Baker was born in Scotland Road, Liverpool, the son of Mary Jane(née Fleming), a cleaner, and John Stewart Baker, a sailor who was rarely at home. His parents were working-class Liverpudlians. Baker left school at 15 to become a Roman Catholic monk and remained in the monastic life for six years, but left after losing his faith, and did his National Service in the Royal Army Medical Corps, serving for two years from 1955 until 1957. At the same time he took up acting, at first as a hobby.

In the late 1960s and early 1970s Baker was part of Laurence Olivier's National Theatre company, and got his first big film break in 1971 with the role of Rasputin in the film Nicholas and Alexandra after Olivier recommended him for the part. He also appeared nude in Pier Paolo Pasolini's version of Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales, released in 1972, as a younger husband of the Wife of Bath.

Doctor Who (1974—1981)

In 1974, Baker took on the role of the Doctor from Jon Pertwee. He was recommended to producer Barry Letts by the BBC's Head of Serials, Bill Slater, who had directed Baker in Play of the Month. Impressed by Baker on meeting him, Letts was convinced he was right for the part after seeing his performance in The Golden Voyage of Sinbad. Baker was working on a construction site at the time, as acting jobs were scarce. Initially he was dubbed "Boiler Suit Tom" by the media, as he had been supplied for a press conference with some old studio set clothes to replace his modest garments.

He quickly made the part his own. As the Doctor, his eccentric style of dress and speech...particularly his trademark long scarf and fondness for jelly babies...made him an immediately recognisable figure, and he quickly caught the viewing public's imagination. Baker played the Doctor for seven consecutive seasons over a seven-year period, making him the longest-serving actor in the part on-screen. Baker himself suggested many aspects of the Fourth Doctor's personality. The distinctive scarf came about by accident: James Acheson, the costume designer, had provided far more wool than was necessary to the knitter, Begonia Pope, and Ms. Pope knitted all the wool she was given; it was Baker who suggested that he wear the resulting...ridiculously over-long...scarf.

The manifestation played by Tom Baker (1974-1981) is often regarded as the most popular of the Doctors. In polls conducted by Doctor Who Magazine, Baker has lost the "Best Doctor" category only three times: Once to Sylvester McCoy in 1990, and Twice to David Tennant in 2006 and 2009.

In a poll published by BBC Homes and Antiques magazine in January 2006, Baker was voted the fourth most eccentric star. He was beaten by Björk, Chris Eubank and David Icke.

He continues to be associated with the Doctor, appearing on documentaries such as The Story of Doctor Who and Doctor Who Confidential and giving interviews about his time on the programme. He reappeared as the Doctor for the 1993 charity special Dimensions in Time and audio for the PC game Destiny of the Doctors. He gets interviewed often in documentaries on the extras of Doctor Who DVD releases from his era as the Doctor and has recorded DVD commentaries for many of the stories.

In a 2004 interview regarding the series' revival, Baker suggested that he be cast as the Master. In a 2006 interview with The Sun newspaper, he claims that he has not watched any episodes of the new series because he "just can't be bothered". In June 2006, Baker once again expressed interest in the role in a guest column for Radio Times, noting that he "did watch a little bit of the new Doctor Who and I think the new fella, Tennant, is excellent."

While Peter Davison, Colin Baker, Sylvester McCoy and Paul McGann have all reprised their roles for audio adventures produced since the 1990s by Big Finish (and sometimes the BBC) Baker had until 2009 declined to voice the Doctor, saying he hadn't seen a script he liked. In July 2009, the BBC announced that Baker would return to the role for a series of five audio dramas, co-starring Richard Franklin as Captain Mike Yates, which would begin release in September. The five audios comprise a single linked story under the banner title Hornets' Nest, written by well-known author Paul Magrs. He returns with a sequel to Hornets' Nest called Demon Quest. "Doctor Who" Doctor Who: Demon Quest 1 The Relics of Time at BBC Shop Baker has also filmed inserts for a video release of the unfinished Shada and also provided narration for several BBC audio releases of old Doctor Who stories.

