Missing Misterio
The Mystery of the Missing Misterios
There is something amiss with the sales of Doctor Who / Dr Misterio to Central American and South American countries.
The big mystery is, did the series actually screen in all the countries purported to have purchased the series? And did it screen in countries not recorded in BBC files?
In an interview with Tom Baker from early December 1979, published in Starlog magazine issue 34 (cover dated May 1980), he says "Dr Who sells in every country in South America except two…". He doesn't state which those two are, but at a guess it would be French Guiana and Surinam, where English, Portuguese and Spanish are not the principal languages.
Of course, we have to assume that Baker knows what he is talking about, and is not merely making up figures and exaggerating, as Baker is well-known for doing (especially in more recent years). But based on other comments he makes in the same interview (such as that the series has been sold to the Middle East and Far East (e.g. Hong Kong and Brunei), Australia and New Zealand, and 65 places in America) we certainly feel there is a high degree of truth in what he claims, as he would certainly have had conversations with his immediate bosses at the BBC as to how popular and successful sales of his stories had been by that point.
The timing of this interview, late 1979, certainly ties in with when the bulk of the known sales to South America and Latin America took place, as this article demonstrates.
THE MEMOS
We refer to two "official" pieces of BBC documentation, both of which identify by name countries to which Doctor Who has been sold.
1: MUSIC CLEARANCES
The following Central and South American countries are named in a series of internal BBC memos (going up to December 1979) advising the corporation's music copyright department of the countries to which the series had been sold, so they could clear the rights to use the incidental music featured in the first 23 Tom Baker stories, Robot to The Invasion of Time (the majority of which had compositions by Dudley Simpson). The same groupings of countries appear consistently on all the memos, some of which have different dates, which reflect more the timing of when each individual memo was written than the date on which the actual "sales" were formally contracted:
| Ecuador | 27 November; 1 & 7 December 1978 |
| Venezuela, Mexico, Chile | 16 & 23 February 1979 |
| Brazil, Guatemala | 23 & 27 March 1979 |
The memos do actually group the countries together on the same page: so Venezuela, Mexico and Chile (in that order) are on the same series of memos, and Brazil and Guatemala (in that order) are both on the same set of notices.
It would appear that Time Life Television, who were the distributors of BBC programming throughout North, Central and South America, offered the series to the first four countries named above at the 4-8 March 1978 NATPE exhibit, with the other two a year later, at the March 1979 exhibit. (The March 1981 exhibit was the final one that Time Life attended; Western World Television Inc took over the Latin American distribution rights, and either picked up all of Time Life's old client base, or started afresh.)
2: FEBRUARY 1987
The February 1987 "memo" mentioned in The Eighties - THE LOST CHAPTERS records sales to the following Latin American countries:
| Chile | 23 stories |
| Costa Rica | 1 story |
| Dominican Republic | 7 stories |
| Guatemala | 24 stories * |
| Honduras | 24 stories * |
| Nicaragua | 24 stories * |
[* We feel sure that 24 should be 23, as that was how many Baker stories were in the package.]
BUT
Is there any significance in the fact that Costa Rica's "1" plus Chile's "23" equals "24"? (Both countries start with the letter "C". Coincidence?) Could it be that for those other three countries allocated with "24", there is yet another country (not named) being the extra "1" in the total?
These sales may have been attained at the 1980, 1981, or subsequent NATPE exhibits.
(Of course, without our seeing the actual memo itself, it's impossible to judge the accuracy of the data, or how it was subsequently adapted for the online version of the 'lost' text.
So - were any countries bracketed together in any way?; The online version of the list has the numbers inside brackets, but is that how the numbers were presented in the memo?; Were the countries listed down or across the page?; Were they in alphabetical order, or another order, and might that order be of significance?; Are there any ditto marks that haven't been taken into account?; Is the "1" noted for Costa Rica in fact an "11", or a misread 'ditto mark'?)
It's not exactly clear what the purpose of this 1987 memo was. Who ordered it? Why was it ordered? Who compiled it? What documentation was accessed and consulted? Was there selective 'editing' done to specifically remove from a much larger list those countries that did not meet with the criteria by which the list was being compiled?
ALSO SCREENED:
There is also the fact that three further Latin American countries screened the series in the 1980s, but are not named in either of the above two 'official' lists:
| Colombia |
| Peru |
| Puerto Rico |
Airdates for Colombia (from 1980, and later 1987) have been found; anecdotal evidence indicates that Puerto Rico aired episodes in the "late 1970s / early 1980s", and Peru sometime in the 1980s.
