May 31, 2025 • 43 mins
Step into a time machine of broadcasting history as Professor John Cook unveils the extraordinary story behind his rare interviews with two television visionaries – Dennis Potter and Sidney Newman.
As a PhD student in 1990, Cook secured what would become a treasured artifact in television history: a candid, two-and-a-half-hour conversation with the notoriously private Dennis Potter, creator of groundbreaking dramas like "The Singing Detective." This wasn't just any interview – it was a champagne-fueled verbal sparring match in a London basement that revealed the soul of a writer who transformed television drama with his revolutionary techniques and deeply personal themes.
The magic lies in the details: Potter arriving late, demanding champagne, chain-smoking throughout while delivering eloquent insights about his craft. "If you listen carefully," Cook reveals, "he would go into a soliloquy and actually reveal many of the secrets." Thanks to modern AI technology, these fragile interview tapes have been restored to near-studio quality, bringing Potter's voice back to life with remarkable clarity after 35 years.
Equally fascinating is Cook's encounter with Sidney Newman, the dynamic Canadian producer who created Doctor Who and revolutionized BBC drama in the 1960s. Newman's candid claim that George Lucas stole the design for R2-D2 from his iconic Daleks provides a delightful glimpse into television history from the man who helped shape it. These interviews capture a pivotal moment in broadcasting's evolution through the words of those who pushed its boundaries.
Whether you're a television history buff, a Doctor Who fanatic, or simply appreciate hearing creative minds discuss their work with honesty and depth, these restored conversations offer unprecedented access to the thoughts, processes and personalities of two men who forever changed what television could be. Subscribe to the JRC Media YouTube channel to hear these remarkable historical artifacts for yourself.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hot lights fade, the curtains rise, new stories
waiting behind our eyes,charlotte and John with the
final say, breaking down thescreens in their own way.
(00:21):
This is the final cut, wherethe real reviews ignite.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Good afternoon and welcome.
I'm delighted to be joined byProfessor John Cook.
He's a professor of media atGlasgow, caledonian, and he's a
pioneer of Potter studies, whichis basically he literally wrote
the book of the greattelevision dramatist Vince
Landbeck.
(00:48):
So basically the book he wrotewas called Dennis Potter Live on
Screen, and then he laterunearthed an unknown Potter
script in the Forrest O'Deanarchive which added it to a
fresh chapter of British TVhistory.
But long before that, as ayoung PhD student, john secured
(01:08):
two extraordinary encounters anin-depth conversation with
Demnitz Potter himself at BBC inMay 1990, and an earlier
sit-down with Sidney Newman, thevisionary Canadian producer who
conceived Doctor who andrevolutionised BBC drama in the
60s.
Today we're going to look backat these informative interviews
(01:31):
and hear what it was like toquestion these two giants of
television and the creativeprime, and explore how these
meetings shaped Professor Cook'sown scholarship and teaching
career.
Professor Cook, thank you forbeing here.
So let's rewind to your student.
How did you first land theinterview with Dennis Potter?
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Well, thank you very much, Charlotte, for that
introduction.
Yes, so it's been quiteinteresting for me recently to
revisit all of this 35 years on,to go back to the very
beginnings of the work that I'vedone throughout my academic
career, but where it all began,and I've managed to dig out the
(02:15):
old interview tapes that Iconducted the interview with
Dennis Potter, and it all sortof came about, really because I
was doing the first British PhDon Dennis Potter's work.
Now, for those who may be lessfamiliar with Dennis Potter,
dennis Potter is a legendaryfigure in the history of
television drama and he's knownnot just in the UK but also
(02:39):
around the world for a lot ofhis pioneering techniques in TV
drama what are often callednon-naturalistic techniques, and
a few of the famous ones thathe customised were adults
playing children in dramas suchas his famous play Blue Remember
Hills, characters stepping outof the drama and bursting into
(03:01):
song, as well as customising awhole series of techniques such
as intricate use of flashbacksand flash-forwards and melding
of fantasy sequences withreality sequences.
So he's a bit of a legend.
He's regarded as one of themost important creative figures
in terms of the way that hepioneered a lot of these
(03:22):
techniques and he's influenceddramatists and filmmakers not
just in the UK but also inAmerica, including figures like
David Lynch, who actually, atthe time that I was interviewing
him, he was actually trying towrite a script for David Lynch
the late great director DavidLynch which was actually an
(03:43):
adaptation of a novel by a Welshwriter called DM Thomas, called
the White Hotel, and Potter wasactually busy writing that on
the very day that I met him hewas working on that screenplay.
The screenplay in the end wasnever produced.
David Lynch went on to otherprojects, not least Twin Peaks,
(04:05):
so it was never produced.
Um, david lynch uh, went on toother projects, not least twin
peaks, um, so it was never,never produced.
But the whole sort of myencounter with them all came
about because I was going aroundlondon interviewing a lot of
the people that had workedbeside dennis potter throughout
his career, uh, includingproducers, uh, directors and
also actually, as you'vementioned, charlotte Sidney
(04:27):
Newman as well, who was reallyhis early executive.
Sidney Newman was head of BBCTV drama in the 1960s when
Potter was getting his start.
So I'd done all this and gonearound and interviewed these
people, but Potter at at thatpoint had just had the biggest
critical drubbing of his careerwith a four-part serial that is
(04:50):
now regarded as a bit notorious,called black eyes, which, um,
previously potter had had alwayshad stellar reviews.
There had been controversiesbut he had always sort of won
the approval of critics andaudiences tended to follow.
But with Black Eyes he hit areal brick wall.
Critics dubbed it as like theworst serial of the year, and
(05:15):
what was more insulting forPotter was that he himself had
directed it, the first piece ofwork that Potter had not only
written but directed.
So Potter wasn't in really anyfit state to accept interviews.
He was quite depressed for awhile but eventually, with me
going around and interviewingall these other figures and
finally what I understand thestory to be finally he thought I
(05:40):
better see this guy was becauseI had gone right the way back
to find some early letters thatin correspondence that Potter
had had with an MP calledChristopher Mayhew in the late
1950s when Potter was a student,potter had worked on a
documentary that ChristopherMayhew had made.
(06:01):
This was a member of parliamentwho was also jobbing as a TV
presenter and Mayhew by thatstage in 1990 had been ennobled
and was now Lord Mayhew andextraordinarily, he seemed to
keep all his correspondencegoing back decades.
So when I had written toChristopher Mayhew now Lord
(06:21):
Mayhew and Mayhew had said well,here's some correspondence, and
he sent it, and that was greatfor me.
But then Mayhew, as a courtesy,informed Potter that these had
been sent to me and Potterthought gosh, this little guy's
digging here, there andeverywhere.
I better see him.
And that's ultimately how theinterview happened.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
So that's fantastic.
What preparation did you do?
And what was one question youwere most nervous about asking
him?
Speaker 1 (06:53):
well, I, you know, understandably, I was a little
nervous as I showed up to hisliterary agent's office.
Uh, that afternoon.
Um, according to my interviewtapes, the exact date was 10th
may 1990.
Um, so it was on that date.
Um, so I was nervous because Iwas a student, he was way up
there and I was, you know, juststarting out.
(07:14):
Um, so it was, there was a,there was a power imbalance, but
, um, ultimately, what I had todo with that interview was very
much play devil's advocate withPotter because, as Potter freely
admitted, he was a reclusivecharacter.
In fact, at one point in ourinterview he said I'm a
reclusive character, I don'texpose myself, I appear to.
(07:37):
In his, in his works he meanthe appears to be more personal
than he actually is.
Now, when you've got a writerthat actually says that to you,
you're immediately on your metalthinking well, hang on, hang on
.
Is he playing games with me?
Is he trying to pull the woolover my eyes or is he being
honest?
So it was very much aninteresting kind of sparring
(08:01):
session.
It went on for two and a halfhours and I should say that
Potter was very friendly duringit.
Now, apparently, as I understandit, he could be aggressive to
strangers coming in and askinghim questions, and many an
interviewer from press had beengiven short shrift over the
years and kicked out essentiallyif they sort of annoyed Potter.
(08:24):
But I guess with with me it wasbecause I was somebody out from
outside that media world of youknow the press that potter used
throughout his career to managepublicity for his work.
This was something different.
It was.
It was more of a an extendedsit down and, and actually, as I
look back on it, it wasextremely kind of Potter to do
(08:45):
this, because I was no one.
He could just continue to sayno, and so it was actually quite
a generous act.
And what I began to realise inlater years was how untypical
this was.
Although Potter was quiteubiquitous in the British media,
it was always at the time thathe was giving publicity for his
work, so he would give lots ofinterviews.
(09:07):
But what I hadn't quiteappreciated that young was that
this was unique, that in fact Idon't think he had ever spoken
to an academic researcher,someone from outside the press,
in such detail ever before sowhen you walked in there to his
office, but what did you firststruck you?
Speaker 2 (09:27):
what struck you first about his demeanor or working
environment?
