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On This Day (USA) - 22 May



The Chase: The Executioners premiered on BBC One in 1965 at 5:41pm BST, watched by 10.00 million viewers.

Ian and Vicki are trapped by a tentacled creature on the planet Aridius. Meanwhile, the Doctor and Barbara witness Daleks set off on a mission to eliminate them!


The Dæmons: Episode One premiered on BBC One in 1971 at 6:16pm BST, watched by 9.20 million viewers.

The Doctor tries to prevent Professor Horner from breaking into an ancient barrow near the village of Devil's End. Posing as the village vicar, the Master summons dark forces.


The Hungry Earth premiered on BBC One in 2010 at 6:18pm BST, watched by 6.49 million viewers.

After Effects premiered on BBC Three in 2010 at 7:00pm BST

Redacted: Recruits premiered on BBC Online in 2022 at 8:00pm BST

 Birthdays
John Sponsler will be 59 - credited as Additional Music by for The TV Movie

Composer who provided the music for Doctor Who The TV Movie.


Cheryl Campbell will be 75 - credited as Ocean Waters in The Vault of Secrets(SJA)

Cheryl Campbell (born St. AlbansHertfordshire, England) is an English actor of stage, film and television.

Cheryl Campbell was educated at Francis Bacon Grammar School, St Albans; London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA). Her repertory theatre experience includes the Watford Palace Theatre, Birmingham Rep and Glasgow Citizens' Theatre.

Cheryl Campbell is known for her starring role as Vera Brittain in the BBC's television dramatisation of Testament of Youth (1979), for which she received Best Actress awards from the British Academy Television Award (BAFTA) and theBroadcasting Press Guild Award.

Campbell earned her first BAFTA nomination the previous year for Eileen Everson, a very different character, opposite Bob Hoskins in Dennis Potter's television serial Pennies from Heaven (1978). Campbell's one other role in a work by Potter is as Janet in Rain on the Roof (1980).

Cheryl Campbell is also a stage performer of considerable note and great range. She has been twice a member of the Royal Shakespeare Company. At the RSC in 1982, she played Nora Helmer in Adrian Noble's memorable production of Ibsen's A Doll's House (for which she was awarded the Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actress in a Revival). In that same season, she also appeared as Diana in All's Well That Ends Well. She returned to the RSC in the 1992-94 season, playing Lady Macbeth to Derek Jacobi's lead in Noble's controversial production of Macbeth; Beatrice-Joanna in The Changeling; Mistress Ford in The Merry Wives of Windsor; and Natasha in Misha's Party. She has also worked at the Royal National Theatre: playing as a junior member of the company in 1975, as Freda in Peter Hall's Old Vic production of John Gabriel Borkman (starring Ralph RichardsonPeggy Ashcroft and Wendy Hiller) and as Maggie in W. S. Gilbert's Engaged; in 1995, as Lady Politic Would-Be in Matthew Warchus's Volpone; and in 2003 as Dotty Otley in the NT's touring (and London) revival of Noises Off.

Campbell's other stage performances in London have encompassed the classics as well as new plays; they include You Never Can Tell (Lyric, 1979); Miss Julie (1983) in the title role; Little Eyolf (1985) as Asta; The Daughter-in-Law(1985) as Minnie; The Sneeze (a Chekhov selection) (1988) in various roles; Betrayal (1991) as Emma; The Strip (1995) as Loretta; Some Sunny Day (1996) as Emily; The Seagull (1997) as Arkadina; Passion (2000) as Nell; and Life After George (2002) as Beatrix. In provincial theatre (aside from the touring productions of The Seagull and Noises Off), Campbell has appeared in: The Country Wife (Manchester Royal Exchange) as Margery Pinchwife; The Constant Wife (Theatr Clwyd) as Constance; A Streetcar Named Desire (Leicester Haymarket) as Blanche (for which she received a Regional Theatre Best Actress award); and So Long Life (touring production) as Wendy.

She has also appeared regularly on British TV:

In period pieces: Sarah Bernhardt in Lillie, Winnie Verloc in The Secret Agent, Bessy Tulliver in The Mill on the Floss, Lady Carbury in The Way We Live Now, Lady Somerset in To the Ends of the Earth.

In dramas: Madeleine Cranmere in Malice AforethoughtLady Eileen 'Bundle' Brent in The Seven Dials Mystery, Eva Jackson in Absurd Person Singular, Caroline Ashurst in A Winter Harvest, Elizabeth Fellowes in A Sort of Innocence, Maria Wearing in Centrepoint, Louie Williams in Fantabulosa.

In episodic TV: Erica Taylor in The Sweeney, Griselda Clement in Miss Marple: The Murder at the Vicarage, Pamela Drake in Boon, Sylvie Maxton in Inspector Morse, Lady Frances Carfax in the The Casebook of Sherlock HolmesThe Disappearance of Lady Frances Carfax, Aline Bauche in Maigret, Emily Coxon in Bramwell, Louise McAllister in Wing and a Prayer, Diana Grey in A Touch of Frost, Sandra MacKillop in Midsomer Murders, Emily Gascoigne in Foyle's War (in the episode entitled A Lesson in Murder), Maureen Hunt in Waking the Dead, Deputy PM in Spooks, Jean Swainbank in Dalziel and Pascoe, Valli Helm in Lewis, Ocean Waters in The Sarah Jane Adventures story The Vault of Secrets.

