The Tertiary Console Room: Review - Doctor Who

"Come on and have a drink. Just relax, it'll make everything all the more ... vivid."

When a mysterious stranger comes to visit a former waitress, the story of a very exclusive 1930's cabaret club named Bianca's is revealed through her recollections and the surviving audio recordings. Between them, Mickey, as she was known then, and Mr Ashcroft piece together the final days of the club, discovering a story of desperation, vengeance and love…

For The Wormery, Big Finish have united Stephen Cole and Paul Magrs to the write the story together, but based on the radically different styles of their past work they seem something of an odd pairing. Cole's previous Doctor Who audios were loud and aggressive offerings which form a stark contrast to the whimsical surrealism that Magrs specialises in but when you consider their individual strengths and weaknesses as writers then the combination doesn't seem so strange after all. Both Cole's The Land Of The Dead and The Apocalypse Element showed intriguing concepts at play but lacked impact because they were poorly executed (something that cannot be said of his more recent Professor Bernice Summerfield plays which show tremendous progress for Cole as a script-writer) while Magrs' plays show his love of character and dialogue beautifully but often at the expense of the plot. By combining their respective talents The Wormery comes across as the best of both worlds, bearing all the hallmarks of Magrs' distinctive writing with outrageous characters, brilliant dialogue and a sense of the surreal with the benefit of Cole's stronger plotting. By doing this, the play has a much firmer foundation to build upon and the richness of it all ensures it is an absolute delight.

Like both Doctor Who and the Pirates and Master before it, The Wormery is an audio that relies on a framing device of the story being recounted outside of the main plot by a narrator, this time from the perspective of Mickey as she takes Ashcroft through the surviving tapes and embellishes them with own memories. Cole and Magrs fuse the narration with the dialogue of the main trust of the story which creates the brilliant effect of Mickey being able to interact with the other characters in the past and asking them questions to explore their nature which serves to introduce the play's dramatis personae in a most atypical way. Magrs dabbled with a similar narrative device in Excelis Dawns, and while that produced some particularly memorable lines - Lord Grayvorn's description of the Doctor as a "foreign sandy haired devil in striped trousers" being just one of them - there was no real rationale for it, but here the reasons behind the narration are much more clearly defined. By choosing to make Ashcroft silent, the writers create a sense of mystery about his identity and why he's interested in these tapes but it has a side effect of making it seem like Mickey is addressing the listener. It's a very clever way of interacting with the audience but also to direct their line of thinking although the authors miss the chance to really use this to subvert our expectations. This structure also means that Magrs' penchant for flamboyant and expressive language can be used without coming across as blatant exposition and description. When Mickey says of Bianca "she would look fragile, delectable. A single pale lily, funereal, exotic, exulting a heavy, only slightly decadent scent" the context makes it palatable rather than being overblown and incongruous as it would have been had it featured in a more conventional tale.

Whilst nominally a "side-step" - presumable due to the presence of Iris - The Wormery draws upon the Sixth Doctor's reactions to the preceding events of The Trial Of A Time Lord strongly, showing him uncharacteristically melancholic but because it's pitched perfectly between the blustery, almost arrogant television persona and the more passionate and effective Doctor he's become on audio the outcome is very successful, as the Doctor's rest is disturbed while he finds himself drawn into the mysteries of the club. Cole and Magrs sometimes let the dialogue slip into irritating self-awareness - with the best example being of the Doctor's remark that there's nothing like a good adventure with plenty of shouting and fighting to distract himself - but these are more than made up for with some insightful meditative moments where we can see how the trial has forced him to consider both his own role and the way that people perceive him, in that despite his actions no one really cares about him or is grateful.

The Sixth Doctor reacts differently to Iris than his audio predecessor, in that he's much less forgiving of her attitude and outlook giving their relationship a sharpness quite unlike the typical one between the Doctor shares with his companion. In Cole's The Plague Herds Of Excelis one of the most notable aspects about how he portrayed Iris was that he characterised her more mysteriously than Magrs and this exposed the underlying sinisterness beneath her outrageous character. While this isn't the case here, with Iris characterised more moderately, the idea of inner darkness is something very important to The Wormery overall. Most of the characters are motivated by their own vulnerability, whether it is the Doctor's introspective pondering of who he might become, Iris' over-the-top attitudes which compensate for her innate fragility or Bianca's desire to move away from who she was and redefine herself.

