Welcome to a brand
-new series of Doctor Who.
'Not only do we have 12 exciting new adventures for you 'but a thrilling new Doctor at the helm.
'
- Action!
- Oh! You've got a dinosaur, too! 'Planning for this epic new series started in late 2013.
'Since then, over 200 people have been working flat out to make this 'the biggest and best series ever.
' Hi there! 'Lucky for you, we've got exclusive access to show you 'all the thrills, spills and expl*sive action.
'So get ready for a brand
-new era.
I promise you're going to love it!' I know I would.
'Over 50 years old and loved around the world, Doctor Who 'has picked up millions of fans along the way, 'and none more dedicated than Peter Capaldi.
'Announced to the world as the 12th Doctor back in 2013, 'Peter is now living his childhood dream.
'But this isn't the first time Peter has appeared in the show.
'Five years earlier, he got a guest role 'starring alongside the 10th Doctor.
' Lobus Caecilius.
'The script came in an e
-mail.
' Usually, you read the script and say, "Yes, I'd like to do it," but I said, "I'll just do it.
" Yeah, it's great! I absolutely love it.
I could do this for ever.
It's a delight.
'Well, his wish has definitely come true.
'We caught up with Peter at his very first read through 'to see how the job's been going.
' It seems to have been a long time that I've been the new Doctor Who.
People keep saying to me "How's it going?
What's happening?
" Well I haven't done anything! I've spent seven months being the new Doctor Who and not getting on with it.
'Well, Peter is obviously eager to get stuck into his new role, 'but, first things first, time for some introductions.
' Peter Hannah.
I play the policeman.
Dan Starkey playing Strax.
You know who I am.
Yes, well, it's quite an extraordinary position to be in to sort of say, "Hello, I'm Peter, and I'm playing this iconic, "historically much
-loved character that's been around for 50 years.
" It's difficult to know quite how to phrase that other than to say I'm Peter Capaldi and I'm the Doctor.
'Wow! What an exciting moment.
'I wonder what lead writer, Steven, thought about it.
' The most exciting thing for me was that it was the very first time we saw Peter and Jenna together.
Egomaniac?
You were talking about me?
We got to the read through of the big, long restaurant scene which always worried me a bit cos it's a long scene with just two people talking.
Clara, what is happening right now, in this restaurant, to you AND me is more important than your egomania.
Nothing is more important than my egomania! That was the first time we actually saw the new TARDIS team in action, and that was properly exciting.
The dynamic is unlikely friendship but just totally works and totally feels natural.
That's the way I feel that we get on together really well like that.
Unlikely friendship that just works.
Geronimo! 'And now for a little treat.
'Here's a snippet of Peter playing the Doctor for the very first time.
' I never know where they come from, the faces.
They just pop up.
Whoosh, zap
- face.
It's all right up until the eyebrows, and then it just goes haywire.
They're att*ck eyebrows.
You could take bottle tops off with these! This is it.
The genie's out of the bottle so let's see what happens.
'So, While Peter headed off to get suited and booted, 'we were poised ready to capture the very first day on set.
' Action! Madame Vastra, thank God! 'And, of course, there were a few familiar faces.
' Ah, first day.
First day of filming.
This this is supposed to be down by the Thames.
'Oh, and we couldn't forget the big, angry dinosaur that turned up, too.
' Yes, we're all looking rather skyward because there's this huge dinosaur.
'So, without an actual dinosaur on set, is it tough to imagine one 'actually being there?
' I don't know.
No, of course not! It's my job.
Well, the dinosaur itself may be CGI 'but be careful where you put your hands.
'The dinosaur spit is 'Well, it's real Honest!' Dinosaur gunk! 'Yes, this angry dinosaur coughs up the TARDIS.
Nice(!)' Action! A giant dinosaur from the distant past has just vomited a blue box from outer space.
'But someone is not deterred by dino slime.
' If you wouldn't mind.
Strax is working with Madame Vastra and Jenny now and helps them out with m*llitary situations like this.
I think Strax sees everything as a m*llitary situation.
Exit the box and surrender to the glory of the Sontaran Empire.
'Well, if a huge dinosaur isn't enough to scare the living daylights 'out of you, this episode introduced an even more frightening new enemy.
' Half
-Face Man is terrifying.
Bring her.
His physicality is brilliant.
You really watch his walk and his movements.
It's fantastic.
It's so finely tuned.
He's our sophisticated droid.
It looks like clockwork inside his head.
He's wearing a silicone prosthetic to simulate this hollow part that completes with the use of a dummy and then CGI is going to put everything together.
This is the dummy for the character of the Half
-Face Man.
It takes a couple of months to get to this because they need to take a life cast of the actor first and then the manufacturing of the mechanism.
