Day 259 — September 16th 2021
City of Death Parts One and Two
City of Death — Part One
Reading back over yesterday’s entry, I worry that I may have given the impression that I don’t like my Doctor Who to be silly and full of jokes. I complained especially about how far in that direction the series moves when Douglas Adams has been put in charge of overseeing the scripts, and I’m about to sound like I’m contradicting myself because in this episode almost every other line is a joke, and I love it.
Heck, even the title is a joke if you translate it into French — Cité de la Mort being a pun on the more common description of Paris as ‘Cité de l’amour’.
I think the main thing about this story is that it’s pretty iconic. I reckon this is only the fourth or fifth time I’ve seen it, yet I found that I was able to quote most of the dialogue in time with the actors. Not even just the funny bits — the whole script! It’s amazing to think that this one was dashed off in a weekend because I think it’s got good claim to being one of the most accomplished and polished scripts the series has ever had. Every line is perfectly crafted, and it’s so much fun to listen to.
There’s so many moments I could choose to quote here, but the one that’s made the biggest impression on me this time around comes when our Time Lords wonder about someone being audacious enough to steal the Mona Lisa;
Doctor Who: ‘She was using [the bracelet] to get a complete report on all the alarm systems around the Mona Lisa.’
Romana: ‘You mean she’s trying to steal it?’
Doctor Who: ‘It is very a pretty painting.’
Romana: ‘It’s a very sophisticated device for a level five civilisation.’
Doctor Who: ‘That? That’s never the product of Earth’s civilisation.’
Romana: ‘Do you mean an alien’s trying to steal the Mona Lisa?’
Doctor Who: ‘It is a very pretty painting.’
I think that’s the perfect example of a joke being set up to be paid off later, and that’s going to be key as the story goes on. So many moments are perfectly seeded in, with the best example probably being Duggan’s punch in the final episode. This one feels clever, but not in a the kind of show-offy way that The Pirate Planet was trying to be.
All the more impressive is that this episode manages to be so good when it opens with what might otherwise be a fairly typical Graham Williams era narrative. The opening model shot of the Jageroth spaceship on pre-historic Earth is brilliantly rendered (the moving camera and the effects on the model are some of the best we’ve had since The Robots of Death) and the spaceship set is great too — although it bears absolutely no relation to the modal — but it’s all fairly standard stuff for this point in the programme’s history. Even the Jagaroth design looks like a rubbish Williams monster.
And yet, I’m captivated by it all right from the start. Possibly because I know how good it’s going to go on to be? Certainly by the time we get to the brilliant cliffhanger, in which Count Scarlioni rips off his face to reveal that alien design hidden beneath, it doesn’t matter if it looks silly, I’m too invested to care.
It’s probably helped because after those opening minutes, with talk of warp drives and alien wars, we settle down to a bit of reality. It’s the first time that the series has travelled abroad to film, and my God they make the most of it. About five minutes of this episode is comprised of dialogue-free shots of Doctor Who and Romana strolling around Parisian streets, being tourists. In any other story I’d be complaining about padding, but here it’s all part of the charm.
I think one of the reasons it works so well here is that it feels fresh and new. We’ve been to Paris twice before in Doctor Who, but on both occasions it was represented by a handful of sets in a London television studio. This is the first time we’ve ever actually been outside the UK, and it’s nice to see something a bit different. It’s also got the same effect as whenever they go out and shoot on real London streets in stories like Invasion of the Dinosaurs — there’s something exciting about seeing these places as they were all those years ago, and seeing our hero in such ordinary locations.
On top of that is the fact that this was — by all accounts — a very happy four day shoot, and I think that comes across on screen. Tom Baker and Lalla Ward are clearly loving spending time together larking around the Parisian streets, and it’s hard not to get caught up in that. Baker especially looks far more on the ball than he has in ages — his costume looks fantastic and he’s carrying it off with a real swagger. It’s great to see them messing about at the top of the Eiffel Tower and popping in and out of Metro stations.
