Destination: Moonbase Alpha (51 page)

Schell has also stated: ‘Barbara was very much against my taking the part [of Maya], because we are very similar. Obviously, I’m younger than she is, but as types, we are similar. She was looking for an Asian girl or an African girl, someone who could really never be confused with her, so that these two women were completely alien to each other. But the production side wanted me to do this and so, obviously, I was going to have to look incredibly different.’

When it came to designing the look for Maya, Schell says: ‘I did a sketch [of Maya]. The finished version of the make-up still has a lot of the ideas that were in that original sketch – the colouring was very much the same, the peak on my forehead, and the bit around my cheeks. The sketch was actually more pronounced. I was also willing to wear a white curly wig. The whole thing was sort of raccoon-like, with a mixture of dark and light. If you look at my first episode, “The Metamorph”, you can see that my ears are brown. However, when they saw the finished episode they decided to drop that idea, because the Americans said that it looked as though my ears were dirty. They gave me the dark hair, which was to make me look more human, I suppose. It was the designer’s idea to give me those octopus-type eyebrows, which he actually wanted to put all over my face. We did one screen test with these – we called them octopods – in various patterns on my cheeks and on my forehead. I said, “Well, if you want to make acne popular, we can begin here.” It was really the most ridiculous idea ever. So we compromised and only the eyebrows were done.

‘In the picture I drew, I had very short hair – like fuzz that I would have on my head. It was a thing of doing animals – different animals, different pigmentations and looking almost like a badger or a panda. That was in my mind, to do something like that. In the drawing, I even did a little whisker, and my neck was completely dark. Oh, very important – stars in my eyes. The pupils were stars, and I lived through a whole month of trying to piggyback contact lenses: soft lenses and hard lenses on top, with the stars. My eyes could never take it. The moment light would shine in, my eyes would water. So that’s why that particular thing didn’t happen. Then we did tests with Keith, and Keith had me as peacocks, multi-coloured, and all sorts of other things.’

Keith Wilson also recalled this period: ‘Catherine was brought in to do the second series, and we spent a period of time working together. We built a little stage within the stage, had a video camera set up, and lights, and we would – just the two of us – just play, basically. I would come up with new ideas, Catherine would have an idea, and we’d get the make-up people in. And we just played for about two weeks. We had to send the videos to America, for Abe Mandell and the people at ITC to approve before the actual character was sort of agreed upon. It took about two weeks. Catherine would have an idea and she’d go off and I’d do something else for an hour or two, and she’d come back and have different make-up on. We’d film it and then she’d go off and do another thing. One particular time she stood there and said, “Are you ready?” I said, “Yes.” I turned the camera on, she smiled, and she had blackened out her front teeth!’

Anton Phillips would return for the first two episodes of Year Two, until he would also choose to depart Moonbase Alpha. Zienia Merton would appear in more Year Two episodes, though she was also replaced by two different substitutes. Merton stated: ‘I was told quite some time before that I would be in series two. But when I got to series two, the first thing Freddy [Freiberger] did was change my character’s name to Sahn. He called me into his office – like I was a child – and he said, “I’m changing your name to Sahn.” I said, “Why? Sandra isn’t a difficult name.” I think, in retrospect, it was Freddy trying to prove his power.

‘Freddy had bottles of champagne waiting for us when we arrived, so I wasn’t made to sit in a dungeon. I was given a dressing room, now and again. I’m not joking. Then they put me into a short skirt. Well, I do trousers or long skirts. I have friends who have never seen my legs. But they put me into this skirt and I didn’t like it.’

Nick Tate managed to return and eventually appeared in 18 second season episodes – despite early efforts to remove his character as well, until ITC and Fred Freiberger realised the great popularity of the Australian Eagle pilot amongst fans. He was to have been dropped and replaced initially by a character called Gary Wolusky, who then went through a name change to become Mark Macinlock, before Nick Tate was invited back at the end of the first week of January 1976, to reprise the familiar role of Alan Carter. The Year One cast members who did return did so at the last minute, after Freiberger apparently realised the benefit of a couple more familiar faces being around on Moonbase Alpha, or learned of a character’s popularity (as in the case of Tate specifically). As Tate recalled: ‘I called my agent and said, “People are asking me if I’m going back into the series?” I was told that they were casting it again. How could this be? So I called Prentis, I called Zienia and I called
Clifton – none of us had heard a word. Then some people started hearing that it was happening, but we weren’t going back. Barry wasn’t around, so I couldn’t ask him. Martin and Barbara weren’t around – they were back in the States – so I couldn’t ask them. I didn’t know whether it was real or not. I asked my agent to contact Gerry Anderson at Pinewood Studios and learned that they were indeed doing another series, but sorry – they didn’t want to have anything to do with the actors from the first series. This was now going to be very controlled by America and they were bringing in a new Producer, called Fred Freiberger, and he had his own ideas about what he was going to do with the series. And so we all just had to eat it. Freddy didn’t have a very high opinion of the first series at all and wanted to change everything. He decided to get rid of everyone on the show, apart from Martin and Barbara. So they recast the show and brought in a stack of new people.

