Radio Interview with Tom Baker (the Fourth, definitive, Dr.)

The Phil O'Neil Show, 30 September, 2003

To the world you will always be Dr. Who.

That is true, that is absolutely true. That’s the only emphatic landmark in my life, that no one can disagree with, that’s right, that I was once a famous children’s hero for 188 episodes. It was the best thing that ever happened to me, and everything, nearly everything, has been less than that; less glorious and less funny and less wonderful than that. My whole life, from as soon as I emerged into the public, was one whole round of smiling children, of confident parents, of instant intimacy everywhere where people watched television (which was everywhere).

So I had this kind of…it gave me…it was the skeleton key to every…everyone. To old ladies, grandmothers, who used to hug their children because they pretended to be frightened, and so when I used to see these old ladies in the street, you know, their bosoms used to tingle with joy.

That was because children would hide in their bosoms when you came on TV.

And so when the old ladies saw me, their bosoms would tingle at the emotional memory.

 You weren’t actually in a position of privilege when you got this job. You were at the time, I believe, working on a building site. You were desperately poor, and you were sleeping on a friend of yours floor, an actor called Paul Angelis.

Well, ya. It wasn’t as bad as all that, you know. You journalists have got to, kind of, paint a picture, and that’s your job, and actors have to paint pictures too…but looking back on it, it was quite a dry flat my mate had. And on the building site, there were some funny guys, and although I wasn’t making much money, I was terribly alive and terribly well. I was just, like all professional inadequates, frustrated because I didn’t want to be on the building site, I wanted to be on the television, I wanted to be in the theatre.

Why may you not have appeared on the story of the Five Doctors, let’s cipher out the rumours of what had happened.

As far as I remember, and all these memories are getting jumbled up, as far as I remember, the five doctor script came up quite soon after I had left, and I had been proprietorial about doing the part. And also, the producers of the five doctors represented the people I had left, when I decided to resign and go on and do something else.

And so they suddenly had an idea to put a script together for five doctors, and I wasn’t feeling, it wasn’t malicious or anything like that, and it certainly had nothing to do with principle (I’ve never had many principles). It’s just, I didn’t feel like joining in some kind of jolly reassembly of old doctors living and dead. And so, I was doing other things, and you know I, ah….I just thought, oh, bugger it, I’ve done it all. And of course, I should have done, now I rather regret it, because later on I became much friendlier with those producers that I disagreed with. I became very, very, warmly, friendly with John Nathan-Turner, people like that. It wasn’t anything malicious, it was just that I felt, you know, I knew it all…and of course, I didn’t know it all, I just felt that at the time, and decided I wanted to be away from it and quiet. So there’s the answer.

What are your thoughts on the new Dr Whos, returning a new series in 2005. Would you want to be a part of that?

I do want to be a part of it, if the BBC want to offer me a part of it. They wouldn’t, of course, offer it, nor would I be interested really, in playing Dr Who again. But I think it would be absolutely great of the BBC (but I suspect they won’t think this way, BBC never agrees with anything I ever said, and I scarcely ever agree with anything the BBC ever says, but who would?). But I would certainly like to come back as the master. Don’t you think that would be a master stroke? It could be very funny…and not only very funny, but quite disturbing as well.