh, no money! I'll get it. You said that, Wack. Give me time. You've had time. 14:01.800 --> 14:08.600 40 quid, Wack. What about it? I'll get it. I know how to get it, but just give us a 14:08.600 --> 14:13.960 couple of hours. You did not bet, Wack. Not with us. You were a loser. 14:13.960 --> 14:19.280 Oh, wait a minute. What's your idea? I'll get it. I'll get you the money. I know that. 14:19.280 --> 14:26.680 It's ten. You've got till twelve. We'll be at Knockers. Oh, and just in case you're 14:26.680 --> 14:31.600 not there with the money, Pinter, show me your name. 14:33.880 --> 14:38.560 Make sure your look changes this time. I wasn't getting a great deal of acting 14:38.560 --> 14:43.640 work. I'd done episodes of Zed Cars again and directors had used me, people like 14:43.640 --> 14:47.760 Jerry Blake had used me on a serial that he did called The Girl in the Black 14:47.760 --> 14:52.120 Bikini, I think it was called. And I'd done a few colour tests for various 14:52.120 --> 14:56.920 directors, Dougie Canfield's one, Jerry Blake was another. But I wasn't getting a 14:56.920 --> 15:02.680 mass of work. And I was more or less on the point of thinking, well, I've got to 15:02.680 --> 15:07.720 do something to earn the living because I'm just getting nowhere with this. I'm 15:07.720 --> 15:11.440 waiting for the phone to ring, waiting for agents to call you and agents losing 15:11.440 --> 15:14.960 confidence and sort of saying, well, you know, I should try another agent. All 15:14.960 --> 15:19.760 that stuff went on, you know. Oh my God. They said life was hard as an actor and 15:19.760 --> 15:25.200 it is. And it's getting harder by the minute. Should I be doing this? I never 15:25.200 --> 15:32.200 really lost faith in the business but you get near to it. And out of the blue, 15:32.200 --> 15:39.360 I got invited to go and audition for Blue Peter. Totally different. So when I 15:39.360 --> 15:44.800 was offered the job, which was after three auditions, I wasn't a hundred 15:44.800 --> 15:48.960 percent certain I should take it because it was a big change of what I, you know, 15:48.960 --> 15:56.280 this isn't what I do. I'm an actor. I'm an actor, dear boy. So, yeah, I wasn't sure 15:56.280 --> 16:00.920 whether to accept it. In the end, I did accept it and I thought I was accepting 16:00.920 --> 16:07.240 it for six months. And I stayed there ten and a half years. The funny thing is, if I 16:07.240 --> 16:13.880 stop to think about the films that we made on the programme, I can 16:13.880 --> 16:17.760 remember them pretty well. As long as my mind, my memory's triggered, you know, we 16:17.760 --> 16:22.920 did say, oh yeah, I remember. And then the memory runs, it cuts in and I can 16:22.920 --> 16:28.800 remember them. And I can remember them in quite a lot of detail. I can't 16:28.800 --> 16:33.800 remember anything, hardly anything we did in the studio. Things that we did on a 16:33.800 --> 16:40.120 recurring basis, like we'd have dogs in, like a new litter of guide dog puppies 16:40.120 --> 16:45.280 is born. And we have them in the studio and see how you select a puppy and so on. Or 16:45.280 --> 16:49.400 the Christmas appeals. I mean, I remember those sort of things because we did them 16:49.400 --> 16:56.320 on a regular basis, you know, burying the tortoise and all that sort of stuff. But 16:56.320 --> 17:04.200 items, nothing. Again, it was a film. I can remember some items we had in the 17:04.200 --> 17:07.720 studio because they related to the film that went before. Like I remember 17:07.720 --> 17:12.960 riding into the studio as part of a pyramid on five motorbikes with the 17:12.960 --> 17:16.600 Royal Signals. But I'd made a film with the Royal Signals, learning how to 17:16.600 --> 17:23.240 be a trials rider. I was abysmal, I fell off a lot. But those sort of things, yes, I 17:23.240 --> 17:27.480 can remember. But for the most part, I can't remember details of things that we 17:27.480 --> 17:29.320 did in the studio at all. 17:29.320 --> 17:33.120 So you famously interviewed John Pertwee in the home of it all? 17:33.120 --> 17:36.520 I think I interviewed him more than once actually. Yes, he came in the studio. But I knew John 17:36.520 --> 17:42.640 quite well. I'd enjoyed John's company in, he had a lovely villa in Ibiza. A very 17:42.640 --> 17:46.280 nice swimming pool. And we made a couple of films for his son, for Sean, 17:46.280 --> 17:52.320 you know. I can remember him throwing me and my wife off the roof of the 17:52.320 --> 17:57.120 place into the swimming pool. We didn't see the swimming pool in the film, we were 17:57.120 --> 18:02.640 just thrown off the roof, which looked pretty good. But yeah, I spent time 18:02.640 --> 18:08.240 with John most summers for about five years and became reasonably good friends. 18:08.240 --> 18:12.840 You know, we'd be invited to his house in Barnes. Funnily enough, I recently met 18:12.840 --> 18:17.840 his wife Ingeborg. She turned out to be a friend of friends who were at the 18:17.840 --> 18:21.800 same dinner party that I went to one evening in Suffolk, which was a surprise. 18:21.800 --> 18:27.800 Nice to see her again. But yeah, yes, I interviewed John on Blue Peter and that 18:27.800 --> 18:32.240 was nice to do. I liked John, but I didn't like him as Dr. Who. That never cut it 18:32.240 --> 18:36.480 for me. Never. I thought it was ridiculous. That was not Billy Arnold, you know. 18:36.480 --> 18:40.400 I mean, it's just so far removed. And it's interesting that I never really took to 18:40.400 --> 18:44.560 Patrick as being Dr. Who. Again, I liked Patrick very much, although he was a lovely man too. 18:44.560 --> 18:51.440 But he was quite, in a way, he was quite close to what Bill had been. There was a 18:51.440 --> 18:58.000 similarity about them as people, you know, just age. There was something that made... 18:58.000 --> 19:03.720 It wasn't a massive move from Dr. Who Bill Hartnell to Dr. Who Pat Troughton. 19:03.720 --> 19:08.160 It was a huge move from Pat Troughton to John Pertwee and so on and so on. 19:08.160 --> 19:12.920 They went on and on. And one could accept those moves more, but for me, Bill was so 19:12.920 --> 19:18.680 definitively Dr. Who, I never really accepted anybody else as being him. 19:18.680 --> 19:25.640 I think of all the doctors that followed, Sylvester McCoy was the most like Billy Hartnell. 19:25.640 --> 19:32.240 Not that I'm saying he was the best actor, but he was just... he had that same sort of 19:32.240 --> 19:38.160 quirky edge that Bill had. Interesting. But it's all a matter of opinion. And I mean, 19:38.160 --> 19:42.680 people who never saw Billy Hartnell, if they didn't watch Dr. Who right at the start, then 19:42.680 --> 19:47.440 why would they think that was the doctor? You know, there are far more interesting or 19:47.440 --> 19:52.840 more elaborate performances later on. I think Christopher Eccleston was fantastic. I think 19:52.840 --> 19:59.880 David... what's his name? It's great. It can always move on. But for me, no, Billy Hartnell's 19:59.880 --> 20:18.880 the man.