Doctor Who Vs. The Eagle Has Landed

Based on the book by Jack Higgins, ITC Enter-

tainment's classic British war film was released

at Christmas 1976, and starred Michael Caine,
Donald Sutherland (who replaced Richard Harris

as Liam Devlin), Robert Duvall, Anthony Quayle,

Donald Pleasence and Larry Hagman. BBC Radio

4's version followed in 1993.

The plot shared many similarities with that of the

wartime West End play, Warn That Man! and Ealing Studios' Went the Day Well? (1942). A sequel, The

Eagle Has Flown was published in 1991, and it was

reported in 2015 that ITV Studios planned to adapt

the novel for BBC1. Higgins (the pen name of Harry Patterson) died in 2022, aged 92. A genuine plot (codenamed Operation Willi) to kidnap the Duke

of Windsor (opposed to Winston Churchill in this

fictional scenario) was conceived by the SS in 1940.

Shown on BBC2 today, the film (distributed by Columbia Pictures) featured

Jean Marsh, and nineteen other Doctor Who guest stars:

• Jenny [Ann] Agutter (Molly) voiced Sekhmet for Big Finish's The Bride of Peladon (2008)
• John [Ronald Leon] Standing (Verecker) voiced Fenric for Gods and Monsters (2012), and Professor Threadstone for Vampire of the Mind (2016)
• [Frank] Denis Lill (Aide) was Dr. Fendelman in Image of Fendahl, and Sir George Hutchinson in The Awakening
• Tim [Michael John Leigh] Barlow (Wilde) was Tyssan in Destiny of the Daleks
• [John] Maurice Roeves (Corcoran) was Stotz in The Caves of Androzani
• Harry Fielder (Outrider) was a Guard (in PP, ZZZ, 4L, 4P, 5A, 5F, 5Z), Crewman (SS, 4T), Vogan (4D), Assassin (4Q), Tigellan (5Q), and Krarg in Shada
• Roy [Anthony] Marsden [born Mould] (Toberg) was Stoker in Smith and Jones
• Peter Miles (uncredited as Hitler) was Dr. Charles Lawrence in The Silurians, Professor Whitaker in Invasion of the Dinosaurs, then Nyder in Genesis of the Daleks, a role he reprised for The Trial of Davros and I, Davros: Guilt (2006) - he also voiced Tragan for The Paradise of Death, and Curator Gantman for Whispers of Terror (1999)
• Malcolm Tierney (Fleischer) was Dolland in Terror of the Vervoids
• Walter Henry [born Israel W Nagelkop] (PC) was an Extra in The Myth Makers (2) and The Silurians (6), Primord in Inferno, and Brother in The Masque of Mandragora
• Valentino Musetti, Bill Weston, Mark McBride, Steve Emerson, Rick Lester, Jim Dowdall, Richard Hammatt, Nick Hobbs and Bill Weston were all stunt performers here too