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Rex Tucker 0 stories, 1963
All the histories of Doctor Who will tell you that Verity Lambert was the show's first Producer. Not so. For about six weeks in May and June 1963 Rex Tucker held that position, albeit purely on a temporary basis. It was under Tucker's brief tenure that the title of the new show was thought up and plans for stories and characters discussed. It was Tucker who laid the foundation stones for the show's future success, yet all he usually warrants in Who histories is mention of the fact he directed The Gunfighters, widely regarded as the worst Who story ever. Which is rather unfair to say the least.
Rex Tucker was a true BBC veteren, having been around from pre-television days as a script writer for several popular radio shows, and was chosen by Sydney Newman to produce his nascent sci-fi serial on the strength of a series of TV adaptations of popular classics. Tucker worked closely with BBC staff writer C.E."Bunny" Webber on a debut story which Tucker later rejected for being too technically demanding, and approached actor Hugh David to play the lead. However, he was never entirely happy with Who's sci-fi slant and handed over the reins as soon as Newman found a suitable replacement.
Verity Lambert 20 stories, 86 episodes, 1963-65
After Sydney Newman's first choice to replace Tucker, Don Taylor, turned the offer down, Newman turned to a young woman who had started work for him at ABC as a typist before graduating rapidly to the position of Production Assistant on Armchair Theatre. After a spell as an American TV producer's PA, Verity Lambert was thrust into the potentially career-ending job of overseeing a brand new show almost from scratch with no background experience to fall back on. To help her she had the steady hand of veteren BBC director/writer/drama specialist Mervyn Pinfield as Associate Producer, with former BBC staff writer David Whitaker joining the team a fortnight later as Story Editor. Right from day one Lambert stamped her authority on the new show, personally selecting William Hartnell for the title role after seeing his performance in the 1963 film This Sporting Life, and making several important changes to the show's format. It was Lambert who gave the go ahead to Terry Nation's script entitled The Survivors rather than the preferred choice of Anthony Coburn's The Robots, despite the fact it featured what Newman referred to as "Bug-eyed Monsters", something he had specifically expounded should not appear in Doctor Who. Lambert successfully defended Nation's corner and the TV legend that was the Daleks was born. Newman knew at that point that Lambert had duly graduated as a fully fledged TV Producer and stepped back to allow her full control.
The first series was largely experimental and stuck rigidly to Newman's original premise of alternating historical adventures with science fiction stories. However, the phenomenal success of the Daleks prompted a number of sequels, which meant the routine had to be rejigged slightly during series two. Whitaker stepped down as Story Editor after the first production block of stories to be replaced by Dennis Spooner, who had written for a number of popular ITV shows. Pinfield, his role virtually redundant by now, left the team after The Romans and retired from the BBC, leaving Lambert and Spooner to build on Who's ever-growing success, beginning with The Web Planet which set viewing figures records which stood for almost ten years. Whitaker's departure had coincided with that of Carole Ann Ford, whose character had been the focus of the first episode. Spooner's departure after The Chase coincided with that of two more original cast members, William Russell and Jacqueline Hill, whose characters had been the original focii of the entire show. Donald Tosh moved over from Compact as Lambert's third Story Editor in 1965 and worked on a total of nine episodes with her before she set off to mastermind an entirely different show set in the Suffolk countryside.
John Wiles 4 stories, 24 episodes, 1965-66
South African Wiles followed a more traditional path to producership than his predecessor but, like her, Who was his first job in that position. It was also his last. A couple of years as Story Editor on Compact led to a similar career in the classics for the new BBC2 channel, before he was promoted by Head of Serials Donald Wilson and sent to Room 5014 to take over the reins from Verity Lambert and, ironically, be teamed up with the man who had replaced him on Compact, Donald Tosh. Although his tenure ended up being brief, he was faced with a multitude of major problems, the first being the enormity that was The Dalek Masterplan, a huge boulder of a story taking up the space of three normal-size stories, staged mainly to please the BBC's Director-General Hugh Carleton-Green. Although regarded by many as a classic, The Dalek Masterplan quickly turned into Wiles' bête-noir for the sheer logistical problems it created and persuaded him to quit his job and the BBC after only four stories, only one of which he had actually instigated.