Was it like a, like a den, orlike what?
Was it the office?
What would it look like?
Speaker 1 (09:35):
well, the interview took place in potter's uh
literary agent's office, so itwas a a neutral space.
In that sense it it wasn't likebeing invited to the writer's
private apartment or anythinglike that, so it was a neutral
space.
It was in the basement of hisagent's office, then office I
think the agency's moved sincethen.
(09:56):
But the interesting thing wasPotter arrived late.
Now, this is characteristic, soI understand.
But when he arrived, maybeabout 20 minutes late, something
like that I'd already beenchatting to the literary agent
and um, uh, you know, and shegave me the literary agent's
name was Judy Dache, and shegave gave me some interesting
(10:17):
background about her own, howshe came to be involved with the
work of Dennis Potter.
But but then when Potter camein, I was immediately struck by
how tall he was actually,because the television screen
doesn't really show, you know,potter didn't need to be always
shot in close-up in interviews,so he was quite tall.
(10:37):
But he immediately came in andhe immediately asked his
literary agent for champagne tobe brought down from upstairs.
Uh, and he, as soon as he camein and took off new times old
times champagne, yeah, this wasso.
This took me back a little bit.
And and um so potter, I guessin that sense, was the original
(11:01):
champagne socialist.
He, um, he enjoyed the goodlife, he, he smoked prodigiously
and he also did drink.
And this was in the middle ofthe afternoon.
So he asked for champagne to bebrought down from his agent's
office and what I noticed wasthat when he sat down he began
(11:22):
to pour some out for himself,and then he looked up at me, and
I'll never forget him staringup at me from behind his glasses
, saying, oh, I suppose you'llwant some of this too.
And then, when I held out myglass for him to pour, he said
typical Scotsman, you know,wanting something for nothing.
So it was that kind of spiritof badinage and playfulness and
(11:46):
friendly verbal jousting thatcharacterized the whole
interview.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
However, he was famous, a very old journalist.
Did he test you and how did youwin his trust?
I mean, how did you feel, howdid you build trust with him?
Was he worried about?
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Well, I think yes, well, this was one of the things
is, I could have been anyoneand the theory could have asked
anything about his work, andthere were occasions when I did
do that, actually, where I sortof pried a little bit.
Now, the occasion of thisparticular discussion is because
to mark Potter's 90thanniversary it's 90 years since
(12:28):
Dennis Potter was born.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
I have released an extract from the interview,
which I think Charlotte is goingto play a bit of at the
beginning of this, yeah, and inthis, actually the bit that I've
selected now this previouslythe interview was unlistenable.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
It had been recorded on an old sort of cassette
dictaphone.
It was all I could afford as astudent and while it was
transcribable and I could, youknow, use it for quoting in my
thesis and then in my academicpublications, it was
unlistenable to anybody really.
But what I've been able to dowith the latest AI tools is take
(13:07):
an extract and restore it tonear studio quality.
So for the first time peoplecan hear what I heard 35 years
ago and the quality of the man'sdiction.
He was extremely eloquent.
Sometimes the way he talked, itwas like poetry.
But the extract that I'vechosen is exactly one of those
moments when I was just sort ofmaybe going a little bit too far
(13:30):
for the reclusive potter, alittle bit maybe too personal
for him, and you'll hearlaughing.
He says I think we've reachedthe end of this interview.
But then, yeah, but thencharacteristically, rather than
swerving, he then went into asoliloquy, essentially a speech
(13:51):
that was far more revealing andtold me far more about the
character of the man and now you, the audience, who can listen
to it, than anything that I hadthe rather banal question that I
had asked.
So this was extremelycharacteristic of Potter is that
he gave you a lot and he didgive of himself and he did
(14:13):
reveal himself, albeit in hisown way and in his own oblique
way.
He's never going to give me thedirect.
You know he hated the wordabout.
He says if you ever ask him orever asked him, you know what's
your work about.
He says if you ever ask him orever asked him, you know what's
your work about.
He says I hate that word.
I hate.
You know it's not about.
You know, art shouldn't beabout that.
In his terms, it should beoblique, it should have metaphor
(14:33):
, but what he would do is by, hewould go into a soliloquy and
actually reveal to you, if youlisten carefully, many of the
secrets, if you listen carefully, many of the secrets.
And this was proven about adecade later when I had the
great fortune of meetingPotter's eldest daughter, jane,
jane Potter, who's still alive,and this was an event in the
(14:56):
Forest of Dean in 2004.
Forest of Dean in WestGloucestershire is where Potter
was brought up and where, nearbyhis, his family still still
live and um, jane had managed tohear, even though they were
almost unlistenable, had managedto hear some quite a bit of of
my interview.
Uh, potter had apparentlytalked about the interview to
(15:19):
her, according to jane at thetime, and said it was a good
interview.
And when Jane listened back toit 2004, 10 years after her
father's death, she took, shesaid it's a bit like having my
father back in the room with me.
So it was, it was a goodinterview.
That that did reveal a lot ofstuff and I mentioned to Jane
(15:39):
that, as a young student, when Ileft the interview two and a
half after two and a half hoursand they finally got rid of me,
I thought to myself, oh, maybeI've missed my chance here,
maybe there was some things Icould have asked and didn't and
so on.
Maybe I've blown it.
But then, listening back to thetapes, I realized that Potter
had given me a lot and in factJane entirely unprompted said
(16:04):
that confirmed that when shesaid with that interview he gave
you everything.
So it was, it was, um, you know, in that sense it's a
remarkable interview and I hopeto be able to release more of it
to studio quality and, in fact,ideally what I would like to do
and maybe put out an appeal ifanybody's listening.
I would like to partner with aprofessional studio producer who
(16:28):
would be able to release thewhole thing and and do it into
the best quality.
What I've done with thisyoutube extract is a sort of
proof of concept, a technical uhexperiment on my part, just
using standard desktop tools,but it'd be great, now that I've
relocated the interview tapes,to really clean them all up in
(16:48):
studio quality, release themprofessionally so that the
audience can hear this, I think,very significant.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Interview with potter so, and if any of you listeners
who have contacts in in themedia industry or in in in terms
of able to clean this up, thatwould be superb if you can get
in touch with us or get in touchwith John on LinkedIn.
My final question here beforewe move on is what answer from
(17:17):
Potter surprised you most?
Did it change the way you laterinterpret his play?
Speaker 1 (17:24):
yes, that's a.
That's a good question,charlotte.
Well, um, again, it's.
It's revealed in embryo form inthe extract that I've released,
which to the public, which isabout, uh, I think it's about a
six minute extract, uh, and itcame at the very end of the
interview when, admittedly,potter was getting a little bit
tipsy because he had beendrinking so much champagne.
(17:45):
By the way, he drunk champagneand chain smoked throughout our
entire interview and I remembermy phd supervisor saying I
should have been paid dangermoney for being in in a room
with the, you know, passivesmoking, because it was
literally a sealed off umbasement in his agent's office.
But, um, the key thing was thatcame out a lot from my interview
(18:09):
with Potter is the religiousaspect of it.
Now, I wasn't particularlyreligious in any great respect,
so therefore I was moreinterested in the techniques
that Potter was using.
But I realized after theinterview and it had been
dawning on me for some timebefore, but I realized that
there was no way I could avoidtackling religion in porter's
(18:30):
work, um, on the basis of theinterview that porter had given
me, because, as you will hear inthe youtube extract, um, he
says, you know, at the end ofthe day, I remain a christian
and here we're now going tolisten to the extract from the
interview.
Except this, that at the end ofthe day, I have tried through a
(18:51):
long route and through my owncalvaries or whatever.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I remain somehow or other, against all the odds of a
Christian.
Now we're moving on to SidneyNewman.
So you were very lucky not justhaving met Dan Sporter but you
also met Sidney Newman.
So how did that encounter comeabout and what did you hope to
(19:19):
learn from the founder of Doctorwho?
And could you also tell us abit the audience, a bit about
Sidney Newman and what his partwas in founding Doctor who?
Yeah, sure, I mean he, his partwas in founding Doctor who.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, sure, I mean, he's famous not just for Doctor
who, but nowadays I think that'swhat he's most remembered for
because he was the guy who, whenhe was a Canadian Sidney Newman
was a Canadian producer whomoved into television production
in Canada, I think originallyfrom documentaries, and then
(19:52):
built up a reputation in Canadathat he was poached in the late
1950s to come over and work forthe commercial television
station ITV in Britain and hepioneered a groundbreaking
series of single plays, singletelevision plays under the
umbrella title Armchair Theatre.
(20:12):
Anyway, flash forward to theearly 1960s and Newman was being
so successful at ITV where hehad also pioneered the Avengers,
not the MCU, the Marvel CinemaAvengers, but the original 1960s
spy series the Marvel cinemaAvengers, but the original 1960s
(20:34):
spy series starring PatrickMcNee and most famously Diana
Rigg as his female sidekick.
