Today In DOCTOR WHO History: June 16th - Warped Factor - Words in the Key of Geek.

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Today In DOCTOR WHO History: June 16th

It's time for Doctor Who.


Welcome to our daily round-up of the Doctor Who episodes which received their premiere broadcast on this day throughout the show's long history, along with anything else of note that may have taken place. You can click on any red text to read our full retrospectives/reviews for that episode, and note that all viewing figures listed are for UK broadcasts (unless otherwise stated).

June 16th
As well as being Carole Ann Ford's birthday, June 16th also saw episode five of The Green Death broadcast in 1973 to an audience of 8.3 million viewers. Skipping ahead to new-Who and the Tenth Doctor was about to catch up with an old nemesis after a trip to Utopia. First broadcast in 2007 at 7:15pm, and guest starring Derek Jacobi as Professor Yana/the Master, this episode was watched by 7.84 million viewers.

Now did someone mention a birthday?
Born June 16th 1940, Carole Ann Lillian Ford was technically not a Doctor Who companion, rather as Susan she was the Doctor's granddaughter who traveled with him from (and before) An Unearthly Child to The Dalek Invasion Of Earth. In her pre-Doctor Who days, Ford had appeared as a supporting actress in several notable productions. For instance, she appeared in the 1959 Cliff Richard film Expresso Bongo, and played Betina, the blind French girl, in the 1962 production of The Day Of The Triffids.

After leaving Doctor Who, Carole Ann Ford found herself typecast as Susan, being offered very similar 'teenage girl' roles - even though when she left the series she was 25 and had had her first child. Because of this much of her post-Who work was in the theatre but she was still often seen on the small screen as a favourite on youth panel shows like Juke Box Jury and various quiz shows, she also had dramatic roles in Whatever Happened to the Likely Lads? (in the episode "Affairs and Relations"), Moonstrike, Compact, and Dial M for Murder. Ford also appeared in several films including The Man Outside (1967), The Hiding Place (1975) and The Incredible Sarah (1976) and, probably most notably, in a typecast-busting appearance in the 1966 film The Great St. Trinian's Train Robbery.

Reprising the role of Susan Foreman has been the only on-screen work Carole Ann Ford has had since 1976, largely through choice as she mostly stopped acting following an illness in 1977 which led to a dramatic weight reduction and the loss of her voice (it recovered later). Playing Susan again in both The Five Doctors and Dimensions In Time, Carole Ann Ford then made a limited return to the profession, reprising the role in a number of Doctor Who audio plays by Big Finish Productions. She had a small cameo role in the 2013 BBC Two docu-drama An Adventure in Space and Time, and also appeared in the one-off 50th-anniversary comedy homage The Five(ish) Doctors Reboot.

A very happy birthday to you!

Join us again tomorrow for another round-up of the episodes broadcast, the spin-offs aired, the special events, the birthday's celebrated and anything else of note that went down on this day in Doctor Who history.

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