‘Conditions of Time and Space’: A Re-enactment Experiment with the British TV series Doctor Who ANDREW PHILIP IRELAND A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of Bournemouth University for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy April 2012 Bournemouth University COPYRIGHT STATEMENT This copy of the thesis has been supplied on condition that anyone who consults it is understood to recognise that its copyright rests with its author and due acknowledgement must always be made of the use of any material contained in, or derived from, this thesis. ABSTRACT Conditions of Time and Space: A Re-enactment Experiment with the British TV Series Doctor Who Andrew Philip Ireland The aim of this thesis is to provide a contribution to knowledge in two areas. Firstly, it seeks to further our understanding of the historical conditions of British television drama production; in particular the constraining and liberating influences of production space on the role of the director, and their decision-making process to bring script to screen. Secondly, the work develops the concept of re-enactment as a practice-based augmentation for archive-based textual reconstruction. As such, the thesis offers deeper discussions on the human context missing from current historiographic approaches to broadcast research. The thesis develops a re-enactment methodology that, via practical realisation, allows researchers to gain insight into the production dynamics of a particular era in history to learn about ‘in the moment’ directing decision-making. This is applied to a practice- based experiment that includes creating a simulation of 1960s production conditions in order to explore the following research question: how would the decision-making process of producing contemporary television drama be affected by the conditions of 1960s production space? I argue that contemporary location-based production is as constraining as the studio it purports to rise above, yet without the same possibilities for creative reaction to counteract the limitations that historical conditions allowed. As a flagship BBC series reflecting contemporary industry practice, Doctor Who is used as the vehicle for analysis. The experiment focuses on a historical re-enactment of a 2006 episode of Doctor Who, “Tooth and Claw”, written by series executive producer Russell T Davies. The re-enacted audio-visual text is provided on DVD along with artefacts that encapsulate the process of production, informing analysis and reflection. 3 LIST OF CONTENTS Copyright Statement 2 Abstract 3 List of Contents 4 List of Figures 6 List of Accompanying Material 8 Acknowledgement 9 Introduction and Aims 10 Chapter 1 Liberation and Constraint: Revisiting the “Studio-Bound” Concept 20 1.1 Introduction 20 1.2 Theatre, Film and the Establishment of Television Production Space 20 1.3 Doctor Who Case Study 31 1.4 Conclusion 41 Chapter 2 Methodology: Issues and Reflections 43 2.1 Introduction 43 2.2 Reconstruction, Remake and Re-enactment 44 2.3 Experiments in Re-enactment 50 2.4 The Research Design 56 2.5 Reflections upon Issues Raised 59 2.6 Conclusion 66 4 Chapter 3 The “Tooth and Claw” Experiment – Part 1 67 3.1 Aim 67 3.2 Method: Simulating the Conditions of Production 68 3.3 Method: Studio Space and Location Space 74 3.4 Method: Undertaking the Studio Re-enactment 93 3.5 Conclusion 101 Chapter 4 The “Tooth and Claw” Experiment – Part 2 102 4.1 Introduction 102 4.2 The Findings 102 4.3 Reflections on the Re-enactment Methodology 112 4.4 Conclusion 119 Conclusions 121 References 127 Further Reading 132 Appendix 1 “Tooth and Claw” episode synopsis 135 Appendix 2 Summary of Required Script Alterations 137 Appendix 3 Breakdown of Production Blocks, Scenes and Locations 140 Appendix 4 “Tooth and Claw” Re-enactment Experiment Studio Floor Plans 144 Appendix 5 Re-enacting the Doctor Who Title Sequence 153 Appendix 6 Commentary on BBC Written Archive Sources 156 5 LIST OF FIGURES 1. Proposed relationship between reconstruction, remake and 49 re-enactment 2. Reporting Experimental Work (Brown, Cherrington & Cohen, 53 1975, p.13) 3. Design of thesis derived from guide to reporting experimental work 53 4. Researcher roles in the context of re-enactment research design 61 5. Reflexive repositioning to enable Bourdieu’s Objectification of 63 Objectification 6. Bournemouth University’s HD TV studio 71 7. Comparison between Breamore House location and studio 77 mock-up 8. Matching pre-filmed VT insert with studio mock-up of the same 78 environment 9. The Production Manager stands in to test filming angle to ensure 79 ‘whiteout’ background behind actors when replicating the backdrop in studio 10. Scale model of studio space to help plan effective use for required sets 80 11. The Doctor and party look beyond the ‘fourth wall’, to a photographic 82 blow-up of an observatory and telescope 12. Rendering a low-cost TARDIS console room 84 13. Photographs of the studio space model produced for the project 85 14. Screenshots depicting movement from studio to location and back to 86 studio, a discontinuity in production but a continuity in narrative 15a. Original