A 100-foot high picture of a Dalek, made entirely from bed linen laid out on the ground, has appeared on the side of a hill overlooking the city of Belfast in Northern Ireland.

The Dalek was placed on the hillside to promote a science-fiction charity event themed around Doctor Who, Sarah Jane and Torchwood to be held on the 3rd of May. It was created by Denis Rush of the group UT Events. He gained permission from the owner of the field in which the Dalek appeared due to the fact that proceeds from the convention will be going to charity.

Other stunts have been giant projections of Daleks on city buildings and local landmarks and even costumed characters like Ood and Clockwork Droids roaming the streets

The Dalek was made from 500ft worth of bed linen pegged into the mountain slope, it stands aprox 100ft high and took two days to make. Local radio stations who have been receiving alot of calls and have been teasing the listeners with invasion plots and other possible reasons before spilling the beans on the event.

More details on the event and the Dalek can be found on the UT Events website.

BBC News also has a report on the Dalek.

As we begin the run-up to "Planet of the Dead", the British media has been full of Doctor Who coverage. In a wide-ranging interview in The Times,Russell T Davies and David Tennant talk about the writing and filming of the Tenth Doctor's last adventures. Tennant says that he cried while reading Davies' last script (currently being filmed in Wales), while Davies reveals that he considered a Doctor Who/Star Trek crossover before the last Star Trek series went off the air. Davies is also interviewed by Scotland on Sunday, including some intimate details about the themes which surface in his writing.

The Sun has several Doctor Who stories this week. They started off with an item about Eighth Doctor Paul McGann(who light-heartedly suggests thatMatt Smith was cast because of his hair), and followed it up with items on David Tennant (recycled from The Tennant Tapes videos on the BBC's Doctor Who site and quotes from Doctor Who Magazine) and Michelle Ryan (who says that her appearance in "Planet of the Dead" is only a one-off). The latter story was also picked up by the Press Association, while Hello! picks up the Sun's Tennant item.

County Times reports that Theatr Hafren in Newtown, Wales will host a theatrical viewing of "Planet of the Dead" on Good Friday. Newtown is one of three towns where special viewings will be held; according to Digital Spy, the other two are Denbigh and Newport.

Digital Spy also has an interview with Freema Agyeman, in which the actress primarily discusses her work on Law and Order: UK, but also mentions Doctor Who.

For fans of classic Doctor Who, The Times has an essay by novelist Esther Freud about her role as the Cryon Threst in the 1985 serial Attack of the Cybermen. Freud is married to "The Next Doctor"'s David Morrissey.

Finally, several sources have reported on actors who have been spotted on location during filming of David Tennant's final story. Those who wish to avoid spoilers should not follow these links, or read the text in the spoiler box below. The news of the actors seen on location, reported by Den of Geek (twice),io9 (twice) and Wired, has been largely drawn from set reports in the Doctor Who Forum's Set Reports/Photos thread. The Sun also had a story on the filming, using (without credit) a photograph taken by a Forum member.

Thanks to Chuck Foster, Ron Mace and "PolyG" of the Doctor Who Forum.

Posted By Anna Roberts

The Sun has published new photos from the first special, Planet of the Dead. These include Malcolm, played byLee Evans, in an article which also reveals details about a character appearing in another special.

The first photo of the aliens featuring in Planet of the Dead, the Tritovore, also appeared in The Sun today, although the newspaper isn't quite sure yet how their name should be spelt.

The Sun believes Planet of the Dead is scheduled to be broadcast on Easter Sunday, 12th April, although there has be no official confirmation of the transmission date from the BBC as yet.

The Daily Express also speculates that Tom Baker is in discussions regarding a future cameo appearance in the series alongside Matt Smith.

Please note, links contain spoilers

The Roundhouse in London is to present The Radiophonic Workshop Live a get together of Peter Howell, Paddy Kingsland, Roger Limb, Dick Mills and Mark Ayres to explore the work of the BBC's Radiophonic workshop. The event, which takes place on 17th May at 7pm, combines live performance and multimedia projections. Tickets are available from the Roundhouse Website.