Of note, only Chile and Guatemala appear in both the music and 1987 memos, when *all* of them should at least be in the 1987 list. Why are the other sales of Dr Misterio missing? Mexico, Ecuador and Colombia should definitely be in the 1987 "memo" but are very much conspicuous by their absence...
Of note, while Chile is in the 1987 list, the two other countries that appear on the same series of music clearances memos are not. Is that significant? Likewise, only Guatemala, which shared the same music clearances notices with Brazil, is named in the 1987 list. Does that mean that whoever compiled the 1987 listing (assuming, of course, that it was based in part on those music clearance advices), only identified the first country in each grouping, and overlooked or deliberately ignored the rest?
Costa Rica is recorded as buying only one story – and yet we have found over 330 airdates for that country. (It's highly doubtful that a single 4-part serial was repeated over 80 times!)
Airdates have been located for Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico, Ecuador, Colombia and Nicaragua only, and in each case the series started in 1979 or 1980. Newspapers have been checked for 1978, 1979 and 1980 for the other countries (with the exception of Honduras, for which only 1984 onwards have been accessed). But "Dr Misterio" is missing from the published television listings for Venezuela, Guatemala, Honduras and Dominican Republic. And for Brazil, where Portuguese is the official language, no listings have been found for "Doutor Who". Sure, it's possible that the series aired outside the date ranges we've searched, but with 98 episodes to find, even if they were stripped five days a week, or aired two together or as omnibuses, it is hard to believe that we couldn't find at least one listing even when viewing one week in every third month at random.
The fact that all the dated music clearances are from November 1978 to March 1979, shortly after the grand launch of the series in the United States, suggests that Time Life wanted to exploit the new series to as many countries as possible, and all at the same time, which was one of the main purposes of the NATPE exhibits. Time Life handled sales to Latin America as well as North America, so did its deal include some sort of "bulk" sale / offer that encompassed not only the USA but also Latin America and South America? (Strictly speaking, Brazil is not Latin America, but since it is part of continental South America, it would presumably also be part of Time Life's catchment area; and indeed, Time Life was financially involved in helping set up Brazil's first television network in the 1960s.) There is no certainty that in all cases an actual sale ever took place. Some of these may have been prospective sales, but with a payment in advance.
In the 1960s / early 1970s, some of the television stations in Latin America were supported financially by the major networks in the United States: for instance the American Broadcasting Company (ABC) had investment interests in stations operating from Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Panama, Uruguay, and Venezuela, although it's not known whether those financial interests continued into the late 1970s when Doctor Who was on offer, or whether this interest went as far as influencing the types of programmes that those stations aired. Time Life's interests in Brazil's Globo TV had already ended by 1978.
Did Time Life perhaps operate a "pool" system, whereby they bought in advance the rights for "X" number of Latin American countries (they "guaranteed" the BBC that they could sell the series to the minimum number of countries needed to make the endeavour worthwhile), and then opened those rights for tender on a "first come, first served" basis? And then, once all the advance sales had been reached, those countries got first 'dibs' on the number of episodes they wanted. (And based on the level of interest, Time Life then undertook the long process of dubbing the episodes into Spanish.)
With the recorded "sales" to Ecuador, Chile, Mexico, Venezuela, Brazil and Guatemala all being within a very short space of time of each other (a five month period), it's possible the series was offered and "sold" to all of them "sight unseen". And once the dubbed tapes had been supplied, all but Mexico, Chile and Ecuador decided to "pass" on the science-fiction series.
Any 'unsold' stories would then go back into the pool, to become available to a second batch of tenders? (Is this why Colombia only got nine serials?) Are the countries named in the music rights registers therefore only those from the first advance offer (even if they subsequently declined to buy the series)? And are those named in the 1987 list those from a much later (partial?) offer? (Is this why Dominican Republic has only "(7)" sales recorded?) Are the countries from the 'second' (and 'third'?) offer (made after 1980) the ones missing (omitted in error?) from the 1987 memo?
And how do the music clearances actually work? Could each music clearance fee actually cover more than one country? For instance, did the clearances for the February sale to Venezuela automatically include its neighbour, Colombia, even if the named country didn't subsequently purchase the series for itself? If a fee had been paid in advance – and thus recorded in the music payments register – did it get refunded if a sale of the series did not proceed? If so, why was the register not updated? Or was the cancellation / refund recorded somewhere else?