sketch depicting the arrival of the TARDIS in the Scottish 87 Highlands surrounded by guards 15b. Screenshot of the final image following post production image 87 layering 16. Queen Victoria’s carriage depicted in close-up only 91 17a. Exterior reverse angles depicting Father Angelo and the Steward’s 95 confrontation 17b. Exterior reverse angles depicting Rose and the Host 95 18. A montage of three inter-cutting scenes with no dialogue proved 98 difficult to time effectively in studio 19. Screenshots from the re-enacted “Tooth and Claw” title sequence 154 using a simulation of the conditions of 1960s practice 7 LIST OF ACCOMPANYING MATERIAL Alongside this text-based document are audio-visual elements submitted on DVD. It is suggested that readers of the thesis view Method and Results content prior to reading chapter 3, and Analysis prior to reading chapter 4. Below is a representation of what can be found on the DVD. Main Menu • Experiment Aim • Method • Results • Analysis • DVD-Rom Method • “I’ve Just Got to Trim the Moon” (running time: 15 minutes). A documentary of the production process for “Tooth and Claw” Results • “Tooth and Claw” (running time: 20 minutes). A 1960s-style re-enactment of the 2006 Doctor Who episode “Tooth and Claw” Analysis • “Gallery Voices” (running time 20 minutes). A montage that provides a representative overview of the 12 hour studio gallery feed of the “Tooth and Claw” studio day • Production Photographs DVD-ROM contents • Interview Transcripts • Production Documentation • Electronic Copy of Thesis 8 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT This work would not have been possible without the help, guidance and support of so many people, including my supervisors Hugh Chignell, Chris Pullen, Sean Street and Charlotte Crofts. I am grateful to so many others for their support and advice, including Craig Batty, Richard Berger, Fiona Cownie, Sue Eccles, Shaun Kimber, Marian Mayer, Mark Readman, Susan Sutton, John Vinney, Neal White and Sally Winter. Thanks to Andrew Sutton for editing the “I’ve Just Got to Trim The Moon” documentary on the DVD, and all the staff and students at Bournemouth University who helped with the production work. Thanks to all the actors who gave time and energy (and understanding) to breathe new life into 1960s television production. Thanks to those who gave up their time for interviews – Lucy Richer, Graeme Harper, Victor Pemberton, Marcus Hearn, and Waris Hussein. Special thanks to the BBC for supporting the project and giving me permission to use the Doctor Who script - in particular, Ian Grutchfield, Julie Gardner and Russell T Davies. Lastly, a special thank you to my lovely family, in particular my parents, my children Thomas and Abigail, and my wife Kerry. 9 INTRODUCTION AND AIMS Janet Thumim (2002, p.1) argues that work on television history inevitably focuses on what she calls “the imaginative recall of a lost object.” The thesis relates to this by combining the traditional text-based approach with a practice-based methodology, offering an experiential journey through research, experimentation, and analysis. Through this work I have two main aims. I seek to challenge the notion of studio space as a limiting, constraining environment for television drama production in the late 1950s and 60s. I also propose a new approach for broadcasting history research – that of experimental re-enactment. This introductory section sets the context for the research, and outlines the structure of the thesis which is produced as a textual exegesis and a collection of artefacts presented on an accompanying DVD. The ‘studio-bound’ era of broadcasting history is named this way to provide a short- hand marker of difference from the contemporary, ‘location-based’ method of production. The definition of the term ‘bound’ in the popularized phrase ‘studio- bound’ can be articulated as follows: Bound n. limit of territory; (usu. In pl.) limitation, restriction (The Concise Oxford English Dictionary 1986, p. 106) The term refers to how Brandt (1981, p.12) describes historical methods of making television: to “favour interior rather than exterior settings it implied a whole series of spatial constraints.” It should be noted that the definition ‘studio-bound’ is not an entirely accurate description; it is usually attributed, I argue unfairly, to the 1950s and 1960s ‘method’ of making television as even in the pre-war 1930s, television was never studio-bound in the sense that production was confined to a studio environment. Rather, outside broadcast units would undertake live broadcasts of theatre performances. As television developed its own language, borrowing heavily from film grammar, drama production gravitated towards studio environments where electronic cameras recorded programmes live, or near-live, for subsequent transmission. Only limited excursions outdoors with film cameras provided 10 alternative production space, and directors had to work creatively to turn studio limitations into creative solutions in order to effectively bring scripts to screen and to achieve “the maximisation of spatial resources” (Bignell 2010, p.56).