- [when advised to portray the Doctor in Doctor Who (1963) as himself by Shaun Sutton] Who's that?
- I like the best of everything.
- [on why he preferred Doctor Who (1963) stories set on contemporary Earth] There's nothing more alarming than coming home and finding a Yeti sitting on your loo in Tooting Bec.
- [on playing it straight in Doctor Who (1963)] In all my years as an actor, I had never been me - I had always hidden behind my glasses, mustaches and funny voices.
- I decided to leave [Doctor Who (1963)] because Roger [Roger Delgado] had died, Barry Letts was leaving, Terrance Dicks was leaving. I thought it looked like the end of an era and I thought, "Well, I may as well go". Shaun Sutton, the head of programmes, said, "Would you like to stay on and do another season?" And I said, "Yeah, yeah, I'll do one more if you pay me a bit of extra money". He said, "Like what?" I told him and they said, "We're sorry to see you go."
- Tom Baker says he's the Doctor. You can't argue with Tom on that one, he did seven years and he always wins the polls.
- Eddie Gray once said to me, "Don't worry, my son, take my advice, say the lines, take the money and go and buy something nice", which is the best advice I'd ever heard in my life.
- I hate working in studios. That's why I adored doing Worzel Gummidge (1979), because we shot the whole thing on film, we were outside all the time.
- In my opinion, Caroline John didn't fit into Doctor Who (1963). I couldn't really believe in her as a sidekick to the Doctor, because she was so darned intelligent herself. The Doctor didn't want a know-it-all by his side, he wanted someone who was busy learning about the world. Although Caroline and I worked well together, I don't think it did the series any harm when she left.
- The tattoos were a little mistake from younger and more foolish days. I always thought it was quite amusing to have the Third Doctor, who was so preoccupied with being the archetypal gentleman, displaying a nice big piece of arm adornment - and nobody said anything when filming, so they were seen on screen. Perhaps people were frightened of offending me so early on in my time!
- I was very fond of the Ogrons, who were wonderful, because they were so big, even I was terrified of them.
- I was delighted to appear in The Five Doctors [The Five Doctors (1983)] and I thought it was a great shame that Tom [Tom Baker] declined to take part. Of course, it would have been nicer to have had a bit more to do, but that was necessarily a problem, considering the amount of characters Terrance Dicks was trying to cram in. Generally, I thought I was done justice, and I told John Nathan-Turner then that I wouldn't mind coming back to do the odd special occasionally.
- Somehow I seem to have been gently bypassed as a serious actor. Too long enjoying life and working in Light Entertainment perhaps.
- [from "Radio Times" 3 January 1970] Small children and animals are every actor's nightmare - I have to cope with monsters.
- I'm an actor playing Doctor Who. I'm often asked questions about what the Doctor thinks and I say: 'How the hell do I know?' I'm speaking somebody else's lines.
- I think sci-fi always draws cult followers. You get these other people, the Trekkies, all over the world, who follow Star Trek (1966). There were only two series of this made [he was mistaken, there were three] and what you see now is endless repeats, but you still get these sci-fi nuts prepared to go anywhere for a convention.
- [shortly before his death] At 76, I'm too old for all the stunts and the Venusian karate - I might find kicking somebody under the chin difficult nowadays.
- [on Worzel Gummidge (1979)] It is an actor's dream because the man changes his mind and his head with monotonous regularity. So you go through all sorts of phases and characters, which appeals to me enormously.
- [on Doctor Who (1963)] I like two things about it. I like the fun of doing it and I like the money.
- I like working on stage because of the reaction. I like to play light comedy and hear the laughs.
- In all my years as an actor, I had never been me - I had always hidden behind my glasses, mustaches and funny voices.
- [on his spy work in WW2] I did all sorts. Teaching commandos how to use escapology equipment, compasses in brass buttons, secret maps in white cotton handkerchiefs, pipes you could smoke that also fired a .22 bullet. All sorts of incredible things.
- [on being cast as The Doctor] When my agent approached the BBC and that long silence on the phone was over we were told that I was on their short list and had been ever since they wanted a replacement for Patrick Troughton.
- Charles Laughton, the famous actor, said to me 'I understand you were thrown out of RADA.' I said 'Yes' and he said 'you're bound to do well, so was I'.
- It never occurred to me that I could ever be remotely considered for the part of the Doctor. When Tenniel Evans, with whom I was playing in The Navy Lark, suggested I put myself up for the part, I thought it was an absurd idea. I was widely known as a radio and stage comedy actor and they would never take the suggestion seriously.
- [concerning the inevitability of his career which he felt later on may have played against him] Because it was the family business, I never had to struggle to join it. I took it for granted, which is maybe why I've never taken it seriously enough.
- I saw the Doctor as an interplanetary crusader and it was this dashing Pied Piper image that appealed to me. I could spread my cloak, take the Earth under my wing and say, 'It's all right now...I'll deal with this.'
- Yes, I got thrown out of RADA, I'm afraid. I'd refused to be a wind. There was a lady who taught Greek dancing and Greek tragedy, and I just had to go 'Wooooo' and I thought it was terribly expensive for my poor father to pay for me to be a wind. So I rebelled, I refused to be a wind.
- [on performing accents] I find it easy to imitate accents, but I can't copy people's voices. I have a set of gramophone records at home and if I'm required to learn an accent, I put them on. It takes me only about fifteen minutes to pick up the way of speaking.
- [on joining the circus as a youth] I had to drive a converted Austin Seven on the Wall of Death, with a lion sitting strapped to a platform behind me. It was a very old lion so you had to kick it where it hurt to make it roar. Only the boss didn't want it roaring. "Folks'll see it ain't got no teeth!", he used to moan.
- My idea of relaxation is riding a motorbike, a bit of water skiing, or a nice burn-up in the jet-boat. My wife thinks I'm demented.
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content