Statistics


On This Day (USA) - 25 January



The Daleks: The Ordeal premiered on BBC One in 1964 at 5:15pm GMT, watched by 10.40 million viewers.

The Doctor and Susan are once again taken prisoner by the Daleks. In the mountains, Ian, Barbara and the Thals must negotiate a vast chasm to reach the city.


The Seeds of Death: Episode One premiered on BBC One in 1969 at 5:16pm BST, watched by 6.60 million viewers.

The TARDIS arrives on 21st Century Earth where all long distance journeys are made instantaneously by T-Mat. But aliens have invaded the T-Mat relay station on the Moon, and they're about to cause havoc...


The Ark In Space: Part One premiered on BBC One in 1975 at 5:36pm GMT, watched by 9.40 million viewers.

The TARDIS arrives in the far future on the Ark space station where mankind's survivors are in hibernation. Sarah is accidentally placed in suspended animation.


Four To Doomsday: Part Three premiered on BBC One (Not Wales) in 1982 at 6:56pm GMT, watched by 8.80 million viewers.

Snakedance: Part Three premiered on BBC One in 1983 at 6:50pm GMT, watched by 6.60 million viewers.

 Birthdays
Chris Johnson was 33 - 5 credits, including Camera Assistant for The Day of The Doctor

Played Barnaby in the online game The Gunpowder Plot


Tom Hopper was 39 - credited as Jeff in The Eleventh Hour

Tom Hopper is an English actor who has appeared in several television programmmes and films including MerlinDoctor WhoCasualty and Tormented. He is best known for playing Sir Percival in the BBC series Merlin.

His next screen role will be in the Rhys Hayward WWII film Grace and Danger. The film is due for release in 2013.

Hopper studied acting at Rose Bruford College graduating with an honours degree in 2006. His theatre roles while at Rose Bruford included, The TempestThe Way of the WorldColliers Friday Night and Festen.

Since graduating, he gained roles in which he was nominated for The Michael Powell Award for Best New British Feature and Initiation (Max Q Film) in 2007.

Hopper was cast in As You Like It at the Watford Palace Theatre and has appeared in various television programmmes and films such as SaxonCasualtyKingdom and Doctors.

Hopper portrayed Marcus in Tormented, a comedy-horror film about a bullied teenager who comes back from the dead to take revenge on his classmates. The film was made by BBC Films, Slingshot & Forward Films. It was released internationally by Pathe, on May 22, 2009 in the UK.

Hopper currently plays Sir Percival in the BBC series Merlin.


Emma Freud OBE was 62 - credited as Script Editor for Vincent and the Doctor

Emma Freud, is an English broadcaster and cultural commentator.

She is a script supervisor with a long association with her husband screenwriter Richard Curtis. As a result of this, she is credited as a senior script supervisor on the Doctor Who story Vincent and the Doctor, which was written by Curtis.

She is a Daughter of Clement Freud and Jill Freud and Great-granddaughter of Sigmund Freud and Martha Freud.

She was awarded the OBE (Officer of the Order of the British Empire) in the 2011 Queen's Birthday Honours List for her charitable services through Comic Relief.


Bill Turnbull (died 2022 aged 66) would have been 68 - credited as Himself in The Wedding of River Song

Bill Turnbull was an English journalist and presenter, best known for presenting BBC Breakfast for some 15 years.

 

He was diagnosed with prostrate cancer in 2017, and campaigned vigorously for greater awareness in men of the disease and to take their health seriously


Christopher Ryan was 74 - 8 credits, including Kiv in The Trial of a Time Lord (Mindwarp)

Christopher Ryan is an English actor. Ryan is perhaps best known for his role as Mike "The Cool Person" in the BBC comedy series The Young Ones.

He played Kiv in the 1986 story Mindwarp and the Sontaran leader General Staal in the 2008 story The Sontaran Stratagem / The Poison Sky

Ryan was born in Bayswater, London and trained at East 15 Acting School from 1968 to 1971. He began his professional acting career with Glasgow Citizens' Theatre in 1971.

Ryan was the only Young Ones cast member who was not already well-known in British comedy circles; he was a last-minute replacement for Peter Richardson, for whom the role of "straight man" Mike was originally intended along with The Comic Strip members Rik MayallAdrian EdmondsonNigel Planer andAlexei Sayle.

