The King's Demons

The Doctor (Peter Davison) has a word
in Kamelion's ear

Two episodes (Part One, Part Two)
First broadcast Mar 15 to 16 1983
Average audience for serial: 6.50m

REGULAR CAST

Peter Davison (The Doctor) Born Apr 13 1951 Click here for Peter Davison's entry on Logopolis

Janet Fielding (Tegan) Born Sep 9 1953 Click here for Janet Fielding's entry on Logopolis

Mark Strickson (Turlough) Born Apr 6 1959 Click here for Mark Strickson's entry on Mawdryn Undead

GUEST CAST

Anthony Ainley (The Master) Aug 20 1932 to May 3 2004 (cancer) Click here for Anthony Ainley's entry on The Keeper of Traken

Isla Blair (Isabella) Born Sep 29 1944
Career highlights
India born Isla made her first appearance in the Beatles film A Hard Day's Night (1964), but her scenes were eventually cut. Her first on screen credit came with Laughter from the Whitehall (1965), with later roles in Rookery Nook (1965), The Liars (1966), The Avengers (1967), The Dickie Henderson Show (1968), The Battle of Britain (1969), Taste the Blood of Dracula (1970), The Regiment (1973), The Venturers (1975), When the Boat Comes In (1976-77), The Crezz (1976), Blake's 7 (1978), The History Man (1981), Alexa (1982), CATS Eyes (1987), Boogie Outlaws (1987), Bookie (1988), Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), Mother Love (1989), Haggard (1990), Inspector Morse (1992), Doctor Finlay (1995), The Final Cut (1995), A Touch of Frost (1996-97), The Match (1999), Mrs Caldicot's Cabbage War (2002), Afterlife (2003),The Quatermass Experiment (2005), Single Father (2010), Johnny English Reborn (2011), Grantchester (2014), Father Brown (2016), Amy and Sophia (2017) and Casualty (2006/19).
Facts
Ironically, Isla's character Isabella meets King John in this story, and John's brother was King Richard I, as played in the Doctor Who story The Crusade by Julian Glover - Isla's real life husband! The two actors have one child, actor Jamie Glover - perhaps best known to Doctor Who fans for playing William Russell in An Adventure in Space and Time and Ian Chesterton in Big Finish's 1960s audio adventures. In 1979, Isla appeared in this TV commercial for Supersoft hairspray. When Isla appeared naked in 1981's The History Man, the "outrage" was discussed in the Houses of Parliament.

Peter Burroughs (Jester) Born Jan 27 1947
Career highlights
4ft 6in Peter's other notable credits include The Legend of King Arthur (1979), Flash Gordon (1980), The Talisman (1980-81), Dick Turpin (1981), The Goodies (1981), The Dark Crystal (1982), Return of the Jedi (1983, as an ewok), Labyrinth (1986), Willow (1988), One Foot in the Grave (1990), Without Prejudice? (2004) and The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005, playing Marvin the Paranoid Android). He was also the cute milk carton in the music video for Blur's Coffee & TV (1999), and took part in a 2002 documentary about Dwarves in Showbiz.
Facts
Peter has two daughters - actresses Hayley Burroughs and Samantha Davis, the latter of whom is married to fellow dwarf actor Warwick Davis (their daughter is actor Annabelle Davis). As well as being Peter's business partner in running Willow Management, Warwick is also remembered as Wicket the Ewok in Return of the Jedi, and also appeared in Doctor Who in Nightmare in Silver. Ironically, Peter was born in Peterborough, UK!