And the Avengers was doinggreat guns.
In fact, recently on my YouTubechannel released my son
actually did the edit released aYouTube shot showing the title
sequence from the Avengers.
So Newman was a real powerhousein television drama production,
(20:54):
both high-brow, like singletelevision plays, and the
low-brow mass market stuff.
As a result he was sosuccessful.
The BBC poached him in the early1960s to come over to the BBC
and be head of TV drama head ofBBC TV drama running the whole
show, history and the future andwould be a crotchety old man.
(21:16):
Initially.
(21:38):
That's how he was envisaged anda lot of it was, as Newman
admitted to me, was borrowedfrom HG HG Wells' famous novel
the Time Machine, published in1899, but more particularly the
1960 Hollywood film versionadaptation of the Time Machine
that Newman had watched.
Newman wasn't the most literateof men he had read.
(22:00):
You know he read widely but hewasn't steeped in literature.
Movies and TV was his firstlove.
So in that sense he was a bitof a rough populist compared to
your typical BBC type in theearly 60s.
And it was a result of thatpopulism that Newman and he came
up the name, I think as well,doctor who.
So I was extremely lucky to getNewman as an interview because
(22:23):
Newman just happened to be inLondon in February of 1990 when
I was doing my research.
He had spent years in the 70sand and most of the 80s in
Canada, but he occasionally cameback to London and rented a
flat because to visit hisdaughter, whose name was Gillian
, and it just so happened thatas I was doing my research.
(22:46):
He was over in London.
So that was an unbelievablepiece of luck.
So you know we talk about, youknow, dennis Pother and how
fortunate I was to get thatinterview.
Well, that was as a result of abit of hard graft, you know,
trying to persuade Pother.
But with Sidney Newman it waspure luck, because these were
the days before Zoom, youcouldn't just go online and
speak to somebody in Canada.
(23:07):
So the fact that I got that,that was actually to me the
biggest scoop of my research.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, so he had already been shaking up drama.
Could you sense the confidenceor controversy in the room when
you're interviewing him also asa person?
Well, how did you?
How did he come across?
Speaker 1 (23:25):
very dynamic man.
He his colleagues had oftentalked about as being one of the
most dynamic figures ever tohave worked in television.
But but one of the things thatwas interesting.
You know we've talked aboutdennis potter and how he was so
tall.
Sydney newman, he was a littlefella, he was, he was, you know,
he stood up to my shoulder andI'm not that tall, I'm about
(23:46):
what?
Five feet nine.
So he was a little man.
Maybe it's the little men, youknow, they often say the little
men are the most powerfulNapoleon complex.
I don't know, but you could tellthat this was a man who had
been a powerhouse.
I mean, when I was meetingSidney Newman he was older, he
was rather a bit of an unknownfigure in british television by
(24:09):
1990 because he had left britainin 1967 to go back to his
native canada.
So that meant that while he wasa legend in tv history circles
and amongst those of hiscolleagues who remembered him,
to the current generation of TVproducers in Britain in 1990,
and obviously since not as wellknown, and Doctor who at that
(24:34):
point was in a hiatus, so Doctorwho, his name wasn't discussed
really in relation to Doctor who.
So he was a bit of a sadderfigure I would say Dennis Potter
was at the height of his powerswhen I met him.
Sidney Newman was a figure indecline who was trying in his
occasional visits to Britain tointerest British television in
(24:54):
making some of his productions.
And he did have some successwith a few independent
productions pitched to Channel 4at the time.
But you can see, if you look uphis resume on IMDb for example,
how his work was tailing offand he was a sort of the lost
ghost of British television.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Do you feel it was a sort of sunset boulevard moment?
Speaker 1 (25:20):
A little bit.
He had time on his hands and hewanted to talk and he wanted to
talk and with me he foundsomebody that we wanted to
listen because, you know, notmany of my generation would know
who Sidney Newman was.
They'd know what Doctor who wasand they'd know the Avengers,
but they wouldn't know the name.
And I was there to interviewSidney Newman, not about Doctor
(25:42):
who but about his relationshipto Dennis Potter and the fact
that he had been head of TVdrama during that period.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Oh, okay, so that's what brought you into.
That was what it was about?
Speaker 1 (25:51):
yeah, but I couldn't resist pitching some questions
about Doctor who, because I loveDoctor who so much.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
So, and the question that you had in your interview
did you manage to, was it quitetalkative of Doctor who, was
that?
So?
What was the majority of theinterview spent on?
Was it on Doctor who or was iton his television career, and
how long was the interview?
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Well, yeah, these are all good questions.
The interview, I mean I spentmost of the day with Sidney
Newman and it wasn't just, youknow, with the tape recorder
switched on.
I mean, when I look back at myinterview tapes I have about
probably about three hours worthof stuff on tape.
(26:37):
But I sat and had lunch withhim in his apartment.
You know he wanted to speak.
I think he was probably a bitlonely in London and so I spent
time with him.
I had my lunch with him and Ispoke to him.
And in fact there's a funnystory actually, because when I,
when I was preparing to comedown from Scotland to do these
various interviews because I'dscheduled them, you know, one
(27:03):
each day because I had a numberof potters directors to
interview and so on SidneyNewman had said remember to
bring a haggis.
So I get to London and Isuddenly realise, oh, I forgot
to bring a haggis.
So I chase round all the Londonbutchers and you know I go into
(27:24):
several butchers no haggis here, mate, this is London and
eventually find a haggis inCovent Garden, a garden butcher.
So I bring this haggis toSidney Newman's apartment, you
know, as a kind of a gift,saying here's the haggis.
You know you asked for haggisand Newman says yeah, but it'll
(27:47):
be off right Because it's notdown from Scotland.
You asked for haggis and Newmansaid yeah, but it'll be off
right Because it's not down fromScotland.
And I didn't have the heart tosay to him that in fact I just
bought it that morning from abutcher's in Covent Garden.
So that's the haggis story.
But I spent a lot of time withhim that day and got a lot of
material.
But you're right, the bulk ofthe interview was on I took him
(28:09):
through his career, starting inCanada, and I was kind of
conscious, you know, that I justdidn't want to do just talk
about Dennis Potter that.
You know, having a sit downwith this man was quite unique.
So I went through his entirecareer and also pitched in
questions that were entirelyunrelated in relation to Doctor
who.
But yes, the bulk of theinterview was on Sidney Newman,
(28:33):
his career at BBC televisiondrama and how he interacted with
Dennis Potter.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Was he proud of the Doctor who, how it came out?
I mean, sometimes when you findthe writer to write something
and what comes out on the screenis quite different, was he
quite happy with how they hadstaged it?
Or was it then that the writerhad more powers over the
production that perhaps theydon't have today?
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Well, sidney Newman was keen to stress that he, as
head of TV drama, he wasn't aproducer of Doctor who.
In fact it was a young, one ofthe first actual female drama
producers, verity Lambert, whoNewman appointed to be the first
(29:16):
series producer of Doctor who.
This was quite groundbreaking atime when women tended just to
be secretaries or assistants atbest, and Newman actually was a
sort of early feminist in thatsense, in the sense that he
would, he would give young womenopportunities, and women of all
ages opportunities, I thinkmaybe because Canada was
(29:37):
slightly more egalitarian atthat point compared to, say, um,
england.
So Verity Lambert was theproducer and she realized it in
her own way and with the firstdirector of Doctor who, the
director of the first story, anAsian man called Varys Hussain.
So again, you know, diversityright in there, right at the
(29:59):
very start of Doctor who, andNewman facilitated that.
He didn't oversee it day to day,but Doctor who wasman's
creation, newman, um, you knowthere was a lot of hands
involved in the creation ofdoctor who, but the inspiration
for it would never have happenedat the bbc if it hadn't been
for this canadian with, um apenchant for science fiction and
(30:23):
time travel, who had recentlyseen the movie the Time Machine
coming into the BBC and wantingto shake it up and having the
power to do so.
So that's really important.
So, newman, you know a reallyimportant figure.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
And if you compare these two experiences, in what
way were the differences in theinterviewees?
Potter and Newman were thedifferent interviewees.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Potter and Newman Different.
Yeah, I mean Potter, it waslike an English literary seminar
, you know, in the sense thatyou're going into a great deal
of depth on aspects of hisreligious belief, his artistic
techniques and very muchexploring that world and getting
(31:08):
into a kind of literary depth.
With sydney newman it was muchmore um conversation, about um
production and about audiences,and you asked before charlotte
about whether he was proud ofdoctor who.
Um, we've released um onyoutube.
A short extract from myinterview with sydney newman, a
sort of follow-up to the DennisPotter interview which people
(31:30):
can hear on YouTube, and the bitthat we've selected or that I
found relevant to Doctor who iswhere he says he in his opinion
I'm not sure I agree with itmyself, but in his opinion
George Lucas with the R2-D2robot in Star Wars stole the
cylindrical design from hisDaleks you know Doctor who's
(31:50):
Daleks.