Former companion Lalla Ward, who played Romana alongside the fourth Doctor, has an exhibition of art inspired by the wildlife of Galapagos, at Chris Beetles Gallery, London, running until 28th March. Pictures will be auctioned in aid of the Durrell Conservation Trust. Ward's husband, Richard Dawkins, has offered to place bids via a special email address listed on his website. The exhibition has been previewed in The Independent.

Former Jon Pertwee companion, Katy Manning, who played Jo Grant, is appearing in a one woman show called Me & Jezebel. The play is based on the true story of when Bette Davis invited herself to stay for a night in the New England house of writer Elizabeth Fuller and didn't leave for a month. Manning plays all the parts including Davis herself as well as the reluctant hostess, naïve, star-struck Elizabeth; her frustrated, deep-voiced husband John; the thumb-sucking, impressionable four-year-old son Christopher; the grandmother Ol' Ma; the Dolly Parton like singing evangelist Grace and even the family dog. The play is currently on tour around the UK before playing at the New End Theatre in North London, from 14 April to May 2.

The address to BAFTA by show runner Russell T Davies is now available on the BAFTA Website. In the talk Davies discusses his origins in children's programmes, his thoughts about the audience and his hopes and fears for children's output in the future.

Thanks to Duncan Borrowman, Tom Boon and Trevor Smith

The Lancashire Evening Post reports that writer Simon Farquhar is looking for the family at the centre of one of Fourth Doctor Tom Baker's most famous tales about his time in Doctor Who.

In his 1997 autobiography and elsewhere, Baker has related how he was so concerned about the possible effect on children of the 1976 serial The Deadly Assassin that while travelling home from a publicity event in the town of Blackpool, he stopped off in the town of Preston to find somewhere he could watch the episode. Seeing some children's bikes in the garden of a house, he knocked on their door, asked if they were Doctor Who viewers and was invited in to watch the programme with the children.

Now Farquhar is reportedly researching the incident for a BBC drama about it, provisionally titled Teatime with Tom Baker. If you are the family or know who they might be, contact details for how to get in touch with Farquhar are given in the article.

Posted By Brigadier Bill

Russell T Davies has taken the lead in a big push to save children's programmes on the BBC. In a speech to BAFTA members, Davies said: "They put money into rubbish films, why can't they put money into children's television?"

Davies created The Sarah Jane Adventures for CBBC, but he claims that because of a cutback in funding for children's programming, the show has nearly been cancelled on three occasions. BBC News reports that he has called for National Lottery funding to be made available to ensure the future of children's programmes. He has insisted that: "It needs to be a special case. They're our children, they're the most vital and precious resource you could ever find. It is more important than industry, it is more important than the economy, it is more important than food and education."

Series three of The Sarah Jane Adventures was affected by a reduction in its budget. Davies explained: "We had to look and say, do we want to make a version of Sarah Jane that's a travesty? It was truly shocking to have a successful show having to face cuts which are that severe."

In the end, the series found the required money due to different BBC departments pulling together to fund it. However, Davies still maintains that in general "children's (TV) is sinking lower and lower down the agenda".

Since the return of Doctor Who to British television, there have been many opportunities for UK children to participate in the programme, from the Blue Peter contests that gave us the Abzorbaloff and young Creet in "Utopia", to the "Doctor Who Backstage" contest held for Children in Need last year. Now older Doctor Who fans will have an opportunity to appear as an alien in a special Doctor Who scene.

John Barrowman is hosting a new programme called "Tonight's the Night", in which members of the public will be able to reveal their hidden talents and perform in a professional venue. According to an earlier press release, "this could mean duetting with a favourite pop group, singing with a big band or tripping the light fantastic with the cast of a hit West End musical."

Now the BBC's Doctor Who website has revealed that "Tonight's the Night" is holding a contest for Doctor Who fans over the age of 18 to appear as an alien of their own creation in a specially written scene.

The contest will be held in several stages. For the first stage, contestants are asked to create a costume for a new Doctor Who alien and submit a photograph of themselves in the costume to the programme makers. They must also create a name, home planet, powers, weaknesses and other details about their alien and submit them with the photograph.

The judges will select 50 "aliens" to participate in the second stage, an "Alien Activity Day". There, the contestants will compete in several group and character tasks and be judged by the programme's panel. Ten semi-finalists will be selected and will meet the judges individually and be assessed on their "vocal, movement and scene stealing abilities", and three finalists will be chosen. The finalists will complete a series of "alien oriented challenges", and a winner will be chosen. The winner will appear in a Doctor Who scene exclusively written for him or her, which will air on "Tonight's the Night" in April or May.

