With the approach of
The Christmas Invasion, the press has gotten back into the Doctor Who fold to a level not seen since last July. Here's a collection of items that have appeared in the past 24 hours alone:
According to today's
The Sun, "Doctor Who bosses have hastily rewritten scripts after star
Roger Lloyd Pack broke his leg. The actor, who played dopey Trigger in Only Fools And Horses, fell down the stairs at his home in Camden, North London. The accident happened just days before Roger, 61, was due to start filming the new series of the BBC sci-fi show, starring David Tennant as the Doctor and Billie Piper as his assistant Rose. So scriptwriters have made Roger's character wheelchair-bound - meaning he could end up looking a bit like evil Dalek creator Davros. A pal said: 'Roger was gutted when he broke his leg. He was worried he would not be able to take part in Doctor Who. But BBC bosses offered to put his character in a wheelchair to get around the problem. They were massively keen for Roger to stay in the show, so they were happy to accommodate him. His character is a real baddie and the wheelchair is a great prop, which adds a bit of mystery and intrigue to the part. So it has worked out very well.' Roger will play the Doctor's enemy John Lumic in the new series in January." Also reported at
Digital Spy.
The
Western Mail features an interview with
David Tennant. "Standing in the cave of the Sycorax warriors, and sword-fighting a seven-feet-tall Sean Gilder as the Sycorax leader in prosthetics and weird contact lenses, and all of those extras standing there....," offers Tennant, almost going misty-eyed at the memories. "OK, it might have been in a warehouse in Newport, with special effects put in later on, but that was the first moment I thought to myself, 'This is something special.' And those moments keep coming every day. Just being in the Tardis, for example. And getting to act opposite Elizabeth Sladen as Sarah-Jane, a veteran Doctor Who sidekick who returns in the next series. I used to watch her when I was a kid, eating beans on toast and a cup of Irn Bru. She looks the same and sounds the same! ... It's mad, it's crazy - how unreal is this? ... I was three years old when I decided I wanted to be an actor. I just loved watching people on the telly. I was watching stories being told, and thinking 'this is just great.' I think I had a conversation with my parents about who those people were in the TV, and as soon as I had an understanding that this was a job, that people got paid for telling stories, that was what I wanted to do. ... My first TV memory is being entranced by Jon Pertwee regenerating into Tom Baker. ... I got another good luck message from Peter Davison, who was filming Distant Shores at the time. I was about ten when Tom regenerated into Peter Davison, so again, another amazing moment. In fact, Peter came on set one day with his children, which was a big thrill both for them and me! We are more aware that he's [the Doctor] someone who fought a war, lost all his people and because he's the last Time Lord, the last authority in the universe, he's less indulgent, more ruthless. ... Wales is a great place to film. You can be in the countryside or by the sea for one scene, and you can be back in the city in no time. ... Every Doctor Who fan I've met has been completely charming. They're always warm, polite, and enthusiastic about the show; they're delightful, welcoming and supportive. What's fascinating is the range of people who come up to you as a Doctor Who fan. They're not just a certain type of bloke, but you get women of all ages, young kids, elderly people - they've all come up to me. And that, I think, reflects the genius of Russell T Davies, that he's created a show that attracts a genuine nine-to-90-year-old audience - well, younger than nine, really."
Today's
The Herald also features comments from Tennant: "It's reeeaaallly exciting. Apart from anything else, it's fun. It's a laugh. You've no idea. It's such a laugh. It really takes you back to tattie scones in front of the telly. ... I've never been boy-band handsome. So my looks have never been an obsession of mine. ... When I was offered [the role], suddenly it was real rather than some kind of childhood fantasy moment. You suddenly start thinking, 'I have to do this now.' It was curious. It was almost a 'be careful what you wish for' moment. ... You're finding ways to skin a cat each day. The Doctor is always right; he always knows where he's going; he has the moral high ground. He doesn't waver from that, so it's finding new ways to come at that. Part of the joy of the character is that he's unexpected. He's an alien and he's unpredictable. ... I was nervous about moving to Cardiff but I'm getting home to London on weekends, so I'm getting back and doing a bit of life. When you're here it's 12hour days, and then you're learning your lines for the next one. There's a relentlessness to it - but I have a lot of friends who are actors, so they know the score. You fall in and out of each other's lives all the time. ... It's different now in the way Russell writes it. The relationship between the Doctor and Rose is a love story - except they're not shagging. He's on his own and yet he has Rose, but can they ever be quite a couple in the traditional sense? He's 900 years old and she's 19, and that would be a bit weird. That said, there are moments in this series that are . . . well, sexual would be the wrong word, but they explore that side of things possibly more than we've seen before. ... You can be saving the universe and then talking about fly-fishing, but you've got to play it for the truth of the situation. You've got to believe that this guy can be talking about tangerines and then suddenly save the world."