A second problem was actress Maureen O'Brien's deep dissatisfaction with her character, Vicki. Wiles' solution was to replace Vicki with a character hurridly introduced in The Myth Makers, the young Trojan handmaiden, Katarina. However, no sooner had Donald Cotton amended his scripts than Wiles and Tosh realised Katarina would be totally unsuitable. Terry Nation was thus instructed to write Katarina out as soon as possible in The Dalek Masterplan and introduce another character to accompany the Doctor for the remainder of that story, whilst Wiles searched for a more adaptable replacement. After rejecting the character of Anne Chaplette from The Massacre for the same reason as Katarina, Wiles eventually arranged for Tosh to rewrite the end of The Massacre to introduce Dodo, virtually a carbon-copy of Susan's character and played by an actress who had narrowly lost out to Carole Ann Ford for that role, Jackie Lane. By now Wiles had decided he had had enough, both of the demanding nature of the show and its leading actor, William Hartnell, who Wiles had never gelled with and had even looked into replacing, and handed in his notice. Partly out of loyalty to Wiles, Tosh too resigned, though before leaving for good, he and successor Gerry Davis struggled to bring to fruition another story which is widely regarded to be a classic, The Celestial Toymaker. Like The Ark, this was initiated by Wiles but, like The Dalek Masterplan, also proved to be a major logistical nightmare. Free of the strict regime of the BBC, the frustrating demands of Who and the irrascible behaviour of its leading actor, Wiles returned to the theatre as a writer and director.
Innes Lloyd 16 stories, 77 episodes, 1966-68
Like his immediate predecessor, ex-Navy man Innes Lloyd was not entirely enamoured with Who when appointed to Room 5014, and despite not always seeing eye-to-eye with his incumbant Story Editor, Gerry Davis, managed to steer the show through its most traumatic period yet and create the conditions necessary to endure the loss of the show's most popular assets. His first task was overseeing the completion of the story which had ultimately caused Wiles' resignation, The Celestial Toymaker. Fortunately the end result exceeded expectations and launched the new team of Lloyd and Davis (which sounds like a firm of Welsh solicitors) on a run of serials which would raise Who out of the doldrums it had sunk into. His second task was to bring to an end the historical aspect of Who which had been an integral part of the show's concept since day one. This was highlighted by the relatively poor response to The Gunfighters. Third was disposing of the characters of Dodo and Steven, a task made slightly easier by actor Peter Purves' dissatisfaction with the way his role had panned out, and their replacement by more contemporary characters. His fourth task was forced upon him by William Hartnell's deterioration due to arteriosclerosis and pressured him into making the unenviable decision of either finding a way of replacing the established star of the show or bringing it to a conclusion, which many within the BBC heirarchy were pushing for. With the help of Davis and the show's unofficial scientific advisor, Kit Pedler, Lloyd successfully fought his show's corner by devising the concept of regeneration to explain the Doctor's new appearance and selected Patrick Troughton as the new star. A new team of writers blooded in BBC soap dramas and ITV action adventure serials raised the standard of imaginative writing to a new high, reverting the plunge in ratings to a steady six-to-seven million and introducing a number of new foes for the Doctor to replace the Daleks, which creator Terry Nation was withdrawing from Who in an eventually unsuccessful bid to take America by storm.
Mindful of his sudden introduction to what was a unique show, Lloyd introduced an "apprenticeship" system whereby his eventual replacement would be appointed several months in advance and act as his assistant, with the same happening for the Story Editor's job. This would ensure continuity and smooth transitions between personnel changes. Thus Peter Bryant was appointed Associate Producer for The Faceless Ones to learn the ropes then sent off to work on The Tomb of the Cybermen whilst Lloyd was busy with The Evil of the Daleks. Similarly, Victor Pemberton shadowed Gerry Davis on the former story before joining Bryant on the latter. The system was thrown into slight disarray when Davis suddenly decided to quit for fresh challenges after The Evil of the Daleks and Pemberton decided he didn't want the responsibility after-all. Bryant therefore took over Davis' job whilst Derrick Sherwin was plucked from freelance writing to become Assistant Story Editor. With the line of succession secure and the regular acting team fairly stable, Lloyd felt able to officially bow out after completing The Enemy of the World, returning to the world of one-off dramas he much preferred.
