The following article was originally written for the sister site to these pages, The Matrix Mutterings, as part of the Who-it-Yourself! series.  The article was written in 1996 before the 1997 completion of Without a Who, which was originally listed as having never been completed, but has now been appended to show it's completion and the passage of time since 1996.  We also discuss our vague plans for future productions.

So... YOU want to make your own Doctor Who video?

Well as Rasillion said to Borusa (regarding immortality) in The Five Doctors, "Be sure. Be very sure." Who-ing it yourself can be a lot of fun, but it can also be a source of great frustration and can strain fun, friendships, and perhaps even your love of the program you wish to "honor".

The odyssey of our plucky little band of film (whoops! video) makers began inconspicuously enough at Tardis 22 around Thanksgiving 1985, either the last or next to last of the pre-Visions Chicago megacons. Whilst wandering around aimlessly between panels I caught one of the ubiquitous flyers posted concerning something I had never heard of before. It was called S-A-V-E-W-H-O, and quite indirectly it would change the way I was a Doctor Who fan for the next six or so years.

S-A-V-E-W-H-O by the Chicago-based group called The Federation was the first fan-made video I had ever seen. Running at 55 or so minutes, it mixed PBS pledge-drive "culture" with a wicked lampooning of Doctor Who's first 22 (at that time) years. The humor was quite "inside"-Who, meaning that you had to know quite a bit about the show to get some of the jokes, but I thought it was wonderful. More than that, I thought it was clever, and quite knowing about what it was that made the show work for fans. But after it was over I thanked the Feds, made a mental note to secure a copy of this for myself--which I did in due course, and thought little more about it.

On July 4, 1986 a group of fans from various local Who-clubs came together in the basement of a house in Hastings, Minnesota to discuss something quite extraordinary. By this time S-A-V-E-W-H-O had been shown locally to various fans to great effect. The gal organizing the get-together, Bart, then produced a script for us to look over and read. Through contacts in Britain Bart had obtained a copy of a play written by two college-age guys, Chris Clarke and Rob Strudwick, titled The Two Companions, which was a variation on The Two Doctors and featured the 2nd, 4th, 5th, and 6th Doctors, as well as Jamie & Peri (the titled companions as it were), Nyssa, and Sarah Jane. As we read through the script our interest in doing the project was quite apparent, although none of us had at that point any technical expertise to bring to bear on the production side. Fortunately Bart had already secured a preliminary okay from a guy named Bob who worked for local public access to direct and edit the project. We christened ourselves as MUM Productions (an acronym for Mini-UNIT Minstrels--as an offshoot for the dominant club most of us were in) and began to divvy up the parts.

For many people, either by costuming already in hand or by inclination, the choice of who would play what fell into place quickly. That is until we got to Peri. It suddenly occurred to someone that it would be really funny if Peri were played by a guy. After everyone not already cast (including me) thought about the implications of this for a few seconds, a couple of us (yes--including me) shot our hands up. Fortunately Matt was a hair quicker off the mark and because of that he got to wear various wonder-bras for the next couple of years. Quite fetchingly too I might add. I ended up playing the "other" companion Jamie, complete with gawd-awful Scottish accent, for the duration and in retrospect felt fortunate to have made a narrow escape from Peri-hood. The other problematic part was that of Eric Saward. As the script read Saward was a minor character who had little more to do than react in a "yes sir, no sir" way to JN-T's character, almost as a puppet would. Boom again came the inspiration and Eric (as we would call him) would be an actual puppet, animated by my right hand and absurd falsetto. Peri and Eric became our two most recognizable traits in the videos to follow.