Tomorrow morning's edition of the
Sunday Herald interviews
Russell T Davies about how he gave 'new life' to Doctor Who. "Nobody is more excited than me about the Christmas special," says Russell T Davies to the Herald. "I am a fiend for Christmas television. When the Radio Times came out, I turned to December 25 and scanned down the listings and there was Doctor Who! It's just astonishing. On a personal level, never mind professionally, I am so delighted that this has happened. ... On the day the first episode was broadcast I was nervous, but I knew how good it was. So if we hadn't got the viewing figures I would have been able to act like a martyr. I could have been burned at the stake with piety in my heart, saying, ‘Never mind! I know it was good!" Says the article, "Best of all were the scripts. One two-part episode, The Empty Child, in which the gas mask-wearing ghost of a little boy killed in the Blitz haunts his gymslip mother, was among the most disturbing and moving things to appear in British television drama. It is hard to believe that it was broadcast at teatime on a Saturday. ... Although suffering from a bad back, presumably from all the TV critics patting him on it, Davies has gamely agreed to discuss the Christmas episode. Talking in his Manchester home, he is clearly excited by the show, and determined to ensure that Doctor Who continues to redefine family viewing as an experience which makes the heart beat faster and the synapses in the brain snap and flex like hungry electric eels. 'Just wait,' he says, 'till you see this.'"
Sunday morning's
The Independent notes in a review of television that "Christopher Eccleston made Saturday evenings on BBC1 a must-see again by breathing new life into an old character, Doctor Who. He fought off invasion by half a million Daleks - and then promptly walked away. If he doesn't regret it, I certainly do. He was, quite probably, the best doctor yet - writer Russell T Davies and Eccleston's replacement, David Tennant, will have a hard act to follow." Also, in the
Guardian, "The consensus view was that reality television had peaked and some new hot genre would emerge in the course of the year. But what no one predicted 12 months ago was that the story of broadcasting in 2005 would be the return of family entertainment. This picture of returning innocence was admittedly patchy - 2005's Big Brother marked a TV nadir, when a drunken contestant masturbated with a bottle - but the fact is that three of the most talked-about series in the schedules were Saturday teatime shows with a potential audience age-span of around 60 years: Doctor Who, Strictly Come Dancing and The X Factor. It is also notable that the first two of them are clever reimaginings of concepts originated several decades ago."
The
Scotsman today said that "A very different kind of Doctor comes under the spotlight... In Doctor Who: Regeneration (Tuesday, Radio 2, 8.30pm), producer Malcolm Prince offers a behind-the-scenes look at the eagerly-anticipated TV programme Doctor Who: The Christmas Invasion (Christmas Day, BBC1, 7pm). The new Doctor, David Tennant, whose film credits include Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, talks about how he intends to tackle the role, while director James Hawes promises that the first programme of the new era will see strange things happening to Christmas trees." The
Independent says, "Mark Gatiss explores how the return of the Time Lord became one of the television phenomena of the year. The documentary traces the story, using interviews with David Tennant (who takes over from Christopher Eccleston as the Doctor on Christmas Day), Billie Piper and the creator of the new series, Russell T Davies."
