A Bluffer’s Guide to Doctor Who: The Smugglers
The real treasures are the friends we’ve kidnapped along the way.
Describe The Smugglers in six words:
Villagers and pirates double-cross each other
This is… the one with the pirates (So, why isn’t it called The Pirates which is way cooler?)
Episodes: 127–130 out of 869
First broadcast: 10 September — 1 October, 1966
First overseas broadcast: May, 1967 (Australia)
I’m New To This Story. What Should I Know?
- It’s completely missing from the archive. What survives in addition to a copy of the soundtrack are a few violent clips showing characters being murdered that was removed from the Australian broadcast. Also, we have one of the few examples of a William Hartnell story having a whole set of tele-snaps.
- It’s the first story of Season Four. If you’re used to the modern series, you will be expecting the companions to be introduced. Except, that happened last season. The TARDIS scene at the start isn’t from Ben’s and Polly’s perspective: It’s from our perspective with Ben and Polly on the backfoot, denying their situation for comic effect.
- Reputation-wise this story has been forgotten. Anyone that remembers it, doesn’t remember it fondly. And hardly anyone remembers it because it had the lowest viewing figures for Doctor Who until 1986, twenty years later. Sadly for The Smugglers, it’s just in the wrong place, wrong time. It’s the second-last Hartnell, second-last historical, second Ben and Polly story, second story directed by a woman. It doesn’t feature a famous historical figure and is inspired by a not that famous text.
And it’s overshadowed by the story that comes after.
Setting: Cornwall, 17th Century (Key bit of information is that it is set after Captain Avery’s death as the pirate crew are his old shipmates. Except, the historical Captain Avery probably died in the early 18th Century)
Villain: Captain Pike, Cherub, other pirates
What Happens?
The thing about this story is that everyone is double-crossing someone else. The other thing about this story is that everyone is so gullible and adverse to negative thinking, that no-one imagines that they’re being double-crossed.
Essentially, the Doctor, Ben and Polly arrive, go to a church and meet Joseph Longfoot. The Doctor fixes Longfoot’s finger and Longfoot obligingly tells the Doctor a clue about the treasure. You see, Longfoot is a vicar but he used to be a pirate (See, the Dr Syn section of Where Does This Story Come From? below).
Anyway, the time-travellers leave, and Cherub asks for the treasure, gets nowhere and kills Longfoot. The travellers go to an inn. Jacob Kewper, the innkeeper, sends his errand boy to the church to see if the travellers are legit. Tom, the errand boy, finds the dead Longfoot and accuses the travellers of murder.
Turns out, the Squire (who is acting as magistrate) is a smuggler, so is Kewper the innkeeper, and so was Longfoot. They’re not upset about the dead vicar but an important part of their smuggling ring being undone. Kewper tries to get the pirates involved and when the pirates know that the Doctor was told Longfoot’s secret, they try to get him to talk.
Either way, it goes badly for all of them when Ben and Polly find a revenue inspector investigating the smuggling. He is rescued by Ben and comes back for the climax with a militia to fight the pirates off. Most people die. The Doctor blames this on greed but in reality it’s because when you trust pirates, you end up with bits of metal entering your body at high velocity.
Among this, the treasure is found but nothing exciting happens to it.
Best Moment
Ben taking his shirt off. Phwoar!
(Or probably, the Doctor telling Ben and Polly that they can’t just leave and that they must save the village from pirates. It’s a scene that really shows the nobility of the Doctor and the responsibility he takes for his actions. But, at the same time, during that scene, Ben is wearing a shirt so it’s not that good.)
How Many Female Co-Stars Does Anneke Wills Get to Hang Out With?
None. There are no female characters besides Polly.
Where Does This Story Come From?
- Dr Syn. A series of historical novels from 1915 to 1944 by Russell Thorndike about the Reverend Doctor Christopher Syn, a vicar who runs a smuggling ring with a secret past as a notorious pirate. Hammer Film Productions, a British film studio, had made a film version called Captain Clegg starring Peter Cushing in 1962.
For our purposes, it’s worth noting that Thorndike’s novels are set in the 18th Century, in the English coast. They also feature a smuggling ring with the vicar an important participant (such as Longfoot in this serial) who is hunted down by pirates from the crew he used to work with (again, Longfoot) and it ends with a battle between the pirates and the Revenue backed by the militia (again, this serial).
This is the start of a pattern for Gerry Davis script-edited historical adventures, in that they are more based in fictionalised, literary history. - Gerry Davis appears to be a fan of Robert Louis Stevenson, either directly or indirectly. That’s conjecture, of course. But considering the history informed by literature approach of Davis, the pirates with their spikes are the pirates popularised by Treasure Island. (And, later, Davis will write a script that is a close cousin of Kidnapped, so the point seems valid).
