He came to prominence as a member of the comedy act "The Ken Campbell Roadshow". His best known act was as a stuntman character called "Sylveste McCoy", whose stunts included putting a fork and nails up his nose and stuffing ferrets down his trousers, and setting his head on fire. As a joke, the programme notes listed Sylveste McCoy as played by "Sylvester McCoy" and, after a reviewer missed the joke and assumed that Sylvester McCoy was a real person, Kent-Smith adopted this as his stage name. Notable television appearances before he gained the role of the Doctor included roles in Vision On (where he played Pepe, a character who lived in the mirror), an O-Man in Jigsaw and Tiswas. Sylvester also portrayed, in one-man shows on the stage, two famous movie comedians, Stan Laurel and Buster Keaton. He also appeared as Bowers in the 1985 television mini series about Robert Falcon Scott's last antarctic expedition, The Last Place On Earth. He took over the lead role of Doctor Who in 1987 from
Colin Baker, and remained until the series was shelved in 1989. He
played the Doctor in the 1993 A distinguishing feature of Sylvester's performances was his manner of speech. He used a slight Scottish accent, rolled his 'r's, and often placed emphasis on unusual syllables or words. This has the added (possibly intentional) effect of sounding a little alien, and wrong-footing the audience. Some viewers, however, took it as evidence of McCoy's limited acting ability. At the start of his tenure he used proverbs and sayings adapted to his own ends (eg. "There's many a slap twixt cup and lap" — Delta and the Bannermen), although this characteristic was phased out during the later, darker series of his tenure. Although Sylvester McCoy only appeared as the Doctor
for twelve serials over three seasons (plus Search Out Science, Dimensions
In Time, the television movie, and audio dramas), fandom treated him
as the "current" Doctor from 1987 to 1996. This view can
be argued not just because he was the last actor to play the role,
but also due to the Seventh Doctor's continuing presence as the Doctor
in original novels and comic strips. Sylvester McCoy's television roles since Doctor Who have included Michael Sams in the 1997 telemovie Beyond Fear, shown on the first night of broadcast of Channel Five. He has also returned to play the Seventh Doctor in a series of audio plays by Big Finish Productions. He has also acted extensively in theatre in productions as diverse as pantomime and Molière. He played the role of Snuff in the macabre BBC Radio 4 comedy series The Cabaret of Dr Caligari. At 5'6 he is the shortest man to play the title
character in Doctor Who.
Film and TV
"Doctor Who" (42 episodes) Time and the Rani: Part 1 (7 September 1987)
- The Doctor
"The Bill" .... Ian Drew / ... (2
episodes, 2002-2006)
|
Sylvester
Mccoy was born Percy James Patrick Kent-Smith in Dunoon, on the Cowal
peninsula, to Irish parents. He was raised primarily in Dublin. In
his youth, he trained for the priesthood, but gave this up and spent
time working in the insurance industry. He worked in The Roundhouse
box office for a time, where he was discovered by Ken Campbell.
charity
special Dimensions in Time, and again in 1996, appearing in the Doctor
Who television movie where he handed the role over to Paul McGann.
In his first series, Sylvester McCoy, a comedy actor, portrayed the
character with a degree of clown-like humour, but script editor Andrew
Cartmel soon changed that. The Seventh Doctor developed into a much
darker figure than any of his earlier incarnations, manipulating people
like chess pieces and always seeming to be playing a deeper game.
Sylvester generally approved of this, as it allowed him to play more
of a dramatic role.
Accordingly,
some consider him to have beaten Tom Baker's seven year record as
the Doctor. However, using these criteria, Sylvester McCoy's record
is beaten by Paul McGann, whose Eighth Doctor appeared in various
media from 1996 to 2005, although only on-screen once in the Doctor
Who television movie.
 |