OFF: Daleks (was Re: HW: Cover Versions)

Eric Siegerman erics at TELEPRES.COM
Sat Jun 15 22:08:16 EDT 2002


On Sat, Jun 15, 2002 at 10:00:51PM +1000, Steven Skane wrote:
> Davros and the Master were my favourites.

Davros for me.  Daleks Rule!

Note that the World Economic Forum usually meets in Davos,
Switzerland.  Coincidence?  I don't think so.....

We built a dalek once.

At the university I went to (Waterloo), there was (probably still
is) an annual play/revue/excuse-for-partying called FASS.  Always
lots of in jokes, puns, silliness, and filk songs written (well,
the lyrics anyway) for the show.

FASS '79 was all on a Dr. Who theme.  The lead character was, of
course, Dr. Whom.  This was during the Tom Baker period, so our
Doctor had a huge loooong scarf that he kept tripping over etc.
There were a bunch of boy scouts going after bizarre merit badges
and generally stirring up shit; Sam and Janet Evening (say it
five times fast and you'll know their theme song); a hunchback
named Pseudomodo; a computer who was very much a HAL 9000 clone,
and a great piece of work as a prop -- two 9-track tape reels for
eyes, with car headlights in the centers, and flashbulbs
(remember those?) for one particular cue; a cheerleader (there
was *always* a cheerleader, 'cause ....  damn, what was her name?
....  anyway, that was her thing, and her boyfriend was one of
the inner circle, so they always found a way to write her into
the script).

Well, you get the idea.

There was a longstanding FASS tradition that people would throw
in ad-libs for the Friday-night late show.  They always tried to
discourage it -- the show had been known to go *hours* over time
-- but it was not to be suppressed.

This guy Russell and I were walking back from a rehearsal one
night (I was a lowly grip, aka stage hand), and I said to him
(though I'm sure he remembers it differently :-) hey, it'd be
cool to build a dalek for the Friday late show.  So we did.

We got permission to use the workshop of the *other* theatre on
campus (so as to keep the secret), drafted a few more people, and
assembled the thing.  It was a bit of a mutant -- we couldn't
find an appropriately domed thing for the head, so just used a
plastic washbasin.  The hardest part was the knobbies on the
skirt, but then Ian! came up with the answer:  hamburger buns.
Holy lateral thinking, Batman!  We bought a bunch, left them out
for a couple of days to go stale and hard, spray-painted them
black ...  presto, dalek knobbies.

The only one of us who actually had the nerve to go on stage in
the thing was this tall gangly guy Rob, and he had to scrunch
down with his knees almost up around his ears to fit inside it.

After its one shining moment on stage, we took it back to the CSC
(Computer Science Club) and made it our mascot.  Charles won the
name-the-dalek contest hands down.  He suggested "Calum" which,
he pointed out, is an archaic form of "Malcolm", the latter being
a pretty unpopular CS prof.

There were fights with Watsfic (the science-fiction club) whose
office was back-to-back with ours.  At one point (after my time)
they stole Calum and painted him pink and blue.  But then I
believe the CSC got him back.

Calum T. Dalek has had a long, if not particularly illustrious,
career as a UW undergrad.  He joined the ACM (Association for
Computing Machinery), and began receiving their journals.  For
all I know, he's been a student member of the ACM for over 20
years (I wonder if their subscription system's smart enough to
catch such things?).

A Google search shows that he's been published in Wired (and
quoted in all seriousness in somebody's book!)

I have no idea whether he still exists in physical form, but
according to their web site (www.csclub.uwaterloo.ca), Calum T.
Dalek is still their Chairbeing, and many illustrations adorn the
site.

Imagine my joy, in 1984 on my first trip to England, at not only
getting to see HW for the first and second times, but also
stumbling across an SF store (Forbidden Planet maybe?) that had
the real deal -- a genuine BBC dalek!  Plus dalek t-shirts for
sale AND Deep Fix "New Worlds Fair" posters.  I was in heaven!

--

|  | /\
|-_|/  >   Eric Siegerman, Toronto, Ont.        erics at telepres.com
|  |  /
Anyone who swims with the current will reach the big music steamship;
whoever swims against the current will perhaps reach the source.
        - Paul Schneider-Esleben



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