Where the clearances in the memos actually an instruction to clear the music for use in those countries in anticipation of the sale being finalised, and in the event of the rights being refused by the copyright holder/s, did that force the sale to be cancelled? Is that why airdates cannot be found for a number of countries: the rights were refused? (Of course, it does raise the question as to why Dudley Simpson or his agents would give the OK for his music to be heard in Nicaragua and Colombia, but not in Venezuela!)
Is there any significance to the fact that Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica all lie in very close proximity to one another?
These countries could have been able to receive television transmissions from their neighbours. Guatemala and Honduras lie between Mexico and Nicaragua; two countries for which airdates have not been found lying slap-bang between two countries for which airdates have been identified. Would that mean a country which did not buy the series still had to pay a small fee because they could pick up cross-border transmissions?
Of the countries under examination, Chile is the only one that appears in the music clearances records, has the correct number of stories in the 1987 memo (23), and has airdates confirmed. All three components are present and there are no conflicts; all the facts fit. So why is it not the same for any of the others?
Let's combine all the tables, placing the countries into known airdate order, the format by which the episodes aired (with a split listing if more than one format was used), and adjusting the 1987 totals where they are missing or likely to be inaccurate:
| Country | Music Paid (to Dec 79) | Airdates | format | 1987 | Adjust |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Mexico (a) | 16 & 23 February 1979 | 4 May 1979 | hour | -- | 23 |
| Chile (a) | 16 & 23 February 1979 | 9 May 1979 | half-hour | 23 | 6 in that format |
| Puerto Rico | -- | late 1979? | half-hour | -- | 23? |
| Chile (b) | 6 Jan 1980 | omnibus | 23 | ||
| Costa Rica | -- | 4 Feb 1980 | half-hour | 1 | 23 |
| Colombia | -- | 13 Feb 1980 | half-hour | -- | only aired 9 |
| Ecuador | 27 November, 1 & 7 December 1978 | 19 March 1980 | hour | -- | 23 |
| Nicaragua | -- | 6 Aug 1980 | half-hour | 24 | 23 |
| Mexico (b) | 1 July 1981 | half-hour | -- | 23 | |
| Venezuela | 16 & 23 February 1979 | ? | ? | -- | 23 |
| Guatemala | 23 & 27 March 1979 | ? | ? | 24 | 23 |
| Honduras | -- | ? | ? | 24 | 23 |
| Dominican Republic | -- | ? | ? | 7 | ? |
| Peru | -- | ? | ? | -- | -- |
ANALYSIS
- In terms of their first airdates, Mexico and Chile are in the same order in which they appear in the music clearance report. Coincidence? (If Venezuela did indeed screen the series, then presumably its first airdate would be around the same time - or it could be 16 months plus later like Ecuador…)
- Mexico is missing from the 1987 memo. However it's entirely possible that Mexico was named in the memo itself, but was accidentally omitted from the published list. On that point, have any other countries been omitted? Problem is we cannot verify either way, as the authors of the book no longer have a copy of the memo...
- And what of the accuracy of the music clearances themselves? And what of the 1987 memo? How many countries were missed due to the BBC records being incomplete, or accidentally (or deliberately!) omitted during the transfer of the information from both sets of BBC documents to the researcher's note-pad?
- Ecuador was the first country to "buy" the series (according to the music clearances) but it wasn't the first to screen it (it was potentially the fifth or sixth (based on the available dates). Ecuador, Venezuela and Brazil appear only in the music clearances, and nowhere else. Airdates have been found for Ecuador, some 16 months after the sales date. Is that significant? (Did Mexico, where the dubbings were performed have first rights to screen the series, and Ecuador, despite some being sold the series first, simply had to wait in line?) Possibly of significance is that both Mexico and Ecuador aired the serials edited into "hours"; Ecuador probably had to wait till Mexico had finished its run first, rather than use the episodic versions that Chile was screening.
- For those countries where airdates have not been found, did the series actually ever screen? Are they merely potential sales that Time Life offered but which ultimately did not go ahead – hence their absence from the other two columns? Is it possible that Venezuela on-sold their unused rights to neighbouring Colombia? Was it the fact that Brazil broadcast in the PAL format, and would have to create their own Portuguese dubs (whereas all other countries in South America had distribution by Time Life, and broadcast in NTSC and Spanish) the reason why the series didn't air, or why it may have aired much, much later than the original 1979 year of "sale"?
