Janet Mahoney - now better known by her stage name of Janet Fielding -
was born in Brisbane, Australia, in 1953. She gained A levels in
Physics, Chemistry and Maths and joined Queensland University, where
she first took up acting. After leaving university she worked with an
English writer/director named Albert Hunt, who in 1977 brought her to
England in one of his shows.
Once in England, she joined Ken Campbell at
the Science Fiction Theatre of Liverpool and appeared in productions
including "The Warp" and "The End is Nigh." Following this she won a
small part in an episode of the Gefrier-Schocker (1980) series.
She was then cast in Doctor Who (1963) as the Australian airline stewardess Tegan Jovanka in Tom Baker's final serial Logopolis: Part One (1981), and became the longest-running companion of Peter Davison's Doctor, appearing until Resurrection of the Daleks: Part Two (1984). After leaving the series, she appeared in episodes of the ITV series Shelley (1979) and Der Aufpasser (1979) and in
productions of "The Collector" and the pantomime "Aladdin" in the
theatre.
In 1991, she gave up acting to work as an administrator in the
pressure group Women in Film and Television, where she stayed for
three-and-a-half years. She then became a director of Marina Martin
Associates, an actors' agency, representing amongst others the Eighth
Doctor, Paul McGann.
