Battlefield

The Brigadier (Nicholas Courtney) and
Morgaine (Jean Marsh)... or is it Bret
Vyon and Sara Kingdom reunited?

Four episodes (Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four)
First broadcast Sep 6 to 27 1989
Average audience for serial: 3.65m

REGULAR CAST

Sylvester McCoy (The Doctor) Born Aug 20 1943 Click here for Sylvester McCoy's entry on Time and the Rani

Sophie Aldred (Ace) Born Aug 20 1962 Click here for Sophie Aldred's entry on Dragonfire

GUEST CAST

Marek Anton (The Destroyer)
Doctor Who credits
Played: The Destroyer in Battlefield (1989)
Played: Vershinin in The Curse of Fenric (1989)
Career highlights
Marek's further credits include The Paradise Club (1989), 'Allo 'Allo! (1992), Love Hurts (1993) and The Famous Five (1996).
Facts
He now lives in Poland.

June Bland (Elizabeth Rowlinson) Born Jun 2 1931
Doctor Who credits
Played: Berger in Earthshock (1982)
Played: Elizabeth Rowlinson in Battlefield (1989)
Career highlights
June's few other screen credits include Bat Out of Hell (1966) and Angels (1980). She also had a long-running role as Vera Harker in 207 episodes of soap The Newcomers (1966-69) and Mrs Lipska in 26 episodes of The Doctors (1970-71).
Facts
In 1995, she established the Stagecoach Theatre Arts School in Basingstoke, UK, which she then sold as a franchise ten years later. In 1950, June married the director Bill Sellars (who helmed the Doctor Who story The Celestial Toymaker), but later divorced him. After this, Sellars moved to Spain to live with his civil partner, Alan Sandilands, but when Sandilands died in 2012, Sellars returned to the UK and remarried June (they had three children together). Sellars died in 2018, aged 93.
In 2015 Toby Hadoke released his Who's Round interview with June here.

Christopher Bowen (Mordred) Born Oct 20 1959
Career highlights
Christopher's first role was in Dempsey and Makepeace (1985), followed by Cyrano de Bergerac (1985), Knights of God (1987), The Shell Seekers (1989), Waiting for God (1991), Darkman (1992), South Beach (1993), Cold Comfort Farm (1995), Little Lord Fauntleroy (1995), Richard III (1995), Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), Heartbeat (2001), Poirot (2001), Lie With Me (2004), Jane Eyre (2006), Holby City (2007), Lewis (2010), Parade's End (2012), Homefront (2012), Maigret Sets a Trap (2016), On Chesil Beach (2017), Ransom (2018), Endeavour (2019) and Outlander (2020). He also regularly played Alex Milburn in the short-lived soap Castles (1995).

Angela Bruce (Brigadier Winifred Bambera) Born May 6 1951
Career highlights
Angela's debut came in Man at the Top in 1973, followed by roles in Within These Walls (1975), Rock Follies (1976), Coronation Street (1978), Empire Road (1979), The Winner (1983), Dempsey and Makepeace (1985), The Practice (1986), Red Dwarf (1988), Spender (1991), Prime Suspect (1991), Van der Valk (1992), Takin' Over the Asylum (1994), Our Friends in the North (1996), Only Fools and Horses (1996), Big Bad World (1999), EastEnders (2000), The Ghost Hunter (2001), Mrs Caldicot's Cabbage War (2002), My Family (2002), Waking the Dead (2005), Spooks (2007), Casualty (1996/2007/2015), Vera (2015), Him (2016) and Doctors (2002/05/09/16/17/20). She's had regular roles as Sandra Ling in Angels (1975-79), Chrissie Stuart in Press Gang (1989-90) and Mandy Goodhue in Bad Girls (2006).
Facts
Angela was born to a white mother and a West Indian father, and was adopted aged three by a couple with the surname Bruce. Angela reprised the role of Brigadier Bambera on the Big Finish audio Animal in 2011.

