The first TV Doctor Who parody – Clive Dunn as Dr Fotheringown with Michael Bentine in the sketch show It’s a Square World (1963).
We all love a good Doctor Who spoof. For three reasons. Firstly, done well, they can be very funny. Secondly, they’re like having an extra little bit of Doctor Who. Thirdly, and most interestingly, they provide a window into how the series was regarded by the general public at any given time. Whether people were laughing with it or at it.
It’s a testament, after all, to the impact of the very first Doctor Who story that the series was sent up almost at once, in the 1963 New Year’s Eve edition of the sketch show It’s a Square World. Here, Clive Dunn plays a doddery scientist in the First Doctor’s outfit, complete with Astrakhan hat, who launches BBC Television Centre into space in a manner reminiscent of the first TARDIS take-off (in which we didn’t see it dematerialise, leaving the impression that it launched like a rocket). As such, it’s a fascinating time capsule; this is a Doctor Who send-up recorded before the Daleks captured the popular imagination and became the obvious target for parody.