Full details and the application form are available at the BBC's Be on a show website. The photograph and application must be submitted by 28 March 2009, so get to work!

The Daily Mirror has reported that one of the Doctor Who specials which will air later this year will be set on Mars. In classic Doctor Who, the recurring monsters known as the Ice Warriors were native to Mars; the planet was also the prison of Sutekh in 1975's "Pyramids of Mars", and in a 1970 serial, human astronauts met "The Ambassadors of Death" on their way to Mars.

The Mirror also reports that the special will star Australian actor Peter O'Brien and actress Gemma Chan as "evil characters" in one of David Tennant's final Doctor Who stories.

The Doctor Who News Page previously reported that The Sarah Jane Adventures had been nominated for a Royal Television Society Programme Award, in the Children's Drama category; the awards were announced on March 17, and SJA lost to junior spy adventure M.I. High.

Finally, the Edinburgh Evening News reports that the Edinburgh police force are planning to bring "Tardis-style" police boxes back into use in the city's downtown. Many Edinburgh police boxes have been converted into coffee shops, but if this initiative goes through others would be used by police, as they were in the 1950s and 1960s.


Thanks to Chuck Foster and "nabusan" of the Doctor Who Forum.

The Sarah Jane Adventures has been nominated for the Royal Television Society Awards, in the "Children's Drama" category. The series was also nominated last year, but lost to CITV's "My Life as a Popat". A full list of nominations can be found at Broadcastnow; the winners will be announced on 17 March 2009.

The Los Angeles Times' Hero Complex blog has an overview of the current status of the Doctor Who world, with quotations from fans and writers in attendance at the recent Gallifrey One convention in L.A.

The South Wales Echo reports that researchers at the University of Glamorgan have received a 20,000 pound grant from the BBC to investigate the "Doctor Who effect" on the public image of Wales. The scholars will interview Doctor Who fans, production personnel, and Welsh tourism officials to determine what effect the filming of Doctor Who, Torchwood and The Sarah Jane Adventures in Cardiff has had on the public perception of South Wales. Contact information for the researchers is available in the news story and at the University of Glamorgan website.

Finally, BBC News has an item about celebrity impersonators on Twitter and other social media, focusing on a woman who set up a Twitter account pretending to be David Tennant. The counterfeit Tennant is also mentioned in an E! Onlinearticle about real and fake celebrity Twitters.

Thanks to "rplon" and "PolyG" of the Doctor Who Forum.

In a scene right out of a Doctor Who script, a team of volunteers clearing a pond of rubbish uncovered a long-submerged Dalek.

The Telegraph reports that sales executive Marc Oakland was pushing a rake around the bed of the shallow pool when he found the object with its distinctive eye stalk.

The 42-year-old said: "I'd just shifted a tree branch with my foot when I noticed something dark and round slowly coming up to the surface. I got the shock of my life when a Dalek head bobbed up right in front of me. It must have been down there for some time because it was covered in mould and water weed, and had quite a bit of damage. One of the dome lights was smashed, but the eye-stalk was intact and the head and neck stayed in one piece as I carefully lifted it out."

Pond warden Tony Brown, 70, was leading the volunteer squad clearing dumped rubbish from the pond, near Beaulieu, Hampshire. He said: "We made a very thorough search of the rest of the bottom of the pond and there were definitely no alien remnants lurking. We've all agreed it best to keep the pond's exact location under wraps. The last thing we want are sci-fi fans descending on the pond frantically seraching for other Dalek parts."

Mr Brown, who trained as a pond warden with Southern Water, has been helping clear out the area for the past eight years. He said: "We've dredged up everything from shopping trolleys, toys, and bicycles. But this is the first time a Dalek's appeared. We have no idea how it ended up in there, or how long ago. We discovered the BBC often took the Daleks out on location for filming, and they travelled to Hampshire on at least one occasion in the 1980s, when Colin Baker played the Time Lord. Who knows? This might be the remains of one of the originals from the old TV series. I'm told they were built to last."

The story is also covered by The Sun, Metro, the Daily Mail and Ananova.