Life of a Creator
Contrary to established lore, Canadian Sydney Newman probably didn’t create Doctor Who as we know it—it was more the fluke result of a ‘creation by committee’ process—but he certainly was probably the driving force behind its creation. Today he’s the featured article on Wikipedia and it gives a great precise of Newman’s career at the CBC, where he was a pioneer at CBC television, in Britain at ITV and the BBC (where he helped devise The Avengers as well as Who) and then at the National Film Board of Canada (where his tenure was mired in controversy over working with Quebecois filmmakers—a really big deal in the NFB of the 1970s).
The Wikipedia piece links to a great bio of Newman on the Historicist blog. And, to make a brief plug, if you want to read about how Newman’s CBC work connected to his part in creating Doctor Who, my essay “Half Canadian On His Father’s Side” appears in the Mad Norwegian Press collection Time Unincorporated 2 (which was co-edited by Robert Smith? and some guy)...
Posted by Graeme on Monday, June 14 at 3:55 am
3 Comments...
cool post graeme, thanks!
Posted by Jimmy on 06/14 at 05:14 PM
One of the reference books out there, though, does indicate that Newman did attempt to obtain official creator credit during the 1980s, and it’s reported that the BBC tried to recruit him to help retool the series during that era as well. I agree it was “creation by committee” and Donald Wilson, CE Webber and Verity Lambert deserve much of the credit as well. Didn’t Newman come up with the idea of regeneration to replace Hartnell? If he did, his impact on the longevity of the show is truly profound. At one point during the CBC’s run of DW, there was some growing criticism about the network airing non-Canadian shows. I never saw DW mentioned by name, but had it ever become an issue, I’m sure a lot of people could have defended the show as semi-CanCon for the Newman connection. Same with The Avengers, which featured Patrick Macnee who did so much work here in the 1950s and later in his career as to be virtually an honorary Canadian!
Posted by Alex on 06/15 at 03:07 PM
The articles I link to actually quote those instances. I don’t deny Newman probably felt himself to be the creator of the show, and he probably contributed some of the most tangible elements, but the historical record is quite clear how many cooks were in the pot when it came to Doctor Who. And it’s rather funny and sad how his proposal for fixing Doctor Who is to make it like the program it hadn’t been since December 1963—a purely educational drama (though full points for wanting to bring back Patrick Troughton and then make the Doctor a woman).
I don’t think regeneration (or recasting the Doctor as a different, younger actor—it wasn’t called regeneration until 1974) was Newman’s idea. It was more down to producer Innes Lloyd and script editor Gerry Davis. Davis said in interviews he borrowed from Jekyll and Hyde for the concept and I think Lloyd was interested in making the Doctor a completely different type of hero—one only needs to see how he changed the Doctor’s character in Hartnell’s last 3 or 4 stories. That said, Newman did sign off on it and was vocal about Troughton’s costuming and portrayal.
Posted by Graeme on 06/15 at 03:25 PM
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