So we've put this out onYouTube.
I think it's gone a little bitviral.
I bet you love that.
You can listen to it.
Yeah, so you can listen to it.
But that, I think, shows thathe was proud of Doctor who and
felt a sense of ownership overit and I think actually actually
a little bit of bitterness thathad maybe run away from him and
he had not maybe, in his view,been remunerated enough yeah,
(32:13):
because Star Wars certainly gota lot of attention at that time,
people queuing for miles for usto say it maybe.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
So do you feel that he didn't get as as much yeah
reward or remuneration for it ashe deserved?
Is that Well I?
Speaker 1 (32:33):
think towards the end of his life.
I think he actually tried toask the BBC for money because he
felt a sense of copyright thathe had owned it.
But the problem was that he wasin common with all the
directors and producers ofDoctor who.
As an executive he was anemployee of the BBC and the BBC
owns the copyright to all itsdramas.
So Sidney Newman's attempt totry and sort of get some money
(32:56):
for it never succeeded, as bestI'm aware.
There may have been some sortof private compensation I don't
know, but certainly publicly I'mnot aware of it and Newman
actually tried to.
When Doctor who was notsucceeding in the 1980s, he
tried to step in to become itsproducer and to revive it by
(33:20):
bringing back the second Doctor,patrick Troughton, and this was
a sort of attempt, I think, forNewman to try and reassert his
control over Doctor who.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
When you look at these both men, they were
outspoken critics of bureaucracyand broadcasting.
Do their warnings stillresonate with today's streaming
landscape?
Speaker 1 (33:41):
um, yes and no, I mean that they're.
Obviously we're going back tofigures who worked.
Their heydays were between the60s and the 1980s, newman,
particularly 1960s.
Dennis potter had a career thatstarted in 1965 and continued
up to his death, sadly fromcancer, at the age of 59 in 1994
(34:03):
.
So, um, they are figures inthat sense from 20th century
television and we've moved onnow.
Um, I have, um, you know, I'vebeen interviewed over the years
by various journalists aboutdennis potter and the question
sometimes comes up, you know,would a dennis potter survive
today in today's world ofstreaming?
And I say absolutely if dennispotter was in his 50s today,
(34:25):
because obviously if he wasalive today he'd be 90, a bit
old maybe now.
But if he, if he had been inhis 50s today, he would very
much, I think, be working instreaming because he liked the
idea of creating a televisionnovel.
And we are in the era ofstreaming now, where series tend
to be about six to eightepisodes.
They're not the sort of longruns of 24 episodes that just a
(34:47):
few years back used tocharacterize american television
.
So that's how potter wrote inthe 1980s.
He would write six part serials, um, maybe up to with his final
works, karaoke and cold lazaruseight parts.
So he would perfectly fit umthat mold and he would also, I
think, want to have one foot inhollywood and one foot in the
(35:08):
bbc, because he had striven forthat, particularly in the 1980s
as his hollywood screenwritingcareer took off.
He always wanted to have onefoot with the bbc and one foot
in hollywood.
So what would be more, whatcould be more perfect for pot
Potter than, say, aco-production deal with Netflix
on a, say, a six part serialthat was for the BBC but
(35:30):
co-produced by Netflix or or oneof the other streamers?
So I think Potter would have um, would have um, survived today.
Sidney Newman, um, well,obviously Doctor who's back, and
it's been back since 2005.
So Sid Sidney Newman, we couldimagine, could be some sort of
consigliere to Russell T Davis.
If he was still alive, I'm suresomeone like Russell T Davis
(35:53):
would have sought out SidneyNewman.
He has acknowledged SidneyNewman within the creation of
Doctor who.
So I think Sidney Newman maybe,as an eminence Grease, could
have contributed to Doctor who.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
OK, just a couple more questions before we finish
up here.
If you could re-ask onequestion to each of them with a
hint side of your scholarship,what would it be?
Speaker 1 (36:19):
Gosh, that's big questions.
I think I'm satisfied that inboth interviews I covered the
ground and so, despite myinitial misgivings with Dennis
leaving the Dennis Potterinterview dash, I wish I'd asked
him that.
I wish I'd asked him that inreviewing the tapes I found that
(36:41):
he had given me everything.
It's just that when you'resitting there with Dennis Potter
and you've got this flow ofeloquence and words and you're
getting drunk with him which mayhave been his technique,
actually giving me champagne aswell, making me drunk or a
little bit tipsy, and theinterview quickly went out the
window in terms of structure andI realized that there was no
(37:03):
way that I was going to be ableto pin dennis potter or someone
of that nature to a structure.
You know, tell me what happened, this and this and this and
this, um.
So in the end it was much morepoetic and it was much more, as
I said, a verbal, a friendly,verbal, jousting match, as I
tried to to probe, and he triedto duck and weave and spin and
(37:25):
spar, because the one thing thatno writer can really do to an
interviewer is reveal themselvesentirely.
They have to hint.
With Sidney Newman it was more Ithink Sidney Newman felt had
done pretty exhaustively, Ithink, in his wonderful Canadian
jargon.
I think he'd have sucked me dry, which is slightly odd.
(37:47):
But there we are.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
Yeah, I must say, if I had interviewed either of them
I would be completelystarstruck, so probably wouldn't
have got out a word.
So my question is for a studentwatching this who dream of
interviewing their heroes whatpractical advice, ethical
caution would you pass?
Speaker 1 (38:03):
on.
Well, ethical.
You've got to be ethical.
You've got to be.
You've got to be truthful.
You'll you'll quickly getsussed if you're, if you haven't
prepared, or if you're going inwith an alternative motive.
So say, for example, you'reactually just interviewing
someone to try and get a job outof them, whereas you've you've
told them that oh yes, I reallywant to find out about your work
.
So you have to be ethical.
(38:25):
You also have to prepare, soyou have to know what you're
asking the people.
This is important, because Iwould not have lasted two and a
half hours with Dennis Potter ifI hadn't shown to him that I
knew at least a little bit abouthis work.
So I pretty much watchedeverything that I could get my
hands on at that time.
(38:45):
I'd researched and researched,so I was prepared when I went in
Nervous, and also I had.
The other key thing, though, isyou cannot go in with what's
called in the academic panel.
It's a structured interviewwhere you just have this
checklist of questions and youjust fire them off and you don't
listen to what the intervieweehas.
Listen to what the theinterviewee has to say, because
(39:07):
the interviewee might revealgold dust to you, uh, but you're
not pursuing it because you'vegot this checklist.
So it has to be structured, butit also has to be open and free
at the same time.
In the academic parlance it'scalled semi-structured.
Have a skeleton, knowing whatyou want to get out of them in
advance, but be prepared toallow the interview to be
free-flowing in order that youcan allow the subject to reveal
(39:30):
themselves to you rather thanyou're not bothering to listen
because you're too busy.
Moving on to the next question.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
and finally, when you revisit these tapes, is there
any single line that gives yougoosebumps?
Is there anything you think, ohGod, oh no, oh God, how wow.
How did I ask that?
Something like that?
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Well, to be frank, I mean it's been very interesting
revisiting the tapes becauseit's been 35 years and you know
it's not that I've listened tothem for a long time With the
Potter one, though the Potterinterview has kind of lived with
me because I have.
There was an attempt todigitize it and release it in
(40:15):
the mid-2000s in a website thatcalled itself the official
Dennis Potter website, which theowner of the um unfortunately
is no longer with us was veryproud of that.
The potter family had agreedthat you could use that title,
so we actually released our, youknow, got the tapes digitized
and released through thatwebsite.
(40:36):
Unfortunately, the website isnow defunct.
It's been defunct for about 15years, um, but they were all
released then.
But the problem was, I'm surenobody listened to them because
the quality was so terrible,because we couldn't digitize at
that time or we could digitizebut not do AI cleanups.
You know it's only in the lasttwo years or so that we've had
(40:57):
AI bots that can go in and cleanup.
So when you ask about goosebumps, it's not so much the content
of the Dennis Potter interviewthat gave me goosebumps recently
.
It was when I did that runthrough, you know, of these very
dodgy tapes, very unlistabletapes, shove them through, uh,
an ai, uh, standard desktop aicleaner, and out came dennis
(41:19):
potter's voice, um, studioquality in the same.
So I was so suddenly I wasgoing was taken back 35 years to
what I heard in the room,rather than this rather sort of,
rather sort of trebly tinklyvoice that had been on the
original analogue tape.
Suddenly this was Dennis Potterback and that is what you can
(41:42):
hear now in the cleaned upextract that I've released for
his 90th anniversary.
It really is.
You know it's not perfect andthere are.
There are little glitches andand what used to be called wow
and flutter um on the tape.
So it's not perfect, uh, andthat's why I'd like to get it
even better.
But my goodness, what?
What an improvement from whatit was.