To be charitable our level of "acting" varied incredibly not only from scene to scene but from take to take. And brother did we have to do lots and lots of takes to get the dialogue even halfway-right. As it happened we were very fortunate in that the "baddies" Mikey Grade and Mary Whitehouse (remembering that the program itself was steeped in the infamous 18-month hiatus at this time), played by Christian and Blanche respectively, were the most natural actors amongst us and set a wonderful tone to react to in the stories which followed. The "abstraction" from reality we stumbled upon (and which would be followed in subsequent videos) was that the Doctor was merely a BBC employee and that Doctor Who was his show. It also occurred to me that because the 2nd and 6th Doctors were the focal point of the story, there were a few overtones of The Prisoner that could be used and we worked into the script, including a fairly cheesy dream sequence.

The Two Companions was taped over approximately 7 weekends in various locations (including sand pits, a direct homage to the Pertwee and T. Baker eras). Because we didn't know any better we actually tried to have special effects in this first video, most of which took forever to set up, but which worked fairly well in the end. But because this would be Bob's only video he would do with us, when he left, so did our ability to do special effects. Thus we ended up reusing what few we had again and again and again. A somewhat dubious note is that this video had the highest "budget" for any of the videos we shot, about $20, most of which went for dry ice or for the paper plates which we used as Tardis roundels. Everything else we managed to come up with ourselves, a strange point of pride for the next several years (when people used to come up and ask me about our "low-budget productions", I would quickly correct them that they were in fact no-budget productions).

Despite the headaches coordinating peoples schedules (which would be a pittance compared to future videos) everyone involved in the production--especially me--had a blast doing it. The Two Companions premiered in October 1986 and had a running time of 39 minutes (approximately six of which were mind-numbingly used in the beginning and ending titles!).

About six weeks after The Two Companions premiered we sat around basking in our minuscule glory and I started pestering Bart about whether another video was possible. I had become intrigued by the whole process of putting the video together, complete from the blocking of the scenes all the way through to the editing. Because the first video had a beginning, middle, and an end (of sorts--the 6th Doctor was exiled into the Troughton-esque regeneration), we were unsure about where we could go with it. We could do something completely different, but then considered that everyone by the end of taping the first video had pretty much worked out the kinks in their respective characters and how things worked for a days taping and decided to press on in the same vein as before. Bart and I also knew that if we were to make a second video it would make sense to make this a trilogy, because the idea I had in mind for the video would have a cliffhanger-type ending requiring further resolution. Thus sprang to life what would become The Wrath of Mikey.

But not without some burgeoning problems. Bob had moved on but luckily a new recruit from one of the clubs, Debby, stepped in with a great deal of enthusiasm and was also instrumental in securing some of the locations we used for taping. The fact that I had little or no technical knowledge didn't stop me from thrashing together a script that didn't always work as a "camera script". The script itself expanded upon The Prisoner themes begun in the first video (including the opening sequence which mimicked The Prisoner by having the 6th Doctor "resign"--a sequence I'm still damn proud we were able to do so well) and was a mishmash of many Doctor Who   situations many would hopefully find funny when appropriately tweaked. I even threw in a little video-within-a-video by making K-9 Meets Godzilla. The cast expanded to include the 3rd Doctor.

We had also determined that we needed to get more out of our taping days and compress the schedule so as to use people better and not wear out their patience. Herein laid another problem, the group had subtly developed a schism along age lines between those "kids" who were still in high school and everyone else who at least had finished college and was working. It was becoming harder to get the "kids" to show up on time and get what was needed done without interminable delay. Because our use of the locations required by the script was time-constrained, this added to the stress. Temperaments were becoming increasingly fragile and there was a few minor arguments. All things considered however much was accomplished in the 4 weekends used for the video taped in February 1987. We then decided to go for broke and rapidly edit the video together--in just 3 weeks!--to make for a presentation at Minicon that year. The Wrath of Mikey had a running length of 34 minutes and I again, despite inserting myself unnecessarily into things I didn't begin to understand, had a ball doing the video.

