WHAT IF?
With a Little Help From My Friends:
HANCOCK'S DALEKS
The True Origins of The Daleks?
In this "WHAT IF" article* we shall look at the rather tenuous relationship of the Daleks creator: writer Terry Nation, with that of writer & comedian Tony Hancock and why Beer Pumps (!) have a unique affinity with all things Dalek...probably.
DALEK MANIA
On the 23rd of November 1963, Dr Who came to our screens amidst the chaos of President Kennedy's assassination in Dallas the previous day.
With a public still reeling in grief over this brutal death, there was little thought to noticing a little sci-fi show on BBC 1, about some old codger and his granddaughter, who kidnap two teachers, whisking them back in time to the stone age, in a rickety old metropolitan police box, to fight off cave men.
And had the series continued on in that vain of historical interlopes, it is likely that Dr Who wouldn’t have lasted much longer than a few episodes.
However, that was all to change, with the subsequent introduction of the Daleks in the second story, (The Dead Planet) which not only captured the imagination of children across Britain, but anchored the family unit for half an hour every Saturday night, creating the highest Tv ratings that BBC 1 had ever seen.
Over nine million viewers tuned in to watch the Doctor fight the metallic monsters, so it was only inevitable that they would return again and again and thus make Dr Who one of Tvs longest running shows and the Flagship of the Beeb.
And at the heart of all this, was the Daleks creator, a welsh writer by the name of Terry Nation, who literally become a millionaire overnight. But not it seems, without a little help from his friends.
As we shall see...
GENESIS OF THE DALEKS
Lets just suppose for one moment, that The Daleks were not just some divine idea that popped into Nations head and that there was no Eureka! moment at his type writer.
Lets also just suppose (for another moment) that there was someone else who (probably) put the Dalek idea into Nations head.
After all, Nation was often vague about where the idea of the Daleks actually came from.
Ask any a famous writer and you might get the same response. A sort of vague look into the horizon, a rubbing of the chin and then some convoluted story that has no meaning. Nation was just as shrewd.
“They just came to me!” He would say.
When interviewed in 1968 by Alan Wicker, his stock answer was :“I needed a villain, and the Daleks just appeared ...somehow!”
Lets just pause it right there: "Somehow?"
Thats a big red flag right there. Nation was hiding something. The secret of his success lay in that one word. Somehow.
Take the money and fly like a thief! was another popular expression he used to bandy about. But perhaps there was more to this, than Nation was letting on.
INSPIRED IDEAS
Ultimately, like all creatives, writers build upon the ideas of others (say HG Wells or John Wyndham) and create something new.
Being a writer sucks. Nation new this only too well. Particularly when nobody notices you even exist, even worse, when you rely entirely on it to pay the rent. Time and time again it seems, much like in the film and music industry, the only way to get ahead, is to plagiarise other artists work. The key to avoiding a law suit was how subtle you lifted others work.
Much like the law suit that ensued after US rock Band The Doors lifted the guitar riff from The Kinks song "All Day and All Night", writers are just as notorious for 'borrowing' ideas off each other. Hence we now have copy-write laws to protect victims of such underhandedness, yet this practice still prevails.
That said, in Nations defence, if every idea was under copy-write, (subject to 25 years in a maximum security prison in space) no creative would ever get out of bed. Ideas build upon other ideas. That is the nature of creativity, it needs to adapt and evolve.
LUCKY SEVEN
Look at it this way:
There are only seven basic plots, seven basic musical notes, seven basic colours even. But from that we have the likes of Shakespeare, Mozart and Van Gogh.
No doubt, there are times in a writers life when his back is against the wall, when the ideas simply don’t put food on the table and the alternative is to pack up and hitch a lift back to Nowheresville and die in obscurity and shame.
Terry Nation was a driven man, he would rather die than risk absolute failure. With a wife and kids in tow, it might not come as a surprise, that he might have 'borrowed' a few ideas off other writers, in order to maintain the bourgeois lifestyle he was accustomed to.
And when it came to Sci-fi, anything was possible, even cone-shaped robots.
And if anything, the Daleks success was a culmination of ideas, solidified by Nation. Lets not forget of course that designer Raymon Cusick and prop builder Bob Roberts (of Shawcraft Models) also had a huge input into realising the Daleks and show producer Verity Lambert fought to get them on the air.
But there was one other person not mentioned in the history books...
TONY HANCOCK
Around this time, comedian and writer Tony Hancock was a big name in television.