- Puerto Rico is not named in any of the memos, and yet based on reliable anecdotal evidence the series aired there in "the late 1970s". (Of course, being recognised as a 'territory' of the USA, sales to Puerto Rico might be included under the recorded sales to "United States".)
- Costa Rica, Colombia, Ecuador and Nicaragua are missing from the "music paid" list – but that's perfectly understandable since their broadcasts did not commence until 1980, and the documents that were examined when the music memo was compiled only went as far as December 1979.
- Colombia is absent from the 1987 memo, and yet the series aired in 1980, the same year as Costa Rica and Nicaragua – both of which are in the same memo - and then again in mid-1987, which was long after the February 1987 memo ha d been compiled.
- Is there any significance to the fact that Colombia only played nine serials in 1980, rather than the full package of 23 stories? Did this exempt them from paying the fees, and thus not be recoded in the sales documentation that was accessed when the 1987 memo was compiled?
- Is the format (half-hour, hour, omnibus) have anything to do with whether or not a country is missing from the 1987 list?
- The jury is still out on Honduras; until 1979 to 1983 newspapers can be checked, we don't know for sure whether or not the series aired.
- Newspapers have been checked for 1978 to 1980 for Guatemala, so it's possible that like Ecuador the series aired much later than when it was "sold" to them. But, still, if music clearances were made in early 1979, other than a delay with the dubbing process, what other factors might there be for holding off screening the series for two years? Both Chile and Mexico screened the series within a few months of the "payment" date. Costa Rica and Nicaragua also screened the series a very short time after the final entry on the music memo was recorded. If the music payment related to the start of broadcast, then Dr Misterio would have played in Guatemala around June 1979... but it didn't! (At least, not according to any of the newspapers we checked.) Did Guatemala end up selling its rights to Costa Rica?
- Airdates for Dominican Republic have not been found despite papers covering 1980 to 1988 being checked...
- Peru is absent from the memo and the music clearances. Newspapers for most of 1979 to 1989 have been viewed without a listing being sighted. And besides, we only have anecdotal evidence to go on that the series had even screened there. We are still searching...
- Airdates for Brazil have been impossible to find; the country has over 50 private TV stations, which don't all have listings in newspapers. (We have not included Brazil in the above table for that reason.)
- Going back to the December 1979 Tom Baker interview, what of Paraguay, Uruguay, British Guiana, Bolivia, Argentina, Panama and El Salvador? Was the series sold to any of those countries as well? (It was reported in the 24 August 1979 edition of Back Stage magazine, that Time Life Television had sold one of its own mini-series to "Chile, Ecuador, Panama, El Salvador, Costa Rica, Honduras, Puerto Rico, Guatemala and Nicaragua", which illustrates what Time Life's catchment area was.)
- When Time Life wound down its television distribution services, Western World Media Inc picked up the rights to Latin America, commencing 1 April 1981. How did the change of distributor affect the sales already negotiated and contracted or about to be contracted by Time Life? Were any of the sales cancelled, voided or re-negotiated after 1981? Is that why the records are amiss? Did the 1987 memo only record some of the sales made by Time Life pre-1981?
CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER
Let's break down the above table even further, this time into chronological order encompassing all the known dates and facts discussed in this page, to see if any patterns emerge…
- 4-8 March 1978 NATPE exhibit – series offered, then formally sold to:
- 27 November 1978 – Ecuador; per music clearances
- 1 December 1978 – Ecuador; per music clearances
- 7 December 1978 – Ecuador; per music clearances
- 16 & 23 February 1979 – Venezuela; per music clearances
- 16 & 23 February 1979 – Mexico; per music clearances
- 16 & 23 February 1979 – Chile; per music clearances [23 stories; per 1987 memo]
- The translating / dubbing process gets under way in Mexican studios…
- March 1979 NATPE exhibit – series offered, then formally sold to:
- 23 March 1979 - Guatemala; per music clearances [24? stories; per 1987 memo]
- 23 March 1979 - Brazil; per music clearances
- potentially also sold to Costa Rica [1? story; per 1987 memo], Colombia and Puerto Rico
- 4 May 1979 – With dubbings completed, Mexico commences screenings (with repeats until 1981)
- 9 May 1979 – Chile commences screenings (with repeats until July 1980)
- late 1979? – Puerto Rico commences screenings
- 4 February 1980 – Costa Rica commences screenings (with repeats until 1983)
- 13 February 1980 – Colombia commences screenings (only nine stories aired prior to expiry of broadcaster's license)
- March 1980 NATPE exhibit – series offered, then formally sold to:
- Nicaragua [24? stories; per 1987 memo]
- Honduras [24? stories; per 1987 memo]
- 19 March 1980 – Ecuador commences screenings
- 6 August 1980 – Nicaragua commences screenings (with repeats until 1982)
- 1980? - Honduras commences screenings?