'Well, it looks creepy to me.
Are you as freaked out as I am?
' Probably not any more but maybe the first days, yes.
'Well, while Half
-Face Man is freaking us all out 'with his scary eyeballs, our costume designer Howard 'has had his own terrifying monster to deal with.
'No, I don't mean the new Doctor!' I've had stress nightmare dreams for the past two days.
'Yes, designing the latest costume for a brand
-new Doctor isn't easy.
'But it's over now.
Phew!' Fantastic.
A great relief.
Peter said very early on after I met him, "You realise I'm going "to have to wear this for the rest of my life.
" No pressure.
But I think he looks fantastic and he genuinely seems very happy.
'And Peter isn't just happy with his new look.
- 'He's over the moon.
'
- I love it! I love the way that it's very modern but at the same time it invokes the past and yet it also propels the new Doctor into the future.
I'm the Doctor.
I've lived for over 2,000 years.
I love it! It's sharp, isn't it?
It's sharp and it's minimalist and really cool.
What do you think?
I think Howard's done an amazing job.
It's really great.
Everyone will find something different in the look.
It will have a sort of '60s feel for some, it will have an Edwardian feel for others.
What I tried to do is not be stuck in any particular genre or period, that it was really just contemporary, but with a hint of something different.
It wasn't deliberate but I think I always wanted something that was connected to the darker kind of tones of the earlier Doctors.
- Yeah, yeah.
- It's very kind of Jon Pertwee.
'Yes, Peter's new costume echoes back 'to some of the past Doctors' outfits.
'Time to see what style he has in common 'with some of his predecessors.
'If you look closely, you can see the more sombre approach 'of a long, dark coat was favoured by the first two Doctors, 'but the red lining in the 12th Doctor's 'has a touch of the 3rd about it.
'And there's the simplicity that harks back to the 9th Doctor 'including his passion for sturdy footwear.
'The accessories so beloved of earlier incarnations
- 'scarves, hats, celery or umbrellas,
- they're all gone.
'This leaves us with a costume that's distinctive, new, striking 'and stylish.
'So what does Peter think of his new iconic costume?
' It's stark.
It means business and I believe it.
It's the thing that makes me feel most like Doctor Who.
'So with a new costume and a new set of scripts, Peter has no excuse.
'It's time for his first moments on camera.
'And someone is more than a little chuffed.
' It's rather exciting.
Almost uniquely, Peter Capaldi's first scene in Doctor Who is the first time that Peter has popped out of the TARDIS.
'This was to bring out a raft of strong emotions for a man who 'has loved Doctor Who ever since he was a young boy.
' Delight mixed with terror, really.
But to actually finally get to be Doctor Who was fantastic.
To sort of emerge from the TARDIS for the first time, that's great, and you shut the door and it's completely black.
You're sort of plunged into the darkness with just me, Jenna and the guy who's providing the smoke.
So it was lovely to be inside that box and to think, "Oh, this is mine, now.
" Bashful?
Sneezy?
Grumpy?
'And being on set is a real treat for Steven.
'After months of only seeing his new Doctor on paper, 'it's time for the real character to come to life before his very eyes.
' Already I'm seeing how he's choosing to move around the set, how he's hitting a funny line, how he's hitting a serious moment.
The fundamental Doctor is the same.
It's those flourishes, those moments, the things they run with, the way they move that make them different, and he's such a funny, inventive actor.
And, simultaneously, he's having an absolute ball because he's playing the part he's always wanted.
- How do you know?
- Oh, come on, Clara! You know that I speak dinosaur! He's not Clara.
I'm Clara! It's been amazing.
He was born to play it and I just remember there was a first line of one take and in my head I was like, "And off we go.
" Why are you all going dark and wobbly?
Clara felt a bit safer with the last Doctor.
He would always catch her whenever she'd fall but with this Doctor, she doesn't quite know how far he's going to go.
He's a bit more reckless.
She's kind of on the back foot and doesn't quite know how to handle this new man with this new face.
So we see a complete change in her.
You need to calm down.
She kind of has to try and keep in control and he doesn't make that easy and the situation doesn't make that easy so it's very different to how it was.
Something's gone wrong.
I'm not flirting, by the way Wrong?
What's gone wrong?
His physicality, and his hands, and his run, just everything about him is the Doctor, and it's such a different Doctor.
So that's been incredible to see him bring that Doctor to life and come together but it was there immediately.
'We really do have an amazing new Doctor on our hands 'and I wonder what Steven thinks of his new time
-traveller.
' He looks like Doctor Who, he sounds like Doctor Who, he's a Scottish Doctor Who and somehow that's just so exciting.
Everybody just Everybody just take five! 'So that may be the end of Peter's first day, 'but this is just the beginning of a brand
-new Doctor.