‘Early in January, I think it was 6 January, Gerry Anderson called my agent and said he wanted to meet with me. I couldn’t work out why – I knew by this stage he must have had the thing cast. So I went down and met him. All the crew were there – I knew all the crew. I walked in and saw all the sets being built and changes being made. I saw Catherine Schell walking around – I didn’t know her, but I could see that people were getting ready for tests and stuff. Gerry brought me into his office and said, “As you can see, we’re getting ready for the new series.” He said, “I’ve got some good news for you. They would like you to be back in the series.” I said, “How is this possible, Gerry?” I looked at a script he showed me, and I could see my character wasn’t in it, Prentis’s wasn’t there, Barry’s wasn’t there, and I couldn’t believe that this was going ahead.

‘The things that Fred said were logical and real and intelligent. We were dealing with a guy who really understood how to make television. But he didn’t understand the show that we had. That was my argument about it – and a lot of other people felt about the same way – that the kind of show that we had and the direction that Sylvia Anderson had intended to go in [was not suited to what he wanted to do] … [Sylvia] might have been able to pull it off. He was clever and maybe would have been able to help her pull it off, but when he came onto the show, Gerry and Sylvia Anderson had been through an unfortunate break-up of their marriage and she was out. Sylvia was a wonderful woman and a wonderful producer. She was great fun and a rather clever actress. She understood the process greatly, and I think her instincts were very good. Her absence didn’t help the show at all.’

‘I was lucky to have even been invited back to the series and I was in a very tenuous situation, but he made certain promises to me about what would happen. I could tell straight off that I was dealing with somebody who was a manipulator. I therefore didn’t sign a contract. I said, “I’ll just come in and see what happens. You’ve got nine scripts written – seven done and two others [already] in production – and I’m not in any of them. You’re just going to have me walk in and say, “Hi guys, I’m here.”’ I felt certain that they just wanted me back as window dressing. They had invited Zienia back, as well. I think there were also a couple of other very peripheral characters that had been around in the background before – one of them was [played by] Sarah Bullen. Freddy had to understand that if you had these people who were constantly in Moonbase Alpha in Command Centre, then you had to have some of the original people back, just to make it look like the same show. Even if you didn’t like them. And I’m sure that was the situation with my hiring. Fred told me something very strange. He said, “You know the reason I’m asking you back in the show?” I said, “No, Fred, what’s the reason you’re asking me back?” He said, “My kids love you. My kids love the show and I went to them and asked who I should have back. They said I’ve got to have Nick Tate.” What an extraordinary thing for him to say! Didn’t he speak to his kids in all the weeks leading up to when we were going to start, or did he only have that conversation with them the day before? He was a very strange piece of work.’

The virtual slaughter of the Year One characters took place in the background and was not addressed in any regard in the episodes of Year Two. It was as if Victor, Paul, Kano and Tanya had never existed. And then, as Mathias vanished, Sandra was replaced on occasion and Nick Tate didn’t appear in six of the new episodes, the programme ran the serious risk of alienating past viewers who might tune in and recognise no-one beyond Martin Landau and Barbara Bain. Landau recalled: ‘We were testing black actresses like crazy. I was still lobbying for Barry. Right up until about three days before, there was a black actress going to play the part [of Maya]. She was terrible! She couldn’t say three words in a row and chew gum at the same time – it was unbelievable! But I loved Catherine! In fact, when we did “Guardian of Piri”, Catherine and I had enjoyed our time together. She’s a delight. But I thought it was “Spock”, you know? We had a magic person suddenly, and that wasn’t what the show was. It was basically … again, you win some and you lose some. We lost some, but I’ve got to say, she was reality. Once you accepted the fact, there was never any reluctance. Nick wasn’t receptive with the addition of Tony, and Nick got short-changed in the second season. Prentis certainly got short-changed. Clifton went by the wayside. But I think the first season was a superior season. Some people don’t. I’ve talked to some people and they like the second season better …’

The loss of Professor Bergman was mentioned in Johnny Byrne’s script ‘The Metamorph’, and Zienia Merton recalls filming the sequence, although the scene never made it to the final edit of the episode. The dialogue in question was to have come in Scene 146:

Simon
[later Tony Verdeschi]: ‘I wish Bergman was here.’