Peter Bryant 10 stories, 56 episodes, 1967-69
Former child-actor Peter Bryant was the first Who Producer to have had previous experience of working on the show, having served under Innes Lloyd as Associate Producer and Story Editor as the first "apprentice" under his predecessor's new scheme. His BBC credentials included appearing in the Corporation's first soap (The Grove Family) and serving as Head of the Radio Script Department. He rose to the rank of Producer temporarily for The Tomb of the Cybermen before replacing Gerry Davis as Story Editor, editing the following three stories before assuming the producership full-time on The Web of Fear. Along with his assistant and successor as Story Editor, Derrick Sherwin, Bryant devised the UNIT concept as a potential new direction for the show following favourable reviews for The Web of Fear. However, he soon found himself embroiled in a disastrous string of events during the making of series six which almost threatened to close the show down for good. To overcome the problems created by several commissioned scripts falling through at the last minute, he appointed Terrance Dicks as Sherwin's assistant, with Sherwin working on stories one, two and six and Dicks on three, four and five. The UNIT concept was introduced in The Invasion, Sherwin rewriting so much of the original script that he was eventually given the on-screen writer's credit, by which time all three of Bryant's regular actors had announced their intention to leave the show. Following an agonising wait for the BBC executives to decide the show's future, Bryant finally received news that Who was to be relaunched in colour but on much the same budget. Fortunately this is where his UNIT concept came into play. By setting all the Who stories in 20th Century England for the foreseeable future, enough savings could be made by not having to construct alien planets in the studio to cover the extra finesse and accuracy demanded by the new all-seeing colour cameras. After selecting Jon Pertwee as the new Doctor, Bryant then fell victim to one of those inexplicable decisions made by those on high. In addition to working on Who, BBC executives decided he and Sherwin could also cope with producing another BBC serial, the Francis Durbridge detective drama Paul Temple. Realising the impossibility of trying to cope with two full-time jobs at once, he handed his Who duties over to his able deputy after completing The Space Pirates.
Derrick Sherwin 2 stories, 14 episodes, 1969
Derrick Sherwin was never officially appointed Producer of Doctor Who. His fourteen episode tenure was technically as Associate Producer following his immediate superior Peter Bryant's decision to concentrate on producing Paul Temple. That said his name appears in the credits as Producer and he managed to see the show through the second crisis of its history. After overseeing the joint finale for Patrick Troughton, Frazer Hines and Wendy Padbury, Sherwin's next task was to launch the revamped show in colour with Jon Pertwee, Caroline John and Nicholas Courtney, with Courtney the only one with previous Who experience, and even managed to find time to briefly revive his acting career as a confused security guard in episode 2 of Spearhead from Space. The second Producer to have worked on the show in another capacity, Sherwin's planned relaunch was handicapped by a studio technician's strike which forced the whole of the first colour story to be shot on film on location. Fortunately, this gave the new look show a glossy cinematic sheen which later productions had to try and match. Sherwin, however, was still technically working on two different shows and quickly opted to follow Bryant's decision to concentrate on Paul Temple, leaving the BBC when that serial finally bit the dust in 1971 to form an independent production company.
Barry Letts 24 stories, 128 episodes, 1969-74
Unlike his two immediate predecessors in Room 5014, Barry Letts' previous Who experience was on set as a director, and it was whilst working on The Enemy of the World that he realised the standard BBC policy of filming one episode per week on a strict chronological basis was entirely unsuitable for a show as technically complex as Who. Thus, as soon as he was appointed Producer by Head of Serials Shaun Sutton, he totally rejigged the entire shooting schedule, having all the scenes set on one particular set filmed at the same time, thus saving money on breaking down and re-erecting sets and re-engaging actors who would otherwise only be needed for a few minutes in episodes separated by several weeks. Although it was an identical system to that used in film production, it was totally revolutionary for television and eventually enabled the BBC and the individual ITV companies to produce far more expensive-looking shows than would have been possible under the old system.
