Sadie Miller remembers her mum Elisabeth Sladen – her life on Doctor Who, her legacy, and the magic of Sarah Jane Smith

"When I have a bad day, sometimes I sit and watch The Sarah Jane Adventures."

While paying a visit to Radio Times HQ, Sadie Miller takes some time to tell us about her mum, Elisabeth Sladen.

The legendary actress, best known for playing iconic Doctor Who companion Sarah Jane Smith, passed away in 2011 – and 1st February 2026 would have been her 80th birthday.

"There's a lot of my mum in Sarah," Miller says, "in that kind of quiet steeliness, but also in the silliness and the fun, in how maternal she is and was".

"My mum was, broadly speaking, what you see is what you get," she adds. "She very was much that person that wouldn't take any nonsense, but she was still calm and kind with it.

"She would always champion the underdog. And even though, on something like The Sarah Jane Adventures, she'd be number one on the call sheet, she always had that company mindset from being in a theatre, that everyone is just as important. She was just lovely, really."

By the time Miller was born, Sladen was already well-known and beloved by fans after her original run in Doctor Who, from 1973 to 1976, alongside Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker.

Introduced as an ardent feminist, Sarah Jane changed the game for companions, and, it could be argued, for women in sci-fi as a whole.

So, as the daughter of Doctor Who's game-changing companion, Miller's introduction to the sci-fi was a tad different to other children's.

"It was through the conventions, when I was maybe six or seven. So I got introduced to the show through the fandom and we would watch it a little bit at home just to give some context.

"But it was always a bit strange really, because the woman that my mum was in the show, irrespective of playing a character, it didn't look like my mum anymore. So it was a weird dichotomy, I think, for a child when the person is on the sofa next to you and on the television."

At the same time, an eight-year-old Miller was also dabbling in performing. She and Keira Knightly made their on-screen debuts together in the Screen One episode Royal Celebration in 1993, with Miller playing Penny, the daughter of Minnie Driver's Sally.

"I think, as a child, you have no real idea that it's someone's job," she points out. "Someone told me afterwards that Minnie Driver was deeply horrified that she had an eight-year-old daughter as part of the cast, that she felt that she was too young for that, which I don't blame her for at all, but she was lovely.

"It was just fun when you're a child. But it was quite an adult production. I think, after that, my parents were just a bit like, 'Whoa, let's pump the brakes on on this.' I remember my mum having quite a serious conversation with me before we went to the screening because of some of the things that I would see. I'm glad I'm not having those conversations with my children quite yet."

At the time, despite the ongoing love from Doctor Who fans, the sci-fi seemed a thing of Sladen's past. But the TARDIS would materialise back into her life when Russell T Davies rebooted the series in 2005, and asked her to return alongside David Tennant's Tenth Doctor, who happened to be a huge fan of Sladen's.

When the Doctor reunites with Sarah Jane in the 2006 episode School Reunion, she doesn't immediately recognise him – it's fair few regenerations later, after all. But he certainly recognises her, and the sheer joy on Tennant's face in that moment led to a bemusing piece of misinformation circulating the internet.

"Online, someone had put that David didn't know that my mum was going to be in that scene, which one of my favourite things ever to read on the internet," Miller recalls.

"They have a script, they have the read through! He knew that it was going to happen. But he's just obviously a lovely actor and the part of him that's also the real David was in that moment as well. I think Russell, as the showrunner, does that so well, where he respects the show's history and fandom, as well as its integrity as its own unit."

But, after her return for School Reunion, Doctor Who still wasn't done with Sladen. Enter The Sarah Jane Adventures!

"They offered her the series and I think she just sort of thought, 'Oh my god, what?!' Miller recalls.

"She was so excited for The Sarah Jane Adventures, and she'd always felt that something else would maybe be on the horizon because, like a lot of women, she had her career and then she had a family, and while I was young, her ability to work was diminished. As caregivers in the entertainment industry, there's not really a lot of leeway. There are so many things that you are not able to do.

"But I think she always hoped that something would come back round again. And I think she was very happy that it was with Sarah... Originally the BBC wanted a different kind of spin-off show, so to have this 60-year-old woman leading a children's TV show, especially [nearly 20] years ago, was such a visionary decision. More!"

Every now and then, Miller delves back into The Sarah Jane Adventures: "It's just lovely. What a unique, weird, strange, amazing thing to get to have of a parent that's passed. So I feel very appreciative of it."

And, even today, Sarah Jane remains one of the best-loved companions of all time.

"I think that she was able to be so many things at once," Miller explains.

"She was scared, but she was brave. She was very moral, but she would still be able to see both sides. She's obviously a feminist character - that's something that was important in its time period as well, but in a way that never sacrificed any elements of being a feminine person. She was never alienating, and I think she was able to carry that quiet steely strength through all those time periods, without losing anything of herself either.

"I think it's great to have a female character that is not defined by being a woman. She even says in the show, 'There's nothing 'only' about being a girl'. That was something that she allowed herself to be, but there was so much around the character as well. I think she's a great example of a lot of different things that are aspirational but not alienating at the same time."

For many fans, Sarah Jane and Sladen are irreversibly intertwined.

"I think it wasn't until after she passed away that I realised quite how impactful the character was and the way that people felt about my mum," Miller reflects.

