Trapped in a snowbound school in the Swiss Alps, the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa encounter a malevolent poltergeist. Or do they?
Trapped in a snowbound school in the Swiss Alps, the Fifth Doctor and Nyssa encounter a malevolent poltergeist. Or do they?
WINTER FOR THE ADEPT
After two ultra-trad stories, one more successful than the other, producing an Andrew Cartmel script was an excellent move by BF. After all, the former script editor always possessed radical ideas about Doctor Who, and the idea of him tackling a fifth Doctor story seemed quite promising. Unfortunately, the great ambition of the script ultimately brings it down, but it should be applauded for attempting in some small way to reach above the ultratraditional groundings of the previous stories.
Without question, the greatest strength of Winter for the Adept is its atmosphere. From the initial framing device, which instantly wraps the listener in the environment, Cartmel expertly crafts a convincing, scary environment for his characters. Cold weather creates a unique, immediate atmosphere, and the setting of the story in the Swiss Alps allows these feelings to grow. The idea of a haunted old school in the mountains is traditional ghost story stuff, but almost automatically lends itself to good drama — it’s almost hard not to be creepy in such a setting.
For the first two episodes, the plot backs up the promise of its setting with a sinister, old-fashioned tale of a haunting. This isn’t to say the story is unrelentingly grim — the scene with the Doctor and Nyssa pursued by a haunted piano is quite funny — but such a pure ghost story is unusual for Doctor Who. Unfortunately (and, by the nature of the format, necessarily), rationality is forced to enter the tale, and the so-called poltergeist is revealed to be a combination of an alien influence and the uncontrolled psychic abilities of two of the resident students. Not that the Spillagers themselves are poorly written — any reference to one’s “ventral slaying claws” gets a thumbs-up from me — but, as with much Doctor Who of this variety, trying to crowbar in a scientific explanation for something that would work much more effectively sans justification just doesn’t come off. It is also apparent that Cartmel had little experience with the audio format at this time: the script is absolutely riddled with terrible expository dialogue that pulls the listener out of the story. I understand that it is difficult to accurately portray the sound of ski poles flying through the air without offering a description, but this story is simply too visual to function properly on audio.
Cartmel always writes a great Doctor — his McCoy, obviously, and his subsequent Troughton for Telos were excellent — and his work here with Peter Davison is no different. This is a very proactive fifth Doctor, something which is generally out of character but is presented in believable fashion in this play. Cartmel plays to Davison’s strengths and, unlike Mike Tucker before him, creates a character who is both an excellent reinterpretation and a faithful recreation, impossible as that may sound.
Nyssa does equally well; granted, she is placed into an NA-type situation wherein her faith in the Doctor is, to a degree, shaken, but the character responds surprisingly: she becomes annoyed! I’ve never faulted Sarah Sutton’s performances, but it’s hard to deny that the character of Nyssa has always been somewhat bland — here, she’s spiky and actually displays a real personality, and it’s obvious that Sutton is enjoying the character more than usual. The age of the actress, for whatever reason, is more apparent in this audio than in most, however, which can break the illusion if that sort of thing bothers you.
The supporting cast is excellent across the board, with Peter Jurasik the featured star. Jurasik’s performance, while necessarily somewhat similar to Londo Mollari in accent, is utterly believable; I confess that I’m unaware of whether or not he voiced his Spillager but, if so, his shift in tone was excellent. India Fisher, meanwhile, displayed much of the enthusiasm that apparently landed her the Charley Pollard role, but the key difference is that here, her performance doesn’t become annoying after ten minutes. Both Fisher and Liz Sutherland turn in fine performances, while Hannah Dickinson’s French accent is, appropriately, entertainingly over the top. Those that say Sally Faulkner’s Tremayne is too cliched of a character — trust me, people like that actually do exist.
The production of Winter for the Adept is the best of the first ten audios, as Andy Hardwick’s sound design perfectly evokes Cartmel’s intended ghostlike atmosphere. It’s very difficult to convey a sense of temperature through audio alone, but the feat is accomplished here — there’s never any doubt that Nyssa is hiking through freezing snow at the beginning, for example. Russell Stone’s music is another achievement, capturing the tone perfectly — after this and Red Dawn, it’s unsurprising that he’d return again to BF production. Finally, Gary Russell’s direction is very strong, drawing excellent performances from his actors and keeping the pace high despite the sedate tone of the material.
As something of an experiment, Winter for the Adept can be best described as a flawed success. While Cartmel’s grasp of the characters and tone coupled with the production turned out an excellent piece of atmospheric drama, his struggles with the plot and dialogue keep it from achieving greatness. Cartmel’s style is, unfortunately, better suited to the novel format, but his natural strengths as an author allow Winter for the Adept to achieve solidly above-average status.
7/10