The Sun has revived the story doing the rounds a while ago that Christopher Eccleston is tipped for the lead role in a remake of 1960s cult TV show The Prisoner.

The article says filming on the joint Sky One/Granada TV/AMC production will begin in the spring, with the programme showing worldwide in January 2008.

There is no comment from Eccleston or his agent, Lorraine Hamilton, in the piece to either confirm or deny his involvement.

To the side of the online article are links to "related stories", including a slideshow from The Runaway Bride.

Also in The Sun is a lengthy interview with Billie Piper in which the actress talks about anorexia, therapy, life as a pop princess and the impact of Doctor Who on her marriage to Chris Evans.

In addition, it refers to her split this week from boyfriend and law student Amadu Sowe, repeating her statement: "I've always tried to shield Amadu from the showbusiness world and public glare that I've learnt to live with over the years.

"I'm afraid that means I'm just not comfortable talking about our relationship or the finer points of it."

The feature finishes by referring to her forthcoming roles in The Ruby In The Smoke and Mansfield Park, with a closing quote from Piper: "I feel a bit more in control of my life than I ever have done - that's a great feeling, I’m really happy about it."

BBC1's Breakfast also covered yesterday's press screening of The Runaway Bride this morning. As with Wales Today last night, the recorded item featured interviews with David Tennant, Catherine Tate and Sarah Parish talking about making the Christmas special.

On the Doctor's surprise at the Bride's appearance in the TARDIS, Tennant said: "I think he's used to his companion being rather grateful for being shown around the universe and shown the sights, but Donna couldn't be less interested. It's an interesting new dynamic for the show."

Catherine Tate commented on several ideas she'd put forward for her characterisation which had been turned down, though she jokinging said that the "comedy teeth" were given to Sarah Parish instead! She also re-iterated that she would have loved to have been an assistant but wasn't asked!

Sarah Parish commented on her role as the villainess: "I think it's the biggest real monster that Doctor Who has ever done. They've done big CGI monsters but this was actually made ... It was a good four hours costume call in the morning for the prosthetics, then an hour and a half to get it off."

Tennant: "It's only the second Christmas that Doctor Who's ever done, but people already seem to be expecting it as part of their Christmas Day lineup, so that's quite nice and I hope that everyone will tune in!"

The item was accompanied by a number of clips from the episode, plus some still photographs of the principal villainess,The Empress of the Racnoss played by Parish in full glory. Some of these photos have now been featured on theBBC News website and the official Doctor Who website. The BBC Breakfast segment is also available to watch online from the BBC News website (real player) - this includes the clips if you want to avoid seeing them!

The people at KTEH 54, San Jose, CA http://www.kteh.org have sent out a press release heralding their acquisition of the Christopher Eccleston Doctor Who episodes, making them the first public TV station to publicize that they purchased this package. It is expected that public TV stations will get Doctor Who in a one-hour block - the unedited episodes followed by a cut-down version of the relevant Doctor Who Confidential episode. Says the article, "Doctor Whoreturns to KTEH after an absence of over four years. When the series last ran, KTEH had aired the equivalent of 7703 episodes (Over 10 times more than the BBC actually produced!!) as well as producing around a dozen Doctor Whorelated interviews. Beginning on April 13, 1981, Doctor Who captured the attention of the viewers of the San Francisco Bay Area, with the series being shown every weeknight, and full stories every Saturday night. Doctor Who last aired in January of 2003, and was a victim of budget problems and declining funding from the viewing public." A Teaser is available at http://www.dvillage.org/KTEH/DW-Teaser.mov.

BBC Worldwide has struck a licensing deal with popular bit-torrent provider Azureus to distribute legal episodes of Doctor Who to United States users early next year. The programme will be one of a number of high profile BBC titles available via Azureus' new Zudeo client software. The deal marks a significant first step for the broadcaster in Peer-to-Peer distribution.

Which episodes will be carried, and what costs will be involved, has yet to be announced. The current series is airing in the US on the Sci-Fi Channel, BBC America and soon in select markets on PBS. The classic series is airing only in a few US markets.

This story is being reported by Wired.com. Thanks to Panodk from our forum for the initial link to Business Wire'sreport.

Update, Dec 20th: Further news links on this story: BBC News and The Guardian.

As previously reported, BBC Audio is releasing The Gunfighters on CD on February 5, 2007. The full soundtrack is narrated by Peter Purves (Steven). The official cover blurb and illustration are below; click on the thumbnail for a larger version. (Thanks to Paul Taylor/Tenth Planet)

A new 30 second long trailer for The Runaway Bride has now broadcast on BBC channels, showing many more clips from the episode.

Meanwhile, the BBC's childrens news programme Newsround featured more interviews with the cast, and also broadcast its own exclusive new clips from the episode in their BBC1 edition this afternoon.

David Tennant: "The Doctor losing Rose was a really big moment for him, and it would be a bit wrong if we just came back and said he's fine now, he's forgotten all about that."

Russell T Davies: "He's heartbroken, absolutely devastated because the love of his life has disappeared. But at the same time I don't want to give viewers on Christmas Day at 7 o'clock an hour's worth of weeping."

Catherine Tate: "They're such different characters, this is in no way a replacement for Rose or anything like that, it's just the next chapter in the Doctor's journey, because he needed a mission, and this was a mission, and it snaps him out of it a little bit."

The crew then when on to say what we can expect from series three (see spoiler section below).

The Doctor Who special can be found online at the CBBC website.


Other coverage of Doctor Who today included a mention of the press screening on the morning's edition of Newsround, which also briefly showed the talking cyberhelmet in an item about buying presents. And ITV1's GMTV also covered the press screening, with television critic Richard Arnold waxing lyrical on how good the Christmas special will be (and bemoaning the fact he missed the press screening himself!)

Six days and counting ...

The BBC Radio 4 arts programme Front Row previewed the forthcoming Christmas season's television highlights on its Tuesday 19th edition, with Time Out magazine's television editor Alkarim Jivani listing his recommended programmes for the festive period. He began with The Runaway Bride, and praised Doctor Who for creating a new tradition of Christmas Day viewing.

"If you talk about Christmas television these days, you have to begin with Doctor Who," Jivani enthused. "It's curious that it's rapidly establishing itself as a Christmas TV fixture for the new century in the same way that Morecambe and Wise was a Christmas TV fixture for the last century."

Jivani also included the Billie Piper-starring The Ruby in the Smoke among his highlights, along with Dracula, which stars former Doctor Who guest actors Sophia Myles and Marc Warren. In a separate item earlier in the programme, Joe Ahearne was interviewed about his new ITV1 drama Perfect Parents, starring Christopher Eccleston.

Full details and the chance to hear the programme via the "Listen Again" feature can be found on the Front Row website.

BBC1's Breakfast programme tomorrow morning (19th Dec) will be looking at the forthcoming Christmas Day special, and will feature David Tennant as a guest.

Don't forget, Catherine Tate will be appearing on this afternoon's New Paul O'Grady Show at 5:00pm, Channel 4.