"I remember my dad and I sitting in my parents' kitchen the day after [her passing] and it got to the Nine O'Clock News, with it being announced, and my phone just buzzed from then until, like, the next six months with people messaging and talking about her," she adds.

"It was like, 'Oh, wow.' I don't think she would've have believed it either. Prior to that, you always had an awareness of it, but it wasn't until that point where you just felt like, 'Oh my goodness, this is something very different.'"

Following her mother's passing, Miller stepped away from performing for a while.

"My mum died when I was at drama school and I think, as most people do, when there is such a big loss, just going through that time period, I had to put that grief somewhere in a room and close the door.

"I couldn't work in the same way because, because in order to keep that door closed, you're closing off a lot of other things as well. And then you can't have full access that you need to as a performer. So I just focused on other things - having my family, whatever."

But then came along a unique offer. Miller was asked if she would play Sarah Jane Smith in Big Finish's series of audio adventures.

"It was a lovely feeling of connecting back to my mum again," she reflects. "It was a joy to do it, and I think, unashamedly as most actors will say, if someone offers you a job, you say 'thank you very much, yes please!'"

In terms of what it actually took to play Sarah Jane, Miller "studied" her mum's old performances.

"As actors, you can only approach a character from yourself and you can't separate it entirely. You have to be very conscious that people are listening for the Sladen sound, so that's obviously the jumping off point, but as it's gone on, I think it's become more of sort of a Venn diagram where Sarah meets somewhere in between the two of us, and I think we probably both see her slightly differently, as we should.

"But you want to find that commonality as well. So I definitely watch her performance, and I think there are certain vocal tics and things that she has that you can't not pay attention to, and they inform the way that Sarah is - the breath and all that kind of stuff. But I think now that I've been doing it a bit longer and people have been so lovely and so receptive, I've been allowed to make some choices as well."

"When I first started playing Sarah, I did think, 'Oh god, how is this going to go? Are people going to kick back against it?'" she adds. "And people were just so lovely and so supportive."

Thinking back to what led her to saying yes to taking on the role, she considers: "If my mum hadn't have passed and if she hadn't wanted to play the character anymore, I don't know if I would have done it. If I'd been doing other work and if my mom's story and mine had been different - I don't know. But, I feel, all things considered, both for my life and also as a connection to my mum, it's been a lovely thing."

As for if she'd play Sarah Jane on screen? "I feel that Sarah has been in Doctor Who too many times! I think it's so exciting to go where the show will go next...but no, I think Sarah, on screen, has had her day."

In 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Davies wrote the webcast Farewell Sarah Jane, which saw the characters friends gather for her funeral.

While Miller has only seen parts of it, she points out: "It does give people this comfort and this sense of an anchor point, and to have it during the pandemic during such a time of uncertainty, people still coming together to make Doctor Who content, Sarah related content, I think is so lovely.

"That's why we have these programs because, as humans, we need to create and to have these characters that we can feel a connection to, that help us through those times. So I think that was a beautiful thing for Russell to put together."

Describing herself as a"nepo baby of some sorts," Miller is grateful for the insight she's had into Doctor Who. While she wouldn't necessarily call herself a fan of the show, she makes no secret of how important the fans - particularly the LGBTQ+ fans - have been for her, and for her mum.

"I think the fandom for Doctor Who especially is so important because it's their chosen family, it's their safe space. I don't know if we're in the second wilderness years, but certainly the first time around, the queer fanbase of Doctor Who absolutely championed the show and my mum and the character and they really kept it going. That is not something that can be overlooked."

She adds: "I don't necessarily think of [Sarah Jane] as a queer character, but I think of her as an asexual character, really. I think it is important that she finds her purpose and her meaning through her connection to other people, but not in a romantic way. And I think that we don't often see that with a young, conventionally attractive female character.

"She talks about femininity, but it's not necessarily her defining characteristic. She was a diva in her fashion choices - I don't think those waistcoats were to attract a man, shall we say?! Obviously she has been written with certain male love interests, but I don't really see that for Sarah.

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"I think we all know underneath what Sarah really is! I don't want to get in trouble! But I think she is a strong, feminine woman in a masculine field and she defines so many things that, at the time were not... she was in so many places where she wouldn't have been. But I think a lot of the companions are like that anyway.

"Liz Shaw especially, even characters like Jo Grant, who is much softer and more feminine and more aligned with men, I still feel that there's that sense of Doctor Who being about finding your chosen family, and I think that's something that a lot of people, for better or for worse, in the queer community, have to go through a lot more. There is no Doctor Who without the queer community."

Reflecting for a moment on the milestone that we're marking, Miller says: "I can't believe that - well, obviously - that she would've been 80. The time just goes so quickly."

Over the years, we've heard a lot from some of the people who loved Sladen, including her co-stars on Doctor Who. But very few knew her as well as Miller. When asked what she wants the world to know about her mum, she pauses for a moment.

"That she really cared about the show. My mum was not well and she kept filming, not through any pressures from anyone around her, but because she loved it and she cared about it. I think that leaving a positive legacy is such a beautiful thing to have come out of her human experience and I think she would just be so grateful that she could be that for people.

"People will still message me and say that they take so much comfort from the character, and inspiration. Someone told me they became a journalist because of Sarah - what a transformative thing to be able to do with your life. I think she'd be very proud."

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