Although The Two Companions and Wrath weren't shot back-to-back, in fact they were several months apart, there was a feeling that the videos had in fact been done consecutively so there was a collective decision to wait about five months before concluding the trilogy. After ramrodding Wrath through (with Bart's timely assistance) I had determined to step away and let someone else carry the load. Fuzzy, non-converted PAL copies of The Trial of a Time Lord had begun circulating around in fan circles in the spring of 1987 and subsequently Christian and Pete stepped in that summer and delivered The Fallout of a TimeLord.  Fallout had the unenviable task to trying to tie up the loose ends I had started in the first two videos, use The Prisoner yet again as a framing device (through the use of the final episode "Fallout"), and continue to expand the roles for everyone to keep them interested (the 1st Doctor was added this time while keeping all the other Doctors which of course had to come together in the climatic final battle of good v. evil). The script in this sense was exhaustively, hideously complete, and as a result terribly overlong. My advice to this effect was somewhat ignored and taping was scheduled for late summer.

By this time nerves were really beginning to fray as some people simply weren't all that interested in getting things done or in securing the needed facilities. Bart had tired of trying to please all of us and get things done and almost left the project, despite the fact that she was a lead character! I too was frustrated because although my parts were relatively small, it was taking forever to get my parts taped and I didn't particularly want to spend all day waiting for that to happen. After one fateful weekend where a light almost fell on somebody's head, we decided to regroup. In order to finish quickly the directing became a collaborative effort, myself included, and the project was finally finished. Now having said all of the above, we still had fun working on the project, but of course by this time everyone working on the production side knew that it really felt like a project, and were quite glad to finish it. The Fallout of a TimeLord had a running length of 54 minutes and premiered in November 1987 just weeks before the local PBS station began running Trial themselves (henceforth we always believed the Beeb stole the trial "concept" from us--as perhaps they should have!).

Over a year passed before I caught the itch to try writing a video again. Although in the interim we as a group had spitballed around some ideas nothing had come of it (although I still can't believe we didn't think of "Doctor Who: The Next Regeneration" what with ST:TNG taking off at that time). Then in early 1989 I started reading about the lame efforts connected with trying to make Doctor Who as a theatrical feature-length movie. Even then I could sense the absurdity in this notion and knew instantly the hook to use for the new video. The result was Doctor Who: The Motion Sickness.

Although the trilogy was over, it was hard not to think in terms of the characters that had been used during the trilogy, and so I did...somewhat. One character that was added for the first time was that of Adric, ably played by Pete. It quite quickly developed that Adric's presence in any video was simple...to be abused, always a necessity in our line of humor. Motion Sickness was a combination of Police Squad, The Princess Bride, Top Secret, and a Saturday Night Live parody. I had learned the lesson from Fallout and made the script relatively short, about 39 minutes and had also vowed to compress the taping to the tightest degree possible. This meant however long, really long days and put a strain on the lead Keith, who was in virtually every scene (right up to the twist ending) and had a larger share of dialog than any character we had yet attempted. He came through wonderfully and thus made things easier than I could have anticipated--truly a comfort considering the whole video was shot in 3 days! (April 1989). Another comfort was that the antagonisms developed during the final phases of the trilogy had either evaporated, or had disappeared because our personnel had undergone quite a turnover and most everyone remaining knew you could still socialize and get the necessary work done when required.

With the production of Motion Sickness largely regarded as a success, the fires were once again stoking amongst some of the others in the group for videos and thus came in the summer of 1989 Faulty Tardis (the inspiration should be clear enough here) and in the autumn our James Bond variation You Only Live 13 Times. Aside from the odd bit of advice, lending my house as a location, and my time in front of the camera, I was happy just to be a spectator and let others carry their loads. It had become quite obvious after Motion Sickness that the best way to ensure making a video work would be to do virtually everything yourself, including writing, directing, producing, making all of the phone calls, coordinating shooting to best match everyone's increasingly busy schedules, and securing the equipment and people necessary to pull everything together. The upshot of this was that whilst you were in production, virtually every free, waking moment was spent thinking about something having to do with the production. A consuming enterprise, and much appreciation goes to Bart and Mark for assuming the mantel in their respective productions. Faulty Tardis ran a sprightly 16 minutes, again abused Adric to good effect and premiered in the late summer of 1989. 13 Times ran 45 minutes and premiered near Christmas 1989.