He played Lucky in Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot at the Queen's Theatre in the West End in 1991, alongside Mayall and Edmondson. Ryan later played Dave Hedgehog in Bottom and Marshall Turtle, one of Edina's unloved ex-husbands on Absolutely Fabulous. He has also appeared in two major sitcoms: he played one of the Driscoll brothers in an episode of Only Fools And Horses and spin-off The Green Green Grass, a pair of identical twin builders in the One Foot in the Grave episode "Hole In The Sky" and also a plumber in the episode "The Valley of Fear". He also appeared in Mr. Bean Goes Back To School, in two episodes of My Family, in Saxondale. Ryan also joined up again with Jennifer Saunders in two episodes of The Life and Times of Vivienne Vyle.

Biography from the Wikipedia article, licensed under CC-BY-SA 


John Owens was 82 - credited as Thorpe in The Dæmons

Actor who appeared in the 1971 story The Daemons.


Richard Davies (died 2015 aged 89) would have been 98 - credited as Burton in Delta and the Bannermen

Richard Davies was a Welsh actor whose film and TV work covers many years but was probably best known for his performance as the exasperated schoolmaster Mr Price in the LWT popular situation comedy Please Sir!.

Davies, who came from Dowlais, Merthyr Tydfil, used a broad Welsh accent for much of his work, but also occasionally used received pronunciation and other accents. This has led to his playing a diversity of characters, (in addition to several Welsh stereotypes). In Please Sir he frequently used the word "boyo" when addressing a fellow member of staff.

Davies played Idris Hopkins in Coronation Street between 1974 and 1975, and appeared in several science-fiction series, among them Robert's RobotsOut of the Unknown, and a well-received performance as Burton in the 1987 Doctor Who story Delta and the Bannermen.

He played Mr White in the Fawlty Towers episode The Kipper and the Corpse and also appeared in Yes MinisterWyatt's WatchdogsMay to DecemberWhoops Apocalypse2point4 Children, and One Foot in the Grave. In 1970 he appeared alongside Sid James in the third episode of series two of Two In Clover playing Victor Spinetti's character's brother when Spinetti was indisposed.

He appeared in several police television series, with a recurring role as Jim Sloan in Z-Cars between 1962 and 1965, returning to the series playing different characters in 1968 and in its sequel Softly, Softly. He also appeared in Dixon of Dock Green several times, The Sweeney, and Van der Valk. He also appeared in a sketch on Not the Nine O'Clock News, impersonating the Welsh trade union leader Clive Jenkins in a spoof edition of Question Time (TV series). He also appeared in the ' Please Sir!' spin off series 'The Fenn Street Gang'.

Films Davies has appeared in include Zulu (1964), Under Milk Wood (1972), and the movie adaptation of Please Sir! (1971). In 1951 he made an unaccredited appearance in the Ealing Studios comedy The Lavender Hill Mob. In 1988 he played the schoolteacher in Queen Sacrifice.

 

Biography from the Wikipedia article, licensed under CC-BY-SA

 

Obituary: Toby Hadoke

 


 Deaths
John Hurt (died 2017 aged 77) - 11 credits, including The War Doctor in The Day of The Doctor

Sir John Hurt, CBE is an English actor.

Hurt has had a career spanning six decades and initially came to prominence for his supporting role as Richard Rich in the film A Man for All Seasons (1966). Since then he has played leading roles as Quentin Crisp in the TV film The Naked Civil Servant (1975), the deformed man John Merrick in David Lynch's biopic The Elephant Man (1980), Winston Smith in the dystopian drama Nineteen Eighty-Four (1984), Mr. Braddock in the Stephen Frears drama The Hit (1984), and Stephen Ward in the drama depicting the Profumo affair, Scandal (1989). He is also known for his television roles as Caligula in I, Claudius (1976), and the War Doctor in the Doctor Who 50th anniversary special (2013).

Hurt's other films include the prison drama Midnight Express (1978), the science-fiction horror film Alien (1979), the adventure film Rob Roy (1995), the political thriller V for Vendetta (2006), the sci-fi adventure film Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (2008), the Harry Potter film series (2001–11), the Hellboy films (2004 and 2008), and the Cold War espionage film Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011). His character's final scene in Alien has been named by a number of publications as one of the most memorable in cinematic history.

He was married to actress Annette Robertson between 1962 and 1964, lived with French model Marie-Lise Volpeliere-Pierrot between 1967 and 1983, married to actress Donna Peacock between 1984 and 1990, production assistant Joan Dalton between 1990 and 1996, lived with Sarah Owens between 1996 and 2002, and is now lives near Cromer in Norfolk with his fourth wife Anwen Rees Meyers, who he married in 2005. He has two sons, Alexander "Sasha" John Vincent Hurt and Nicholas "Nick" Hurt, both from his third marriage.