The Wormery is founded on a mix of the surreal and an intriguing science fiction concept, and Bianca's is a hotbed of plotting and counterplotting with no less than three factions scheming away against each other, but Cole and Magrs ensure that it all develops logically and with such verve that the listener cannot help but be swept up into it all. There is a certain predictability regarding some aspects of the story, although given the development of the play and the emphasis Mickey's narration places on particular plot elements it would seem that this is a deliberate move on the part of Cole and Magrs, to give the listener the delicious pleasure of moving ahead of the story and gaining satisfaction when the major revelations prove them right. Part of this does come from familiarity with Magrs' previous work - there's an element in the plot which is similar, but not quite the same, as something he did in one of his Doctor Who novels (which is referenced here) and it's one of Iris' fundamental character traits to boast about how her own adventures parallel those of the Doctor. But if anything the way this comes about all adds to the allure of the piece.

As the most consistently brilliant of Big Finish's four Doctors, Colin Baker is - predictably - on top form again here, taking his role and instilling it with the passion and conviction that only he can and yet because of the situation that that Doctor finds himself in, he shows his more accessible side too. For her third appearance as the "louche trans-temporal adventuress" Iris Wildthyme, Katy Manning builds on her previous two by continuing to demonstrate the forthrightness of the character but developing a rare sense of vulnerability when the boorish Iris discovers that the man she has loved unashamedly for centuries has seemingly fallen for another woman. It's this mixture of emotions which Manning communicates well that gives her more depth and means that rather than coming across as her usual irritating self, Iris appears rather endearing which certainly makes for a refreshing change! Baker and Manning work well together, building up a nice spiky repartee between their characters which helps to give the production some of its energy.

Maria McErlane proves an inspired choice for the role of Bianca, the glamorous and determined star of her own show. Her silky and seductive voice is perfect for the over-the-top Bianca, who believes she is nothing without the adoration of the audience, and gives her considerable presence which is essential to make the central triangle between Bianca, Iris and the Doctor believable. Both McErlane and Manning really bear the jealous rivalry that builds between their characters superbly and the basis for their intense, almost instinctive, dislike of each other explains so much when it is delivered. Jane MacFarlane delights as narrator Mickey whose gentle Scottish burr soothes as she draws the listener into the extraordinary story she is going to tell them. She gracefully switches between the seasoned narrator and her breathless younger self effortlessly.

Paul Clayton's Henry stands out as perhaps the most obvious of the story's villains, given that he seems to be always scheming and plotting behind the other's backs in nefarious tones but as the play progresses we can see that he's driven by jealousy of Bianca and the power she holds over the patrons with her charisma. So while he may initially seem so arch that Iris could drive her double-decker under him, Clayton teases out the hidden depths in the character which makes him altogether more interesting. Perhaps the only performance that doesn't really convince is James Campbell's as Allis and Ballis. It's an appealing idea to have the same person voicing two parts like this and Campbell does well in making Allis and Ballis sound distinctive, but because the roles are underwritten he cannot add any real depth to either of them.

For a play that is set in a musical cabaret club, it's appropriate that its own score is so vivacious and helps to set The Wormery apart from its peers because while most Big Finish audio dramas feature music that is a good accompaniment to the drama, Jason Loborik and Stephen Cole's music here interacts with the events of the play acutely to the point where they become one, feeding the emotion the script possesses with plenty of melancholy. This is shown perfectly by the ominous piano notes that strike out when Bianca draws attention to Iris' arrival in the club which change when the Doctor realises who she is into a raucous, anarchic tune evoking the spirit of misadventure that Wildthyme brings marvellously. Enhancing the atmosphere immensely is Ian Potter's work on the sound design which is so evocative and real that the scenes set in Bianca's really come alive magnificently. The sound and music are often elements whose importance to audio drama are overlooked but those involved with The Wormery are all due immense praise as it's this that helps make the production so atmospheric and increase the listener's involvement enormously.

The Wormery is rather like an exotic cocktail with director Gary Russell blending the ingredients of the sound design, music, performance and the wonderful dialogue together masterfully so Cole and Magrs' brilliant script can realise its truly sublime qualities. The writers admit that it's a "boozy celebration" of Doctor Who and the cast perform dazzling in bringing that about in unforgettable and uproarious style.