Missing Misterio
THE MYSTERY OF THE MISSING MISTERIOS
There is something amiss with the sales of Dr Misterio to Central American and South American countries.
The big mystery is, did Dr Misterio actually screen in all the countries purported to have purchased the series?
BBC Records list the following Central and South American countries in a report (going up to December 1979) for which a payment had been made for the rights to use incidental music featured in the first 23 Tom Baker stories, Robot to The Invasion of Time:
| Ecuador | by December 1978 |
| Chile | by February 1979 |
| Mexico | by February 1979 |
| Venezuela | by February 1979 |
| Brazil | by March 1979 |
| Guatemala | by March 1979 |
The February 1987 memo mentioned in The Eighties - THE LOST CHAPTERS records sales to the following Latin American countries:
| Costa Rica | 1 story |
| Chile | 23 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.]
Of note, only Chile and Guatemala appear in both lists, when in fact they all should. Why are the other sales of Dr Misterio missing? Nicaragua and Costa Rica should certainly be listed in the music payments register – or is it simply that their payments hadn't been recovered at the time these records were compiled? And Mexico should definitely be in the 1987 memo.
Airdates have been located for Chile, Costa Rica, Mexico and Nicaragua only. Newspapers have been checked from 1978 to the mid-1980s for the other countries (with the exception of Honduras, for which only 1984 onwards have been accessed). But Dr Misterio is missing from the television listings for Venezuela, Ecuador, Brazil, Guatemala, Honduras and Dominican Republic.
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, it is hard to believe that we couldn't find at least one listing even when viewing every third month at random.
The BBC records might be wrong. We don't necessarily know what the "by Month/year" data was recording. Given that Time Life handled sales to Latin America as well as North America, it is possible that they bulk-sold the series to all countries that they handled distribution for in Latin America. There is no certainty that an actual sale took place. These may have all been prospective customers.
And how do the music payments actually work? A fee may have been paid in advance – and were recorded in the music payments register. But the sale of the series might not have been completed and gone ahead. The fee would have been refunded. But was the register updated to record this? Or was this recorded somewhere else?
Is there any significance in the fact that Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica all lie in very close proximity to one another? These countries would have been able to receive television transmissions from their neighbours. Even if a country did not buy the series for broadcast, was rights clearance payment payable on account of cross-border transmissions? 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.
Of the nine countries under examination, Chile is the only one that appears in both the music records, has the correct number of stories in the 1987 memo (23), and had its airdates confirmed. All three components are present and there are no conflicts; all the facts fit.
Let's combine the two tables:
| Country | music paid | 1987 memo | airdates |
|---|---|---|---|
| Chile | by February 1979 | 23 | 9 May 1979 |
| Mexico | by February 1979 | -- | 4 May 1979 |
| Costa Rica | -- | 1 | 4 Feb 1980 |
| Nicaragua | -- | 24 | 6 Aug 1980 |
| Guatemala | by March 1979 | 24 | -- |
| Honduras | -- | 24 | -- |
| Ecuador | by December 1978 | -- | -- |
| Venezuela | by February 1979 | -- | -- |
| Brazil | by March 1979 | -- | -- |
Costa Rica and [[Nicaragua] are missing from the "music paid" list – but that's perfectly understandable, since their broadcasts did not commence until 1980, which is after the music memo was compiled.
Ecuador, Venezuela and Brazil appear only in the music report, and nowhere else, so we could probably consider those as being potential sales (from 1979) that ultimately did not go ahead – hence their absence from the 1987 memo and no airdates. Newspapers have been checked from 1978 to 1980 for Guatemala, so it's possible that the series aired much later, but if music payments were made in 1979, why delay broadcast?
The jury is still out on Honduras; until 1979 to 1983 newspapers can be checked, we don't know whether or not the series did air.
CONCLUSION
Even though we may be completely overlooking something obvious here, there is still a mystery...
- 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 payments had been made, and the money later refunded?
- Did some countries have to pay music clearances for the simple fact that their neighbours who did screen the series did?
- 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?
A number of questions that can't be answered – so for now, the Mystery of the Missing Misterios will have to remain unsolved...
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