The Romans [4.3]

The TARDIS crew are enjoying a decadent life of luxury in a Roman villa. Taking unscrupulous advantage of the owner’s absence, our heroes have broken in and have taken up residence. They lounge around eating grapes and swanning about in togas until the Doctor loses patience. Deciding to head off on a sightseeing trip to Rome, he is swiftly mistaken for the celebrated Corinthian lyre-player Maximus Tertullian.

Thinking it fun to play along, the Doctor finds himself embroiled in an assassination plot. Meanwhile Ian is kidnapped and sent to the galleys; Barbara becomes the slave of an exceedingly amorous Ceasar Nero and Vicki just giggles along and gets in everybody’s way.

The Majesty

The sense of humour in this story carries it along. From the relaxed tone of the bickering holiday scenes in episode one, to the slapstick buffoonery in Nero’s mansion, there is always something to have a little chuckle over. The relationship between Ian and Barbara is undisguisedly romantic in this story, which is rather nice, given how restrained their relationship is portrayed elsewhere.

Derek Francis is brilliant as Nero – he takes a larger than life ‘Carry on Cleo’ approach to the role, and whether he is chasing Barbara around the palace, manically waving his burning maps, poisoning his servant Tittylinus or simply eating a chicken, he steals every scene he is in. Perhaps it’s childish - his first action in the story, after entering the great hall to the sound of trumpets, is to release an almighty belch – but I’m not minding that!

The Misery

The humour tends to work against the drama. There is never any sense of peril or danger, even when are characters are in genuinely life-threatening situations. Ian faces beheading, Barbara faces rape (again), the Doctor faces being torn apart by lions; and everything is played for laughs. It’s entertaining, but it’s not dramatic.

The Doctor is all over the place with his lines. It’s charming in its own way, of course, but it’s missing a little of its potential sharpness.

Magical Moments

• The TARDIS falls over after landing on the edge of a cliff. It’s never happened before. It’s rarely happened since. Kudos points to the story for being original.
• The crew rejoice over their meal. Hartnell achieves his campest moment yet, when he refers to the ‘Peacock in an Orange & Juniper Sauce, garnished with lark's tongues’ as “Absolutely Fabulous!” He is less impressed by the ‘Ants Eggs in Hibiscus Honey’. (“What do you think I am? A goldfish?”). Great acting, and Barbara must be an amazing cook!
• The moment where Barbara is styling Ian’s hair is rather charming, as is the moment where she thumps him over the head with a priceless vase.
• “Is that your lyre?” belts out the gruff centurion. “Why, have you lost one?” asks the Doctor.
• The Doctor engages in the ‘gentle arts of fisticuffs’, taking out an assassin and throwing him out the first floor window while laughing hysterically all the time. I’m not quite sure whether this is funny or just plain weird, but it’s pleasantly nonchalant in comparison to the Doctor’s contemporary hand-wringing over the ethics of physical force.
• “Ten Thousand Sestertii!”, bellows the slave master as Barbara is sold. No wonder the crowd go quiet. It’s worth about £92,000 in todays money...
• We see more of the Doctor’s flesh than we ever imagined, as he and Nero have a sauna session together!
• Nero goes on the rampage when some numpty of a servant pours boiling water directly on his feet. “You maniac!” he screeches - the epitome of indignant fury!
• “We’ll never catch them now...” shrug the Roman soldiers, after Ian and his pal have nipped into the corridor outside. No wonder Nero stabs one of them for being ‘not very good’. It’s definitely half-baked security around the Emperor.
• Hearing that Nero wants to throw him to the lions, the Doctor rattles of a sequence of the most outrageous puns. “I shall make it a roaring success. I shall play something they can really get their teeth into. If I go down well, I might even make it my farewell performance. I’ve always wanted to be considered as an artist of some taste; generally regarded as palatable, hmmm? But we should not stand here chewing the fat”
• Nero delivery the daftest death threat in Dr Who: “I’ll have you both killed over and over again. I’ll have you tied out on a stake in the arena. On an island with water all round. And in the water there will be alligators, and the water level will be raised and the alligators will GET YOU!”
• The Doctor indulging his pyromaniac tendencies once again, cackling as Rome burns. We cut to Nero, laughing hysterically and playing the lyre, surrounded by flames. I’m not sure what exactly we are saying about the Doctor in this scene, but no parallel with Nero can be good.

In Summary

In some ways it’s another conventional historical adventure, but The Romans is definitely an outlier in terms of tone. This is about 90% slapstick comedy, with 8% drama and 2% sci-fi. It’s not alone in having comical elements, but it’s probably the most obvious ‘comedy’ in the history of Doctor Who. Treated as a serious historical study, it’s a disaster; treated as a solid building-block of the Dr Who Universe, it’s disappointing; but treated as it is – a light Vaudeville comedy – it’s highly entertaining. It’s one of the greatest strengths of the Dr Who format that each story can have it’s own genre - I’m still waiting for the ‘musical’! The days of the First Doctor were fantastic for exploring the potential of the series and pushing the envelope this way and that way. Taken on its own terms, ‘The Romans’ is brilliant fun.

Overall: 4.3