Synopsis:
The Pilot, leader of a human colony on an alien world, is enjoying a Drum Majorette display choreographed by a colonist named Barney when he spots his security chief, Ola, pursuing a young man. This is Medok, who had been on his way for treatment when he broke free.
He manages to get outside the colony complex where he sees a strange blue wooden box appear out of nowhere.
The Doctor's companions emerge from the TARDIS. All are wary, with Jamie arming himself with a sturdy stick after having witnessed the savage-looking claw on the time scanner.
The Doctor points out that the creature they glimpsed was large, so they will easily see it approaching a long way off.
Seeing that he seems to be carrying a weapon, Medok lunges at Jamie. Ben instinctively steps in and wrestles the fugitive to the ground where he is seized by the pursuing guards. Ola questions how the strangers came to be in the vicinity of the colony, then invites them to come and meet the Pilot who will want to thank them in person for helping to capture Medok.
The Doctor is concerned that Medok isn't a criminal, but someone who it is claimed is in need of "treatment".
At the colony, they notice muzak and jingles playing, along with frequent encouraging announcements, which appear to help regulate the day for the colonists. They are invited to attend the Refreshing Department, presided over by Barney, which includes make-overs, sun-bathing and other beauty treatments. The Doctor uses a machine which tidies up his appearance - so then uses a rough-and-tumble machine to get back to the way he looked in the first place.
The Pilot appears to have an unseen superior known as the Controller, whose still photograph appears on screens as announcements are made.
Elsewhere, Ola is escorting Medok to the security centre. A friend named Questa urges him not to resist the help he is being offered. He tries to warn everyone that there are creatures which infiltrate the colony at night.
The Doctor is observing nearby. After everyone has gone he breaks into the centre and frees Medok in order to speak to him - asking for more information about the creatures he has seen.
The captive runs off and the Doctor is arrested by Ola, accused of freeing the prisoner. They should all be sent to the mines. Polly argues that they are unfamiliar with their laws, and it was the Doctor who captured Medok in the first place. The Pilot agrees, and suggests that they should visit the colony's Labour Centre to learn more about their society.
On their way there, the Doctor spots Medok hiding in a building under construction on the edge of the main colony complex.
At the Labour Centre, the travellers meet a man named Alvis who is a shift leader. He explains that the colony mines and refines a gas which is vital to their survival. It is dangerous work, but everyone in the colony is willing to work hard.
The Doctor sneaks away and goes to find Medok at the building site, having him tell him more about the creatures he sees at night. He claims they have claws and crawl around on multiple legs like giant insects.
His companions are searching for them when Ola announces that it is time for the night-time curfew, and they must report to guest quarters. The Doctor reappears and goes with them. Ola warns them that anyone caught outside after curfew can be shot on sight.
However, the Doctor then later sneaks out again after everyone has gone to bed, intending to rejoin Medok and witness the creatures for himself.
Ola is still searching with his men, and they find that they will have to leave their hiding place as they approach.
They are about to slip into another empty building when they see a dark shape moving towards them through the gloom - a huge crab-like creature with glowing eyes...
Written by Ian Stuart Black
Recorded: Saturday 4th March 1967 - Lime Grove Studio D
First broadcast: 5:50pm, Saturday 11th March 1967
Ratings: 8 million / AI 50
Designer: Kenneth Sharp
Director: John Davies
Guest cast: Peter Jeffrey (Pilot), Gertan Klauber (Ola), Terence Lodge (Medok), Graham Armitage (Barney), Ian Fairbairn (Questa), Alvis (Anthony Gardner), Drum Majorette (Maureen Lane), Chicki (Sandra Bryant), Graham Leaman (Controller), Denis Goacher (Voice of Control), Richard Beale (Broadcast Voice), Robert Jewell (Macra Operator).
Ian Stuart Black had contributed two scripts for the latter part of William Hartnell's third season as the Doctor - The Savages and The War Machines, the latter based on an idea from Kit Pedler.
Black had moved on to other projects, including Adam Adamant Lives!, which had for its hero a Victorian adventurer displaced through time to the present day. Story editor Gerry Davis approached him to contribute a further four part story for Doctor Who.
Davis brought the idea of a seemingly happy and idyllic setting - such as a holiday camp - harbouring a dark secret, with sinister things going on in the background. There were thought of some subterranean creatures which only emerged at night - like the Morlocks in HG Wells' The Time Machine.
Seeking a monster to place in this story, Davis referred to a noticeboard he had set up in the production office. This held brief synopses of every story broadcast to date, with an accompanying photograph. This had been initiated by Davis to ensure there was no repetition of story ideas or concepts.