Noel Collins (Pat Rowlinson) Dec 11 1936 to Aug 15 2011 (lung cancer)
Career highlights
Noel's first credit was a 1967 Wednesday Play called Days in the Trees, followed by The Rats are Coming! The Werewolves are Here! (1972), Adult Fun (1972), Middlemen (1977), Within These Walls (1978), Pennies from Heaven (1978), Accident (1978), A Question of Guilt (1980), Never Never Land (1980), Bread (1986), A Master of the Marionettes (1989) and Health and Efficiency (1994). He is most associated with the character of Sgt George Parrish in over 80 episodes of Juliet Bravo (1980-85).
Facts
Noel was first diagnosed with lung cancer in 1996, after which he had a lung removed. He became one of 53 people who launched a £17m lawsuit against Gallaher and Imperial Tobacco, claiming the companies were negligent in not reducing the tar content in cigarettes once the link between smoking and lung cancer had been established. The claim was abandoned in 1999 because of the prospect of soaring legal costs if it were lost.

Nicholas Courtney (Brigadier Lethbridge Stewart) Dec 16 1929 to Feb 22 2011 (cancer) Click here for Nicholas Courtney's entry on The Daleks' Master Plan

Angela Douglas (Doris Lethbridge-Stewart) Born Oct 29 1940
Career highlights
After debuting in a 1958 episode of Dixon of Dock Green, Angela's credits include The Shakedown (1960), Bootsie and Snudge (1960), Coronation Street (1961), Emergency Ward 10 (1961), The Gentle Terror (1961), Compact (1962), Some People (1962), The Comedy Man (1964), Sergeant Cork (1966), Wuthering Heights (1967), Jason King (1972), Digby, the Biggest Dog in the World (1973), Father Brown (1974), The Gentle Touch (1984), Strathblair (1993), Soldier Soldier (1994), Hamlet (1996), This Year's Love (1999), Deceit (2000), The Four Feathers (2002), Holby City (2004), Four Seasons (2008-09) and Sniff (2010). She had regular roles as Julie Ward in Oil Strike North (1975) and Isobel Trimble in Cardiac Arrest (1995-96), but is best known for being a member of the Carry On film franchise team, appearing in four films between 1966-68.
Facts
Angela was married to actor Kenneth More until his death in 1982 (she had put her acting career pretty much on hold to care for Kenneth after he was diagnosed with a rare form of Parkinson's Disease in 1979). Her second husband is director Bill Bryden.

James Ellis (Peter Warmsley) Mar 15 1931 to Mar 8 2014 (stroke)
Career highlights
Belfast born James made his first appearance in Escape (1957), then The Adventures of Robin Hood (1958), Over the Bridge (1961), The Scales of Justice (1966), Full House (1973), Til Death Us Do Part (1975), The Long March (1980), Boys from the Blackstuff (1982), The Gathering Seed (1983), Tripper's Day (1984), Re-Animator (1985), The Practice (1986), The Marksman (1987), Troubles (1988), Little Sir Nicholas (1990), Woof! (1991), So You Think You've Got Troubles (1991), In Sickness and in Health (1992), Lovejoy (1993), Priest (1994), Common as Muck (1994), Leapin' Leprechauns! (1995), Spellbreaker: Secret of the Leprechauns (1996), Mike and Angelo (1997), Birds of a Feather (1998), Big Bad World (1999), Sunburn (2000), Only Fools and Horses (2002), Magic Grandad (2003), The Bill (2004), Down to Earth (2005) and Eternal Law (2012). He had recurring roles as Norman Martin in three Graham Reid Play for Todays (1982-84), Paddy Reilly in One By One (1984-87), Sarge in Nightingales (1990-93), Uncle Minto in Ballykissangel (1998-99) and Mr Mullen in Playing the Field (1998-2002). However, it is his long-running role as Bert Lynch in more than 620 episodes of Z Cars (1962-78) that he will be most remembered for.
Facts
James (whose father was a sheet metal worker on the Titanic) was also a poet, writer and a translator of folklore from foreign languages into English. Married twice, James had four children - two of whom sadly predeceased him: Adam was murdered in London in 1988, aged 28, while Hugo killed himself in 2011, aged 49.
This is Your Life: James was the subject of BBC TV's This is Your Life on January 25th, 2001, surprised by host Michael Aspel during rehearsals for the play The Playboy of the Western World at the National Theatre.

Marcus Gilbert (Ancelyn) Born Jul 29 1958
Career highlights
Marcus debuted in The Weather in the Streets (1983), then Master of the Game (1984), Hammer House of Mystery and Suspense (1984), Robin of Sherwood (1984), Connie (1985), Biggles (1986), Rambo III (1988), Uncle Silas (1989), A Ghost in Monte Carlo (1990), Hunter (1991), Army of Darkness (1992), Riders (1993), Murder, She Wrote (1994), The Lazarus Man (1996), Doctors (2001), Freebird (2008) and Meet Pursuit Delange: The Movie (2015).
Facts
In the 1990s he became the male face of the Nescafe Gold Blend coffee adverts, having previously found acclaim in the New Romantic/ punk/ skinhead mash-up that is the 1984 Lee Cooper jeans advert Mean Jeans (it won the Best Cinema Commercial Award of 1986). Keen traveller Marcus now has his own production company, Touch the Sky Productions, which makes documentaries on his ascents of locations such as Mount Kilimanjaro and the Peruvian Andes.
In 2016 Toby Hadoke released his Who's Round interview with Marcus here.

Robert Jezek (Sergeant Zbrigniev) Born Apr 6 1955
Career highlights
Canadian Robert debuted in The Ted Kennedy Jr Story (1986), then took roles in Star Cops (1987), The March (1990), Shadowchaser (1992), Death Machine (1994), Event Horizon (1997), Dark Realm (2001), The 51st State (2001), Living the Quake (2006), Rosemary and Thyme (2006), Inside the Twin Towers (2006), Casino Royale (2006), The Christmas Miracle of Jonathan Toomey (2007), Taggart (2008), Shameless (2009), EastEnders (2011), Holby City (2012), Walking with the Enemy (2013), Asylum (2015), Ren (2016), Two Tramps and a Tin of Tuna (2018) and The Spy (2019). Between 2010-12, Robert regularly played Steve Conway in the series I Shouldn't Be Alive.
Facts
Robert provided the voice of Frobisher, the shape-shifting penguin who started out as a companion to the Sixth and Seventh Doctors in the comic strips of Doctor Who Magazine and then transferred to audio in two Big Finish adventures in 2000-02. In 2000, Robert appeared in the music video for Fatboy Slim's Sunset (Bird of Prey), and in 2008 appeared in drag in a Renault Twingo commercial.

Jean Marsh (Morgaine) Born Jul 1 1934
Doctor Who credits
Played: Joanna in The Crusade (1965)
Played: Sara Kingdom in The Daleks' Master Plan (1965-66)
Played: Morgaine in Battlefield (1989)
Played: Party guest in An Adventure in Space and Time (2013, uncredited)
Career highlights
Jean's career began in The Infinite Shoeblack (1952), then The Limping Man (1953), The Twilight Zone (1959), I Spy (1967), UFO (1970), Frenzy (1972), The Eagle Has Landed (1976), Hawaii Five-O (1978), Return to Oz (1985), Willow (1988), A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court (1989), The Tomorrow People (1994), Fatherland (1994), Dangerfield (1997), Sensitive Skin (2007), Sense and Sensibility (2008), Crooked House (2008), The Last Post (2011), Outlier (2014) and Grantchester (2014). Jean co-created the series Upstairs, Downstairs (1971-75 and 2010-12, and appeared in it as Rose Buck), and The House of Eliott (1991-94). She had regular roles as Sylvia Parrish in The Informer (1966-67), Roz Keith in 9 to 5 (1982-83) and Mrs Croker in The Ghost Hunter (2000-01).
Awards
1975: Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series (Upstairs, Downstairs)
2012: Officer of the order of the British Empire (OBE) for services to drama
Facts
Jean was married to Third Doctor Jon Pertwee between 1955-60, and trivia fans might like the fact she appeared in Nicholas Courtney's first and last stories in Doctor Who - The Daleks' Master Plan and Battlefield! In 2011 she suffered a minor stroke and heart attack, causing her to miss much of the filming for the second series of the Upstairs, Downstairs reboot. Jean studied ballet as a child in order to overcome a nervous paralysis she suffered as a result of witnessing deaths and bombings during World War Two.

Dorota Rae (Flight Lieutenant Lavel) Sep 15 1957 to Dec 19 2018
Career highlights
Polish born Dorota Kwiatkowska made her debut in her native language in Akwarale (1978), then Terrarium (1981), Thais (1984), Widziadlo (1984), Pay Off (1987), Love After Lunch (1987), Crossroads (1988), Game, Set and Match (1988), Testimony (1988), Gunblast Vodka (2000), Kameleon (2001), Pensjonat Pod Roza (2004), Hotel 52 (2011), Druga Szansa (2016) and Blondynka (2018).
Facts
Dorota died in Adelaide, Australia. For a lovely collection of photos of Dorota, mainly from the late 1970s and 1980s, click here. Dorota was married to Charles Bodman Rae, professor of music at the University of Adelaide, Australia.
In 2015 Toby Hadoke released his Who's Round interview with Dorota, as well as actor Stephen Garlick, here.

