Algeria

ALGERIA is in North Africa; it is the second largest country on the African continent. Once a French colony, it gained its independence in 1962.

Profile

Country Number (35)	1973	SECOND THIRD WAVE
Region	Africa
Television commenced	December 1956
Colour System	1979	PAL
Population	1974	14,700,000
TV Sets	1974	155,000
Language/s	Arabic	French

Television Stations / Channels

Algeria began its television service in 1956. Colour transmissions began in 1979 with the PAL colour system. There is just one television station: Radiodiffusion Television Algerienne (RTA).

• TELEVISION ALGERIENNE (Arabic)
• TELEVISION ALGERIENNE (French)

Language/s

The principal languages of Algeria are Arabic and French; Doctor Who would most certainly have been broadcast with the Arabic soundtrack that was provided by the BBC. Given that the French newspapers had TV listings in French, it is likely that the broadcasts also had French subtitles.

ادكتورهو / LE DOCTEUR WHO

Algeria was the 35th country to screen Doctor Who. It was the last to screen the William Hartnell stories in the 1970s (see Selling Doctor Who.)

BBC Records

The Seventies records a sale of "(4)" stories prior to February 1977. The Handbook identifies these as: C, E, K and L.

In DWM, Algeria is identified in nine story Archives: A, B, C, E, F, G, J, K, and L.

Stories bought and broadcast

WILLIAM HARTNELL

Nine stories, 37 episodes:

A	An Unearthly Child	1
B	The Daleks	7
C	Inside the Spaceship	2
E	The Keys of Marinus	6
F	The Aztecs	4
G	The Sensorites	6
J	Planet of Giants	3
K	The Dalek Invasion of Earth	6
L	The Rescue	2

The programme was supplied as 16mm black and white film prints with Arabic soundtracks.

Only part one of An Unearthly Child was supplied to Algeria.

Origin of the Prints?

Libya was the Arabic nation that had screened Doctor Who prior to Algeria – the same 37 episodes were purchased by that country in late 1969. Therefore it is highly likely that Algeria's prints came from Libya.

Transmission

Suzane, 31 December 1973

La Planete, 1 January 1974

La Destruction, 8 January 1974

La Mer Morte, 10 January 1974

Le Temple, 18 January 1974

Etrangers dans l'Espace, 22 January 1974

La Planete des Geants, January 1974

Les Daleks, 1 February 1974

L'Ennemi, 6 February 1974

WILLIAM HARTNELL

The series started on Monday, 31 December 1973, at 7.30pm, and screened seven days a week in a variety of different timeslots (ranging from 5.55pm to 7.35pm) until Tuesday, 7 February 1974 - an almost uninterrupted run of 37 episodes over a 39 day period. The 12 and 13 January scheduled episodes must have been pre-empted, as the same two episodes are also listed as screening on 14 and 15 January.

There is no clear record that Algeria screened Doctor Who again, even after the introduction of PAL colour.

Fate of the Prints?

Algeria was the last country to purchase the William Hartnell stories. The BBC was already at that time (1973/74) actively selling the Jon Pertwee stories in both colour and b/w formats.

It is not known what happened to these Arabic prints. The fact that the BBC held a collection of Arabic prints in late 1976 might indicate that Algeria sent the films to England sometime after broadcasts had completed.

TV listings

TV listings have been obtained from the newspaper El Moujahid, a French language paper published in the capital, Addis Abbas.

In the French paper, the series was called Le Docteur Who, which is the French equivalent of the Arabic title الدكتور هو.

The 31 December issue called the series "un feuilleton d’aventure des science-fiction", which translates as "a science fiction adventure series". It also names the main cast as "Carrol Ann, William Russel, William Martnell et Jacqueline Hill" (sic). The lead actors for The Keys of Marinus part one, are named as "William Wartnel, William Russel, Carrol Ann Ford, Jacqueline Hill" (sic).

A majority of the listings also give the episode number - e.g. 1ere partie (1st part), 12eme partie (12th), 23eme partie (23rd), 34 partie, etc.

Some of the listings also give the name of the director (réalisé par), although in some cases these are wrong, with Frank Cox, John Cox (!) or Melvin Pinfield (sic) sometimes being credited for episodes they didn’t direct.

"La Planete des Geants" is credited three times – on 27, 28, 29 January – but the first for which should be part six of The Sensorites.

French titles

The newspaper identified the episode titles by the French translations of the adopted Arabic titles, which in some cases differ significantly from the original English:

1	Suzane	Susan
2	La Planete	The Planet
3	Les Survivants	The Survivors
4	L'Evasion	The Escape
5	not known
6	La Mobilisation	The Mobilisation / The Liquidation
7	Le Malheur	The Misfortune / Bad Luck
8	Le Sauvetage	The Rescue / Salvage
9	La Destruction	The Destruction
10	Le Desastre	The Disaster
11	La Mer Morte	The Dead Sea
12	L'Araignee	The Spider
13	La Foret Bruyante	The Noisy Forest
14	La Terreur	The Terror
15	La Sentence de Mort	The Sentence of Death
16	Les Yeux de Maurinius	The Eyes of Marinus
17	Le Temple	The Temple
18	Les Soldats de la Mort	The Soldiers of Death
19	Le Sacrifice	The Sacrifice
20	Jours Sombres	Dark Days
21	Etrangers dans l'Espace	Strangers in Space
22	Variations	Changes
23	Danger	Danger
24	La Race Eteinte	The Extinct Race
25	not known
26	not known
27	La Planete des Geants	The Planet of the Giants
28	not known
29	not known
30	not known
31	Les Daleks	The Daleks
32	Le Jour du Retour	The Day of Return / of Recurrence
33	not known
34	not known
35	not known
36	L'Ennemi	The Enemy
37	Mesures Desesperees	Desperate Measures

• Episode 24 is printed as "LA RAGE ETEINTE" in El Moujahid; we think this is a printing error, and that the title should be "LA RACE ETEINTE", "The Extinct Race", which in the context of the narrative, makes better sense than does "The Extinct Rage".

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