01x01 - Bringing Back the Doctor

[bunniefuu]

It's back. I can't quite believe
it's actually back.

I think he's an alien
from another world.

Ready for this?

Here we go.

History.

I came back to the BBC
as Head of Drama BBC Wales.

It was my first meeting with Jane,
the drama commissioner,

and she just came out with it and said,

“How would you feel
about bringing back Doctor Who?"

I read in the newspaper

that Russell was going to write Doctor
Who and it was really intriguing to me.

We did have loads of people
that we were thinking about,

but Chris was always in our heads.

I would never approach Chris Eccleston
in a million years.

I wouldn't have thought
he would have been interested.

I liked the idea of a writer
as intelligent and rigorous as Russell

writing for children.

Because, I think, you know, if you can
get them young with good stuff,

as they grow older, they're going
to demand good stuff of the television.

We just wanted someone
who would be a brilliant actor

and would surprise the audience,
and not be a predictable choice.

And then I got an email from him.

He'd been out for a jog and he said,
“I've been thinking about Doctor Who

“and, if you don't mind,
can I put myself on the list?“

I'm the Doctor, by the way.
What's your name?

- Rose.
- Nice to meet you, Rose.

Run for your life.

The Doctor is a legend
woven throughout history.

When disaster comes, he's there.

Fantastic.

You tell me, where do you want to go?
Backwards or forwards in time?

SIMO N P EGG: Filming for the new series
began in July .

And Doctor Who Confidential
was there from the start.

The new series, really, we want it to be
everything the old series was

with a great big wodge of
shoved into this it as well

'cause I genuinely love the old series.

DAVIES: Tonight is our first proper
night-sh**t in Landon.

And it's very early on in the run,
we're only five days in.

We've done five days in Cardiff,
now we're in London,

and we're doing the big London stuff,
which includes the London Eye.

Whenever we come here
we want to maximise it,

so you get all the big locations,

all the big touristy-type settings
in the background.

It's got a sense of humour
like it always had.

Hopefully it's less studio-bound. That
will be the greatest visible change.

Is that it was terribly, terribly
confined in, sort of, three-walled sets.

We're doing a lot of it on location.

At least, so far,
I think about % of it is on location.

, that makes the whole picture
look bigger, more ambitious, more epic

and more modern, frankly.

SIMO N: As night falls aver Landon,

the day has only just begun
for Chris and Billie.

DAVIES: Tonight is also our first big
Chris-and-Billie scene,

with the Doctor and Rose together,
and that's exciting.

They've done lots of scenes so far
running about

fighting monsters and things,

but tonight is the heart of it, really,
which is the two of them doing dialogue.

MAN". The scene at the Embankment
is one of the scenes where I think

the Doctor starts to realise that Rose
is no mere ordinary mortal, you know.

He's very much familiar with, kind of,
ape-like humans

that fundamentally just scream and panic
and don't understand

and have no ability to just take on board
the fact that he's an alien,

that this is a spaceship, that it's
bigger on the inside than the outside.

ROSE: If you are an alien, how come you
sound like you're from the North?

Lots of planets have a North.

What's a police public call box?

It's a telephone box from the s.

It's a disguise.

It's pride, but I think he knows
it's a bad disguise.

- Exactly, that's why it's kind of...
- It's a disguise, yeah.

- I'm trying to justify it.
- Yeah.

So, if you can, like, wind me up
about it, I'll fight my corner.

What's a police public call box?

It's a telephone box from the...

- It's a disguise.
- Okay.

What he finds, I think, with Rose
is that one, she's interested.

Two, she's kind of bright, she's sparky,

she's not fazed
by what's being thrown at her,

and she's had a lot
thrown at her by now.

And, kind of, in that situation
where he himself is so snowballed

with the fact that he's lost the signal
and he's trying to search for something

and it's all going terribly wrong

and she tunes in to what it is
he's looking for

and focuses and finds something for him.

A huge metal circular structure.
Like a dish, like a wheel, radial.

Close to where we're standing.
Must be completely invisible.

What?

What is it? What?

Oh!

Fantastic.

BOAK: Russell said "I'd really like
them to hold hands an the bridge."

And at that moment, there is a kind of
bonding. They're in it together.

He's not said to her, "Come with me,"

or he's not trying to look after her or
anything. She's just part of the team.

It kind of happens in that one moment.

BOAK: Be ready with the camera.

You could time the action

so a couple of buses went past.

- There's not a bus in sight. Look.
- Yes.

We wanted the Millennium Wheel,
the Houses of Parliament,

we wanted the bridge,
we wanted the river

and we wanted London buses as well but,
for some reason, we didn't have a bus.