Stefan Schwartz (Knight Commander) Born May 1 1963
Career highlights
Stefan's acting career began with Strong Medicine (1986), after which he took roles in Inspector Morse (1987), The Bill (1989), Portrait of a Marriage (1990) and Do Not Disturb (1991). After that he gave up acting to become a major film and American TV director, helming Soft Top Hard Shoulder (1993), Giving Tongue (1996), Shooting Fish (1997, which he also wrote), The Abduction Club (2002), The Best Man (2005, which he also wrote), Hustle (2007), Spooks (2007), Trial and Retribution (2009), Crash (2008-09), Luther (2010), Camelot (2011, on which he was also an executive producer), Being Human USA (2012), House MD (2012), Revenge (2013), The Walking Dead (2013), Dexter (2011-13), White Collar (2012-13), Black Sails (2015-16), The Americans (2014-18), Flesh and Bone (2015), Fear the Walking Dead (2015-17), Power (2015-18), Nightflyers (2018), NOS4A2 (2018), The Boys (2019) and Fortunate Son (2020).
Facts
Stefan's work on Shooting Fish won him Best Director at the Catalonian International Film Festival in 1997, while he also won an Audience Award for Soft Top Hard Shoulder at 1992's London Film Festival.

Ling Tai (Shou Yuing) Born 1960
Doctor Who credits
Played: Tourist in The Leisure Hive (1980, uncredited)
Played: Seabase crewmember in Warriors of the Deep (1984, uncredited)
Played: Shou Yuing in Battlefield (1989)
Career highlights
Ling came to prominence as a regular on children's series Crackerjack between 1983-84, but began acting in The Mystery of the Disappearing Schoolgirls (1980), then The Two Ronnies (1981), Bergerac (1983), Never the Twain (1984), John and Yoko: A Love Story (1985), William Tell (1988), Stay Lucky (1989), Coronation Street (1989), Wilt (1990), Soldier Soldier (1993) and The Missing Star (2006). She also played Lily in children's series Spatz (1990).

Facts

Born in China as Gayling Tai, she was found abandoned as a baby on the streets of Hong Kong. Rescued by a policeman, Ling was taken to an orphanage, and at six months old was taken to the UK with nine other babies and adopted by a British couple. In 1988 she married and had one child, but later divorced.

Paul Tomany (Major Husak) May 14 1957 to Jul 26 1992
Paul's other credits were Triangle (1982) and Capital City (1989).

CREW

Ben Aaronovitch (writer) Born Feb 22 1964
Doctor Who credits
Wrote: Remembrance of the Daleks (1988), Battlefield (1989)
Career highlights
Ben's other screen writing work includes Jupiter Moon (1990), Casualty (1990) and Dark Knight (2001). Ben has now become a successful author, penning the Rivers of London series of books since 2011, which follows his authorship of several Doctor Who novels, including Transit (1992) and The Also People (1995).
Facts
His father was economist and Communist Sam Aaronovitch, and his brothers are broadcaster and journalist David Aaronovitch and actor Owen Aaronovitch. Ben's website is called The Folly and his blog is Temporarily Significant.

Michael Kerrigan (director) Nov 2 1952 to Aug 7 2014
Doctor Who credits
Directed: Battlefield (1989), The Sarah Jane Adventures: Day of the Clown (2008), The Sarah Jane Adventures: Secrets of the Stars (2008)
Career highlights
Michael's other directing work included Spine Chillers (1980), Maggie (1981), Secrets (1982), The Baker Street Boys (1983), No 73 (1983-85), Henry's Leg (1986), Knights of God (1987), Mr Majeika (1988-90), EastEnders (1990), The Bill (1990-91), Parallel 9 (1992), The Famous Five (1995-96), Springhill (1996-97), The Phoenix and the Carpet (1997), Holly and Stephen's Saturday Showdown (2004), The Courtroom (2004) and The Basil Brush Show (2002-07).

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

Andrew Cartmel (script editor) Born Apr 6 1958 Click here for Andrew Cartmel's entry on Time and the Rani