An Evening With Doctor Who
Doctor Who returned to BBC TV screens for the first time in more than three years on Saturday 13th November 1999 with a special 'Doctor Who Night' on BBC 2. Introduced by Tom Baker the evening started at 8.55pm and went on to 12.30am. The highlight of the evening was a forty minute documentary titled "Doctor Who, Adventures in Space and Time". The Doctor's assistants and the series writers revealed the background to the series and each of The Doctors, from William Hartnell through to Paul McGann, were featured in clips. Another documentary titled "Carnival of Monsters", concentrated on the show's monsters and featured: the Daleks, Cybermen, The Master, Sea Devils and the Sontarans . The Evening also included; a repeat of the classic 7th episode of "The Daleks", three special comedy sketches written by Mark Gatiss (one of the creators of the cult comedy 'The League of Gentlemen') and two short films from the BBC's science department investigating the technology of Doctor Who and exploring the scientific reality behind the science fiction. These explained the theory behind the TARDIS and time traveling. The second documentary looked into how the doctor is able to regenerate and so appear to live forever. The evening was then be rounded off with another showing of the 1996 Doctor Who movie starring Paul McGann. As hoped, this version of the 1996 TV Movie was the unedited version and was the first time that it has been shown complete in the UK (even the video release was edited). This evening turned out to be something special especially as Tom Baker, who played the Fourth Doctor, hosted the evening. It was also to be the prelude of a complete repeat run of all the colour stories, on BBC 2 on Tuesday nights, which started with the Jon Pertwee story "Spearhead From Space". However, after showing just two other stories, the Third Doctor story "Doctor Who and the Silurians" and the Fourth Doctor classic "Genesis of the Daleks" the repeat run was suddenly cancelled due, according to the BBC, to low ratings.
		The BBC2 Dalek Logo
		The Radio Times Cover (13 - 19 Nov 99)

The complete line-up for the evening's viewing was as follows:   20:55 Doctor Who Night   Tom Baker presents a night of programmes celebrating the popular science fiction series, Doctor Who.   21:00 Doctor Who Night: The Pitch of Fear A comedy sketch written by Mark Gatiss. It is 1963 and a young television producer comes up with a novel idea for family viewing.   21:05 Doctor Who Night: Doctor Who: Adventures in Space and Time A biography of Doctor Who, the ultimate Timelord. Each generation of Doctor is described including the incredible feats and foes they each faced are revealed by the writers, producers and fellow actors who played the assistants.   21:45 Doctor Who Night: How to Live Forever Professor Tom Kirkwood, an expert on ageing, examines the process of regeneration and explains how The Doctor keeps coming back and how long he can carry on.   21:50 Doctor Who Night: Carnival of Monsters Documentary looking at some of the adversaries faced by The Doctor and how they were created.   22:20 Doctor Who Night: The Web of Caves 2nd comedy sketch. The Doctor faced many bad adversaries of the universe, but some aliens attempt to be more frightening than others.   22:25 Doctor Who Night: How to Build a TARDIS Nuclear physicist, Doctor Jim Al-Khalili, explains how the TARDIS works and looks into the theory of time traveling.   22:30 Doctor Who Night: Doctor Who: The Daleks (Episode 7) The Doctor's first encounter with the Daleks ends on the planet Skaro as he attempts, along with his fellow companions, to save the peace-loving Thals from their malicious mutant neighbours.   23:05 Doctor Who Night: The Kidnappers 3rd and final comedy sketch of the evening. Staring Peter Davison who finds himself kidnapped by two Doctor Who fans.   23:05 Doctor Who (The Unedited Version) The Doctor returns in the feature-length adventure set in San Francisco on New Year's Eve where he finds himself, shot, newly regenerated and then in a race against time to prevent his old adversary, The Master, from destroying the Earth as the new millennium is about to commence.

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