Although something of an outsider who had only been appointed after illness prevented fellow director Douglas Camfield from moving into Room 5014, Letts gelled immediately with Script Editor Terrance Dicks, Assistant Script Editors Malcolm Hulke and Trevor Ray and unofficial script advisor Robert Holmes, and used this sense of team spirit to create similar teams of actors, writers and directors who would make regular contributions to the show. The full team of regular actors, comprising Jon Pertwee, Nicholas Courtney, Katy Manning, Roger Delgado, John Levene and Richard Franklin, first assembled for Terror of the Autons at the beginning of series eight, all but Levene and Franklin appearing in every story of that series. The team of regular writers included Holmes, Hulke, Bob Baker, Dave Martin and Don Houghton, although Houghton was soon replaced by Robert Sloman, whilst the director's team included Michael Briant, Paul Bernard, Lennie Mayne and Letts himself. Whilst this tended to generate a general sense of sameness for much of the Pertwee era, it meant everyone involved knew exactly what was expected of them, saving a lot of time and money by reducing the need to reshoot botched filming sessions or rewrite inconsistent scripts. Three of Letts' greatest achievements on-screen were the introduction of the Master as the Doctor's antithesis (a concept suggested by William Hartnell in 1965), the reintroduction of the Daleks following a four-and-a-half year lay-off, and the gathering together of Messers Hartnell, Troughton and Pertwee for the tenth anniversary story. Unfortunately, all good things eventually come to an end and the tragic death of Roger Delgado in the summer of 1973 heralded the break-up of the acting team. Katy Manning departed not long after and Richard Franklin too indicated he wanted to bow out gracefully. When Pertwee also decided to quit at the end of series eleven, both Letts and Dicks felt the time was right for them to move on as well. Letts eventually found a new Doctor in the form of Tom Baker, appointed Robert Holmes as Script Editor in place of Dicks, oversaw the production of Baker's debut story then moved on with Dicks to produce a series of adaptations of the classics for the BBC. He returned to the show briefly in 1980 as Executive Producer to oversee John Nathan Turner's first few months in Room 5014.
Philip Hinchcliffe 16 stories, 68 episodes, 1974-77
Philip Hinchcliffe was the first incumbant of Room 5014 not to have a BBC pedigree. He came straight in from ATV and formed an instantly successful partnership with old-Who-hand Robert Holmes which steered the now Tom Baker-led show into regions of gothic horror which had full-time self-appointed guardians of the nation's morals like Mary Whitehouse up in arms almost permanently throughout his tenure and beyond. Both Hinchcliffe and Holmes shared a love of classic gothic novels and films and unashamedly plundered the genre for ratings-busting Who stories. Series thirteen was the highlight, both of the Hinchcliffe/Holmes era and the show in general, with the likes of Robert Louis Stevenson's The Strange Case of Dr.Jekyll and Mr.Hyde, George Pal's Forbidden Planet, Hammer's The Mummy, Don Siegel's Invasion of the Bodysnatchers, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein and Nigel Kneale's The Quatermass Experiment providing the raw material for a team of highly experienced writers to refurbish as Who stories. The gothic theme was further explored by introducing a new Victorian-style TARDIS Control Room clearly influenced by George Pal's The Time Machine in The Masque of Mandragora. When Lis Sladen was finally allowed to bow out at the end of The Hand of Fear, Hinchcliffe took the unprecedented step of producing a story featuring no companions at all, having rightly decided Tom Baker was capable of carrying the show on his own. The following story, The Face of Evil, introduced an entirely new type of character in the savage, uncivilised Leela. Inspired by Shaw's Pygmalion, Hinchcliffe's idea was for the Doctor to gradually civilise Leela over a series of adventures. Unfortunately, subsequent events conspired to thwart Hinchcliffe's grand plan with only The Talons of Weng-Chiang showing the way the concept was headed. In an inexplicable move which was to have far-reaching and damaging effects for Who, BBC executives decided to move Hinchcliffe over to a new serial that had been developed to compete with ITV's The Sweeney. The man behind Target's development, Graham Williams, was moved in the opposite direction. Neither show ever fully recovered.