Baker has been involved in the reading of old Target novelisations in the BBC Audio range of talking books, "Doctor Who (Classic Novels)". Doctor Who and the Giant Robot was the first release in the range read by Baker, released on 5 November 2007, followed by Baker reading Doctor Who and the Brain of Morbius'(released 4 February 2008), Doctor Who and the Creature from the Pit (released on 7 April 2008) and Doctor Who and the Pyramids of Mars (released 14 August 2008). In October 2009, Baker was interviewed for BBC Radio 4's Last Word to pay tribute to the deceased former Doctor Who producer Barry Letts. He described Letts, who originally cast him in the role, as “the big link in changing my entire life”.

Little Britain

After his work on Lionel Nimrod's Inexplicable World, in 2001 Baker was cast as a similar narrator of Little Britain on BBC Radio 4, and remained in the role when it transferred to television. Baker has suggested that he was chosen for the part in Little Britain due to his popularity with Walliams and Lucas, part of the generation to whom he is the favourite Doctor. "I am now being employed by the children who grew up watching me", he stated in a recent DVD commentary. His eccentric voice-overs include such comments as "The Conservative Party is my favourite political party, after Labour and the Lib Dems", and "If people in Britain want to buy a pet, they go to a pet shop. If they want to buy a pet shop, they go to a pet shop shop. If they want to buy a pet shop shop, then they're just being silly." On the Little Britain Abroad special he remarked "In Paris, Anne is paying a visit to the Louvre. At my age I'm up all night visiting the Louvre". Another trademark of Little Britain's narration is the deadpan quotation of old rap lyrics, usually in the opening credit sequence.

On 17 November 2005, to mark the start of Series 3 of Little Britain, Baker read the continuity announcements on BBC One from 19:00 to 21:30 GMT. The scripts were written by the same writers as Little Britain (David Walliams and Matt Lucas) and Baker assumed his Little Britain persona. He used lines such as "Hello, tellyviewers. You're watching the BBC One!" and "In half an hour, Jenny Dickens's classic serial Bleak House. But first let's see what the poor people are up to in the first of two visits this evening to the EastEnders."

Film

Baker also appeared in the 1971 film Nicholas and Alexandra as Grigori Rasputin. He was nominated for two Golden Globe Awards for his performance, one for Best Actor in a Supporting Role and another for Best Newcomer.

Baker appeared as Moore, an artist whose paintings are imbued with voodoo power, in The Vault of Horror (1973), as Koura, the villainous sorcerer, in Ray Harryhausen's The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973); and as Halvarth, the Elven healer, in Dungeons & Dragons (2000).

In the late 1990s, it was reported that Baker was a candidate for the role of Gandalf in the Lord of the Rings films. Baker has since stated that he was only approached for "a role" in the film, and when told that it would mean spending months away in New Zealand, he turned down the offer.

Voice acting

Baker has appeared in various radio productions, including a role as "Britain's most celebrated criminal barrister", Sir Edward Marshall-Hall in John Mortimer Presents the Trials of Marshall Hall (1996), and a part in the 2001 BBC Radio 4 version of The Thirty-nine Steps as Sir Walter Bullivant. He guest starred in The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (a pastiche series written by Bert Coules) in the 2002 episode "The Saviour of Cripplegate Square".

From 2000 to 2005 Tom voiced the character Max Bear in the Channel 4 (UK) Max Bear Productions animated series. More recently, he voiced the role of the villain ZeeBad in the 2005 computer-animated film version of The Magic Roundabout.

Baker narrates the children's computer animation series The Beeps which is shown on Five's Milkshake! as well as narrating Tales of Aesop on BBC, a television series based on Aesop's Fables with beautiful puppet animation.

Video games

Baker also returned to star as the Fourth Doctor in the video game Destiny of the Doctors in 1997. His voice has also featured in Fire Warrior (2003), Cold Winter (2005), Resurrection, Antaeus Rising, The Video Game (2007) and "Sudeki" (2004)

Narration

Baker is a prolific and highly recognisable voiceover artist. In a 2005 survey of British adults, Baker's voice was found to be the fourth most recognisable after the Queen, Tony Blair and Margaret Thatcher.Tom Baker has also narrated a animation adventure of Doctor Who as the Fourth Doctor.In 1992 and 1993 Baker narrated BBC radio comedy series Lionel Nimrod's Inexplicable World. In 1994, Baker provided the narration for Channel 4's Equinox rave documentary Rave New World. "Equinox" Rave New World (1994) In 2002 he had a speaking role in the critically-acclaimed but commercially unsuccessful Hostile Waters as the Narrator.

