Destination: Moonbase Alpha (37 page)

On-screen Date:
877 days since leaving Earth orbit.

Filming Dates:
Monday 27 January – Monday 10 February 1975

Incidental Music:
The Ultra Probe’s voyage is scored by the beautiful and haunting neo-baroque piece ‘Adagio in G Minor’. This composition is now recognised as being an original composition by Remo Giazotto (published in 1958), although Giazotto had fabricated a story that it was based upon a fragment of music by Tomaso Albinoni (and the piece is frequently referred to as ‘Albinoni’s Adagio’.) This arrangement is by Allain Lombard and was published by Delyse [Envoy] Recording Co.

Commentary:

Nick Tate:
‘In the first series the show was devised very much around the concept of Martin Landau and Barbara Bain having been big stars in America. They wanted to shoot the show very much all about them, and the rest of us were very peripheral. They intended bringing on guest actors who would have nice, meaty roles and then go away again, because the nature of the beast was that they were an alien who would go away, or they were a character who would be brought up from the bowels of
Space: 1999
and they would die in space somewhere and never be seen again. That’s how they handled actors who had larger roles.

‘For the most part they didn’t want us other [regular] actors – Prentis and Zienia and
Clifton, Anton and me – to have big parts. I just got lucky that Alan’s character grew. But I did have an awkward time in “Dragon’s Domain”. I had seen an early draft of that script and my character was the character that saved the day and killed the dragon. The writer, Chris Penfold, had in fact originally written the episode for me. It was a great break for me and I was very excited about it. I was not supposed to see any of the early drafts, but I did see it, because I’d gone to Johnny Byrne’s house and he’d told me about it and I’d seen the draft. I liked that early script the best; I took it home and learned a lot of it … When the shooting script came down six weeks later, my character is in the first three pages and then gets knocked on the head and spends the rest of the episode in the infirmary. They brought in an Italian actor to play a new character, Cellini, and of course the Dragon kills him and Martin then kills the Dragon and saves the day.

‘I couldn’t understand the great change in that script. I went in to Sylvia to ask her why, and she closed the door and said, “There are things that go on in a series that you should understand. This is not something that I can change for you.” I said, “But you told me how much you liked me, and how much you wanted things to improve for me. This was going to be my big break.” She said, “Yes, it was, but there are other people here that have more power than I do.” It turned out that Martin didn’t want it to be. He’d read the draft and said, “Nick is not to play that role. That’s not his position here.” I’ve kept that pretty much under my hat for a long time, but that’s the reason why most of us were not given ongoing relationships within the show, because Martin and Barbara didn’t want it. That’s the truth. And it was the downfall of the show, really, if you want to know the truth of it.

‘When the show aired in America, one of the main complaints about it was that there wasn’t a great deal of interrelationships and things going on with the people, and the viewers wanted to know why there wasn’t a lot of human stuff happening with them. The reason was because – stupidly – it was decided that all those relationships should be contained within the two lead actors, or guest actors who would come on and be killed or fired; and it was a big mistake. Sylvia loved all the actors she had on the show and she was a great supporter of me and Prentis and Zienia, and she wanted us to do more. But we weren’t allowed to do more.

‘They brought in Gianni to play the role [of Cellini] … I remember the first day that he worked I had to do a scene with him, and the irony was that his English was really very poor. He was a very good Italian actor who could speak broken English, but to do all that dialogue, it just wasn’t there for him. So he came to me – I don’t think he realised the role was originally written for me, otherwise he probably never would have had the gall to ask me this – but he said, “Would you help me learn the role?” I said, “Sure, of course,” because I liked him. He came to my dressing room and we read the lines over and over. I tape-recorded every one of his lines for him in English and he went away and learned them – parrot fashion – from me. He was such a nice guy, and he deserved to do it well.’