(42:04):
And you can get a sense of thatif you listen at the start of
the interview, where you have alittle bit of the older analogue
, and then what I do as ademonstration is I take you into
the studio quality AI-enhancedrecording and man, what a
difference.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Thanks, yeah, and thank you for the interview, say
for listening.
In the back here we will.
We show a clip from this.
But if you want to find outmore or if you want to listen to
, please go to the jrc mediayoutube channel and listen to
the extract.
And, as I say, the aim ofprofessor cook is to release the
whole extract as the cleaned upversion and if you're able to
(42:49):
assist with that, please contactus.
But otherwise, I would justthank Professor Cook for this
interview and thank you, thankyou.
Hot lights fade, the curtains rise, new stories
waiting behind our eyes,charlotte and John with the
final say, breaking down thescreens in their own way.
(00:21):
This is the final cut, wherethe real reviews ignite.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Good afternoon and welcome.
I'm delighted to be joined byProfessor John Cook.
He's a professor of media atGlasgow, caledonian, and he's a
pioneer of Potter studies, whichis basically he literally wrote
the book of the greattelevision dramatist Vince
Landbeck.
(00:48):
So basically the book he wrotewas called Dennis Potter Live on
Screen, and then he laterunearthed an unknown Potter
script in the Forrest O'Deanarchive which added it to a
fresh chapter of British TVhistory.
But long before that, as ayoung PhD student, john secured
(01:08):
two extraordinary encounters anin-depth conversation with
Demnitz Potter himself at BBC inMay 1990, and an earlier
sit-down with Sidney Newman, thevisionary Canadian producer who
conceived Doctor who andrevolutionised BBC drama in the
60s.
Today we're going to look backat these informative interviews
(01:31):
and hear what it was like toquestion these two giants of
television and the creativeprime, and explore how these
meetings shaped Professor Cook'sown scholarship and teaching
career.
Professor Cook, thank you forbeing here.
So let's rewind to your student.
How did you first land theinterview with Dennis Potter?
Speaker 1 (01:53):
Well, thank you very much, Charlotte, for that
introduction.
Yes, so it's been quiteinteresting for me recently to
revisit all of this 35 years on,to go back to the very
beginnings of the work that I'vedone throughout my academic
career, but where it all began,and I've managed to dig out the
(02:15):
old interview tapes that Iconducted the interview with
Dennis Potter, and it all sortof came about, really because I
was doing the first British PhDon Dennis Potter's work.
Now, for those who may be lessfamiliar with Dennis Potter,
dennis Potter is a legendaryfigure in the history of
television drama and he's knownnot just in the UK but also
(02:39):
around the world for a lot ofhis pioneering techniques in TV
drama what are often callednon-naturalistic techniques, and
a few of the famous ones thathe customised were adults
playing children in dramas suchas his famous play Blue Remember
Hills, characters stepping outof the drama and bursting into
(03:01):
song, as well as customising awhole series of techniques such
as intricate use of flashbacksand flash-forwards and melding
of fantasy sequences withreality sequences.
So he's a bit of a legend.
He's regarded as one of themost important creative figures
in terms of the way that hepioneered a lot of these
(03:22):
techniques and he's influenceddramatists and filmmakers not
just in the UK but also inAmerica, including figures like
David Lynch, who actually, atthe time that I was interviewing
him, he was actually trying towrite a script for David Lynch
the late great director DavidLynch which was actually an
(03:43):
adaptation of a novel by a Welshwriter called DM Thomas, called
the White Hotel, and Potter wasactually busy writing that on
the very day that I met him hewas working on that screenplay.
The screenplay in the end wasnever produced.
David Lynch went on to otherprojects, not least Twin Peaks,
(04:05):
so it was never produced.
Um, david lynch uh, went on toother projects, not least twin
peaks, um, so it was never,never produced.
But the whole sort of myencounter with them all came
about because I was going aroundlondon interviewing a lot of
the people that had workedbeside dennis potter throughout
his career, uh, includingproducers, uh, directors and
also actually, as you'vementioned, charlotte Sidney
(04:27):
Newman as well, who was reallyhis early executive.
Sidney Newman was head of BBCTV drama in the 1960s when
Potter was getting his start.
So I'd done all this and gonearound and interviewed these
people, but Potter at at thatpoint had just had the biggest
critical drubbing of his careerwith a four-part serial that is
(04:50):
now regarded as a bit notorious,called black eyes, which, um,
previously potter had had alwayshad stellar reviews.
There had been controversiesbut he had always sort of won
the approval of critics andaudiences tended to follow.
But with Black Eyes he hit areal brick wall.
Critics dubbed it as like theworst serial of the year, and
(05:15):
what was more insulting forPotter was that he himself had
directed it, the first piece ofwork that Potter had not only
written but directed.
So Potter wasn't in really anyfit state to accept interviews.
He was quite depressed for awhile but eventually, with me
going around and interviewingall these other figures and
finally what I understand thestory to be finally he thought I
(05:40):
better see this guy was becauseI had gone right the way back
to find some early letters thatin correspondence that Potter
had had with an MP calledChristopher Mayhew in the late
1950s when Potter was a student,potter had worked on a
documentary that ChristopherMayhew had made.
(06:01):
This was a member of parliamentwho was also jobbing as a TV
presenter and Mayhew by thatstage in 1990 had been ennobled
and was now Lord Mayhew andextraordinarily, he seemed to
keep all his correspondencegoing back decades.
So when I had written toChristopher Mayhew now Lord
(06:21):
Mayhew and Mayhew had said well,here's some correspondence, and
he sent it, and that was greatfor me.
But then Mayhew, as a courtesy,informed Potter that these had
been sent to me and Potterthought gosh, this little guy's
digging here, there andeverywhere.
I better see him.
And that's ultimately how theinterview happened.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
So that's fantastic.
What preparation did you do?
And what was one question youwere most nervous about asking
him?
Speaker 1 (06:53):
well, I, you know, understandably, I was a little
nervous as I showed up to hisliterary agent's office.
Uh, that afternoon.
Um, according to my interviewtapes, the exact date was 10th
may 1990.
Um, so it was on that date.
Um, so I was nervous because Iwas a student, he was way up
there and I was, you know, juststarting out.
(07:14):
Um, so it was, there was a,there was a power imbalance, but
, um, ultimately, what I had todo with that interview was very
much play devil's advocate withPotter because, as Potter freely
admitted, he was a reclusivecharacter.
In fact, at one point in ourinterview he said I'm a
reclusive character, I don'texpose myself, I appear to.
(07:37):
In his, in his works he meanthe appears to be more personal
than he actually is.
Now, when you've got a writerthat actually says that to you,
you're immediately on your metalthinking well, hang on, hang on
.
Is he playing games with me?
Is he trying to pull the woolover my eyes or is he being
honest?
So it was very much aninteresting kind of sparring
(08:01):
session.
It went on for two and a halfhours and I should say that
Potter was very friendly duringit.
Now, apparently, as I understandit, he could be aggressive to
strangers coming in and askinghim questions, and many an
interviewer from press had beengiven short shrift over the
years and kicked out essentiallyif they sort of annoyed Potter.
(08:24):
But I guess with with me it wasbecause I was somebody out from
outside that media world of youknow the press that potter used
throughout his career to managepublicity for his work.
This was something different.
It was.
It was more of a an extendedsit down and, and actually, as I
look back on it, it wasextremely kind of Potter to do
(08:45):
this, because I was no one.
He could just continue to sayno, and so it was actually quite
a generous act.
And what I began to realise inlater years was how untypical
this was.
Although Potter was quiteubiquitous in the British media,
it was always at the time thathe was giving publicity for his
work, so he would give lots ofinterviews.
(09:07):
But what I hadn't quiteappreciated that young was that
this was unique, that in fact Idon't think he had ever spoken
to an academic researcher,someone from outside the press,
in such detail ever before sowhen you walked in there to his
office, but what did you firststruck you?
Speaker 2 (09:27):
what struck you first about his demeanor or working
environment?
Was it like a, like a den, orlike what?
Was it the office?
What would it look like?
Speaker 1 (09:35):
well, the interview took place in potter's uh
literary agent's office, so itwas a a neutral space.
In that sense it it wasn't likebeing invited to the writer's
private apartment or anythinglike that, so it was a neutral
space.
It was in the basement of hisagent's office, then office I
think the agency's moved sincethen.
(09:56):
But the interesting thing wasPotter arrived late.
Now, this is characteristic, soI understand.
But when he arrived, maybeabout 20 minutes late, something
like that I'd already beenchatting to the literary agent
and um, uh, you know, and shegave me the literary agent's
name was Judy Dache, and shegave gave me some interesting
(10:17):
background about her own, howshe came to be involved with the
work of Dennis Potter.
But but then when Potter camein, I was immediately struck by
how tall he was actually,because the television screen
doesn't really show, you know,potter didn't need to be always
shot in close-up in interviews,so he was quite tall.
(10:37):
But he immediately came in andhe immediately asked his
literary agent for champagne tobe brought down from upstairs.