- 1 April 1981 – Time Life is replaced by Western World Television as distributor to Latin America…
- 1981? - Venezuela commences screenings? (two years after 1979 sale)
- 1981? - Guatemala commences screenings? (two years after 1979 sale)
- 1985 – the first seven years rights period on the episodes expires…
- July 1985 BBC Showcase in Nassau – limited run of episodes offered, and formally sold to:
- Dominican Republic (7 stories; per 1987 memo)
- Colombia again? (for its 1987 run)
- and possibly other countries (as yet unidentified)
- 1985? – Dominican Republic commences screenings?
- 10 February 1987 – the "1987 memo" is compiled; Ecuador, Venezuela, Mexico, Brazil, Colombia, and Peru are (for whatever reason/s) omitted from this list
- April/May 1987 – Colombia's second batch commences screenings
ANALYSIS
From this, we can see that the first three countries are missing from the 1987 memo, which might be significant in determining how the memo was compiled in the first place.
Given the close time frames in which each group of countries aired the series and the three different formats in use (half hour, hour and omnibus), were there perhaps several sets of tapes in each format on cycle, with one set starting in Mexico, with another set specifically for South America and the third for Central America?
Let's create the possible tape 'bicycling' sequences:
- Set 1 (hour): Mexico -> Ecuador (neither in the 1987 list)
- Set 2 (half hour): Chile -> Colombia -> Mexico -> Colombia (for 1987 run) (only Chile in 1987 list)
- Set 3 (half hour): Costa Rica -> Nicaragua -> Honduras # -> Guatemala # - > Dominican Republic (only 7) # -> ? (all in the 1987 list)
- Set 4 (half hour): Puerto Rico # -> Venezuela # -> Peru # -> ? (none in the 1987 list)
- Set 5 (omnibus): Chile (in the 1987 list)
Countries in bold are absent from the 1987 list.
As you can see from this, it's possible to have one set of duplicates of a given format being handed down along a chain of countries all within the same region.
Only one of the potential Set 2 countries is named in the 1987 memo. (But Chile also got omnibuses, so it's appearance in the 1987 memo might be for that format rather than the half-hours!)
Of course, without the confirmed premiere airdates or the format for the six countries (marked #), it's impossible to judge the accuracy of this flow-chart!
But as can be seen, with a little bit of manipulation, the format (half hour, hour, omnibus) might explain why certain countries are missing from the 1987 list.
CONCLUSION
From the available research material (BBC records and newspapers), we have an almost equal number of named countries without airdates and unnamed countries with airdates. What does that tell us?
We may be completely overlooking something obvious here!
- Have we been looking in the wrong newspapers and date ranges?
- Are the BBC records wrong / inaccurate / incomplete / being taken out of context?
- For those countries where no airdates have been found, were the 'sales' cancelled after the music clearance advices had been sent, and any monies paid later refunded or held on credit?
- Did some countries have to pay some sort of "proximity payment" to cover transmissions they received from their close neighbours?
- Did a sale to the first country in each region (as per the groupings on the music clearances) cover other costs of the second (and third?) country within that same region, which is why the second and third country named on the same music clearances is not recorded in the 1987 memo?
- For sales and/or advance payments for screenings that didn't proceed, could the "sale" be transferred to another country that "refunded" the original purchaser instead of the BBC? (e.g. Venezuela "sold" its rights to Colombia, but only the former is recorded in the clearances registers...)
- The "sales" were handled by Time Life, who would have notified the BBC of all sales that had been completed; but how accurate was their communication with the BBC? Did they provide the BBC with details of every sale?
- Did the format in which the series was sold determine how/if a sale was recorded?
- Did a sale of Doctor Who to one of the non-PBS networks (ABC, CBS, NBC) allow that network to on-sell the programme to those Latin American stations with which they were affiliated?
A number of questions that can't for now be answered – so for now, the Mystery of the Missing Misterios will have to remain unsolved...
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