Gerald Flood ("King John", Voice of Kamelion) Apr 21 1927 to Apr 12 1989 (heart attack)
Doctor Who credits
Played: "King John" in The King's Demons (1983)
Played: Voice of Kamelion in The King's Demons (1983), Planet of Fire (1984), The Caves of Androzani (1984)
Career highlights
After debuting in Do-It-Yourself (1957), Gerald found fame as Conway Henderson in the Pathfinders series (in Space, to Mars and to Venus, 1960-61), followed by even more renown as Mark Bannerman in Plateau of Fear and its sequels City Beneath the Sea and Secret Beneath the Sea (1961-63). Later work includes Out of This World (1962), Smokescreen (1964), Callan (1967), Two in Clover (1969), Strange Report (1969), Patton (1970), Steptoe and Son (1970), Tom Brown's Schooldays (1971), Bachelor Father (1970-71), The Main Chance (1972), Second Time Around (1974), Raffles (1977), The Racing Game (1979), Third Time Lucky (1982), Bleak House (1985) and Mornin' Sarge (1989). He also enjoyed regular roles as Colonel Sharif Mahmoud in Crane (1963-65) and Peregrine Smith in The Rat Catchers (1966-67).
Facts
Gerald's grandson is Newcastle and England rugby union player Toby Flood. In June 1984, Gerald was a passenger aboard a sleeper train from Aberdeen to London which came off the rails at Morpeth and crashed. Gerald suffered a massive heart attack in 1984 while appearing in Blithe Spirit at the Ashcroft Theatre in Croydon, UK. In his later years Gerald reportedly had a problem with alcohol.

Michael J Jackson (Sir Geoffrey) Born Jan 19 1948
Career highlights
No, not that Michael Jackson! This one made his acting debut in Man About the House in 1973, followed by roles in The Legend of Robin Hood (1975), Anna Karenina (1977), Hazell (1979), One Summer (1983), Morons from Outer Space (1985), Fairly Secret Army (1986), Kinsey (1992), Bugs (1995), Highlander (1996-97), Murder Rooms (2001), Murphy's Law (2004), Mobile (2007), Coronation Street (2012-14) and Pleasure Island (2015). Michael also had regular roles in Wish Me Luck (1988-90) as Kit Vanston (which he also wrote an episode of in 1990), soap Brookside (1996-98) as Ollie Simpson, daytime soap Doctors (2003-04) as Dr Mike Miles, and soap Emmerdale (2010-11) as Jerry Walsh.
Awards
1978: Evening Standard British Film Award for Most Promising Actor
Facts
More recently Michael taught at Calderstones School in Liverpool.

Christopher Villiers (Hugh) Born Sep 7 1958
Doctor Who credits
Played: Hugh in The King's Demons (1983)
Played: Professor Moorhouse in Mummy on the Orient Express (2014)
Career highlights
Making his debut in Lady Killers (1981), Christopher's CV includes roles in Squadron (1982), Young Sherlock: The Mystery of the Manor House (1982), Sweet Sixteen (1983), Mansfield Park (1983), Kit Curran (1986), Mog (1985-86), Capstick's Law (1989), We Are Seven (1991), First Knight (1995), The Detectives (1997), Sliding Doors (1998), Faith in the Future (1998), Ultraviolet (1998), Midsomer Murders (1997/99), Big Meg, Little Meg (2000), Stig of the Dump (2002), The Vice (2002), Family Affairs (2002), Trevor's World of Sport (2003), Judge John Deed (2006), Kidulthood (2006), From Time to Time (2009), The Knot (2012), Vera (2014), The Coroner (2015), Indian Summers (2016), Silent Hours (2017), The Royals (2018), The ABC Murders (2018), Ghosts (2021) and Slow Horses (2022). Between 2006-08 he regularly played Grayson Sinclair in soap Emmerdale, and also played Captain Nigel Croker in Mile High (2004-05) and Colonel Brigwell in Hetty Feather (2015-18).
Facts
His brother Jay is also an actor, while his sister Cat is a producer. Christopher is related to Henry Villiers, Bishop of Durham in the 1860s, and George Villiers, the 4th Earl of Clarendon in the 19th century. In 1995, Christopher co-founded the 2020 Casting firm which supplies extras for film productions. Christopher is godfather to one of Resurrection of the Daleks actor Leslie Grantham's sons. Here he is, on Twitter!