Baker has worked on a number of video games, including Heretic Kingdoms (also known as Heretic Kingdoms: The Inquisition), Hostile Waters (2001), Cold Winter (2005), Resurrection (2005), Fire Warrior (2003), Perfect Dark (2000) and Defender of the Future (2000). He also voiced both the narrator and the god "Tetsu" in the role-playing game Sudeki, but was uncredited.

During the first three months of 2006, his voice was used by BT for spoken delivery of text messages to landline phones. He recorded 11,593 phrases, containing every sound in the English language, for use by the text-to-speech service.The BT text message service returned from 1 December 2006 until 8 January 2007, with 2p from each text going to the charity Shelter. Also a single "sung" by Baker's text voice, "You Really Got Me", originally by The Kinks, was released on 18 December 2006 with BT's proceeds going to the charity. The creator of the song was Mark Murphy, designer of the site.

His voice may be heard at London's Natural History Museum narrating commentary to some of the exhibits that support Darwin's theory of natural selection.

Baker has made three other brief forays into the world of music: he provides the monologue to the track "Witness to a Murder (Part Two)" on the album Six by Mansun; he appears on Technocat's single "Only Human" in 1995, and in 2002 he recorded the monologue to the track "Megamorphosis" on the album andabrek by Stephen James, although the album was not released until 2009. Baker provides narrative at two British tourist attractions: the Nemesis roller coaster at Alton Towers, Staffordshire; and the London Dungeon, a museum depicting gory and macabre events in the capital, narrating the events leading up to and comprising The Great Fire of London.

Tom Baker voiced the character "Max Bear", a series of animated stories broadcast on Channel 4 (UK Terrestrial) from 2000 to 2005. He narrated Australian cartoonist Bruce Petty's 2006 movie about world politics, Global Haywire.

Baker played "Puddleglum", a "marsh-wiggle", in the BBC adaptation of C.S Lewis' Silver Chair.

Baker also portrayed Sherlock Holmes in a four part BBC miniseries version of The Hound of the Baskervilles in 1982. In the U.S., this production was telecast on A & E. "The Hound of the Baskervilles" (1982)

He also appeared as a guest on the quiz show Have I Got News For You and was subsequently described by presenter Angus Deayton as the funniest guest in the show's history. A particular highlight of the show was when Baker gave an anecdotal account of how he, whilst entering a recording studio in Wales, was accosted by a member of the public who told Baker "I will never forgive you, nor will my wife, for what you did to our grammar schools". Baker claimed that the initial benevolence he had first felt for the stranger completely evaporated and he responded with "What are you talking about, you daft bugger?!?!", upon which the stranger replied "I'm so sorry. For a moment I thought you were Shirley Williams".

According to the Daily Mirror, Baker's appearance made him a cult figure once again and helped revive his career. He later returned to Have I Got News For You as a guest host in 2008.Baker played the role of the Captain in the Challenge version of Fort Boyard, and has also hosted the children's literature show, The Book Tower. He has recorded a show called, 'Tom Baker- In Confidence' to be shown in April 2010.

Baker's autobiography, Who on Earth is Tom Baker? (ISBN 0-00-638854-X), was published in 1997. He has also written a short fairytale-style novel, The Boy Who Kicked Pigs (ISBN 0-571-19771-X), which is subtitled "A Grotesque Masterpiece".

Baker's first marriage in 1961 was to Anna Wheatcroft (niece of the rose grower Harry Wheatcroft). They had two sons Daniel and Piers, but divorced in 1966 and Baker lost contact with his sons until a chance meeting with Piers in a pub in New Zealand allowing them to renew their relationship. In December 1980 he married Lalla Ward who had co-starred in Doctor Who (playing his companion Romana) with him for two years. However, the marriage lasted only 16 months.