Uh, and he, as soon as he camein and took off new times old
times champagne, yeah, this wasso.
This took me back a little bit.
And and um so potter, I guessin that sense, was the original
(11:01):
champagne socialist.
He, um, he enjoyed the goodlife, he, he smoked prodigiously
and he also did drink.
And this was in the middle ofthe afternoon.
So he asked for champagne to bebrought down from his agent's
office and what I noticed wasthat when he sat down he began
(11:22):
to pour some out for himself,and then he looked up at me, and
I'll never forget him staringup at me from behind his glasses
, saying, oh, I suppose you'llwant some of this too.
And then, when I held out myglass for him to pour, he said
typical Scotsman, you know,wanting something for nothing.
So it was that kind of spiritof badinage and playfulness and
(11:46):
friendly verbal jousting thatcharacterized the whole
interview.
Speaker 2 (11:52):
However, he was famous, a very old journalist.
Did he test you and how did youwin his trust?
I mean, how did you feel, howdid you build trust with him?
Was he worried about?
Speaker 1 (12:04):
Well, I think yes, well, this was one of the things
is, I could have been anyoneand the theory could have asked
anything about his work, andthere were occasions when I did
do that, actually, where I sortof pried a little bit.
Now, the occasion of thisparticular discussion is because
to mark Potter's 90thanniversary it's 90 years since
(12:28):
Dennis Potter was born.
Speaker 2 (12:31):
I have released an extract from the interview,
which I think Charlotte is goingto play a bit of at the
beginning of this, yeah, and inthis, actually the bit that I've
selected now this previouslythe interview was unlistenable.
Speaker 1 (12:45):
It had been recorded on an old sort of cassette
dictaphone.
It was all I could afford as astudent and while it was
transcribable and I could, youknow, use it for quoting in my
thesis and then in my academicpublications, it was
unlistenable to anybody really.
But what I've been able to dowith the latest AI tools is take
(13:07):
an extract and restore it tonear studio quality.
So for the first time peoplecan hear what I heard 35 years
ago and the quality of the man'sdiction.
He was extremely eloquent.
Sometimes the way he talked, itwas like poetry.
But the extract that I'vechosen is exactly one of those
moments when I was just sort ofmaybe going a little bit too far
(13:30):
for the reclusive potter, alittle bit maybe too personal
for him, and you'll hearlaughing.
He says I think we've reachedthe end of this interview.
But then, yeah, but thencharacteristically, rather than
swerving, he then went into asoliloquy, essentially a speech
(13:51):
that was far more revealing andtold me far more about the
character of the man and now you, the audience, who can listen
to it, than anything that I hadthe rather banal question that I
had asked.
So this was extremelycharacteristic of Potter is that
he gave you a lot and he didgive of himself and he did
(14:13):
reveal himself, albeit in hisown way and in his own oblique
way.
He's never going to give me thedirect.
You know he hated the wordabout.
He says if you ever ask him orever asked him, you know what's
your work about.
He says if you ever ask him orever asked him, you know what's
your work about.
He says I hate that word.
I hate.
You know it's not about.
You know, art shouldn't beabout that.
In his terms, it should beoblique, it should have metaphor
(14:33):
, but what he would do is by, hewould go into a soliloquy and
actually reveal to you, if youlisten carefully, many of the
secrets, if you listen carefully, many of the secrets.
And this was proven about adecade later when I had the
great fortune of meetingPotter's eldest daughter, jane,
jane Potter, who's still alive,and this was an event in the
(14:56):
Forest of Dean in 2004.
Forest of Dean in WestGloucestershire is where Potter
was brought up and where, nearbyhis, his family still still
live and um, jane had managed tohear, even though they were
almost unlistenable, had managedto hear some quite a bit of of
my interview.
Uh, potter had apparentlytalked about the interview to
(15:19):
her, according to jane at thetime, and said it was a good
interview.
And when Jane listened back toit 2004, 10 years after her
father's death, she took, shesaid it's a bit like having my
father back in the room with me.
So it was, it was a goodinterview.
That that did reveal a lot ofstuff and I mentioned to Jane
(15:39):
that, as a young student, when Ileft the interview two and a
half after two and a half hoursand they finally got rid of me,
I thought to myself, oh, maybeI've missed my chance here,
maybe there was some things Icould have asked and didn't and
so on.
Maybe I've blown it.
But then, listening back to thetapes, I realized that Potter
had given me a lot and in factJane entirely unprompted said
(16:04):
that confirmed that when shesaid with that interview he gave
you everything.
So it was, it was, um, you know, in that sense it's a
remarkable interview and I hopeto be able to release more of it
to studio quality and, in fact,ideally what I would like to do
and maybe put out an appeal ifanybody's listening.
I would like to partner with aprofessional studio producer who
(16:28):
would be able to release thewhole thing and and do it into
the best quality.
What I've done with thisyoutube extract is a sort of
proof of concept, a technical uhexperiment on my part, just
using standard desktop tools,but it'd be great, now that I've
relocated the interview tapes,to really clean them all up in
(16:48):
studio quality, release themprofessionally so that the
audience can hear this, I think,very significant.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
Interview with potter so, and if any of you listeners
who have contacts in in themedia industry or in in in terms
of able to clean this up, thatwould be superb if you can get
in touch with us or get in touchwith John on LinkedIn.
My final question here beforewe move on is what answer from
(17:17):
Potter surprised you most?
Did it change the way you laterinterpret his play?
Speaker 1 (17:24):
yes, that's a.
That's a good question,charlotte.
Well, um, again, it's.
It's revealed in embryo form inthe extract that I've released,
which to the public, which isabout, uh, I think it's about a
six minute extract, uh, and itcame at the very end of the
interview when, admittedly,potter was getting a little bit
tipsy because he had beendrinking so much champagne.
(17:45):
By the way, he drunk champagneand chain smoked throughout our
entire interview and I remembermy phd supervisor saying I
should have been paid dangermoney for being in in a room
with the, you know, passivesmoking, because it was
literally a sealed off umbasement in his agent's office.
But, um, the key thing was thatcame out a lot from my interview
(18:09):
with Potter is the religiousaspect of it.
Now, I wasn't particularlyreligious in any great respect,
so therefore I was moreinterested in the techniques
that Potter was using.
But I realized after theinterview and it had been
dawning on me for some timebefore, but I realized that
there was no way I could avoidtackling religion in porter's
(18:30):
work, um, on the basis of theinterview that porter had given
me, because, as you will hear inthe youtube extract, um, he
says, you know, at the end ofthe day, I remain a christian
and here we're now going tolisten to the extract from the
interview.
Except this, that at the end ofthe day, I have tried through a
(18:51):
long route and through my owncalvaries or whatever.
Speaker 2 (18:56):
I remain somehow or other, against all the odds of a
Christian.
Now we're moving on to SidneyNewman.
So you were very lucky not justhaving met Dan Sporter but you
also met Sidney Newman.
So how did that encounter comeabout and what did you hope to
(19:19):
learn from the founder of Doctorwho?
And could you also tell us abit the audience, a bit about
Sidney Newman and what his partwas in founding Doctor who?
Yeah, sure, I mean he, his partwas in founding Doctor who.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
Yeah, sure, I mean, he's famous not just for Doctor
who, but nowadays I think that'swhat he's most remembered for
because he was the guy who, whenhe was a Canadian Sidney Newman
was a Canadian producer whomoved into television production
in Canada, I think originallyfrom documentaries, and then
(19:52):
built up a reputation in Canadathat he was poached in the late
1950s to come over and work forthe commercial television
station ITV in Britain and hepioneered a groundbreaking
series of single plays, singletelevision plays under the
umbrella title Armchair Theatre.
(20:12):
Anyway, flash forward to theearly 1960s and Newman was being
so successful at ITV where hehad also pioneered the Avengers,
not the MCU, the Marvel CinemaAvengers, but the original 1960s
spy series the Marvel cinemaAvengers, but the original 1960s
(20:34):
spy series starring PatrickMcNee and most famously Diana
Rigg as his female sidekick.
And the Avengers was doinggreat guns.
In fact, recently on my YouTubechannel released my son
actually did the edit released aYouTube shot showing the title
sequence from the Avengers.
So Newman was a real powerhousein television drama production,
(20:54):
both high-brow, like singletelevision plays, and the
low-brow mass market stuff.
As a result he was sosuccessful.
The BBC poached him in the early1960s to come over to the BBC
and be head of TV drama head ofBBC TV drama running the whole
show, history and the future andwould be a crotchety old man.
(21:16):
Initially.
(21:38):
That's how he was envisaged anda lot of it was, as Newman
admitted to me, was borrowedfrom HG HG Wells' famous novel
the Time Machine, published in1899, but more particularly the
1960 Hollywood film versionadaptation of the Time Machine
that Newman had watched.
Newman wasn't the most literateof men he had read.