It became one of those nightmarish
scenarios of trying to film something

and being dependant on a bus coming

and then trying to time
the run of the actors and cue them

to run at exactly the right time
so that the buses came alongside them

just at the critical moment.

I'd like to be able to say it happened
very quickly but, of course, it didn't.

How's that? Got it. Good, yeah.

- It's all right.
- Well done.

I'm sick of red London buses
getting in the back of my sh*t.

The thing is, with someone like Chris
as an actor, playing the Doctor,

he's such a fine actor, he's gonna bring
completely new qualities to him.

A new alienness, a new energy,

the way he walks,
the way he dresses, everything.

There's a brand-new
Chris Eccleston Doctor

and there's a whole generation of kids

for whom that's gonna be
their definitive Doctor.

He's got the grinning madness of Torn.

But he's got the sort of vulnerability
of Peter Davison.

It's like when you're a kid.

The first time they tell you
that the world's turning

and you can't quite believe it

'cause everything
looks like it's standing still.

I can feel it.

And a little bit of that excitedness
that Paul McGann brought to it.

The turn of the Earth.

The ground beneath our feet
is spinning at , miles an hour.

And the entire planet is hurtling
around the sun at , miles an hour.

And I can feel it.
We're falling through space, you and me.

Clinging to the skin of this tiny
little world and if we let go...

That's who I am.

My hope is that the eight-year-olds that
watch it, I'll be their first Doctor.

I hope they haven't seen
any DVDs of anybody.

- Hiya.
- Hi.

- Good to meet you.
- I'm Jordan.

- You're the Doctor.
- Yeah, I am.

For today, I am.

SIMO N: Now officially the ninth Doctor,

Chris continues the long tradition
of Doctor who,

which continued to thrive
even when the series went off air.

One of my favourite things about
the Doctor Who world

is that when it went off air,

the thousands of Doctor Who fans
didn't let it die there.

The Doctor Who industry, I guess you
could call it, has been going on and on

and from strength to strength
ever since.

In about ,
a new range of books was started.

The magazine's been running now
for years.

There's always a comic strip in there.

The Doctor Who audio adventure
started in .

DIRECTOR: Off you go.

“Peri, what's happening?
Where's Erimen?“

She was just in there,
but she disappeared in front of my eyes.

She just melted away.

We had been doing
other sci-fi audio stuff, CD dramas

and then out of the blue,
we got asked to go in for a meeting

and they said, “Hey, guys, we've heard
what you do. We quite like it.

“How would you like to have the licence
to perhaps do Doctor Who on CD?“

Our first one came out in ' and we've
been bashing away at it ever since.

SIMON". There's a budget of millions,
an award-winning cast and crew,

some of the UK's best scriptwriters,
episodes to make,

five directors to sh**t them
and only months to film.

And action.

But at the end of the day,
it all comes down to one Doctor

and a battered leather jacket.

- Russell had scripted a leather jacket.
- Really battered, so...

Battered leather jacket,
so you get the traveller thing.

WRIGHT: I didn't want the costume
to ever became

an object where you used to think,
"What's he wearing today?"

It had to be a silhouette
that you were very used to

and when he's against
all the other aliens

from the back or from the side,
you always know it's him.

His clothes shouldn't really dominate
his role, they should help.

Chris' costume is very stripped down,
which very much suits his Doctor.

He wants the acting to come forward
and be at the centre of it.

And, actually, if you look back
that's sort of quite a attribute.

Something very minimalist about that.

SIMO N: And with a new Doctor,
comes a new companion.

You got me. Very funny.

Right, I've got the joke.

Run!

With a lot of the things he does, he's
kind of got eyes in the back of his head

and he's weighing her up
right from the start, really.

He's years old, she's ,
yet they think alike.

She's so astute and so, kind of,
inquisitive that she spots things.

DIRECTOR: Action.

- You ripped his arm off.
- Yup.

- Plastic.
- Very clever, nice trick.

- Who are they then, students?
- Why would they be students?

'Cause to get that many people
dressed up and being silly,

they got to be students.

- That makes sense. Well done.
- Thanks.

PIP ER: And that's what he loves about
her and that's what she loves about him.

They are just partners in crime,
through and through.

But she's not scared
to challenge him equally, you know.

And I think that's something
that he finds quite brilliant about her.

They want to overthrow the human race
and destroy you.

- Do you believe me?
- No.

But you're still listening.

SIMO N: the Doctor's back,
with a new assistant,

a universe full of foes
and a 's police box to take him there.

Get ready for the new series
af Doctor Who.