They noticed that spiders had never been used in the series.
Black commenced his first draft of what was then known as "Dr Who and the Spidermen", emphasising that the monsters needed a gas to survive which was toxic to humans.
The story was originally scheduled to take place third in the new Doctor's run, immediately following William Emms' "The Imps".
Director John Davies had worked for Innes Lloyd before, whilst designer Ken Sharp had spent the last six months working on children's variety show Crackerjack!.
The story title was briefly amended to "Dr Who and the Insect-Men", then became "Dr Who and the Macras".
This came about because Davis had gone off the idea of basing a story around spiders, having seen the Zarbi in The Web Planet. It was decided now that the monsters should be based on crabs. Sharp and Davies visited the Natural History Museum in London where they studied a number of crabs through a microscope. The name chosen for the new monsters derived from macrocheira kaempferi - the Japanese spider crab which can measure up to 12 feet.
The construction of the Macra prop was, as usual, farmed out to Shawcraft Models of Uxbridge.
The change from spider-based creatures to crab-like ones resulted in scripting discrepancies, as some pieces of dialogue in the finished episodes still referred to insects.
BBC Enterprise's synopsis of the story referred to the creatures as "Macras", "crab-like Macra-Men" and "insect men" at different points.
Lloyd had decided that the series should have a new title sequence, which he had hoped would be introduced during Troughton's first story, The Power of the Daleks. Plans were made with graphics designer Bernard Lodge and engineer Ben Palmer to film this on 26th November at Riverside Studios, as part of the recording of the Dalek story's final instalment.
The session finally took place in Television Centre's Studio 2 on Friday 9th December.
The new titles would include the Doctor's features for the first time. This had been attempted back in August 1963 but experiments using a live image of technician Tony Halfpenny fed into the howlround mix were deemed too scary to use by Verity Lambert - the face taking on a demonic appearance.
Lodge would use a photograph of Troughton's face, lit from the top, as a basis for the new graphics. Roughened polystyrene would be used for the mix from image to image. The text font was changed to Times New Roman.
It had been intended that a new arrangement of Ron Grainer's theme music would accompany the new titles, but this was deferred until the following story.
During the second week of January 1967, Lloyd took a holiday and assistant story editor Peter Bryant was placed temporarily in charge of the series. Costume designer Sandra Reid was still in hospital and was now replaced by Vanessa Clarke, after Daphne Dare had covered the previous few episodes.
Composer Dudley Simpson worked closely with Brian Hodgson of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop on the music cues for the story, creating 11 minutes of highly distinctive music for the story.
Delia Derbyshire created the Chromophone Band track, which tops and tails the story.
Some of the muzak heard in this story had been featured previously in the science fiction anthology series Out of the Unknown.
Filming on The Macra Terror got underway on Wednesday 15th February with scenes of Terence Lodge being pursued across a wasteland by Klauber's Ola and some guards, who included John Caesar. He had played a Monoid in The Ark. Lodge was cast as Davies had employed him previously. Danny Rae, playing another guard, sprained his ankle running over the rough ground. A handheld 16mm camera was employed as well as the fixed 35mm one. The regular cast were not required, their scenes being reserved for the TV studio. The TARDIS prop was taken on location and seen to materialise. It had been intended that its departure in the fourth episode would be filmed at the same time, but this idea was dropped.
It was so cold that the budget included a bottle of brandy to warn cast and crew up.
The location was the Associated Portland Cement Manufacturers Ltd quarry near Dunstable.
For many, many years, Doctor Who Magazine persisted with the claim that the footage of Patrick Troughton, viewed by the Time Lords in the first episode of The Three Doctors, came from this story.
Friday 17th saw Graham Leaman photographed at Ealing for his stern Big Brother-like appearance as the Controller, shortly before filming his scenes as the older, unkempt character for later in the serial.
On the same day Davies filmed the detached Macra claw, to be seen on the TARDIS Time Scanner at the conclusion of The Moonbase.
On Monday 27th February publicity photos were taken of guest stars Peter Jeffrey and Klauber in costume as the Pilot and Ola. This was earlier than usual in the production process, but Radio Times argued that with only a one week gap between recording and broadcast the publication could no longer wait for the camera rehearsals, on the day of recording, when publicity shots were usually taken.
Rehearsals began the following day, with John Davies complaining about the catering facilities at St Helen's Church Hall, North Kensington. The situation would deteriorate further...