(22:00):
You know he read widely but hewasn't steeped in literature.
Movies and TV was his firstlove.
So in that sense he was a bitof a rough populist compared to
your typical BBC type in theearly 60s.
And it was a result of thatpopulism that Newman and he came
up the name, I think as well,doctor who.
So I was extremely lucky to getNewman as an interview because
(22:23):
Newman just happened to be inLondon in February of 1990 when
I was doing my research.
He had spent years in the 70sand and most of the 80s in
Canada, but he occasionally cameback to London and rented a
flat because to visit hisdaughter, whose name was Gillian
, and it just so happened thatas I was doing my research.
(22:46):
He was over in London.
So that was an unbelievablepiece of luck.
So you know we talk about, youknow, dennis Pother and how
fortunate I was to get thatinterview.
Well, that was as a result of abit of hard graft, you know,
trying to persuade Pother.
But with Sidney Newman it waspure luck, because these were
the days before Zoom, youcouldn't just go online and
speak to somebody in Canada.
(23:07):
So the fact that I got that,that was actually to me the
biggest scoop of my research.
Speaker 2 (23:12):
Yeah, so he had already been shaking up drama.
Could you sense the confidenceor controversy in the room when
you're interviewing him also asa person?
Well, how did you?
How did he come across?
Speaker 1 (23:25):
very dynamic man.
He his colleagues had oftentalked about as being one of the
most dynamic figures ever tohave worked in television.
But but one of the things thatwas interesting.
You know we've talked aboutdennis potter and how he was so
tall.
Sydney newman, he was a littlefella, he was, he was, you know,
he stood up to my shoulder andI'm not that tall, I'm about
(23:46):
what?
Five feet nine.
So he was a little man.
Maybe it's the little men, youknow, they often say the little
men are the most powerfulNapoleon complex.
I don't know, but you could tellthat this was a man who had
been a powerhouse.
I mean, when I was meetingSidney Newman he was older, he
was rather a bit of an unknownfigure in british television by
(24:09):
1990 because he had left britainin 1967 to go back to his
native canada.
So that meant that while he wasa legend in tv history circles
and amongst those of hiscolleagues who remembered him,
to the current generation of TVproducers in Britain in 1990,
and obviously since not as wellknown, and Doctor who at that
(24:34):
point was in a hiatus, so Doctorwho, his name wasn't discussed
really in relation to Doctor who.
So he was a bit of a sadderfigure I would say Dennis Potter
was at the height of his powerswhen I met him.
Sidney Newman was a figure indecline who was trying in his
occasional visits to Britain tointerest British television in
(24:54):
making some of his productions.
And he did have some successwith a few independent
productions pitched to Channel 4at the time.
But you can see, if you look uphis resume on IMDb for example,
how his work was tailing offand he was a sort of the lost
ghost of British television.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Do you feel it was a sort of sunset boulevard moment?
Speaker 1 (25:20):
A little bit.
He had time on his hands and hewanted to talk and he wanted to
talk and with me he foundsomebody that we wanted to
listen because, you know, notmany of my generation would know
who Sidney Newman was.
They'd know what Doctor who wasand they'd know the Avengers,
but they wouldn't know the name.
And I was there to interviewSidney Newman, not about Doctor
(25:42):
who but about his relationshipto Dennis Potter and the fact
that he had been head of TVdrama during that period.
Speaker 2 (25:48):
Oh, okay, so that's what brought you into.
That was what it was about?
Speaker 1 (25:51):
yeah, but I couldn't resist pitching some questions
about Doctor who, because I loveDoctor who so much.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
So, and the question that you had in your interview
did you manage to, was it quitetalkative of Doctor who, was
that?
So?
What was the majority of theinterview spent on?
Was it on Doctor who or was iton his television career, and
how long was the interview?
Speaker 1 (26:16):
Well, yeah, these are all good questions.
The interview, I mean I spentmost of the day with Sidney
Newman and it wasn't just, youknow, with the tape recorder
switched on.
I mean, when I look back at myinterview tapes I have about
probably about three hours worthof stuff on tape.
(26:37):
But I sat and had lunch withhim in his apartment.
You know he wanted to speak.
I think he was probably a bitlonely in London and so I spent
time with him.
I had my lunch with him and Ispoke to him.
And in fact there's a funnystory actually, because when I,
when I was preparing to comedown from Scotland to do these
various interviews because I'dscheduled them, you know, one
(27:03):
each day because I had a numberof potters directors to
interview and so on SidneyNewman had said remember to
bring a haggis.
So I get to London and Isuddenly realise, oh, I forgot
to bring a haggis.
So I chase round all the Londonbutchers and you know I go into
(27:24):
several butchers no haggis here, mate, this is London and
eventually find a haggis inCovent Garden, a garden butcher.
So I bring this haggis toSidney Newman's apartment, you
know, as a kind of a gift,saying here's the haggis.
You know you asked for haggisand Newman says yeah, but it'll
(27:47):
be off right Because it's notdown from Scotland.
You asked for haggis and Newmansaid yeah, but it'll be off
right Because it's not down fromScotland.
And I didn't have the heart tosay to him that in fact I just
bought it that morning from abutcher's in Covent Garden.
So that's the haggis story.
But I spent a lot of time withhim that day and got a lot of
material.
But you're right, the bulk ofthe interview was on I took him
(28:09):
through his career, starting inCanada, and I was kind of
conscious, you know, that I justdidn't want to do just talk
about Dennis Potter that.
You know, having a sit downwith this man was quite unique.
So I went through his entirecareer and also pitched in
questions that were entirelyunrelated in relation to Doctor
who.
But yes, the bulk of theinterview was on Sidney Newman,
(28:33):
his career at BBC televisiondrama and how he interacted with
Dennis Potter.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Was he proud of the Doctor who, how it came out?
I mean, sometimes when you findthe writer to write something
and what comes out on the screenis quite different, was he
quite happy with how they hadstaged it?
Or was it then that the writerhad more powers over the
production that perhaps theydon't have today?
Speaker 1 (28:55):
Well, sidney Newman was keen to stress that he, as
head of TV drama, he wasn't aproducer of Doctor who.
In fact it was a young, one ofthe first actual female drama
producers, verity Lambert, whoNewman appointed to be the first
(29:16):
series producer of Doctor who.
This was quite groundbreaking atime when women tended just to
be secretaries or assistants atbest, and Newman actually was a
sort of early feminist in thatsense, in the sense that he
would, he would give young womenopportunities, and women of all
ages opportunities, I thinkmaybe because Canada was
(29:37):
slightly more egalitarian atthat point compared to, say, um,
england.
So Verity Lambert was theproducer and she realized it in
her own way and with the firstdirector of Doctor who, the
director of the first story, anAsian man called Varys Hussain.
So again, you know, diversityright in there, right at the
(29:59):
very start of Doctor who, andNewman facilitated that.
He didn't oversee it day to day,but Doctor who wasman's
creation, newman, um, you knowthere was a lot of hands
involved in the creation ofdoctor who, but the inspiration
for it would never have happenedat the bbc if it hadn't been
for this canadian with, um apenchant for science fiction and
(30:23):
time travel, who had recentlyseen the movie the Time Machine
coming into the BBC and wantingto shake it up and having the
power to do so.
So that's really important.
So, newman, you know a reallyimportant figure.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
And if you compare these two experiences, in what
way were the differences in theinterviewees?
Potter and Newman were thedifferent interviewees.
Speaker 1 (30:47):
Potter and Newman Different.
Yeah, I mean Potter, it waslike an English literary seminar
, you know, in the sense thatyou're going into a great deal
of depth on aspects of hisreligious belief, his artistic
techniques and very muchexploring that world and getting
(31:08):
into a kind of literary depth.
With sydney newman it was muchmore um conversation, about um
production and about audiences,and you asked before charlotte
about whether he was proud ofdoctor who.
Um, we've released um onyoutube.
A short extract from myinterview with sydney newman, a
sort of follow-up to the DennisPotter interview which people
(31:30):
can hear on YouTube, and the bitthat we've selected or that I
found relevant to Doctor who iswhere he says he in his opinion
I'm not sure I agree with itmyself, but in his opinion
George Lucas with the R2-D2robot in Star Wars stole the
cylindrical design from hisDaleks you know Doctor who's
(31:50):
Daleks.
So we've put this out onYouTube.
I think it's gone a little bitviral.
I bet you love that.
You can listen to it.
Yeah, so you can listen to it.
But that, I think, shows thathe was proud of Doctor who and
felt a sense of ownership overit and I think actually actually
a little bit of bitterness thathad maybe run away from him and
he had not maybe, in his view,been remunerated enough yeah,
(32:13):
because Star Wars certainly gota lot of attention at that time,
people queuing for miles for usto say it maybe.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
So do you feel that he didn't get as as much yeah
reward or remuneration for it ashe deserved?
Is that Well I?
Speaker 1 (32:33):
think towards the end of his life.