In 1986, Baker married for a third time, this time to Sue Jerrard, who had been an assistant editor on Doctor Who. They moved to an old manse in Boughton Malherbe near Maidstone, Kent where they kept several cats, before emigrating to France in 2002. During this time he was a regular in the Red Lion in Lenham village where his distinctive voice could be heard above all other voices. They sold the property to Vic Reeves, shortly after Baker had worked with him on Randall & Hopkirk . In November 2006, Baker returned to live in the UK, buying a house in Tunbridge Wells, later moving to the East Sussex countryside.

Baker has sceptical views on religion and describes himself as irreligious, or occasionally as Buddhist, but not anti-religious. "People are quite happy believing the wrong things. I wasn't unhappy believing all that rubbish. Now I'm not unhappy thinking about it because I can laugh at it." Politically, Baker has expressed disdain for both the Conservatives and the Labour Party saying, in 1998, "When the Conservatives were in I cannot tell you how much I hated them. But I realise how shallow I am because I now hate the Labour Party as much."

Filmography

• 1968 - The Winter's Tale - The Bear
• 1971 - Nicholas and Alexandra - Rasputin
• 1972 - The Canterbury Tales (I racconti di Canterbury) - Jenkin
• 1973 - Cari Genitori (Dear Parents) - Karl
• 1973 - The Vault of Horror - Moore
• 1973 - Luther - Tom's character (Pope Leo X) doesn't appear in some versions of the film
• 1973 - The True Story (TV film) - Sea Captain
• 1973 - The Golden Voyage of Sinbad - Koura
• 1974 - The Mutations - Lynch
• 1984 - The Passionate Pilgrim (short film) - Sir Tom
• 1984 - The Zany Adventures of Robin Hood - Sir Guy de Gisbourne
• 2000 - Dungeons & Dragons - Halvarth
• 2005 - The Magic Roundabout - Zeebad

Television

• 1968 - Dixon of Dock Green - "The Attack" - The man
• 1968 - Market in Honey Lane (ATV soap opera; Tom in 1 episode: "The Matchmakers") - Doorman
• 1968 - George and the Dragon (ATV sitcom; Tom in 1 episode: "The 10:15 Train") - Porter
• 1968 - Z-Cars: "Hudson's Way" (2 episodes) - Harry Russell
• 1968 - Dixon of Dock Green - "Number 13" - Foreman
• 1969 - Thirty-Minute Theatre: The Victims: Frontier - Corporal Schabe
• 1970 - Softly, Softly (aka, Softly Softly: Taskforce) (1 episode: "Like any other Friday") - Site Foreman
• 1972 - BBC Play of the Month: The Millionairess - Dr. Ahmed el Kabir
• 1973 - Arthur of the Britons - series 2 episode "Go Warily" - Brandreth / Gavron
• 1974 - The Author of Beltraffio (TV film) - Mark Ambient
• 1974-1981 - Doctor Who - The Fourth Doctor
• 1978 - four episodes of the BBC2 series Late Night Story - each episode was an eerie tale involving the theme of childhood; episodes ran for fifteen minutes and were aired before the station closed for the night. One episode, Sredni Vashtar, which had been scheduled to start the series, went unscreened due to a writer's strike.
• 1979 - The Book Tower (22 episodes) - Presenter (himself)
• 1980 - The Curse of King Tut's Tomb - Hasan
• 1982 - BBC version of The Hound of the Baskervilles - Sherlock Holmes
• 1983 - Jemima Shore Investigates - "Dr. Ziegler's Casebook" - Dr. Norman Ziegler
• 1984 - Remington Steele - Season 2 episode: 'Hounded Steele - Interpol agent Anatole Blaylock
• 1985 - Jackanory - The Iron Man by Ted Hughes - Storyteller (himself)
• 1986 - BBC adaptation of The Life and Loves of a She-Devil - Father Ferguson
• 1986 - Blackadder II episode "Potato" - Captain Redbeard Rum
• 1986 - The Kenny Everett Television Show - BBC Season 4, Episode 1 - Patient, aka John Thompson, aka Blu-Tac, aka Tom
• 1990 - The Silver Chair - Puddleglum
• 1990 - Douglas Adams's futurology documentary Hyperland - Software Agent
• 1990 - Boom - Co-presenter
• 1991 - The Law Lord - Sir Lionel Sweeting
• 1991 - Selling Hitler - Manfred Fischer
• 1992 - Cluedo (series 3) - Professor Plum
• 1992-1995 - Medics - Professor Geoffrey Hoyt
• 1993 - Doctor Who - Dimensions in Time - The Fourth Doctor
• 1994 - The Imaginatively Titled Punt & Dennis Show ep. 6 - Actor in supermarket (11 second cameo)
• 1998 - Have I Got News For You - guest (himself)
• 2000 - This Is Your Life - himself
• 2000-2001 - revival of Randall & Hopkirk - Wyvern
• 2001 - Fun at the Funeral Parlour - Quimby
• 2003 - Swiss Toni (episode 1:"Cars Don't Make You Fat") - Derek Asquith
• 2003 - Strange (final episode: "Asmoth") - Father Bernard
• 2003 - Fort Boyard - The Captain
• 2003-2006 - Little Britain - Narrator
• 2004-2005 - Monarch of the Glen (series 6 & 7 only) - Donald MacDonald
• 2007 - Marple - episode Towards Zero - Frederick Treves
• 2008 - Little Britain USA - Narrator
• 2008 - Have I Got News For You - guest presenter (himself)
• 2010 - Tom Baker - In Confidence (Sky Arts) - Tom interviewed by his old friend Professor Laurie Taylor