Sandra
[nods]: ‘But he isn’t.’

Simon
: ‘One lousy space suit with a faulty helmet and Victor had to be in it.’

Sandra
[gently]: ‘We can’t bring him back, Simon.’

A new crop of faces appeared. Apart from Catherine Schell, Tony Anholt joined the cast as Tony Verdeschi (originally called Simon Hays), a hot-blooded Italian in charge of Moonbase security. Anholt said: ‘I got a phone call at home out of the blue from Gerry Anderson who said, “Have you seen
Space: 1999
?” I think I had seen one episode of it and, to be perfectly honest, had thought, “What a load of rubbish.” I said, “No, I don’t think I have. Why?” He said, “Well, we did a year of it and it was sort of shelved, and now we think we’re going again with the second year. Freddy Freiberger is coming over to give it a slightly new feel and Abe Mandell,” who is ITC New York, “wants you in it. Lew Grade wants you in it. I would be very happy to have you in it. Would you be interested?” The deal was set up and it all seemed favourable, so to the end of the following January I found myself in one of those outfits, as what I think was billed as “The Most Dynamic Explorer in the Universe” or something!’

John Hug took on the semi-regular role of Eagle pilot Bill Fraser. Fraser had a wife, Annette, who was introduced as a new supporting character in ‘The Metamorph’, portrayed by Anouska Hempel –,but she was promptly dropped and never heard from again! Jeffrey Kissoon played Dr Ben Vincent, replacing Dr Mathias … that is, until Dr Vincent vanished and was himself replaced by Dr Ed Spencer, played by Sam Dastor. And then there was ‘The Mark of Archanon’, in which Dr Vincent is missing, replaced by Raul Newney as Dr Raul Nunez, who appears in only this one episode. Sandra’s replacements would be Yasuko Nagazumi as Yasko Nugami and Alibe Parsons as Alibe. Also featured in several episodes was the character Petrov (originally called Jameson), stationed in Weapons Section, portrayed by Peter Porteous (husband of costume designer Emma Porteous). Confused? The producers didn’t think the audience would notice.

Fred Freiberger made the following comments regarding the cast changes: ‘We thought if we were going to drop a main character, we would drop Nick Tate, and then I reconsidered. I thought, “No, this guy’s brilliant. He’s a real asset to the show.” So every time you want to cut something you can find it’s an asset … But we started the second season and we had Tony Anholt there … We didn’t have to explain Tony Anholt. He was just there – the characterisation, if it’s done well, will explain in the action what’s going on. When I first got to the show I got a call from Barbara, and she had a wonderful sense of humour. I wanted to give her character more of that. We may have discussed putting in explanations as to what happened, but I don’t know. I don’t remember if we did.’

Major set alterations and relocations were implemented. Most significant of all, the vast Main Mission was replaced by the tighter confines of Command Centre. (While prominent signage utilised the American spelling of ‘Center’ – obviously tailoring the series to the American market as much as possible – smaller labelling also visible on-screen featured the British spelling, as does this book). In general, sets were smaller and more compact, and in an interesting twist, the producers decided to move most of the active areas of Moonbase Alpha into the underground sections of the base. This meant the elimination of the prominently featured windows from the first season. While no explanation was provided for any of these changes, the assumption and common behind-the-scenes explanation is that it was a choice made for the safety of the Alphans – they would be more sheltered from radiation, alien attack and other hazards in underground locations than in surface installations. It was also a stylistic choice prompted by Fred Freiberger, who felt the larger Year One sets were depersonalising and that the smaller scale would assist in his desire to achieve a sense of excitement and urgency. The Eagles shrank as well – in the second season, the Stewardess Section between the command and passenger modules is missing (which is, of course, incongruent with the external model design, which didn’t change). Even the travel tubes became smaller and now included only four seats instead of six.