I think he actually tried toask the BBC for money because he
felt a sense of copyright thathe had owned it.
But the problem was that he wasin common with all the
directors and producers ofDoctor who.
As an executive he was anemployee of the BBC and the BBC
owns the copyright to all itsdramas.
So Sidney Newman's attempt totry and sort of get some money
(32:56):
for it never succeeded, as bestI'm aware.
There may have been some sortof private compensation I don't
know, but certainly publicly I'mnot aware of it and Newman
actually tried to.
When Doctor who was notsucceeding in the 1980s, he
tried to step in to become itsproducer and to revive it by
(33:20):
bringing back the second Doctor,patrick Troughton, and this was
a sort of attempt, I think, forNewman to try and reassert his
control over Doctor who.
Speaker 2 (33:30):
When you look at these both men, they were
outspoken critics of bureaucracyand broadcasting.
Do their warnings stillresonate with today's streaming
landscape?
Speaker 1 (33:41):
um, yes and no, I mean that they're.
Obviously we're going back tofigures who worked.
Their heydays were between the60s and the 1980s, newman,
particularly 1960s.
Dennis potter had a career thatstarted in 1965 and continued
up to his death, sadly fromcancer, at the age of 59 in 1994
(34:03):
.
So, um, they are figures inthat sense from 20th century
television and we've moved onnow.
Um, I have, um, you know, I'vebeen interviewed over the years
by various journalists aboutdennis potter and the question
sometimes comes up, you know,would a dennis potter survive
today in today's world ofstreaming?
And I say absolutely if dennispotter was in his 50s today,
(34:25):
because obviously if he wasalive today he'd be 90, a bit
old maybe now.
But if he, if he had been inhis 50s today, he would very
much, I think, be working instreaming because he liked the
idea of creating a televisionnovel.
And we are in the era ofstreaming now, where series tend
to be about six to eightepisodes.
They're not the sort of longruns of 24 episodes that just a
(34:47):
few years back used tocharacterize american television
.
So that's how potter wrote inthe 1980s.
He would write six part serials, um, maybe up to with his final
works, karaoke and cold lazaruseight parts.
So he would perfectly fit umthat mold and he would also, I
think, want to have one foot inhollywood and one foot in the
(35:08):
bbc, because he had striven forthat, particularly in the 1980s
as his hollywood screenwritingcareer took off.
He always wanted to have onefoot with the bbc and one foot
in hollywood.
So what would be more, whatcould be more perfect for pot
Potter than, say, aco-production deal with Netflix
on a, say, a six part serialthat was for the BBC but
(35:30):
co-produced by Netflix or or oneof the other streamers?
So I think Potter would have um, would have um, survived today.
Sidney Newman, um, well,obviously Doctor who's back, and
it's been back since 2005.
So Sid Sidney Newman, we couldimagine, could be some sort of
consigliere to Russell T Davis.
If he was still alive, I'm suresomeone like Russell T Davis
(35:53):
would have sought out SidneyNewman.
He has acknowledged SidneyNewman within the creation of
Doctor who.
So I think Sidney Newman maybe,as an eminence Grease, could
have contributed to Doctor who.
Speaker 2 (36:07):
OK, just a couple more questions before we finish
up here.
If you could re-ask onequestion to each of them with a
hint side of your scholarship,what would it be?
Speaker 1 (36:19):
Gosh, that's big questions.
I think I'm satisfied that inboth interviews I covered the
ground and so, despite myinitial misgivings with Dennis
leaving the Dennis Potterinterview dash, I wish I'd asked
him that.
I wish I'd asked him that inreviewing the tapes I found that
(36:41):
he had given me everything.
It's just that when you'resitting there with Dennis Potter
and you've got this flow ofeloquence and words and you're
getting drunk with him which mayhave been his technique,
actually giving me champagne aswell, making me drunk or a
little bit tipsy, and theinterview quickly went out the
window in terms of structure andI realized that there was no
(37:03):
way that I was going to be ableto pin dennis potter or someone
of that nature to a structure.
You know, tell me what happened, this and this and this and
this, um.
So in the end it was much morepoetic and it was much more, as
I said, a verbal, a friendly,verbal, jousting match, as I
tried to to probe, and he triedto duck and weave and spin and
(37:25):
spar, because the one thing thatno writer can really do to an
interviewer is reveal themselvesentirely.
They have to hint.
With Sidney Newman it was more Ithink Sidney Newman felt had
done pretty exhaustively, Ithink, in his wonderful Canadian
jargon.
I think he'd have sucked me dry, which is slightly odd.
(37:47):
But there we are.
Speaker 2 (37:48):
Yeah, I must say, if I had interviewed either of them
I would be completelystarstruck, so probably wouldn't
have got out a word.
So my question is for a studentwatching this who dream of
interviewing their heroes whatpractical advice, ethical
caution would you pass?
Speaker 1 (38:03):
on.
Well, ethical.
You've got to be ethical.
You've got to be.
You've got to be truthful.
You'll you'll quickly getsussed if you're, if you haven't
prepared, or if you're going inwith an alternative motive.
So say, for example, you'reactually just interviewing
someone to try and get a job outof them, whereas you've you've
told them that oh yes, I reallywant to find out about your work
.
So you have to be ethical.
(38:25):
You also have to prepare, soyou have to know what you're
asking the people.
This is important, because Iwould not have lasted two and a
half hours with Dennis Potter ifI hadn't shown to him that I
knew at least a little bit abouthis work.
So I pretty much watchedeverything that I could get my
hands on at that time.
(38:45):
I'd researched and researched,so I was prepared when I went in
Nervous, and also I had.
The other key thing, though, isyou cannot go in with what's
called in the academic panel.
It's a structured interviewwhere you just have this
checklist of questions and youjust fire them off and you don't
listen to what the intervieweehas.
Listen to what the theinterviewee has to say, because
(39:07):
the interviewee might revealgold dust to you, uh, but you're
not pursuing it because you'vegot this checklist.
So it has to be structured, butit also has to be open and free
at the same time.
In the academic parlance it'scalled semi-structured.
Have a skeleton, knowing whatyou want to get out of them in
advance, but be prepared toallow the interview to be
free-flowing in order that youcan allow the subject to reveal
(39:30):
themselves to you rather thanyou're not bothering to listen
because you're too busy.
Moving on to the next question.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
and finally, when you revisit these tapes, is there
any single line that gives yougoosebumps?
Is there anything you think, ohGod, oh no, oh God, how wow.
How did I ask that?
Something like that?
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Well, to be frank, I mean it's been very interesting
revisiting the tapes becauseit's been 35 years and you know
it's not that I've listened tothem for a long time With the
Potter one, though the Potterinterview has kind of lived with
me because I have.
There was an attempt todigitize it and release it in
(40:15):
the mid-2000s in a website thatcalled itself the official
Dennis Potter website, which theowner of the um unfortunately
is no longer with us was veryproud of that.
The potter family had agreedthat you could use that title,
so we actually released our, youknow, got the tapes digitized
and released through thatwebsite.
(40:36):
Unfortunately, the website isnow defunct.
It's been defunct for about 15years, um, but they were all
released then.
But the problem was, I'm surenobody listened to them because
the quality was so terrible,because we couldn't digitize at
that time or we could digitizebut not do AI cleanups.
You know it's only in the lasttwo years or so that we've had
(40:57):
AI bots that can go in and cleanup.
So when you ask about goosebumps, it's not so much the content
of the Dennis Potter interviewthat gave me goosebumps recently
.
It was when I did that runthrough, you know, of these very
dodgy tapes, very unlistabletapes, shove them through, uh,
an ai, uh, standard desktop aicleaner, and out came dennis
(41:19):
potter's voice, um, studioquality in the same.
So I was so suddenly I wasgoing was taken back 35 years to
what I heard in the room,rather than this rather sort of,
rather sort of trebly tinklyvoice that had been on the
original analogue tape.
Suddenly this was Dennis Potterback and that is what you can
(41:42):
hear now in the cleaned upextract that I've released for
his 90th anniversary.
It really is.
You know it's not perfect andthere are.
There are little glitches andand what used to be called wow
and flutter um on the tape.
So it's not perfect, uh, andthat's why I'd like to get it
even better.
But my goodness, what?
What an improvement from whatit was.
(42:04):
And you can get a sense of thatif you listen at the start of
the interview, where you have alittle bit of the older analogue
, and then what I do as ademonstration is I take you into
the studio quality AI-enhancedrecording and man, what a
difference.
Speaker 2 (42:25):
Thanks, yeah, and thank you for the interview, say
for listening.
In the back here we will.
We show a clip from this.
But if you want to find outmore or if you want to listen to
, please go to the jrc mediayoutube channel and listen to
the extract.
And, as I say, the aim ofprofessor cook is to release the
whole extract as the cleaned upversion and if you're able to
(42:49):
assist with that, please contactus.
But otherwise, I would justthank Professor Cook for this
interview and thank you, thankyou.
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