The Minister of Chance (series)

The Minister of Chance was a series of fantasy stories written by Dan Freedman. The series centred on the eponymous Minister, who was introduced in Freedman's Seventh Doctor webcast Death Comes to Time, and his involvement in court intrigue on the planet Thea.

The eponymous main character, the Minister of Chance, is portrayed and characterised consistently with his debut appearance in Death Comes to Time. Although in this series he was played by Julian Wadham rather than Stephen Fry, initial promotional material for the series explained this by describing him as a "defrocked Time Lord" "now in his second regeneration".^[1] The events of Death Comes to Time are alluded to as a tragedy in the Minister's past, and following from the Seventh Doctor's revocation of his TARDIS in that story, the Minister travels through time and space by "the scientific formula for doors".

Publisher's summary[[edit] | [edit source]]

Now in his second regeneration, defrocked Time Lord The Minister Of Chance finds himself saddled with 'Kitty', an 'assistant' he apparently cannot get rid of - and perilously entangled in the court intrigues and military politics of a forest planet on the brink of war. Sylvester McCoy, Paul McGann and Paul Darrow join Julian Wadham (The Iron Lady) and Lauren Crace (EastEnders) in an audio adventure that will take you to a spectacular world where science is heresy and magic is law...

Stories[[edit] | [edit source]]

Audio[[edit] | [edit source]]

Season 1[[edit] | [edit source]]

A prologue and five full audio stories were produced and released by Radio Static from 2011 to 2013.^[2]

The episodes were later remastered, split into multiple parts (a single, three 3-parts & two 4-parts), and re-released as a weekly podcast from 5 October 2020 to 23 February 2021.^[3][4][5]

The prologue, The Pointed Hand, introduced Paul McGann as Durian and Sylvester McCoy as Persidian III, the Witch Prime.

#	Title	Author	Featuring	Length	Original Release	Podcast Release
1	The Pointed Hand	Dan Freedman	Kitty, Durian, the Witch Prime	9 min., 1 sec.	13 February 2011	5 October 2020
2	The Broken World	The Minister of Chance, Kitty, Durian, the Witch Prime	35 min., 15 sec.	18 March 2011	19 October 2020 (Part 1) 27 October 2020 (Part 2) 2 November 2020 (Part 3)
3	The Forest Shakes	36 min., 47 sec.	15 May 2011	9 November 2020 (Part 1) 16 November 2020 (Part 2) 23 November 2020 (Part 3)
4	Paludin Fields	47 min., 22 sec.	20 September 2012	30 November 2020 (Part 1) 7 December 2020 (Part 2) 14 December 2020 (Part 3)
5	The Tiger	42 min., 33 sec.	1 March 2013	4 January 2021 (Part 1) 11 January 2021 (Part 2) 18 January 2021 (Part 3) 25 January 2021 (Part 4)
6	In a Barque on the River Hex	51 min., 50 sec.	17 May 2013	1 February 2021 (Part 1) 8 February 2021 (Part 2) 15 February 2021 (Part 3) 23 February 2021 (Part 4)

Season 2[[edit] | [edit source]]

On 14 November 2014, it was teased by Dan Freeman via Tumblr that a Season 2 was in development, due to be released in 2015. However, nothing came of this.^[6]

Film[[edit] | [edit source]]

A video adaptation of the prologue was released on 17 October 2014^[7] to promote a Kickstarter for a full film adaptation of The Minister of Chance,^[8] but it ultimately failed to meet its fundraising goal.^[9]

Book[[edit] | [edit source]]

On 8 December 2016, Dan Freeman announced on his Kickstarter for the unproduced movie that the series would be made into a novelisation.^[10]

On 1 June 2022, Arcbeatle Press released a short webcast on their YouTube channel titled He is Coming...,^[11] and on 30 June 2022, The Minister of Chance novelisation was released.^[12]

Notes[[edit] | [edit source]]

• Despite the limited size of the audio series cast, it had a substantial overlap with Doctor Who and related productions, including:

Sylvester McCoy, Paul McGann, Julian Wadham, Lauren Crace, Jenny Agutter, Paul Darrow, Beth Goddard, Tamsin Greig, Peter Guinness, Kemi-Bo Jacobs, Gethin Anthony, Simon Hickson, Mark Lewis, Sophie Aldred, Daniel Easton, Richard Garaghty, James Manley-Buser, Gareth Jones, and George Murphy.

• During production of the audios, the Minister of Chance crew also gave a shoutout on their website to their many friends for their help, hard work and talent in getting them to that point. These were (in no particular order):
  • Neil Fraser and Edward Kemp - RADA
  • Emily Horn, Georgina Grant Haworth & Lin Cordoray - LAMDA
  • Karl Phillips
  • Julian Mayers at Yada Yada Productions
  • Eloise Whitmore
  • Andy Wood
  • Allison Moulton
  • Jen and Tony Eden
  • Helen Langton
  • Andy Meany

Gallery[[edit] | [edit source]]

Main article: The Minister of Chance (series)/Gallery

External links[[edit] | [edit source]]

• The Minister of Chance at Dan Freeman: Writerator
• The Minister of Chance at Clare Eden
• The Minister of Chance on Fourble

Footnotes[[edit] | [edit source]]

Notes[[edit] | [edit source]]

References[[edit] | [edit source]]