7 Actors Who Hated Being On Doctor Who

Before Romana regenerated and fans were introduced to the Lalla Ward incarnation of the character, she was played by Mary Tamm from 1978 to 1979.

With just a single year under her belt, Tamm had an incredibly short tenure on the show, and one of the driving reasons behind her swift departure was the fact that she detested the direction her character was going in.

Upon agreeing to star as Romana in the first place, Tamm had been assured that she wouldn't be playing a typical companion or "damsel in distress" sort of role - Romana, due to her status as a Time Lord, would be on equal footing with the Doctor himself.

While this was true for a while, Tamm started to notice that Romana was slowly devolving into more of an assistant role as the episodes went by, and eventually, she grew sick and tired of playing that kind of character, and decided to leave the show.

"They said, 'she's going to be just as powerful as the Doctor.' It did work for a while, but it was only a half-hour format and you've got to have somebody who's explaining what's going on to the audience, so inevitably I ended up saying, 'oh, what's that, Doctor? Why, Doctor?' After 26 episodes, I thought, 'it's not going to go any further.' I'd had enough by then and I decided to leave after that one series."

An old rumour stated that Tamm had left the show because she was pregnant, but the actress has previously denied this story, claiming that John Nathan-Turner made it up.

In reality, it was her issues with Romana's characterisation that catalysed her exit.