But his genius was not created in a vacuum, he still required help.
Like most successful comedians, he employed various writers to help write comedy sketches, that would keep him in pocket. One of these writers was none other than Terry Nation, who seemed to be in hot demand, even turning down the BBC's offer to work on Dr Who.
But what has any of this got to do with Daleks?
PING PONG BALLS.
It was no secret that Tony Hancock was a nightmare to be around. A constant drunk, it soon overshadowed his genius.
Even comedian Spike Milligan noted he seemed to outrage everyone and push them away, sooner or later. However, as far as Terry Nation was concerned, beggars couldn’t be choosers and he worked alongside Hancock on various ideas for sketches.
Usually this would entail the familiar surroundings of the local pub.
On one such drinking session, (rumour has it), that Hancock suggested they do a comedy sketch that included a robot with the following attributes:
‘an inverted cone, covered with ping-pong balls and with a sink plunger sticking out of its head"
And so there you have it.
The basics of the Dalek shape was (probably) all Hancock: A cone shaped body. The plunger (which became the manipulator arm). The ping-pong balls that became the hemispheres.
Of course the design would need realising. And what about its size? Ping pong balls on a 5 foot high cone might not have been all that effective. Perhaps the cone itself would have been scaled down in size to make the ping pong balls look bigger?
Thus the first Dalek might have (probably) been intended for a comedy sketch that featured puppetry and miniature Daleks. Who knows.
But this is only part of this probably puzzle solved. What about the actual Dalek name?
Where did that come from?
BEER PUMPS
Writers of sci-fi are always on the lookout for weird and unusual names, particularly when it comes to naming things of alien origin.
C3PO from Star Wars for example, was actually a grid reference from a ordinance map, that Director George Lucas drew upon.
Again when interviewed, Nation would rub his chin about where he got the name from. Was it from his collection of encyclopaedias? Or was it in fact, a Croatia word, meaning a far and distant place? Probably. But then again, probably not.
Contrary to popular belief, the very name 'Dalek' may very well have come from the same source as his and Hancock's various inebriations. Basically the pub.
These (probable) origins are far less dramatic of course for press circulation. Far better to say a little white lie to embellish the story.
But here it is:
DALEX
In most English pubs you cared to enter, there were a range of famous beer pumps called "DALEX".
The Dalex brand was quite clearly labelled upon the base of the beer pump (or on the pump handles) and while eyeing up the buxom bar maid, it is most likely that Hancock (or Nation) must have made a mental note of this, waiting for several pints of the good stuff.
Why Nation never owned up to this (as the probable origins of the Dalek name) is possibly fearing a law suit by the Dalex company. Insisting instead (in interviews) that the word came from the book ends of his encyclopaedias. Another reason is that it sounds much more intellectual than:
"Oh I was sloshed one night with Tony and we noticed it on a beer pump!"
Hence he (probably) changed the spelling from Dalex to Daleks and realised he could make them singular and plural! Its a win win.
Meanwhile, Nations relationship with Hancock was becoming more and more tenacious.
BBC OR BUST
By 1963, Hancocks drinking was (probably) becoming impossible for Nation to cope with. On one incident, he stripped off naked on a train and began running around the carriage, with Nation in pursuit, trying to get his clothes back on.
With his drunken antics soon getting the better of him, Hancock's cone-shaped robot sketch idea, never came to fruition, preferring to drink himself into a stupor.
To add to this frustration, Hancock saw little value in Nations ideas, often dismissing them in favour of his own, driving a wedge further between them.
So it was only inevitable that Terry would be fired, (and with a family to feed) Nation had little option but to come crawling back to the BBC.
It was now or never time, BBC or bust. Nation would need to crystallise his writing career once and for all. Subsequently he would write the script for the first Dalek story and most likely drew upon all his experiences to pull it off -to get that pay cheque and fly like a thief.
It is in all probability that Nation drew inspiration from Hancocks cone shaped robot idea. Maybe as a last resort or maybe as a fuck you to the way Hancock had treated him.
After all, with his drunken antics pushing everyone away, it was clear Hancock was never going to realise his Cone-Shaped robot sketch but the idea in itself was worth recycling for Dr Who. Perhaps Nation hoped Hancock (being utterly inebriated most of the time) had forgotten about the whole thing.
Wether he was aware of it or not, Nation drew further inspiration from HG Wells War of the Worlds, essentially taking the idea of the octopoid martians (within their tripod war machines) and condensing the whole idea down into a pepper-pot.
