News services are reporting that this year's Children in Need will feature a special to include all seven living Doctor Who lead actors.

The report below is from the Telegraph. The story also appears in the News of the World and the Sunday Mirror.

[Remember: treat all such news as rumour until confirmed officially by the BBC.]

The BBC News website is reporting that the new Royal Shakespeare Company production of "Love's Labour's Lost", starring David Tennant, has proved a critical hit. The play is being staged in Stratford-upon-Avon in tandem with "Hamlet", in which Tennant also stars, until November 15th.

Says the article: "According to BBC arts correspondent Razia Iqbal, Tennant began rehearsals for Love's Labour's Lost 'almost immediately' after Hamlet opened in August. 'The RSC may have another hit on their hands, which is surprising given the play is Shakespeare's most forgettable early comedy,' she said." The piece also includes praise from critics Neil Norman and Michael Billington, and notes that Tennant performs his role in his native Scottish accent.

A lost sequel to "Love's Labour's Lost", called "Love's Labour's Won", featured in the 2007 Doctor Who episode "The Shakespeare Code", starring Tennant as the Tenth Doctor.

The latest issue of Doctor Who Adventures, the BBC's weekly comic for younger fans, has been released in the UK. The latest issue contains information on the return of the Eighth Doctor to the airwaves on BBC7, and the second part of the magazine's K9 competition. Also included this week are:

The website Den of Geek has published full details of the forthcoming DVD box set release of series four of Doctor Who, which is to be released next month. The article contains a full run-down of the documentary features, deleted and extended scenes and audio commentaries included on the set.

The same website has also published another article detailing information gleaned from some of the new audio commentaries. This includes the note thatDavid Tennant at one point refers to new head writer and executive producer Steven Moffat as his "new boss", which the website takes to indicate that they will be working together on the fifth series of the programme, to be broadcast in 2010.

Unofficial overnight figures show that Part Two of The Last Sontaranachieved an audience of 0.6 million. The Sarah Jane Adventuresprogramme got a 6.1 per cent share of the audience.

The average is slightly down on the previous week's, probably because the episode had already been shown on CBBC.

Final figures for the BBC1 and CBBC showings will be released by BARB next week.

The Appreciation Index for the episode was 86, putting the programme firmly in the excellent category. It was the highest figure on BBC1 for the day.

According to a post this morning on the Doctor Who Forum from Derek Hambly at Tenth Planet Events, Ian Collierpassed away. Collier was well known to fans as Omega, the renegade Time Lord villain from "Arc of Infinity," a role he later reprised in a special audio appearance for Big Finish Productions, the aptly titled "Omega". Collier also played Stuart Hyde in "The Time Monster" during the Jon Pertwee era, and also appeared in two additional Big Finish audios: as Bernice Summerfield's father Isaac in "Death and the Daleks," and Commisar Erco Sallis in "Excelis Decays" at the behest of the story's writer, the late Craig Hinton. Collier was a popular guest at conventions. He died October 1 due to unspecified causes.

Actress Velile Tshabalala, who plays the character of Rosita in the forthcoming Doctor Who Christmas special The Next Doctor, has given an exclusive interview to the West Sussex Gazette, a local newspaper based in the south of England.

Tshabalala was appearing last weekend at a living history event in Amberley, West Sussex. To publicise it, she spoke to the Gazette's entertainments reporter, Phil Hewitt, and also talked about her role in "The Next Doctor", saying: "I am just so excited about it. We filmed it in April in Cardiff and Gloucester and Monmouth and so it has died down a bit, but now it is getting closer and I just can't wait.

"It is just a one-off Christmas special but out of all the episodes I could have been asked to do it is far better that it is this one."

On the subject of whether she might reappear in future episodes, Tshabalala added: "I would love to do more. At the moment I am just being positive about it, that I did it and that I had a great time. But I would love to be in it again if I can."

She also spoke briefly about her character's role in the episode, information regarding which is included in the spoiler box below.

I have to be very careful what I can say and can't say about it all. You have to bear with me! But she is an East Londoner, very Cockney.

The Doctor is faced with another Doctor. Rosita is the assistant to the other Doctor but as the episode goes on she starts helping the Doctor we know.

Both The Guardian and The Independent newspapers in the UK have today published reviews of Doctor Who: The Writer's Tale, the new book by Russell T Davies and Benjamin Cook.

The Guardian's review is written by Veronica Horwell, who delivers a very positive verdict. "Fifteen chapters of that should be far too much even for us fundamentalist Doc-venerators," she writes. "But it isn't far too much. It's the Doctor Who Annual for adults, and it's not nearly enough, should have been 1001 pages, because Davies doesn't need to be writing fiction, shaping stuff retrieved from the flux of his Great Maybe, to be a storyteller. He's the Scheherazade of Cardiff Bay. He's making this up as he goes along."

The Independent's piece is combined with an interview with Davies, conducted recently at BBC Television Centre. "There's such goodwill towards Doctor Who," Davies comments. "Which makes it much easier for us. It's not like someone really famous will come on and have to play a murdered prostitute, like in Prime Suspect. They have fun and it's seen by kids and that's what really registers with people and means they're up for it."

This year's Flip Animation Festival, held in the city of Wolverhampton, features a special screening of the animated episodes from the 1968 Patrick Troughton story The Invasion.

The episodes were lost but in 2006 they were meticulously reconstructed using audio recorded off-air by fans mixed with newly created animation courtesy of Cosgrove Hall. These animated reconstructions have been warmly received and this is a chance to see them on the big screen.

The screening will be followed by an opportunity to find out more about how and why the animated episodes were commissioned, whether there may be further productions in the future and to meet some of the people responsible for making them. The talk will also highlight the world of Doctor Who fan animation.

Speakers Include

• James Goss, who ran the BBC's Doctor Who website for seven years and as part of this he produced the BBC's first webcasts, and commissioned the Invasion animations. He produced the BBC One animation Doctor Who: The Infinite Quest and has written a Torchwood book.
• Jon Doyle, from Firestep Productions, 2 x Bafta winning Animation Producer/Director/Artist whose work includes the animated series Scream of the Shalka, The Invasion and The Infinite Quest.
• Rob Ritchie, fan animator and producer of a raft of well received Doctor Who clips. Rob is contributor to the Who3d feature film project and he created Doctor Who 3d visuals for the stage play, The Trial of Davros.
The panel will be chaired by Myles McLeod, of animation duo The Brothers Mcleod.

The showing is on November 8th and is scheduled to start at 11.15pm. Please note this is a free event, and places will be allocated on a first come first served basis, so please arrive early to pick up a ticket.

Posted By John Bowman

A talk about the Doctor Who and Torchwood art department is to be given in Cardiff later this year.

This free event, looking at the creative use of locations in Cardiff, will be held at the Millennium Centre on Sunday, December 7 between 6pm and 7pm, and will be followed by a question-and-answer session with production designerEdward Thomas and his team.

Tickets must be booked in advance by calling 08700 40 2000 or visiting the main ticket desk.

The talk will coincide with an exhibition of Doctor Who concept art on Level 2 in the Glanfa foyer of the centre, running from December 5 to January 4.