Broadcast magazine says of Doctor Who: "There was an element of back to the future about some of this year's biggest hits. First we saw the old Time Lord himself, Doctor Who, re-emerge from his Tardis, attracting massive audiences and plaudits for BBC1. The Doctor proved there was still a place in the schedule for something long forgotten: family viewing. Doctor Who's success has sparked a hunt for old heroes with the BBC already commissioning Tiger Aspect to bring back Robin Hood and Granada looking to remake The Prisoner, possibly for Sky One. We can expect other retro heroes to resurface." It notes that Doctor Who was #4 on the list of BBC1's Top Five Programmes, beaten in the ratings only by "EastEnders," "The Vicar of Dibley" and "Comic Relief: Red Nose Night" (with "Little Britain" as #5 on the list). The Magazine also features an opinion piece of Emily Bell, editor-in-chief of Guardian Unlimited, in which she refers to Russell T Davies on the subject of "People of the Year," noting "creatively it has to be Russell T Davies for his high-quality output and his salvation of family viewing. "
Tomorrow's
The Observer talks about the record numbers of gay men and lesbians occupying key positions across British life, noting Russell T Davies: "Head writer of the BBC's recently revived Doctor Who. Also responsible for other audience-pullers such as Casanova, Linda Green and Bob & Rose. Came to prominence in 1999 when Channel 4 showed his controversial drama series Queer as Folk, an explicit tableau of love, lust, clubbing and gay life in Manchester. Currently working on the Doctor Who spin-off series, Torchwood, about a team who investigate alien goings-on in Britain, due to be aired on BBC3 in 2006 - 'X Files meets This Life,' says Davies. Has been with his partner, Andrew Smith, a Customs officer, since 1999. Born in Swansea." It features a comment from Stuart Murphy, former Controller of BBC3, calling Davies "an absolute genius".
The
Scotsman, in an article about the television year in review, says, "What a difference a year makes. ... Doctor Who (BBC1)... was great fun. No programme faced a bigger challenge in 2005 than how to 'do' the Daleks; Russell T Davies chose opera. With a whoosh of Wagner, the eggbox psychopaths took to the air, finally ridding themselves of all comparisons to Mariah "I don't do stairs" Carey, and there was a strange serenity about them as they croaked their last. Until next time, that is. ... On ITV1 came Secret Smile, starring Kate Ashfield and Claire Goose and featuring a dirty rotten scoundrel etc, etc. The latter right bad yin was played by David Tennant, Scotland's best-kept acting secret until last year's Blackpool, which he followed early in 2005 with the Carry On-ish Casanova (BBC3, Russell T again). Now he's about to go stratospheric as the new Doctor Who."
The
Observer in the Guardian says of Tennant in "Secret Smile", "It was great to see Tennant building on last year's quite brilliant performances in Blackpool and He Knew He was Right and finally coming out as a primetime star. Gratifying too, to watch him providing some genuinely nasty, meaty, murderous filling in 2005's otherwise fluffy white-bread Casanova/Doctor Who sandwich. There were a couple of moments in Secret Smile when he was genuinely terrifying, which, given that his character (Brendan Block. Sounds like shock. Sounds like a dance DJ, too, come to that) had established his general horribleness within about the first 10 minutes, meant that building on all this without turning Block into a staring-eyed panto-turn would, in lesser hands, have been an insurmountable dramatic challenge." Today's
Evening Chronicle, Newcastle also says about the show that "Tennant was good as Brendan and he did menacing pretty well, but then he's had plenty of practice recently and is in danger of becoming rent-a-villain. Maybe he's getting in the nasty roles before he becomes forever associated with Doctor Who and his time-travelling exploits." And today's
Daily Telegraph says, "This was swept along by the sheer menace of David Tennant's staring-eyed performance as Brendan Block, a malevolent nasty who charmed women before beating or murdering them. (I hope he is not like this as Doctor Who)."
The
Guardian today reviews the BFI TV Classics book about Doctor Who written by Kim Newman: "Newman's Doctor Who traces the sci-fi staple from 1963 genesis to Cool Britannia comeback, pointing out that only when fixating on its own fanbase has it struggled." The article also reviews DW comic strip artist Dave Gibbon's latest endevour, The Originals.
Also in the press:
TV Squad talks about David Tennant in "Secret Smile" and "Harry Potter";
Digital Spy notes that Tennant "has been seeking advice on his love-life from co-star Billie Piper" according to the Daily Star.
(Thanks to Steve Tribe, Paul Engelberg, Peter Weaver, Faiz Rehman)
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