Graham Williams 17 stories, 72 episodes, 1977-79
Having joined the BBC as a script editor in 1970, Graham Williams was happily working on a new detective series designed to take on and beat ITV's The Sweeney when he was abruptly moved to Room 5014 and told to run Doctor Who instead. Although Williams got on with the task in hand without much complaint, starting by reviving the now refurbished white TARDIS control room, it soon became apparent that he was out of his depth when it came to dealing with the eccentricities of the show's undoubted star, Tom Baker. As well as Baker, Williams inherited Script Editor Robert Holmes and co-star Louise Jameson, the latter central to Hinchcliffe's Leela concept. Williams had had to persuade Holmes not to follow Hinchcliffe and stay on until a replacement was found, whilst attempting to please Baker meant Williams had little time to concentrate on developing Jameson's role, which led to Jameson deciding to quit at the end of series fifteen. The result was a string of increasingly disappointing stories written and directed by a number of individuals new to the show. The K9 concept was seized upon as a promising viewer-hook when Bob Baker and Dave Martin created the canine robot for The Invisible Enemy but it rapidly became yet another foil for Baker's oblique sense of humour. Dismayed at the way Who had been allowed to become The Tom Baker Show, Holmes finally quit after finalising his own script for The Sun Makers. Following Jameson's rather abrupt departure in a story Williams himself was forced to rewrite with new Script Editor Anthony Read, Williams tried to introduce a sense of cohesiveness by staging a series of stories linked to a central theme, the Key to Time series. Although this introduced a new companion in the form of recently graduated Time Lady Romana, the results were less than impressive and led to Read jumping ship to join ITV. Despite serving a similar term as his predecessor, Williams went through three Script Editors to Hinchcliffe's one, his third right-hand man being Douglas Adams, who had recently risen to prominence with the revolutionary radio serial The Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy after having replaced John Cleese as Graham Chapman's writing partner on Monty Python. This should have rung alarm bells for Williams but he failed to notice. With Adams on a similar wavelength to Baker, the show veered well away from its original premise, with anarchic surreal comedy becoming de rigeur. Series seventeen kicked off with the first appearance of the Daleks for over four years, this and the subsequent story, City of Death, another which had to be totally rewritten by Williams and his script-editor, ironically achieving what would be the highest viewing figures in the show's history, albeit thanks to a technician's strike which had ITV off the air for three months. The series ended in major disappointment when the intended finale, Shada, was forced to be abandoned unfinished when BBC technicians staged their own walkout. Unable to cope with Baker's overpowering presence affecting almost every stage of production from initial plot outlines to ad-libbed additions to finalised scripts, Williams' tenure ended under a cloud with the show at its lowest ever ebb. Adams went on to enjoy fame and fortune with his multi-media-formatted Hitch-Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy whilst Williams ended up at Tyne Tees producing Supergran after a return to Who as a writer was scotched by the cancellation of the original Series Twenty-three.
John Nathan Turner 47 stories, 170 episodes, 1980-89
When John Nathan Turner returned to the show he had worked on as Production Unit Manager, he found Room 5014 in total disarray. He had two regular actors, one of which was almost out of control, a pile of scripts, only two of which were viable, no Script Editor, no directors, very few writers willing to submit scripts they knew would be changed beyond all recognition by the show's lead actor, and very little faith from the BBC heirarchy. Within a matter of weeks he had taken on Chris Bidmead as Script Editor, commissioned a lorry-load of new scripts from new writers, engaged a new team of experienced directors, ordered new title graphics and music, secured two extra episodes and told Baker his next series would also be his last. The first signs of Turner's revamping of what had become a tired concept came in Full Circle, the third story of series eighteen. Gone were the surreal in-jokes and the substandard plots that had typified Williams' tenure, in came fresh new ideas, glossy location shoots and a general sense of purpose. It also introduced the character of Adric, the first step in Turner's plan to enlarge and totally change the regular cast. Romana and K9 departed in Warrior's Gate, Nyssa and a rejuvenated Master were introduced in The Keeper of Traken whilst Tegan joined in Logopolis, the story that saw the end of Tom Baker's near seven year stretch and his replacement by Peter Davison, who Turner had worked with on the popular BBC serial All Creatures Great and Small. Having already plundered that show for writers and directors, it only seemed appropriate to also select a prominent cast member to be the new Doctor.
Turner's new look for the show included a blend of writers from differing backgrounds. Some were new to television, others were old hands at TV writing but new to Who, still others were new to writing but had experience in other areas of TV production. However, Turner's most revolutionary change came in Davison's first series when the traditional Saturday tea-time transmission time was ashewed for two mid-week slots. Unfortunately, whilst this meant ratings would no longer suffer the diversionary tactics being deployed by ITV, it also caused a great deal of confusion with large numbers of viewers failing to realise there were actually two episodes being broadcast each week, as well as halving the actual series run from twenty-six weeks to just thirteen. To countermand any potential loss of interest in the show, Turner also instigated a policy of casting well-known actors in prominent roles. Lamentably this too backfired, with many fans seeing this as a cheapening of the show (it was essentially a precursor of modern attitudes towards TV drama where celebrity faces are considered more important than plot quality). His obsession with all things new extended to the post of Script Editor, Bidmead, himself new to the job, being replaced by Antony Root, who was technically an Assistant Floor Manager on work experience, and eventually Eric Saward, again new to script editing. Although this promised a fresh influx of new ideas, it was a policy that was also likely to backfire spectacularly.