There’s some really great locations on display, too. For ages I assumed the door to the Count’s house was a piece of scenery installed by the production crew. It’s just too perfect, complete with a carving of the Medusa which isn’t unlike the design of the Jagaroth. But no, it’s real and it still hung in Paris until very recently (I think I’m right in saying the doors were removed in 2019 as part of renovations to the building, and hasn’t returned yet). When we visited for a long weekend a few years ago I dragged my wife up and down loads of streets trying to find the doors, and wasn’t disappointed when we finally discovered them. From photos I always thought they were at the end of a little cul-de-sac, but they’re actually just on the side of a street, and had been painted red which threw me off.
I’ve genuinely loved this episode and it’s an absolute 10/10 — the first one of the Graham Williams era. One of the very best ever.
City of Death — Part Two
Having spent so much time in Part One desperately making sure that you know they’ve gone all the way to Paris to film, this episode goes in completely the opposite direction, with only two establishing shots — one of the door and one of a window — from the location shoot in the whole episode. The rest is entirely studio-bound, and with the exception of the final couple of scenes it’s entirely set within a few rooms at the Count’s château.
I think it’s to the story’s credit that this doesn’t feel like an abrupt change of pace, and as much as I enjoyed the location work in the last episode, I don’t mourn its loss here.
The sets are — as always when they’re representing somewhere ‘real’; — are fantastic, and I completely buy the château as a place. The thing which really makes all this work, though, is the characters these rooms have been populated with. I can’t remember the last time we had a set of guest characters this brilliantly rich, and the parts have all been cast to perfection. Julian Glover is obviously the stand out star, just as he was the last time he showed up in Doctor Who, but I don’t think there’s a single weak link in the entire team.
There’s one character — and performance — which I’ve sometimes seen singled out as being a little too over the top and spoiling things a bit, and that’s David Graham as Kerensky. It’s true to say that he’s perhaps going a little more over the top than anyone else, with an affected eastern European accent and some comical facial expressions, but I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that. I totally buy Kerensky as part of this world, and it has to be said that the performance is incredibly fun to watch (and to imitate between episodes). As ever, Tom Baker has raised his game in the face of such a strong cast, and I love his interactions with Kerensky. We don’t often see this incarnation of Doctor Who interacting with scientists like this, but it’s charming to watch;
Kerensky: ‘I am the foremost authority on temporal theory in the whole world.’
Doctor Who: ‘The whole world?’
Kerensky: ‘Yes.’
Doctor Who: ‘Well, that’s a very small place when you consider the size of the universe.’
Kerensky: ‘Ah, but who can?’
Doctor Who: ‘Oh, some can. And if you can’t, you shouldn’t tinker with time.’
Upstairs, perhaps my favourite scene of the entire story takes place when Doctor Who and his friends are first brought in to be interrogated by the countess, and later her husband. The entire scene is the perfect example of the carefully honed script I banged on about during Part One, and it’s filled with quotable lines and funny jokes, culminating in one of the more famous exchanges of the story;
Countess: ‘My dear, I don’t think he’s as stupid as he seems.’
Count: ‘My dear, nobody could be as stupid as he seems.’
The scene is also the first showcase for something else this episode is very good at; giving Romana plenty to do and making her extremely capable in the process. During Season Sixteen the series seems to go back and forth on how much Romana is allowed to do. For every instance of her piloting the TARDIS better than Doctor Who, or finding a segment of the Key to Time in a matter of minutes, there’s three examples of her just being nay other companion. In this episode we really get to see her in charge. There’s a wonderful bit where the Countess proudly announces that Romana will never be able to open a Chinmese puzzle box only for the Time Lady to manage it in a matter of seconds.
And it’s Romana who uncovers the hidden Mona Lisas, bricked up in a secret room at the back of the basement. I love watching Doctor Who and Duggan explore the lab and bicker with each other while Romana coolly goes about her work in the back of shot, carrying equipment back and forth and ignoring the frivolity. It’s episodes like this which make me appreciate how brilliant she can be as a companion.
I can’t let this episode pass without mentioning the cliffhanger, which is one of the best in the series history. Just when you think you’ve got a handle on the plot, Doctor Who travels back to 1505 and discovers the Count there too! It’s such a brilliant reveal, and it’s the perfect example of something making you desperate to return next week. Fantastic.
9/10
