Doctor Who Vs. The Hound of the Baskervilles (1982)

This neglected treatment of Conan Doyle's

best loved and most staged work originally

 aired in October 1982, and was adapted by

Alexander Baron - he had also dramatised

The Musgrave Ritual and Wisteria Lodge in

1968, then Granada's A Scandal in Bohemia in

1984.

Never released commercially in the UK, and rarely repeated, this drama (quite faithful to the

novel) only became available to purchase when

the sadly short-lived BBC Store launched in late

2015.

This BBC1 production was the first TV vehicle for Tom Baker after vacating the TARDIS - his portrayal of Sherlock Holmes is reminiscent of

the Doctor (recalling Baker's pseudo-Holmesian

role in The Talons of Weng-Chiang). Baker is only the third actor to play both the Time Lord and the Great Detective,

after Peter Cushing and Richard Hurndall. Baker would reprise Holmes

for the stage in The Mask of Moriarty in 1985. Dr. Watson was depicted

here by Terence Rigby, who later appeared in The Sign of Four.

The four-part mystery was recorded at BBC Birmingham and filmed on

location in its Dartmoor setting. Produced by Barry Letts and script

edited by Terrance Dicks, the serial also featured Caroline John,

and another fourteen Doctor Who cast and crew connections:

• Nicholas [Robin Frank] Woodeson (Sir Henry) voiced the Clocksmith for Big Finish's Doom Coalition 3 (2016), and the titular role for The Quest of the Engineer (2020)
• [Frank] Morris Perry (Barrymore) was Captain Dent in Colony in Space
• Gillian [Mary] Martell (Mrs Barrymore) and Terry [Philip Julian] Forrestal (Sir Hugo here; stuntman on Without a Clue) both appeared in K9 and Company, as Lilly Gregson and Tractor Driver
• Michael [John] Goldie (Selden here; PC Murcher in A Study in Scarlet; Artist in The Final Problem, 1985) was Craddock in The Dalek Invasion of Earth, and Elton Laleham in The Wheel in Space
• William [Arthur] Squire (Frankland) was the Shadow in The Armageddon Factor
• Hubert [Thomas Morgan] Rees (DI Lestrade here; Dr. Watson in The Baker Street Boys) was the Chief Engineer in Fury from the Deep, Captain Ransom in The War Games, and John Stevenson in The Seeds of Doom
• Peter Wragg was the VFX designer on The Visitation too
• costume designer Joyce Hawkins had worked with Baker on Horror of Fang Rock [also produced at Pebble Mill]
• Norma Flint was production assistant on Warriors of the Deep too
• David Hughes was also studio sound assistant on The War Machines, Fury from the Deep, The Space Pirates (6), Colony in Space and Horror of Fang Rock
• Mark Kershaw (vision mixer), Sue Hedden (AFM) and Susie Bancroft (make-up artist) all worked on K9 & Company too
• scenic painter Brian Bishop began his career as an uncredited back- drop painter on (episode 1 of) The Aztecs