Polly Wright

Polly Wright was a companion to the first and second incarnations of the Doctor.

Early life
Polly was the child of Dr. Edward Wright and his wife, the former Miss Bettingham-Smith. Edward was the middle child. His older brother was named Charles, and his younger, Randolph. Edward and Bettingham-Smith married in about August 1939 and had one son soon thereafter. By 1943, they had their second child, Polly. At this point, the Edward Wright family were known to have lived "in a big, old house in the country". Inasmuch as her extended family were concerned, Polly's patrilineal grandmother and two uncles were still living at the time of her birth.

By 1944, her father's younger brother, Randolph, had been imprisoned in a Nazi prisoner of war camp, where he subsequently died. By contrast, Edward survived World War II, as he lived long enough to sire three more boys and to tell Polly stories of her uncle.

In her young adulthood, Polly reflected on her parents and said that she'd always "taken them for granted" while she was away from home enjoying herself, but that they were always there for her when she needed them. (CC: Resistance)

Joining the Doctor
Polly was sophisticated, and had an upper-class accent, likely derived from her father's education and her mother's life as a socialite. (CC: Resistance) Her accent later would lead to her being nicknamed "Duchess" by Ben. However, she worked for Professor Brett before meeting as his secretary. She was unhappy that WOTAN's typing was faster, and more accurate, than hers. Polly was a typical 1960s London 20-something, and enjoyed her time out of work. She met Ben Jackson at the Inferno nightclub, where she was chatting him up, and together they joined the Doctor. Her relationship with Ben was close from the start. She and Ben found a TARDIS key dropped by the Doctor, and fitted it into its lock. They ended up inside the ship. (DW: The War Machines)

Early travels with the Doctor
The Doctor first took them to 17th century Cornwall, where they encountered smugglers. (DW: The Smugglers) In 1986 at the South Pole, she helped fight off an invasion by Cybermen from Mondas. At the conclusion of these events, the exhausted Doctor collapsed and went through his first regeneration. (DW: The Tenth Planet) On the planet Vulcan, she adjusted to the Doctor's having changed into a new and younger persona. On Vulcan, she met the Doctor's archenemy, the Daleks. While Ben remained more doubtful than an impersonator had not simply replaced the Doctor, she remained more open to the possibility that he had changed form. (DW: The Power of the Daleks)

Later travels
Polly was confident, and not afraid to use her feminine wiles. She used her femininity, and attractiveness, to enlist the help of Redcoat Algernon Ffinch while the travellers were in the Scottish Highlands. Polly also encouraged Kirsty McLaren, and the other Scots girls, to use their femininity to lure Algernon into a pit, where they then took his money, identity disc and a lock of his hair. She struck up a relationship with Finch, and teased him whenever they met. Calling him 'Algy', she realised that he had developed an admiration for her. (DW: The Highlanders)

Despite her beauty, and her femininity, Polly was more than just a pretty face. When the travellers arrived on the the Moonbase in 2070 and had to face the Cybermen, Polly soon realised that the plastic parts of the Cybermen could be attacked using a mixture of solvents. She instantly thought of the way that nail polish is dissolved by nail varnish remover, and concocted mixture including acetone, benzene, ether and epoxy propane to make a substance (called "Cocktail Polly" by Ben) which was shot at the Cybermen using adapted fire extinguishers. (DW: The Moonbase)

Although Polly enjoyed her adventures, she couldn't hide her desire to stay at home when she got the chance. After an adventure with the alien Chameleons in 1966, they discovered that the TARDIS had come back to London just prior to the date that they had departed. With Ben, Polly left the TARDIS, and returned to her life having never appeared to be missing. (DW: The Faceless Ones)

Life after the Doctor
On New Year's Eve 1986, Ben and Polly once more reunited. Their relationship had not lasted and they had gone on to marry other people. (ST: Mondas Passing) In 1999, the Doctor helped Ben meet Polly once more. They both admitted their love for each other. (ST: That Time I Nearly Destroyed the World Whilst Looking for a Dress) In 2010, Sarah Jane Smith stated that Ben and Polly were running an orphanage together in India. (SJA: Death of the Doctor)

Personality
Teasing banter was a typical way for Polly to treat those she was close to. She hid her affection for others, particularly from Ben, behind this façade. The teasing and banter with Ben was part of an ongoing development of their relationship. She was chatting him up when she met him, and she was still chatting him up when they left the TARDIS together. When her friends are in trouble, Polly was completely serious - particularly if Ben was one of those in trouble. In those circumstances Polly would drop the banter and flippancy, and work towards practical solutions.

Nicknames
She was also often called "Poll" by Ben which was adapted to "Paul" when she was pretending to be a boy in 17th century Cornwall. (DW: The Smugglers) He also described Polly as "our little dolly-rocker duchess" (DW: The Smugglers) or simply "the duchess".

Quotes

 * Polly - Quotes

Is "Polly Wright" right?
Like Vicki before her, Polly's surname was never spoken in any televised episode. "Wright" comes to Polly via stories in other media. The first such story to give her the surname was the 1995 novel by Gary Russell, Invasion of the Cat-People, one of the last Virgin Missing Adventures. Once BBC Books took back the original novel license from Virgin, it then became effectively "house policy" of the BBC Past Doctor Adventures line to call her "Polly Wright:, as evidenced by both Steve Lyons' and Mark Gatiss' usage in their 1997 offerings, The Murder Game and ''The Roundheads.

Prior to this, the name was the subject of speculation.

In the introduction to Cat-People, Russell made his case for the surname, claiming that "Wright" was used in the audition script Anneke Wills and others read while vying for the part of Polly. It is unclear whether this was ever independently confirmed. One thing seems self-evident, though: had she been called "Polly Wright" in 1966, viewers might well have wondered whether she was related the earlier companion, Barbara Wright, last seen on television just a year earlier.

The matter became more complicated during the John Nathan-Turner era, thanks to Doctor Who non-fiction author, Jean-Marc Lofficier. In both 1981's The Doctor Who Programme Guide and 1992's The Universal Databank, he referred to her as "Polly Lopez". This surname was the result of not one but two misunderstandings on his part, both having to do with episode two of The Faceless Ones. As the cliffhanger to part one suggested, Anneke Wills was not then playing Polly, but a duplicate created by the Chameleons. At the start of part two of the story, the Doctor asked Anneke Wills' character her name, to which she replied, "Michele Leuppi, from Zurich". This name was later confirmed in the serial's novelisation. What Lofficier heard, though, was "Lopez", and he believed, for reasons obscure, that this was the surname of the real Polly. Thus the name "Polly Lopez" came to be used in two of the most popular Doctor Who reference works to bookend the 1980s.

Then, in a 1993 Myth Makers interview with Nick Briggs, Wills confided that Polly's surname was "Bettingham-Smith". However, in her 2007 autobiography Self-Portrait, Wills recanted, saying that her character had no surname and was simply "Polly".

All of these questions seem to have been resolved by the 2009 Big Finish audio, Resistance. In that play, she encounters what she believes is her patrilineal uncle, Randolph Wright. The Doctor dispenses with the possible relationship to Barbara by revealing that, in independently deducing Randolph was her uncle, he considered the fact that "Wright was a very common name". Later, it is revealed that "Bettingham-Smith" is actually her mother's maiden name. Finally she is directly called "Polly Wright" in the play — several times by the Doctor himself.