Doctor Who Vs. The Pale Horse

The Queen of Crime's fifty-second
crime novel (serialised then pub-
lished in 1961) featured novelist
Ariadne Oliver. She also appeared
in seven other books (from 1936
to 1972), but was omitted from
both of ITV's adaptations of The 
Pale Horse (shown in 1997 and
2010), and Mammoth Screen's

version.
The mystery was also dramatised
twice for BBC Radio, in 1993 and
2014. BBC1's most recent Agatha

Christie thriller (another screen-

play from Sarah Phelps) was first

shown in February 2020. The full,

two-part version was repeated on

BBC4 last night - it featured Rufus Sewell, Kaya Scodelario, and twenty-

one Doctor Who cast and crew connections:

• Bertie [born Robert] Carvel (Osborne here; Max Mallowan in Agatha Christie: A Life in Pictures) was the Mysterious Man in The Lazarus Experiment
• Sean [Carl] Pertwee (DI Lejeune here; Oglander in The King of Clubs; Dr. Griffith in The Moving Finger, 2006; Stubbs in Dead Man's Folly, 2013) made a cameo appearance in The Five(ish) Doctors
• Claire Skinner (Yvonne here; Amy in A Murder is Announced, 2005; Miss Rich in Cat Among the Pigeons;) was Madge Arwell in The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe
• Sarah Woodward (Clemency here; Jane in Death in the Clouds) voiced Theodora for Secret History (2015), Vesh Taralesh for Stolen Goods (2018), and Anla Jessik for The Quest of the Engineer (2020)
• James [Edward] Fleet (Venables here; Carter in The Secret Adversary; Scudamore & Sherston for Absent in the Spring) voiced O'Reilley for Max Warp (2008), Geoff Cooper for The Entropy Composition, and Martin Ashcroft and Sir Jack Merrivale for Special Features (both 2010)
• Nicky Goldie (Mrs. Coppins here; cast in Witness for the Prosecution, 2024) voiced the Spillager Empress for Winter for the Adept, Valeria Hedone for The Fires of Vulcan (both 2000), Inquisitor Danby for Excelis Rising (2002), and Polk for The Moonrakers (2020)
• stunt co-ordinators Dani Biernat and Crispin Layfield both worked on the revived run
• Matt Hermiston was stuntman on The Woman Who Fell to Earth too
• Charlotte Mitchell (costume designer here; assistant on Poirot) was costume assistant on Love & Monsters, then supervisor on Blink and Turn Left
• David Key was also camera assistant on six adventures (from Last Christmas to Twice Upon a Time)
• Joanne Pearce (art director) was prop buyer on The Return of Doctor Mysterio, The Pilot, Smile and The Doctor Falls
• James Moss was also camera operator on The Sontaran Stratagem, The Poison Sky and Torchwood
• Matt Sanders (art director was draughtsman on ten episodes (from the 2016 Christmas special to Twice Upon a Time) and artist on Class
• Gareth Webb (3rd Crowd AD) was floor runner on Hide, Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS, Nightmare in Silver and The Name of the Doctor
• Shirley Schumacher was also focus puller on The Beast Below and Victory of the Daleks
• Dewi Jones (sound first assistant) was boom operator on The Five (ish) Doctors Reboot
• Mark Turner was SFX supervisor on The Long Game too
• Ben Blackall was also stills photographer on twenty stories (from The Woman Who Fell to Earth to The Timeless Children)
• Luke Jefferson was first assistant camera on Death in Heaven too
• Monty Till (location manager) was unit manager on eight episodes (from The Snowmen to The Time of the Doctor)

Doctor Who Vs. Ordeal By Innocence

Published in late 1958, the Queen

of Crime's fifty-seventh mystery

novel was one of the author's favourite works and is now

considered a classic of the genre. 

Cannon Films' adaptation of Ordeal

By Innocence was released in 1985,

followed by ITV Studio's treatment 
for Marple in 2007. 
This version was scripted by Sarah

Phelps, writer of And Then There

Were None and Witness for the Prosecution.