Frazer Hines missed the last day of rehearsals to do some filming at Gatwick Airport for the following story.
Recording got underway at Lime Grove on Saturday 4th March with the new title sequence. This was supposed to be followed by the opening credits playing over shots of the Drum Majorette band, but this was changed at the last minute to a close-up of Medok's face.
Both the Refreshing Department and Labour Centre sets featured large back projection screens on which could be shown photographs of Leaman as the Controller.
The TARDIS was set up on a cliff-face beside the entrance gateway to the colony (pictured above).
The first break came after the Refreshing Department sequence, to allow the regulars to change out of the costumes they had been wearing. Anneke Wills donned a wig to give Polly much shorter hair, whilst Hines and Craze wore tunics with shorts. Troughton briefly donned a smartened up version of his costume.
The second break allowed Klauber to move from the security section set, and the final one was scheduled following the Doctor's first visit to Medok in the empty building which is under construction.
Closing captions ran over a shot of the Macra prop, recorded in darkness and surrounded by dry ice.
We'll save our look at the Macra itself until next time.
Inspirations for Black's story, other than those originally offered by Gerry Davis, might include the Patrick McGoohan spy series Danger Man, which the writer contributed to. It has been theorised that the main character - Drake - is the person who later becomes The Prisoner when he tries to resign from his role. Black was involved with the cult classic as well. The latter's Village is a holiday camp-style setting which harbours dark secrets, being a type of prison in which people are brainwashed amongst other things. One episode of Danger Man featured a holiday camp which turned out to be a mock-up behind the Iron Curtain, designed to train Soviet agents.
The mind control aspects of The Macra Terror we will also come back to.
For such bleak subjects, there's a considerable amount of humour in this opening episode - mainly involving the discomfort felt by the Doctor and his companions as the colonists attempt to involve them in their enforced jollity.
Sadly, the producers of the animated episodes elected to remove entirely the Refreshing Department sequence. It might not add to the overall storyline, but it is illustrative of this society's need for everyone to conform, with seemingly innocent, fun activities actually masking an invidious mental conditioning process.
The sequence also has some lovely character moments for the regulars - the last time we will really see them as a group of friends who travel together, though that wouldn't have been known at the time.
There are some humorous exchanges in these scenes:
Ben (looking at the Doctor's 'refreshed' shoes): "Oh they're fantastic! You can see your face in them".
The Doctor: "Precisely. Who wants to see their face in a pair of suede shoes?".
And earlier:
Jamie: "Hey mister, would you call the ladies off. I'm frightened what they might do to me".
Barney: "Oh but you look charming, sir. Charming".
Jamie: "That's what I'm frightened of".
- The ratings remain healthy, despite the minimal publicity. As you can see below, publicity images concentrated on a couple of men in uniforms - visually uninteresting - and there was no trailer made for this story. The new monster was hardly promoted at all, with only a couple of newspapers running the single photograph of the prop.
- The day before broadcast, Junior Points of View showed mostly negative views about the programme, though one young fan thought that the story editor should be replaced, or forced to write better material for such a good actor. The show as also described as being intended for "intellectuals".
- At the weekly programme review meeting on 15th March, BBC Controller of Programmes, Television - Huw Weldon - described this episode as "an agreeable kind of terror".
- Ian Fairbairn was originally going to be cast as a guard, but got the better role of Questa. He will return to the series as one of Douglas Camfield's repertoire of favoured actors, appearing in The Invasion, Inferno and The Seeds of Doom.
- Graham Leaman will go on to play Time Lords in Colony in Space and The Three Doctors, as well as featuring in Fury from the Deep and The Seeds of Death.
- Richard Beale had previously voiced the Refusian in The Ark, and had played Bat Masterson in The Gunfighters. He'll return in The Green Death.
- Gertan Klauber had played the galley-master in The Romans.
- Sandra Bryant had been seen in The War Machines, when she played Kitty, manager of the Inferno nightclub. On the day before recording she requested through her agent that she be released from later episodes due to another job offer. Davies would recast another actress as Chicki for Episode 4.
- Peter Jeffrey's best known role in Doctor Who is as Count Grendel in The Androids of Tara. He was the first ever actor to go on record stating that he took a role in the series specifically to please his children - claiming they wouldn't have forgiven him had he turned the part down.
- Many years later, when Gerry Davis visited the production office to discuss a "Genesis of the Cybermen" storyline with Eric Saward and JNT, he was pleased to see that his story synopsis noticeboard idea was still in use.
- Radio Times previewed the story with a brief synopsis and one of the images of Jeffrey and Klauber:
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