Keith had been nursing an idea for a video for a while and decided to finally forge ahead with it in the summer of 1990. Keith had actually undertaken to learn how to use a camera and editor and because he had a natural understanding of picture composition, his video The Blues Cousins contained a large number of marvelously composed shots. The Blues Cousins was different from the other videos we had attempted in that it had virtually nothing to do with Doctor Who. By now the inspiration taken in our videos from non-Doctor Who sources meant we were placing Doctor Who characters in non-Doctor Who situations and twisting them for effect. Keith's video was more about us, literally! It seemed to be a video about people making videos, but we had a great time doing it.

Because we had been at this video business now for 4 years, many of us had had significant changes occur in our lives, mine included. The opportunities to get together for any reason, not just a video, were becoming harder and harder to come by and so it developed that the production of each new video was providing us with an opportunity to see each other and catch up. I had begun sensing during production on Blues Cousins that the collective time afforded to us as a group was nearing an end and so I hurriedly pushed onto paper one more idea that had been rolling around in my noggin for a while. My sources for inspiration were Police Squad, Twin Peaks and one of my all time favorite cartoons and they were pureed into Doctor Who in the 20th and 9/10 Century.As significantly I managed to convince everyone that I would like to shoot it immediately after Blues Cousins had finished taping in the fall of 1990. Again this would be quite a load on Keith who was attempting to edit Blues Cousins while serving again as my lead. If this bothered him, he didn't show it, and came through for me admirably. I was also determined to inflict maximum abuse (and possible embarrassment) on Adric and managed to kill him about a half-dozen times during the course of the video. Because the blocking done in laying the scenes out required a lot of editing, it did take somewhat longer to crank this one out, about six weekends. The Blues Cousins premiered near Christmas 1990 and ran 54 minutes. 20.9 premiered in January 1991 and ran 45 minutes.

Although we didn't know it at the time, 20.9 was to be our last production. A script was written and one days shooting was done in July 1991 for Without a Who, which was a wonderful Doctor Who take on the film Without a Clue. Naturally for our video the companion was the really smart one with the Doctor the incompetent dullard, and Bart had fashioned an excellent script in my view. Sadly the project was abandoned--although the raw footage still exists. And that was it.

Or was it?  Rumors began circulating in mid 1997 that Bart was getting pestered by Pete and Debby about finishing Without a Who.  With little fanfare, and noting that the remainder of the shooting script only required a reasonably small core of actors to finish the project, production was completed in the early autumn 1997.  It is now regularly regarded as one of our best productions.

Nowadays when we do see each other, perhaps no more than once a year, we still talk about the videos of yore, even throw around the odd idea or two for a new one. At this point we sit down, take a deep breath or two, and let the idea pass.  We do have an idea for the last scene in the last video (this assuming we know it is the last video already planned out.  Now all we have to do is find that last video to make.

9½ videos (counting K-9 Meets Godzilla) over 4½ years (for the most part) wasn't too bad a run. This doesn't even count offshoot hybrid productions done in conjunction with The Federation, Doctor Who's Flying Circus &  Black Adric (not technically part of MUM "canon"-- to seem presumptuous).  A couple of us (not me I hasten to add) learned camera and editing well enough to actually make a living at it. A couple others are still acting recreationally. Also of note is that a few members of the group actually got married to each other during the course of our run (one because the group brought them together--others for other reasons). For me the experience wasn't necessarily life-changing, but I had a heck of a lot of fun, and made friendships that will quite possibly endure for a lifetime. After all I still have the proof on videotape.

On July 4th, 1996 this year many of us still living locally got together to celebrate 10 years of our collaborative nonsense. We laughed at the bloopers (perhaps the true product of all the sweat and energy are the out-takes of those things which did go wrong--so much more memorable!), marveled at how each of us had--or had not--changed in that time, and of course exchanged stories. Good friends, shared experiences. Isn't this what fandom is all about?