Colin Baker was born in 1943 in the Royal Waterloo Lying-In Hospital in
London during an air raid. He spent his earliest years in London with
his mother, while his father served in the armed forces. He narrowly
avoided an early death during the wartime blitz when a piece of flying
shrapnel just missed him, embedding itself in the side of his cot.
After the war, Baker's father took a job as managing director of an
asbestos company in Manchester. The family moved north to live in
Rochdale, although Baker attended school in Manchester.
It was during
his early schooling that - through the mother of one of his fellow
pupils, who was a casting director at Granada TV - he had his first
experience of acting. It was 1954 and the series was called
My Wife's Sister (1956),
starring Eleanor Summerfield,
Martin Wyldeck and
Helen Christie. Colin Baker went
on to attend St. Bede's College in Manchester, where he was invited to
take part in their annual productions of Gilbert and Sullivan
operettas. The twelve-years-old Baker appeared in the chorus for a
production of "Yeoman of the Guard" and, a year later, landed a more
major part - playing the female lead, "Phyllis" - in "Iolanthe".
After completing his schooling, Baker went on to study law. One day during
this period, he and his mother went to see an amateur production of
"The King and I" at the Palace Theatre, Manchester. Inspired by the
performance and encouraged by the president of the company that had
staged the Amateur Dramatic Society and quickly became hooked on
acting. Baker took a job as a solicitor but, as time went on, became
less and less interested in this career. Finally, at the age of
twenty-three, he decided to become a full-time actor.
Baker joined the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Art (LAMDA), where he trained for
three years. At the end of this, he was summoned with two of his fellow
students to see the head of the drama school, who gave them rather
gloomy predictions for their future prospects as actors and suggested
that they seek alternative careers. These predictions proved somewhat
wide of the mark as not only did Baker go on to great success but so
too did his fellow students - David Suchet
(who - amongst many other achievements - starred in LWT's award-winning
productions of Agatha Christie's
"Poirot") and Mel Martin (whose
numerous credits include the series
Liebe zu Lydia (1977), also
for LWT). After leaving LAMDA, Baker took a temporary job driving a
taxi in Minehead in order to be near his then-girlfriend. He then
received a call to come to London to audition for a part in a BBC2
drama series called
The Roads to Freedom (1970),
which he won. This led to further TV roles, including two more for
BBC2: "Count Wenceslas Steinbock" in "Balzac's Cousin Bette" (1971) and
"Prince Anatol Kuragin" in an ambitious twenty-part serialisation of
Lev Tolstoy's "War and Peace" (1972-72). He
also took on a wide range to theatre work, including several
William Shakespeare
festivals, appearing in productions of "Macbeth" and "Hamlet".
In the mid-seventies, Baker landed the role that would make him "the man
viewers love to hate". This was "Paul Merroney" in the BBC1 series
The Brothers (1972). After "The
Brothers", Baker married actress
Liza Goddard, who had played his on-screen
wife in the series, but the marriage eventually ended in divorce. Baker
later married actress Marion Wyatt. Theatre work kept Baker almost
constantly busy for the next five years including appearances in
everything from comedies to thrillers, as well as more Shakespeare. He
also had a few further TV roles, including one as "Bayban" in "Blake's
7: City at the Edge of the World" (BBC, 1980) and one opposite
Nyree Dawn Porter and
Ian Hendry in the drama series,
For Maddie with Love (1980)
(ATV, 1980).
Baker's next TV role after "For Maddie with Love" was as
"Maxil" in the Arc of Infinity: Part One (1983)
story, "Arc of Infinity". Shortly before Baker took the role of the
Doctor on "Doctor Who", he and his wife suffered the loss of their baby
son, Jack, to cot death syndrome. Baker subsequently became a
passionate fund raiser for the Foundation for the Study of Infant
Deaths, with many of is personal appearance fees being donated to the
charity. Baker's time as the sixth Doctor was cut unexpectedly short,
initially by BBC One controller Michael Grade's hiatus between the twenty-second and twenty-third
seasons and then by the decision of Grade to oust him from
the role.
After his departure from "Doctor Who", the actor returned to
the theatre, appearing in highly successful runs of "Corpse" and
"Deathtrap" and having a four-month stint in the West End farce, "Run
for Your Wife", with Terry Scott. TV
work included a guest appearance in the BBC's
Casualty (1986) and presenting
assignments on programmes for the Children's Channel. After directing a
play called "Bazaar and Rummage", Baker was asked to play the Doctor
once again - this time on stage, taking over from
Jon Pertwee in the Mark Furness Ltd
production, "The Ultimate Adventure". This tour proved to him that,
despite the brevity of his time as the Doctor on TV, he had amassed a
loyal following amongst younger viewers.
In the 1990s, Baker had
continued to pursue a successful career, mainly in the theatre. He has
made regular appearances in pantomime, and his stage work has included
roles in the musical adaptation of
Charles Dickens' "Great
Expectations" and in a comedy entitled "Fear of Flying". He has also
starred in the "Stranger" series of videos made by Bill Baggs Video,
alongside a number of other actors known for their work on "Doctor
Who".