When allegations of sexual assault 
were levelled at actor Ed Westwick 
his role was recast and makers 
Mammoth Screen returned to 
Scotland to reshoot the drama. The whole, three-part thriller (event-

ually shown in April 2018 after a four-month postponemnet) was

repeated for BBC4's Agatha Christie season last night - it featured

Anna Chancellor, Anthony Boyle, Luke Treadaway, Alice Eve,

Matthew Goode, and eleven Doctor Who cast and crew alumni:

• Bill [Francis] Nighy (Leo Argyll here; Marsh in Thirteen at Dinner) played Dr. Black in Vincent and the Doctor
• Morven Christie (Kirsten here; Elsie in The Labours of Hercules) was Alice O'Donnell in Under the Lake and Before the Flood
• Christian [Louis] Cooke (replaced Westwick as Mickey) was Private Ross Jenkins in The Sontaran Stratagem and The Poison Sky
• Eleanor Tomlinson (Mary) was Eve in The Sarah Jane Adventures: The Mad Woman in the Attic
• Brian McCardie (Gould) voiced Alan Weir for Big Finish's Masters of Earth (2014)
• Gary Hoptrough was also stuntman on The Runaway Bride and Let's Kill Hitler
• stunt co-ordinator Tony Lucken was stuntman on Dalek, Bad Wolf, The Parting of the Ways and The End of Time
• Adam Recht was film editor on A Christmas Carol too
• Gerry Glynn and David Kneath were also SFX technicians on four- teen episodes (from Kill the Moon to Twice Upon a Time) and six- teen others (from Into the Dalek to The Husbands of River Song)
• conductor Dave Foster was a musician on over a hundred stories (from Voyage of the Damned to

Doctor Who Vs. Ashes to Ashes, Series 1

 

"My name is Alex Drake. I've been shot and that bullet's

taken me back in time. Now I'm lost in 1981. All I can do

is fight, and search, and stay alive. Because somehow I

will find a way home."

The sequel series to Life On Mars was also produced by Monastic and 
Kudos for BBC Wales. Keeley Hawes now led the cast as another out-
of-time detective, DI Alex Drake - a colleague of recently deceased

DCI Sam Tyler. Philip Glenister, Marshall Lancaster and Dean Andrews

 all reprised their roles (as DCI Gene Hunt, DC Chris Skelton and DS

Ray Carling respectively), and were also joined by newcomer

Montserrat Lombard (as WPC Shaz Granger).

Ashes to Ashes (referencing another David Bowie song) was co-

created by Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah, and centres 

on a present-day Metropolitan Police inspector, Drake who is shot 

and regains consciousness in 1981. Like its predecessor, the period

 setting was lovingly recreated against a rich backdrop of social

 history, and more importantly here, the music of the early eighties.

Another repeat run of the first six-part season (originally trans-

mitted from January 9 to February 27 2008) began on Drama

last night - it featured a total of forty Doctor Who cast and crew

connections:

• Hawes played Ms. Delphox in Time Heist 
• Graham was also writer of Fear Her, The Rebel Flesh and The Almost People
• series producer Beth Willis was an executive producer on Doctor Who Confidential, The Adventure Games and twenty-seven stories (from The Eleventh Hour to The Wedding of River Song)
• Julie Scott was also a BBC production executive on seventy-seven instalments (from The Runaway Bride to Last Christmas), Time Crash, Doctor Who Proms, Blood of the Cybermen, City of the Daleks, Dreamland, Music of the Spheres, Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures
• Jonny Campbell was also director of The Vampires of Venice and Vincent and the Doctor
• Catherine Morshead was also director of Amy's Choice and The Lodger 
• Adam James (Markham) was DI Macmillan in Planet of the Dead
• Joseph Long (Luigi) was Rocco Colasanto in Turn Left, and the Pope in Extremis
• Geff Francis (Viv James) was George [Maitland] in The Bells of Saint John
• Roy [William] Skelton (voice of Rainbow puppets Zippy and George) voiced Daleks, Monoids, Cybermen and Krotons for the classic series, and was Norton in Colony in Space, James in (episode 5 of) The Green Death, Chedaki in The Android Invasion, and King Rokon in The Hand of Fear
• Rupert Graves (Moore) was John Riddell in Dinosaurs on a Spaceship
• Paul Thornley (Kay) voiced the Computer and Marko for Seven Keys to Doomsday (2008), Gomori and Steward for Paper Cuts, Michael Rond for Fitz's Story (both 2009), and Robbie Flint and Cyril for Criss-Cross (2015)
• Sid Mitchell (Dane) was Pickens for The Haunting of Thomas Brewster (2008)
• Christopher Fairbank (Bonds) was Fenton in Flatline, and voiced Doc Baroque for The Scapegoat (2009), Pierre Aronnax for The Wreck of the Titan (2010), and Marc Brunel for Iron Bright (2018)
• Callum Dixon (Thief) was Jarva Slade in Kerblam!
• Amelda Brown (Elaine) voiced Margaret for The Gunpowder Plot
• Nik Howden (Youth) was Maurice in Vincent and the Doctor
• Claire [Louise] Rushbrook (Trixie) was Ida Scott in The Impossible Planet and The Satan Pit, then voiced Tula Chenka for Escape from Kaldor (2018) and The Robots (2019-21), and the Abbess and Marna for Out of Time 1 (2020)
• Leo Bill (Burns) was the Pilot in A Christmas Carol
• Tracy Wiles (Girl) voiced Moira Brody for Masters of Earth (2014), Jacqui McGee for UNIT: Extinction (2015), UNIT: Silenced (2016), Death on the Mile (2018), Narcissus, The Power of River Song (both 2019), Outback and Longshot (both 2021), Commander Barnac for The Neverwhen (2016), Ground Control and Secretary for Their Finest Hour, Sharlan for The Invention of Death, Hadway, Salma and V75 for Escape from Kaldor (all 2018), Drones for The False Guardian and Time's Assassin, Announcer and Coms for State of Bliss, Marzanna and Engel for Nightmare Country (all 2019), Tryana for Return to Skaro, Ren, SV66 and Gat for The Robots 2 (both 2020), and Draven, Shira and Sentinel for The Shadow Squad (2021)
• Lucy [Jane] Briers (Patty) voiced Jenny Chaplin for After the Daleks (2021)
• Jeanie Gold (Partygoer) was Neighbour in The Sontaran Stratagem, The Poison Sky and The End of Time (1)
• Russell [George] Tovey (Johnstone) was Midshipman Alonso Frame in Voyage of the Damned, The End of Time (2) and for One Enchanted Evening (2017)
• Phil Davis (Cale) was Lucius Petrus Dextrus in The Fires of Pompeii, and voiced Titus for The Cannibalists (2009)
• Madhav Sharma (Chatterjee) was Patel in Frontier in Space (3)
• Troy Glasgow (Ska Boy) was Angelo in The Time of Angels
• Geoffrey [Dyson] Palmer (Lord Scarman) was Edward Masters in The Silurians, the Administrator in The Mutants (1), and Captain Hardaker in Voyage of the Damned 
• Paul Anderson (Suspect) made his TV debut in The Christmas Invasion as Jason
• [Michael Thomas] Jeremy Clyde (Chief Super) voiced George Sinclair for Absent Friends (2016), and Lord Braye for Planet of the Drashigs (2019)
• David Schaal (Look-a-like) voiced Sergeant Zogroth and Bus Driver for The Star Beast (2019)
• Sean Clayton was second assistant director on Dalek and Father's Day too
• Derek Lea was also a stuntman on Dalek, Bad Wolf, The Parting of the Ways, The Age of Steel and Partners in Crime
• Gary Hoptrough and Rob Hunt were both stuntmen on The Runaway Bride - they also worked on Let's Kill Hitler and The Day of the Doctor respectively
• Christine Greenwood was make-up designer on Remembrance of the Daleks too
• film editor Jamie Pearson also edited nine episodes (from The Eleventh Hour to The Angels Take Manhattan)
• Edmund Butt was the composer on An Adventure in Space and Time too
• Matt Wood (visual effects supervisor) and Simon Blackledge (VFX artist) both worked on A Town Called Mercy and The Power of Three - Wood also worked on The Doctor, the Widow and the Wardrobe
• Antonia Grant was also the location manager on The Sound of Drums and Last of the Time Lords

Doctor Who Vs. Tower Block

This low-budget British thriller (a co-
production from Creativity Media and
Tea Shop) was written by James
Moran, and premiered at the 2012
FrightFest Film Festival - a theatrical

release followed a month later.

Shown again on the Horror channel

last night, Tower Block featured

Sheridan Smith, Jack O'Connell,

Ralph Brown, and nine Doctor Who

cast and crew connections:

• Russell [George] Tovey (Paul) played Midshipman Alonso Frame in Voyage of the Dead - a role he reprised for The End of Time, Part 2 and Big Finish's One Enchanted Evening (2017)
• Julie Graham (Carol) was Ruby White in The Sarah Jane Adventures: Goodbye, Sarah Jane Smith, then Ravio in Ascension of the Cybermen and The Timeless Children - she also voiced Prime Minister 470 for Planet X (2016), Carolyn for The Blood Furnace (2017), and Miss Beecham and Sovari for The Year of Martha Jones (2021)
• Nabil Elouahabi (Gary) voiced Esteban for The Flames of Cadiz (2013)
• Steven Cree (DC Devlin) voiced Neil Redmond for Uncanny Valley (2016)
• James Weber Brown (Brian) was the Minister in In The Forest of the Night
• Louise Brown was foley artist on The Woman Who Fell to Earth too
• Stuart Conran was also the prosthetics artist on New Earth and The Idiot's Lantern
• Scott MacIntyre was supervising armourer on Twice Upon a Time too
• Mark Corden (runner) was second assistant director on Can You Hear Me?