Audiography

• 1994 - John Le Carre's The Russia House - Barley Blair (lead role) -
• 2009 - Doctor Who: Hornets' Nest - The Dead Shoes
• 2009 - Doctor Who: Hornets' Nest - The Circus Of Doom
• 2009 - Doctor Who: Hornets' Nest - A Sting In The Tale
• 2009 - Doctor Who: Hornets' Nest - Hive Of Horror
• 2009 - Doctor Who: Hornets’ Nest: The Complete Series
• 2010 - Doctor Who: Demon Quest 1 The Relics of Time
• 2010 - Doctor Who: Demon Quest 3 A Shard of Ice
• 2010 - Doctor Who: Demon Quest 2 The Demon of Paris
• 2010 - Doctor Who: Demon Quest 4 Starfall
• 2010 - Doctor Who: Demon Quest 5 Sepulchre

Bibliography

• 1997 - Who on Earth is Tom Baker? (ISBN 0-00-638854-X)
• 1999 - The Boy Who Kicked Pigs (ISBN 0-571-19771-X)

• British synthpop band The Human League recorded a tribute track to the actor entitled "Tom Baker". In 1981 it was released as the B-side to their "Boys and Girls" single. The instrumental track was re-released on some CD versions of their Travelogue album.

• A cartoon Tom Baker, as one of the "esteemed representatives of television", appeared as the fourth incarnation of The Doctor, in The Simpsons episodes "Sideshow Bob's Last Gleaming", "Treehouse of Horror X" and "Mayored to the Mob".

• His distinctive voice has become a gift for impressionists such as Jon Culshaw, who regularly impersonates Baker in the comedy series Dead Ringers: in one episode, he makes a prank call to Baker in character as the Doctor, which prompts the memorable reaction from the real Baker: "No, no, there must be a mistake, I'm the Doctor." Similarly, when Culshaw called another Doctor, Sylvester McCoy, in character, he got the response: "Tom? Is that you? Have you been down the pub?". Other typical 'in character' send-ups for Culshaw would include asking a garage engineer to convert his Tardis to unleaded and complaining of the 400 year journey time from Euston to Glasgow by train, on being told by National Rail enquiries that the 12.00 train arrived at 16.15.

• On the "Leverage" episode "The Mile High Job" Tom Baker, along with fellow Former "Doctor's" Sylvester McCoy and Peter Davison are mentioned as available fake ID's for the team to get onboard an aircraft.