GRAHAM LEAMAN
Born on 9 August 1920 Graham Leaman is an obscure actor within the Doctor Who history, and many fans probably don’t know who he is. Despite his obscurity, he appeared as five different characters in Doctor Who between 1967 and 1973, totalling up 17 episodes to his name.
He first appeared as the doomed Controller in The Macra Terror, supposedly leading a human colony on a distant world. However, it later turned out that the Controller was a puppet for the Macra, and the Controller was eventually killed by a Macra which grabbed him by the neck. He returned the following season for Fury from the Deep where he played Price, the communications officer on the Euro Gas Refinery which came under attack from the Weed Creature. His third appearance saw Graham Leaman take on the role as the Grand Marshall. Hidden under heavy make-up and a large Ice Warrior helmet, the Grand Marshall appeared in the final two episodes of The Seeds of Death. With the first episode of Colony in Space, Leaman played the Time Lord Scora, a character previously introduced in The War Games. Returning for his fifth and final appearance, Leaman once again played another Time Lord in The Three Doctors. His character voiced concerns that three incarnations of The Doctor should help one and other during the crisis Omega posed to the universe.
Notably Leaman tended to play characters who were confined to small sets or chairs. Unfortunately Graham Leaman battled with multiple sclerosis, and as such played characters who remained stationary for long periods at a time. However, film and TV buffs can see Leaman walk into shot, with walking sticks in the Doomwatch episode ‘You Killed Toby Wren’ (1970).
Although he wasn’t a prolific actor, Leaman had six one-off roles in BBC Sunday-Night Theatre (1952/53(twice)/54/56/57) and four one-off roles in No Hiding Place (1959/62(twice)/63). Leaman’s final known acting role in TV came in 1974, and he unfortunately died on June 14 1985 aged just 64.
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