In regular series: Madeleine Claveau in Monsignor Renard, Molly Gilcrest in William and Mary, Lola's mum in Funland, Sophie's mum in Peep Show. In 2011 she joined the cast of Casualty as the ED's new joint Clinical Lead Miriam Turner.

On film, her roles have included: Sheila McVicar (to Roger Daltrey's John McVicar) in 1980's McVicar; Jennie Liddell in 1981's Oscar-winning Chariots of Fire; Lady Aline Hartlip in 1984's The Shooting Party (with Dorothy TutinJames Mason and John Gielgud); and Lady Alice Clayton (Tarzan's mother) in 1984's Greystoke - The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes.

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


John Flanagan will be 80 - credited as Writer for Meglos

John Flanagan is an Australian fantasy author. 

Along with Andrew McCulloch he wrote the 1980 Doctor Who serial Meglos.

His best known work is the Ranger's Apprentice novel series, which is about a boy named Will who is taken as an apprentice Ranger to the grim and mysterious Halt. 

He co-created the television series Hey Dad! 

In 2008, he won the Australian Publishers Association's Book of the Year for Older Children and the International Success Award for Erak's Ransom


Cavan Kendall (died 1999 aged 57) would be 82 - credited as Achilles in The Myth Makers

Cavan Kendall was a British actor. He acted in many television series and in films Eureka and Sexy Beast.

Kendall was the paternal half-brother of actress Kay Kendall. He was born to Terry Kendall and Dora Spencer  in ClaphamLondon and died of cancer in Gloucestershire aged 57.

He played Achilles in the Doctor Who story The Myth Makers.

Also worked on Sexy BeastThe Clandestine MarriageEurekaBadger by Owl-LightBlood MoneyThe Enchanted CastleThrillerJohn MacnabITV PlayhouseThe Way We Live NowThirty-Minute TheatreThe Spanish FarmThe Portrait of a LadyHere We Go Round the Mulberry BushLes MisérablesSt. IvesSoftly SoftlyITV Play of the WeekBoyd Q.C.Jezebel ex UKThe Human JungleSakiITV Television PlayhouseThe Roving ReasonsThree Golden NoblesBilly Bunter of Greyfriars SchoolJo's BoysThe Machine BreakersThe Railway Children



 Deaths
Jonathan Battersby (died 2010 aged 56) - credited as Winder in The Beast Below

Jonathan Battersby played Winder in The Beast Below. He also appeared in an uncredited role in Victory of the Daleks.

Battersby, as well as being a well respected actor, was well known in financial circles. After graduating from RADA in 1972, he worked as an actor for a number of years, including a spell in the National Theatre. In 1981 he left acting and joined the financial industry, rising to become president of the Life Insurance Association.

He retired from the LIA in 2004, and returned to his previous career as an actor, winning roles in Secret Diary of a Call Girl and Emmerdale as well as Doctor Who.


Jack Watling (died 2001 aged 78) - 2 credits, including Travers in The Abominable Snowmen

Jack Watling was a British actor.

He played Travers in 12 episodes of Season Five of Doctor Who, acting alongside his daughter Deborah Watling, who played the Second Doctor's companion Victoria Waterfield. He reprised the role decades later in the independent Doctor Who spin-off video Downtime (1995).

Watling trained at the Italia Conti Academy of Theatre Artsas a child and made his stage debut in Where the Rainbow Ends at the Holborn Empire in 1936. He made his first film appearances (all uncredited) in Sixty Glorious YearsHousemaster (both 1938) and Goodbye, Mr Chips(1939).

In 1941, he played Bill Hopkins in Once a Crook in his West End debut. Later that same year, he played George Perrey in Cottage to Let. He starred as Flight Lieutenant Teddy Graham in the original 1942 production of Terence Rattigan's Flare Path.

He had a long career in low-key British films, originally in easy-going boyish roles. Early appearances were in We Dive at Dawn (1943), The Way Ahead (1944), The Winslow Boy (1948) and Meet Mr. Lucifer(1953). In 1955 he appeared in Orson WellesMr. Arkadin.

In 1958 he played Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall in the critically acclaimed docudrama A Night To Remember. In 1960 he appeared in the film Sink the Bismarck.

His reputation as an effective and reliable television actor took root in the early 1960s. Between 1964-69 he was Don Henderson, the troubled conscience to tough businessman John Wilder (Patrick Wymark) inThe Plane Makers and its sequel The Power Game. Watling also appeared as Doc Saxon in the 1970s series Pathfinders

Watling was married to former actress Patricia Hicks. He was the father of actors Dilys Watling, as well as Deborah Watling and Giles Watling, and of sculptor Nicky Matthews.

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