Johnny Byrne:
‘I thought “Dragon’s Domain” was awfully good. Again, it was different, because we had a voice-over, but it worked awfully well in it. That was a really spooky dragon they had, and I saw the poor thing mouldering away outside in the back-lot for the remainder of the series. And, poor little thing, I used to take my dogs up to the studios and we would go chasing rabbits around the back-lot and they would always end up somehow having a pee on the old octopus, or whatever it was!’

Christopher Penfold:
‘“Dragon’s Domain” was an attempt to take on the whole issue of monsters in what I hoped was a fairly creative and constructive way. I saw that episode for the first time [around 1993] and I felt quite pleased with it. It treats monsters in quite a philosophical way. The special effects in view of what we have seen in
Alien
and
Star Wars
now look laughable, but in a way it didn’t matter.

‘I think that in “Dragon’s Domain” what I was taking on was the notion of how we deal with the idea of monstrosity. We live in a world that insurance companies attempt to persuade us is insurable in every respect. Security is something that we strive for, and yet all of us know, either at the back of our minds or indeed around the corner, there can always be arbitrary and unexpected horrors. The whole horror genre is built on that. In “Dragon’s Domain” I really wanted to take that on and to tell a story in which the belief in the monster would turn out to be real, in the sense that it was an aspect of the unknown universe with which an individual suddenly becomes confronted; in the face of no experience, other than the kind of accumulation of mythological stories that have dealt with this notion. That was the only equipment that they, the Alphans, had to deal with the Dragon.’

Bloopers:
Watch the effects shot immediately before Cellini says, ‘There’s got to be someone around.’ In this (and the following) shot of the spaceship graveyard the Ultra Probe is clearly shown already docked to the Dragon’s ship and already missing its pilot’s section … In story terms, of course, the Probe hasn’t even docked yet! Another case of special effects shots being inserted in the wrong order into an episode.

The Dragon is shocking enough for any horror film – just ignore the strings manipulating its tentacles as Cellini becomes entangled in its grip.

The Space News broadcast gives the current date (leading up to the launch of the Ultra Probe) as 3 September 1996; but Helena later chronicles the launch date of the Ultra Probe as 6 June 1996. The problem was simple: the script had the date written in the European order of day, month, year (as ‘9-3-96’ – 9 March 1996), however actor Bob Sherman read the date in the American order of month, day, year, as 3 September 1996.

Observations:
Helena Russell’s personal quarters are shown again, for the first time since ‘Matter of Life and Death’. Apparently she’s either moved or renovated, because they’re different than they were before.

The special effects team experimented with including the TARDIS from
Doctor Who
and a model of
Star Trek
’s
USS Enterprise
in the spaceship graveyard, before ultimately abandoning the idea.

‘Dragon’s Domain’ is another episode that tested the boundaries of what could be considered ‘family viewing’ due to the graphic nature of the Dragon swallowing its prey and spitting them back out again as grotesque smouldering corpses.

Strikingly,
‘Dragon’s Domain’ is the fifth episode in a row that takes place purely in outer space and doesn’t feature a planet at all, which makes one of the criticisms the series frequently faced – that the Moon was improbably encountering a different planet each week – difficult to comprehend and goes a long way to demonstrating that the critics making such statements never actually watched the programme.

Actress Barbara Kellermann’s name is more commonly spelt ‘Kellerman’, but she does occasionally get credited either way in various productions.

Review:
The final association of writer Christopher Penfold and director Charles Crichton, ‘Dragon’s Domain’ is an unforgettable science fiction landmark. Penfold takes his first inspiration from the ancient tale of Saint George and the Dragon and projects a childhood fear onto the Alphans – what monster lies waiting for us in the dark of space?

‘Dragon’s Domain’ begins 877 days after the Moon left Earth orbit, placing a timeline to the journeys of Moonbase Alpha. It’s interesting to see that the events of the first series to date have occurred not within one year, but well over two years of Alphan time. Sadly, this timeline would be ignored by the second series, which would begin its premiere episode ‘The Metamorph’ at 342 days after leaving Earth orbit.

