Monday 13 November 2017

C is for... Collector


A diminutive, bald headed man who governed the planet Pluto in the far distant future. He was confined to an electronic wheelchair. Based in Megropolis One, he represented a business concern known simply as the Company which had paid for the human race to move to the planet. Everyone was heavily taxed on every aspect of their life - and death. The Collector employed an official called a Gatherer in each of Pluto's Megropoleis to oversee tax collection. He was protected by his own personal guard - the Internal Retinue - and the population was kept in check through the distribution of an anxiety-inducing gas throughout the city.
The Collector could be quite sadistic, enjoying personally overseeing executions. The Doctor joined a rebel group who were opposed to the Collector's tyranny. A revolution began, and the Doctor broke into the Collector's inner sanctum and reprogrammed his computer with a growth tax to create massive losses. The Collector could not cope with this and reverted to his natural form - a small green plant-form akin to seaweed. He was really an alien Usurian - his humanoid shape having been an illusion maintained by the chair he always travelled in. The Doctor sealed him in the base of the chair.

Played by: Henry Woolf. Appearances: The Sunmakers (1977).

  • Woolf was one of the Transylvanians performing the 'Time Warp' in the Rocky Horror Picture Show. A close friend of Harold Pinter, the playwright dedicated one of his works to Woolf. He moved to Canada in 1978, and helped found a Shakespeare festival, which he chaired until 1997 when he retired, though he has acted a little since.
  • The Collector's bushy eyebrows were a reference to then Chancellor of the Exchequer Denis Healey.

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