Add a little Nazism in there and hey presto!
Thus the Daleks were born...
SUGGESTIVE THINKING
Bare in mind, that up to this point, nothing was ever mentioned about the how Daleks actually looked, at least not in the script.
Never the less, the idea of radioactive mutants incased in leg-less machines resonated heavily with series producer Verity Lambert and despite fierce opposition from BBC stalwarts, (including head of BBC Drama Sydney Newman) she fought tooth and nail, to get that script the green light.
Soon Dalek production was underway, with Terry Nation hinting his (lifted) design ideas to Ray Cusack, over various phone calls, during the Daleks development.
Cusick was already a talented and accomplished designer anyway but drew heavily from Nations suggestions that the Daleks should have no recognisable human features.
So it is quite probable that Nation hinted at Hancocks Cone shaped robot, (in particular the ping pong balls) and so Cusick came up with various designs, none of which Nation was happy with, probably because they seemed too close to Hancocks original description, that it might cause a kerfuffle.
One night however, Cusick saw the Georgian Dancers performing on Tv and immediately phoned Nation about basing the Daleks movements on them.
Nation indicated (probably) that he had seen the same show and stated he was "thinking the exactly the same thing" also but then again, he could have just taken advantage of Cusick's suggestion.
CLOAK AND DAGGER AFFAIR
Perhaps Nation used the Georgian Dancers to cover his tracks? If this was the case, then things would escalate into a cloak and dagger affair, with Nation likely using Cusick's Georgian Dancers idea as a clever ruse, so not to arouse suspicion from Tony Hancock, who undoubtedly would have scuppered the whole production with a law suit, had he got wind of his Daleks being constructed without his consent.
Finally Cusick came up with a drawing that Nation was happy with. It was not too cone shaped and not so obviously lifted from Hancocks description but nevertheless, the sink plunger is finally implemented into the design.
Curiously the ping pong balls were omitted in favour of spikes.
Feeling he was on the right track, Cusick refined the design, replacing the spikes with the original idea of the ping pong balls, which later became larger and more concise hemispheres, with the notion of having them illuminated, an idea later dropped due to budgetary constraints.
Subsequently, Shawcraft Models were quickly employed to make the actual Dalek props and did a fantastic job of interpreting Cusick's interpretation, based on Nations suggestions, (probably) lifted from Hancock (who may well have lifted the idea from somebody else). Probably.
My money's on the buxom bar maid.
With Dalek Mania, came variations on the Dalek, supplied by designer Spencer Chapmen (who added tricycles and a larger fender base) which was later re-used in the Dalek movies by Milton Subotsky (who also added larger dome lights and introduced the manipulator claw) .
All this came about because nobody had ever made a cone-shaped robot before.
And the rest is history.
LEGACY
From beer pumps and sink plungers, to heated arguments in the production office, the success of the Daleks and their credit has been of endless debate, with unsung hero’s still yet to surface.
For these reasons, the entertainment business is at times, a cut throat culture, best avoided and yet irresistible to the aspiring novice, until it is way too late.
No more so than for the many writers that have succumb to its allure, like moths to the flame.
With the subsequent rise of Dalek Mania (and millionaires being made overnight from Dalek Toys), Nation himself had already accumulated around four million pounds in Dalek related mechanise, never sharing a single penny with Ray Cusick or Shawcraft, let alone his poor drunken writing buddy Tony Hancock.
Even script writer David Whitaker, (who was heavily involved in all Dalek related media), would only receive the standard contracted fees, despite contributing more to the Dalek phenomena, than anyone else involved.
Rumour also had it, that when Tony Hancock finally saw his creations on Tv, he was understandably enraged but ultimately too devastated to act upon it.
Thus, within four years of "Dalek Mania" exploding across Britain, (and Terry Nation living the high life), Tony Hancock would emigrate to Australia and (still drinking heavily), eventually committed suicide in 1968.
He left a note that read: "Things just seemed to go too wrong too many times."
Ultimately, if any of this was true, then Tony Hancock should be credited for coming up with the Daleks, or at least contributing to the final Dalek design.
If anything, the Daleks were a culmination of ideas, forged into being by the talents of Terry Nation, Ray Cusick, Bill Roberts, Spencer Chapman, David Whitaker, Milton Subotsky, Verity Lambert and of course Tony Hancock.
Less we not forget their names.
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