- Sydney Newman’s original educational remit. It is why the series did historical adventures, after all. Yet, Davis’ vision of them clearly isn’t educational and Davis and Innes Lloyd didn’t like the historical stories so began phasing them out. It’s a shame because there is a way of getting these stories to work. First, have John Lucarotti write them. Second, follow Dennis Spooner’s example from The Time Meddler and incorporate aliens…
Any Behind-the-Scenes Gossip?
Written by Brian Hayles / Directed by Julia Smith
Director Julia Smith was approached to direct because she knew the Cornish coast well. This was important as The Smugglers was going to be given a five-day location shoot by the Cornish coast. Script editor Gerry Davis had wanted a romantic, swashbuckling adventure for writer Brian Hayles and to give it the sense the script needed, producer Innes Lloyd sent the crew out on the most extensive location shoot Doctor Who had experienced up to that time. Anneke Wills and Michael Craze, who were new companions Ben and Polly, enjoyed the location filming. William Hartnell did not go.
Innes Lloyd had just had a success with Shaun Sutton, the new BBC Head of Serials, who had granted him permission to recast the Doctor. During the production of this story, Hartnell and Lloyd met were the star reluctantly agreed that he would need to leave. Hartnell told his wife he was leaving on July 16th, and the two of them went on holiday. In Cornwall.
Stray Observations
Doctor open about not being able to control the TARDIS
TARDIS made inaccessible due to high tide. Seems like the standard ‘isolate the TARDIS’ trope.
The TARDIS crew being suspected of murder: A trope establishing itself although it’s done almost as farce here.
Nice teasing Ben and Polly with hope they might still be in 1966, just in Cornwall.
Ben sulking in prison, Polly being the witty, stoic one. She’s the one that comes up with the escape plan. Her being scared of rats played for laughs (way above Susan in The Reign of Terror)
Doctor trying flattery on Captain Pike and it working gives Hartnell some comedy (“I’m sure you could see through any flattery”) Again, give Hartnell stuff that isn’t technobabble and he can do it.
Wonder if having the pirates moored limits the action? Their treasure hunting consists of… eavesdropping and hobnobbing with the Squire. (And wouldn’t ‘The Pirates’ have been a more exciting title?)
Polly mistaken for a boy. In Ep 1, it’s funny but by Ep 4 with Cherub threatening “the lad” it just makes everyone look stupid (and they’re very gullible to begin with). They must think he’s a very pretty boy considering his face looks like Anneke Wills. (Maybe it’s to remove any fear of rape by the pirates but surely the adventure tone of the series means we don’t need to think that. The Time Meddler went out of its way to imply rape, and it didn’t have Vicki disguise herself at all).
Polly only woman in story. No innkeeper’s wife, no nosy parker banging on about strangers or curses.
The location shooting at Cornwall looks lovely and is part of a few significant moments.
“It’s Avery’s curse!” says Polly observing Pike and Cherub fighting. Nice that greed is being played as a curse. No guarantee such an approach nowadays.
The TARDIS team have an opportunity to leave but the Doctor tells them to stay; a “moral obligation to the village.” This is the Hartnell people have forgotten.
First ‘Polly put the kettle on’ joke from Ben.
What we are missing: Action-packed Ep4 (no music for fight scenes as usual). Wonder how well it was all choreographed (telesnaps only offer a few frames). The extensive location shoot would have no doubt added to scale.
Between You and Me
Purely functional Doctor Who, which considering the variety of tones and stories recently, probably comes a relief to some. Not bad but hardly inspiring. It’s not hard to conclude that unlike recent adventures, this story doesn’t actually know what it wants its audience to feel. Whereas others aimed for fear and paranoia (The Celestial Toymaker, The War Machines), fear and rage (The Savages) or fascination and wonder (The Ark) and comedy (The Gunfighters), The Smugglers aims for… Well, excitement in its battle sequences. This a vision of the series that’s about action. This will win out with regular consistency: Doctor Who will try to have action set-pieces in each of its episodes from now on (as opposed to just the climax). It does make it hard to judge a missing story. Perhaps, if its ever found, there’ll be a Great Re-evaluation. For my part, if any aspect of this production needs re-evaluating, it’s William Hartnell who puts on a charming, twinkling solid performance. It’s almost a surprise to know what’s going to happen next…
Further / Recommended Reading:
https://www.doctorwholocations.net/stories/smugglers
As a taste of what is might have been like, here are the Australian censor cuts: