Before the First Episode: Emerald Soup

 If you weren't watching the first episode of Doctor Who at 5.16pm on Saturday 23rd November 1963, then you were watching the final episode of Emerald Soup over on ITV. (Or, you were sitting in darkness in the widespread blackout across the country.)

Emerald Soup was a seven-part science fiction serial about a group of children trying to prevent enemy agents to steal samples of a radioactive liquid made from seaweed. It doesn't seem as if any recordings of the series remain - so it's difficult to judge whether the show was actually a strong rival for the Saturday evening audience. It didn't return for a second series.

The best account of Emerald Soup I've found is by Laurence Marcus who says the plot of the programme was:

Three crooks are after the secret that John and Margaret Maxwell (William Dexter and Jessica Spencer) have discovered in experiments with seaweed to produce the cheapest form of radio-isotope ore. Most of the action takes place on beaches and in caves which become the hide-out for the Maxwell's children, Tim (Gregory Phillips) and Jo (Janina Faye), as well as their school friend, Gally (Karl Lanchbury).

And:

In the Maxwell laboratory an exciting new experiment is underway, but unexpected results occur. The children discover that mysterious parties are interested. Can the teenagers stop the Gaunt gang from leaving the country with stolen samples? And is the dear old soul who runs the village shop all that she seems?

Before the First Episode: The Radio Times

 

Doctor Who wasn't the front cover of the Radio Times for the week that the programme launched on Saturday 23rd November 1963. Skepticism by Kenneth Adam, Director of Programmes at the BBC meant that the magazine ended up promoting the return of Beyond Our Ken, a comedy sketch radio programme returning for its seventh - and final - series. It starred the popular comedian, Kenneth Horne, and also featured Bill Pertwee, brother of Third Doctor, Jon.

Inside, the new programme received a half-page feature on page 7:

 

The listing inside described the new programme simply as "An adventure in space and time":

Before the First Episode: Publicity

 

Considering the years that it takes a modern tv show to get made, the genesis and production of Doctor Who happened in less than a year. In early August, William Hartnell had his first costume and make-up tests and filming of the opening credits took place before the end of the month. Publicity photos of the four regulars at Television Centre took place mid-September and, by the end of that month, the first episode had been recorded and was re-recorded in mod-October. (Shannon Patrick Sullivan has written a great summary of how the show was created.)

The energy put into production doesn't appear to have also been put into promoting the new programme. Publicity started at the end of July with a meeting with the Radio Times at Televsion Centre (plans to have Doctor Who on the front cover of the Radio Times in November were unfortunately dropped in favour of the return of the radio series, Beyond Our Ken). In early Autumn, some of the television trade papers reported that the show was forthcoming. There was a TV trailer broadcast at 5.40pm on Saturday 16th November - now, sadly lost - which, according to those who saw it showed clips from the first episode. A second trailer was broadcast on Friday 22nd November - though it's unclear whether this was just a repeat.

There was also a brief radio trailer broadcast on the Thursday 21st November on the BBC Home Service in which Hartnell explained:

My name is William Hartnell and, as Doctor Who, I make my debut on Saturday the 23rd November at 5.15. The Doctor is an extraordinary old man from another world who owns a time and space machine. He and his grand-daughter, Susan (played by Carole Ann Ford) have landed in England and are enjoying their stay, until Susan arouses the curiosity of two of her school-teachers (played by William Russell and Jacqueline Hill). They follow Susan and get inside the Ship and Doctor Who decides to leave Earth, starting a series of adventures which I know will thrill and excite you every week.

Again, the recording no longer exists.

Supposedly, the decision not to feature Doctor Who on the front cover of the Radio Times - which would have been the primary means of publicity - was made by Kenneth Adam, Director of Programmes at the BBC, who was meant to be skepitcal about the success of the programme. The inside feature on page 7 still ran. describing the Doctor as a "mysterious exile from another world and a distant future". There are brief hints of future adventures: "a distant galaxy where civilisation has been devastated by a neutron bomb" (what would become Skaro) or "journeying to Cathay in the caravan of Marco Polo".

I find the way in which the programme is described - in a detatched, formal manner - far different to the manner in which modern shows are written as if the characters and events are real.