With his policies in place and apparently working faultlessly, Turner turned his attentions towards celebrating the show's Twentieth anniversary in style. Not content with a single story, he opted to include elements from the past in each of series twenty's stories. Thus Omega and Borusa appeared in Arc of Infinity, the Mara returned in Snakedance, the Brigadier returned after an eight-year-plus absence in Mawdryn Undead, a story which began a trilogy featuring the return of the Black Guardian, whilst the Master reappeared in The King's Demons. The Daleks should have rounded the series off before the big anniversary story but a technician's strike caused production of their showcase to be postponed. With the celebrations over, Turner became the first producer to be faced with the task of finding a second new Doctor when Davison opted to bow out after three years. After selecting Colin Baker to take over, now with the effervescent Peri as his sole travelling companion, the show took a turn towards the morbid and grotesque influenced by Saward's rather black sense of humour. Naturally this raised a number of complaints, leading to the show's "resting", a move controversially ordered by the BBC1 controller Michael Grade. Whilst Turner surrepticiously orchestrated a press and fan's campaign to have Who reinstated, Saward wrote Slipback for BBC Radio 4 to try and bridge the huge gap between series twenty-two and twenty-three. This differing approach to the "crisis" gradually widened an already discernable gap between Producer and Script Editor, reaching splitting point during the making of the fourteen-part epic The Trial of a Time Lord, Saward leaving abruptly partway through scripting the penultimate episode. By now, Turner had fingers in many pies, sanctioning all kinds of Who-related merchandise and bringing both the Target series of TV tie-in novels and Doctor Who Magazine in with the TV show to form a multi-media gestalt under his overall control.
The publicity Turner had generated during the so-called "Cancellation Crisis" ironically played into Michael Grade's hands. Originally nothing more than an extended rest period between series, Turner's behind-the-scenes influence allowed Grade the opportunity to force conditions on him if the show was to continue, the most prominent being the insistence that Colin Baker be replaced as the Doctor. Turner thus became the first Producer to have to search for a new lead actor three times. Still basking in the glory of having saved the show, albeit with conditions attached, he appointed Sylvester McCoy as Baker's replacement, and another total newcomer as Script Editor, Andrew Cartmel. Turner's continued belief in injecting fresh blood began to backfire at this point. McCoy was far from convincing as the new Doctor whilst Baker's abrupt departure meant continuity rested entirely on the shoulders of Bonnie Langford, who Turner had specifically created the character of Mel for purely on the basis of her hair colour and who many fans openly disliked. Cartmel, meanwhile, was not only new to Who, he was new to television as well, not the best qualifications for dealing with a long-established show under threat of cancellation. Series twenty-four proceeded tentatively, with McCoy managing to win over many of his doubters, but then Langford decided to move on. Both Turner and Cartmel had differing ideas over the type of character to replace Mel, Turner preferring the more traditional female companion in the form of Fifties Welsh teddy-girl Ray, originally intended to be played by Lynn Gardner, whilst Cartmel pushed for the more radical Ace. Eventually Cartmel got his way and, with the help of a number of personal acquaintances mostly new to television, moved the show away from its long-established format. Stories became more obscure and cerebral and created a whole new persona for the Doctor which was light years from anything that had been done before. Realising he had lost control, Turner allowed Cartmel an almost free rein whilst he began badgering his superiors to find a new Producer. By now, however, the BBC executives had more-or-less decided to end the show and rescheduled it in direct competition with ITV's hugely popular soap Coronation Street in a deliberate bid to further depress the viewing figures. With Turner trying desperately to be transfered elsewhere whilst publically supporting the show's new direction, Cartmel decided upon a themed approach to series twenty-six. Ironically, with the show about to come to an ignominious end, the theme was "Evolution", all four stories in the series involving the concept in one form or another. Ratings, however, continued to plummet and Turner continued to be denied the opportunity to move elsewhere. Eventually, as series twenty-six was beginning its run on air, rumours began circulating that the BBC were looking to farm the show out to an independent production company. With the BBC apparently then refusing all offers from interested production companies, including Verity Lambert's CinemaVerity and Victor Pemberton's Saffron Productions, what this amounted to was no more Who for the forseeable future. Turner finally got his freedom, Cartmel moved on to Casualty along with many of his writing cronies, and Room 5014 was closed forever.
