Producing The Celestial Toymaker wasn't easy, even by Doctor Who standards. Most of the difficulties stemmed from the fact that it arose at a time of transition in the production office. Though commissioned by the team of producer John Wiles and script editor Donald Tosh, it was ultimately completed by the new team of Innes Lloyd and Gerry Davis. The two sides simply had very different ideas about how the story should proceed.
All four episodes were in fact written three different times. Brian Hayles had delivered all four original scripts, likely in late 1965. Tosh and Wiles had immediately seen that the scripts could not be practically realised, and thus Tosh rewrote them entirely. By the time he was finished, though, he was no longer script editor. Davis, his replacement, now had to deal with the fact that Tosh had inserted the use of the title characters from a play called George and Margaret by Gerald Savory without obtaining permission. Since Savory was now Head of Serials, and had the power to veto scripts, he quickly rejected Tosh's approach to The Celestial Toymaker.
Davis therefore had to tackle the scripts again. These rewrites got Savory's approval, but the old production team were left wondering what had happened to their scripts. Tosh opined that Davis' approach was "much lighter, more pantomime" than his own. The results were no more pleasing to John Wiles, who wrote a memo to Savory on 25 February 1966, after he had technically left the Doctor Who production office. In it, he claimed that the central battle of wills between the Doctor and the Toymaker had been downplayed to the benefit of new elements involving a more childish confrontation between the companions and the Toymaker's creations. Ultimately, Wiles would have liked to have seen the entire production halted, since its commissioning producer and script editor had gone - and with them, the original, more adult intent of the story.
Davis therefore had to tackle the scripts again. These rewrites got Savory's approval, but the old production team were left wondering what had happened to their scripts. Tosh opined that Davis' approach was "much lighter, more pantomime" than his own. The results were no more pleasing to John Wiles, who wrote a memo to Savory on 25 February 1966, after he had technically left the Doctor Who production office. In it, he claimed that the central battle of wills between the Doctor and the Toymaker had been downplayed to the benefit of new elements involving a more childish confrontation between the companions and the Toymaker's creations. Ultimately, Wiles would have liked to have seen the entire production halted, since its commissioning producer and script editor had gone - and with them, the original, more adult intent of the story.
Following the completion of The Celestial Toymaker, the Trilogic Game prop came into the possession of Peter Purves, who was very pleased with Steven's increased importance in the serial. Unfortunately, after leaving Doctor Who, Purves endured a year and a half without work and came to see the Trilogic Game as the source of his bad luck. He finally discarded the prop, and ironically was rewarded with a role in Z Cars (1962) the following day.
Peter Cushing stated in an interview that he believed that his incarnation of the Doctor was canon (he played him in Dr. Who and the Daleks (1965) and Daleks' Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. (1966)). According to his theory, the Celestial Toymaker had kidnapped a future incarnation of The Doctor, wiped his memory and made him relive all his past adventures. Interestingly, he came up with the theory before the concept of regeneration was established in the series.
The first of a four-part serial called "The Celestial Toymaker". Only episode four of this story is currently in the BBC Archive. The rest were destroyed by the BBC during the 1970s.
At the end of Episode Four, there was an apology in the form of an oral announcement after the credits to the estate of Frank Richards, the creator of the schoolboy hero Billy Bunter, because the character Cyril - depicted in the episode as an overage schoolboy - resembles Billy Bunter.