Tony Cellini’s quarters are likely the most personal presented in the series, decorated with a variety of ancient weapons and artwork. Kano is again seen playing chess, a hobby of his – either playing against other people or against Computer. Here he gets to beat Commander Koenig as the two lounge on the steps in Main Mission for their match. There is a wealth of character conflict and drama, especially between Koenig and Dr Russell, who are at odds over Cellini. Koenig respects his old friend, while Helena thinks Cellini is unstable and a threat to the safety of Alpha.

The back-story is wonderfully detailed. Viewers learn that Professor Bergman discovered and named Ultra in 1994, and there is a flashback to events on Moonbase Alpha in 1996 as preparations build for the Ultra Probe mission. Koenig appears here in an orange-sleeved Reconnaissance uniform, contrasting against his usual Command black. Colourful jackets are also on display, as well as name badges – both would become regular features in Year Two. While ‘Another Time, Another Place’ showed a possible future life for the Alphans, ‘Dragon’s Domain’ shows their past. Barbara Bain, Barry Morse and Martin Landau all shine portraying slightly younger versions of their characters. Gianni Garko is also memorably effective as the obsessed Cellini.

During the flashback sequences, the
Space: 1999
term ‘black sun’ is used again in reference to black holes. The term would also be used in the Year Two episode ‘Seed of Destruction’. The flashback and narration itself effectively set the tone and maintain the mood of the episode.

The journey of the Ultra Probe is also shown through flashback, with a voice-over by
Helena. These sequences feature the use of silent space, both scientifically accurate and extremely rare for a filmed science fiction production. (Indeed, with the depiction of silent space and use of a classical orchestral score, the voyage of the Ultra Probe bears a resemblance to that of the Discovery in
2001: A Space Odyssey
.). The Ultra Probe joins the growing list of Earth’s disastrous space exploration missions in
Space: 1999
, including the Meta Probe, the Astro 7, Voyager One (and Voyager Two), and the Uranus Probe.

The Ultra Probe is a stunningly designed and completely believable miniature, coupled with perfectly matched and impressive interior sets. The model work by Martin Bower in this instalment – specifically for the Ultra Probe and the spaceship graveyard – is without doubt the best in the series. While watching the spaceship graveyard scenes, viewers can see Arra’s craft from ‘Collision Course’ and the bomber most famous from ‘War Games’, among other familiar ships.

Keith Wilson designed the incredible Dragon, which is the most convincing and thoroughly ‘alien’ creature to appear in
Space: 1999
. It is horrifying, and so utterly otherworldly that it failed to register as a life form on the Ultra Probe’s Black Box, or on the scans from Alpha or the Eagle. With the arguable exception of the mutated Anton Zoref in ‘Force of Life’, this is the only alien monster to appear throughout the 24 episodes of Year One.

Barry Morse always wanted to do unique and different things to add to the characterisation of Victor Bergman, and this desire shows itself during the flashback scene in Commissioner Dixon’s office. As the men take their seats, Bergman sits on the arm of his chair, crosses his legs and slouches comfortably sideways while drinking a cup of coffee. It’s a subtly sharp contrast to the bearing of the other actors (Martin Landau and Gianni Garko), who simply sit down in their chairs in the conventional manner.

Also of interest in this scene, for those viewers who like to take note of set details, are some good views of a Keith Wilson painting hanging to the side of Dixon’s desk. It’s quite futuristic looking, with a predominance of red and yellow, and several figures.

Nick Tate gets to act a lighter moment in this tense episode (‘What’s that guy got against me?’), as do Landau and Bain as he gives her a flower and they share a tender exchange. These are effective counterpoints to the horrifying aspects of the story. Another enjoyable comment comes from
Helena, when she remarks somewhat pointedly about Cellini, ‘He didn’t even take his toothbrush.’ This all adds greatly to the warmth of the characters in general and the developing relationship between Koenig and Russell especially. As usual, Helena is the sensible one throughout this adventure, while Koenig is hot-headed – a perfect match for each other.