Doctor in Trouble

Leslie Phillips - Dr. Burke
Robert Morley - Captain George Spratt
Harry Secombe - Llewellyn Wendover
Joan Sims - Russian Captain
Irene Handl - Mrs. Dailey
Simon Dee - Basil Beauchamp
Angela Scoular - Ophelia O'Brien
James Robertson Justice - Sir Lancelot Spratt
Graham Stark - Satterjee
John Le Mesurier - Purser

The last of the Doctor films shows signs that the series was running out of steam, it’s not exactly hilarious but the smutty farce is at least pretty lively. But even so, the dependable Leslie Phillips makes the most of a middling script, wrapping his famously suave purr around each fruity innuendo and limp double entendre. Doctor in Trouble borrows heavily from the Carry On films in style but features a curious gallery of famous faces including Harry Secombe, Irene Handl, the future Monty Python star Graham Chapman and even the short-lived 1960s chat-show host Simon Dee.

Dr Burke (Leslie Phillips), greatly resents the success of the heart-throb television doctor, Basil Beauchamp alias Dr Dare (Simon Dee). When Basil is admitted to hospital under his care, he is about to relish in the situation until Sir Lancelot Spratt (James Robertson Justice), a fan of Dr Dare, takes over and announces that he needs a holiday. Sir Lancelot suggests a cruise on board an ocean liner his brother Captain George Spratt (Robert Morley) skippers.

Burke meanwhile is after a top US medical post, but for this he needs to be married. He has chosen a model as his bride to be, and follows her when she is assigned a modelling job aboard a cruise ship. What he discovers is that she is in fact on the same boat as Dr Dare and is one of the women attempting to woo him! Dr Burke is accidentally knocked unconscious and unintentionally becomes a stowaway on the ship. Burke masquerades as a female, dodging the Master at Arms until he’s caught and initially assigned to the post of Captain’s steward, and ends up as ship's doctor.