Doctor Who Vs. The Omen

On location at Fulham: Peck,
director Donner and Troughton

Richard Donner's cult horror film was

shown on BBC2 last night - it featured

a notable Oscar-winning score from

Jerry Goldsmith, and an intense per-

formance (and memorable death

scene) from Patrick Troughton as

doomed Father Brennan.

Here, Robert Thorn (Gregory Peck),

US ambassador to Britain, learns the

shocking truth about his son Damien

(Harvey Stephens) - he is the Anti-

christ, with a 666 birthmark, and

must be slain by means of sacred

daggers.

The feature spawned three sequels - 1978's Damien: Omen II, Omen III:

The Final Conflict (1981), and TV

movie, Omen IV: The Awakening

(1991). The saga concluded in 1985

with the novel Omen V: The Abomination. An NBC TV pilot based on The Omen aired in 1995, and a

film remake and spin-off TV series,

Damien, followed in 2006 and 2016. Phantom Four Films also produced a prequel, The First Omen, in April.

The Omen (an Anglo-American production released by Fox in 1976) also

starred Lee Remick, Billie Whitelaw, David Warner, Leo McKern, and

thirteen Doctor Who cast and crew connections:

• Tommy [George] Duggan (Priest here; Matteus in Omen III) was Senator Alcott in The Mind of Evil
• Roy Boyd (Reporter) was Driscoll in The Hand of Fear
• Ronald [Frederick] Leigh-Hunt (Man) was Commanders, Julian Radnor in The Seeds of Death, and Stevenson in Revenge of the Cybermen
• Burnell Tucker (Agent) was Garner Two in The Angels Take Manhattan
• Robert [born Lucio Herbert] Rietty (Monk) voiced Bedloe for Death Comes to Time
• Juba [Elgar] Kennerley (Spectator) was an Old Man in (episod 2 of) The Massacre
• Tina Simmons (Official/Remick's stand-in here & The Medusa Touch) began her career as an Inferno Customer in The War Machines (1), and was Passenger in The Faceless Ones (1)
• Michael Leader (Spectator) was Clone in The Leisure Hive (4), Terileptil in The Visitation (4), Mutant in Mawdryn Undead (4), and Soldier in The King's Demons (1)
• Anthony Lang (Bystander) was an Egyptian Slave in The Daleks' Master Plan, Extra in The Highlanders (1) and The Faceless Ones (1), Time Lord in The Three Doctors (1), and Kaled Councillor in Genesis of the Daleks
• Walter Henry [born Israel Nagelkop] (Orderly) was an Extra in The Myth Makers (2), The Highlanders, The Macra Terror, The Silurians (6), The Masque of Mandragora, The Deadly Assassin and City of Death, was Primord in Inferno
• stunt co-ordinator Alf [Charles Richard] Joint was a Heavy in The Ambassadors of Death, Primitive/Guard in Colony in Space, and stunt arranger on Battlefield
• Eddie Powell (Policeman) and William Parnell both worked on Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 AD - as Thompson and assistant sound editor