Frank Windsor (Ranulf) Jul 12 1928 to Sep 30 2020
Doctor Who credits
Played: Ranulf in The King's Demons (1983)
Played: Inspector Mackenzie in Ghost Light (1989)
Career highlights
Debuting in The Masque of Kings in 1955, Frank's CV includes roles in Hilda Lessways (1959), An Age of Kings (1960), A for Andromeda (1961), This Sporting Life (1963), The Avengers (1968), Spring and Port Wine (1970), Sunday Bloody Sunday (1971), Barry Mackenzie Holds His Own (1974), Headmaster (1977), Middlemen (1977), The Goodies (1977), Kidnapped (1978), The Plank (1979), The London Connection (1979), Charlie (1984), Revolution (1985), Dear John (1987), The Real Eddy English (1989), Chancer (1990), EastEnders (1992), September Song (1995), The Famous Five (1996), Sunburn (2000), Judge John Deed (2002-03) and Between Two Women (2004). Frank will be forever remembered as Detective Sergeant John Watt in 129 episodes of Z Cars (1962-65/78), as well as its numerous spin-offs, including 84 episodes of Softly Softly (1966-69), 123 episodes of Softly Softly: Task Force (1969-76), six episodes of Jack the Ripper (1973) and six episodes of Second Verdict (1976). In all, Frank appeared in 348 productions as Watt. In later years he might be recognised as Harry Bradley in Flying Lady (1987-89), the Chief Superintendent in comedy The Detectives (1993-96), Kenneth Samuels in Casualty (2003-04), or even advertising Sun Life insurance for the over-50s in TV commercials (2002-03). He also advertised holiday/ property magazine Dalton's Weekly in a number of TV ads, as well as Players cigars.
Facts
Frank was a founding member of the Oxford and Cambridge Players, later the Elizabethan Players. In June 1997 Frank's 29-year-old son David and his married lover Denise Rothwell were both killed when they left a hotel in Wester Ross, Scotland, without paying their £100 bill and their car plunged 15ft off the road into the River Grudie, drowning them.
This is Your Life: Frank was the subject of Thames TV's This is Your Life on December 3rd, 1975, surprised by host Eamonn Andrews during a special dinner at the Metropolitan Police Sports Club. Unfortunately, by the stage in the evening that Frank was surprised, he was somewhat inebriated, and flummoxed Eamonn Andrews by telling off-colour jokes, visibly sliding down in his chair, and ending the show by repeatedly shouting "Rubbish!". The number of edits the show required before transmission apparently set a record. One of the guests at the tribute was fellow Doctor Who actor James Ellis.

CREW

Terence Dudley (writer) Sep 28 1919 to Dec 25 1988 (cancer)
Doctor Who credits
Directed: Meglos (1980)
Wrote: K-9 & Company (1981), Four to Doomsday (1982), Black Orchid (1982), The King's Demons (1983)
Career highlights
Terence started out in the 1950s as a playwright and soon went into script writing, his early credits including The River Flows East (1962), and then Moonstrike (1963), Detective (1964), Boy Meets Girl (1967), Doomwatch (1970-72), Survivors (1977) and All Creatures Great and Small (1978-80). He became a BBC producer and director in the early 1960s, and in this capacity worked on productions such as The Nightwatchman's Stories (1959), The World of Tim Frazer (1960-61), The Men from Room 13 (1961), Cluff (1964-65), Champion House (1967), Doomwatch (1970-72), Colditz (1972), Survivors (1975-77), Secret Army (1978), To Serve Them All My Days (1980-81), Triangle (1983) and All Creatures Great and Small (1978-83).
Facts
In 1963 he was invited by Doctor Who's original producer, Verity Lambert, to write the very first story (as a replacement for Anthony Coburn's 100,000 BC), but declined. His son is child actor Stephen Dudley, who appeared in over 20 episodes of Survivors (1975-77) as John Millon.

Tony Virgo (director) Born Sep 29 1948
Career highlights
Tony started out as a production assistant on Survivors (1976), Blake's 7 (1978), Secret Army (1977-78) and Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (1979), before becoming a director on Angels (1982), Nine Days in May (1984), Emmerdale Farm (1985), Travellers By Night (1985), Crossroads (1985), EastEnders (1986-88), A Country Practice (1989) and All Creatures Great and Small (1988-89). He then became a producer on series such as EastEnders (1987-88), The Bill (1990-92), Perfect Scoundrels (1992), The Vet (1995-96), Dangerfield (1996), Backup (1997), Dalziel and Pascoe (1997-98), The Scarlet Pimpernel (1999), My Brother Jack (2001) and Peak Practice (1993-2002).
Facts
In 2000, Tony became head of drama at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Since 2011 he has been a Conservative councillor on Bracknell Forest Council.

John Nathan-Turner (producer) Aug 12 1947 to May 1 2002 (liver failure) Click here for John Nathan-Turner's entry on The Leisure Hive

Eric Saward (script editor) Born Dec 9 1944 Click here for Eric Saward's entry on on Castrovalva