| Cast: |
The Doctor - Joe Binks
Dr Lynn Frewin - Trina McGreggor
Dr Robert Ebner - Nigel Peever
DS Hooper - Rupert Booth
Glen Mercer - Phillip Jackson
Constable Boden - Andrew Crines
Steve Smart - John Isles
Andmarr - Mark Lenton
No.1 - Lawrence Ahlemeyer
Raman - Gareth Preston |
| Crew: |
Written by Lawrence Ahlemeyer
Incidental Music by Chatri Ahpornsiri
Theme by James Leatherbarrow
Produced and Directed by Gareth Preston |
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Producer's Notes:
Unlike the other notes, I'm writing this one straight after completing it, so maybe time will alter my perceptions. It's odd, it feels like an ending and yet I know I have several more scripts I want to do and one nearly completed story sitting on my hard drive. Yet this story is the end of one chapter I suppose. We are all different kinds of people now than we were when we started back in 1991. I've sadly lost touch with some folk, whilst others have become even closer friends. I've no idea how many people have heard these stories but I'm occasionally pleasantly surprised when I hear them mentioned in far flung places on the Internet, or an unexpected email arrives with a comment, good or bad, usually good. Mind you, people who hate them are less likely to expend the energy writing to criticise are they?
Whilst waiting for the script to be finished, I had recorded Madhouse for the second season and produced the first Agents of Psyence story called Truth and Bone. Lawrence meanwhile had started a new job and moved house, which consumed a lot of his time. Eventually, Lawrence came up to my house and we wrote most of the second episode in a day.
The idea of Final Frame was to record it in two sections, almost as two plays with two separate casts ala Carnival of Monsters. We laughingly hoped this would speed up production. In the end three sessions were held, the first at my house, the second at Rupert Booth's home in Newcastle and the third in Mark Lenton's abode in Sheffield. All the recording sessions were enjoyable and went pretty smoothly. I was able to use my new Tascam DAT recorder to good use, resulting in some very hi-quality recordings. Interestingly all the funny behind the scenes out-takes came from this last session, which I think is down to the mix of personalities.
Lawrence returned to my house later to sit in on some of the mixing, which was very helpful and something I'll try and repeat with future stories and writers. When the background sound is especially busy, that's probably as much thanks to Lawrence's pushing me. Lately I've also added a new amplifier to my PC set-up, which has helped make production easier. For the sound effects, they are mostly off the shelf but often tweaked by altering the pitch and adding flange to make them suitable.
Chatri is a friend of my Agents of Psyence co-producer Rik Hoskin and was already an experienced composer and musician. He very kindly supplied an album's worth of new material for Final Frame and what you hear in the story is only about a third of it!
I'm pretty happy with this story. Although there have been several 'reset button' stories appearing in Doctor Who fiction lately, this one still manages to be different and it wraps up the season completely, leaving the landscape clear for a lighter season two.
Whenever that is!
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