Lawrence Miles (Various)

Lawrence Miles wrote some of the most interesting New Adventures novels, and now (among other things) has a blog that, whether or not you agree with him, is definitely worth a look. These quotes are from various interviews over the years. For a really good, really long interview, try here.

On the original TV series

Doctor Who’s my native mythology. If you read, say, the work of Salman Rushdie… forget about the blasphemy for a moment, it’s not important right now… there’s a lot of material in there that comes from traditional Indian culture, there are lots of links to Indian mythology. Which doesn’t mean he has to believe in gods with the heads of elephants, obviously. It’s just part of his background, those are the symbols he grew up with. That’s more or less the way I feel about Doctor Who. I’ve got a pretty low opinion of a lot of the original episodes, but it’s still my home territory.

Doctor Who always went for action over style, and that’s one of the things I like least about it. Plenty of interesting things happen, but there’s not a lot of artistry there. Which is probably why Logopolis is my favourite story, because it’s supposed to be the Fourth Doctor’s funeral, and it feels like a funeral.

If the TV series had survived, then I don’t think there’s any question that by Season Thirty they would’ve been doing stories like Warhead. That’s what’s most interesting about Doctor Who, I think, that constant development.

On Alien Bodies

One of the points of Alien Bodies… was to do something that felt like a Robert Holmes story, but set in the same universe as the TV Movie. I felt the TV Movie was only half a Doctor Who story, it was like a cross-breed of Doctor Who as we knew it and American SF television.

So, the idea was to do a kind of second-generation cross-breed, kind of 75% Doctor Who instead of just 50%. It needed an ‘old’ monster for it to work properly, and I felt fairly confident about using the Krotons because… well, it’s not really as if anybody’s that bothered about them.

On reinventing monsters

I’m not sure that “making over” monsters is such a good idea.If you’re writing a book about Daleks… oh, if only… then nobody’s going to want to read something that’s post-modern and ironic about the subject of Daleks.

They’re going to want a story with huge Dalek armies exterminating everything in sight and a great big Dalek battlefleet coming over the horizon. A good monster’s a good monster, there’s no reason to play around with it.

If you start playing around with Cybermen, then there’s a chance of you just spoiling the Cybermen, but I thought I could probably get away with doing whatever I liked to the Krotons. Not exactly a first-division monster.

On the prospect of Doctor Who returning (pre-2005)

Eventually, there will be another TV series of Doctor Who. And it will fail horribly, because inevitably it’ll be aimed at the kind of fan-targeted SF market that didn’t even exist until Star Trek: The Next Generation came along and spoiled everything. Doctor Who only works as a family adventure series, but when it finally comes back you can bet any money you want it’ll be like Babylon 5 or something. It’ll only last one series, maybe two. So then the TV programme will be dead forever.

On Doctor Who in 2010

Moffat tries to make the Doctor a fetish-object, because that’s how we think of him as long-term Doctor Who viewers, and because we’re the ones to whom he’s pandering. (Well, not me. But you know what I mean). What the author’s actually doing is ensuring the Doctor’s worthlessness. If you make someone all-powerful, then power’s worth nothing at all, especially if you do it just to reinforce fan-opinion of the safe and clean-cut Boy One.

Steven Moffat (2010)

I’ve lost track of whether any of the information in these quotes contains spoilers, so caution is advised. These come from various sources, and are all related to series 5, or 6, or the 2010 Christmas Special, or other current stuff:

On becoming the showrunner

I was boarding a plane when it happened: Russell sent me an e-mail as I was about to fly to Athens for a meeting about the incredibly short-lived Greek version of my comedy Coupling. I found out subsequently that heavy hints had been dropped twice before about me taking over the show, but I’d been too slow and too hungover to pick up on them.

On series five

Doctor Who is an incredibly difficult programme to make. Since the first day of filming, when the tide came in early and chased us off the beach, we’ve been in a state of crisis. Now, a television crisis isn’t a real crisis but it’s still enough to stop you thinking about these weird, metaphysical things, like the show’s importance in terms of so-called 3GTV (three-generation television, appealing to children, parents and grandparents] or how it’s down to me and Simon Cowell to keep the fabric of society together.

On The Big Bang

The universe has ended, mate, he’s dead. The Doctor is in the Pandorica, there’s this little voice saying: ‘Hello, that was a big bang wasn’t it? Oh, something happened out there?

On the 2010 Christmas Special

There will be a Christmas special – well, a flashback Christmas special – but no, we won’t be telling you anything, not a single thing. It’s too early.

On series six

(It’ll be) similar (to seriees 5) in the sense that it’s an arc that doesn’t get in the way too much.

On Russell T. Davies returning

He said ‘Don’t even ask me for series five because I’m just knackered, I just want to go lie down’, and I think I’ll find out how that feels. But I did ask him for series six, and I always will.

He’s pretty adamant that he’s not going to (come back). I’m in constant touch with him. He did an awful lot of ‘Doctor Who’ for an awful lot of years, and I think he’s finding it in a way hard, because in effect he’s done a ‘Doctor Who’ story for ‘The Sarah Jane Adventures’. So I think he probably wants to get away from it for a bit. I can understand that, because he did a hell of a lot. It would be just joyous to get him back, becaus I miss him.

On his writing

Russell reckons it’s all about parenthood with me. It’s his view that every writer has one story that they go on re-telling and that being a father is mine.

Neil Gaiman (2010)

For a long time, there’s been something of a ‘will he, won’t he’ thing going on regarding Neil Gaiman and Doctor Who. Well, it’s all settled now, and he is. Writing an episode for series 6, that is. Here’s how it all unfolded:

February 2010

I know it’s cruel to make you wait for things, (but) in about 14 months from now, which is to say, NOT in the upcoming season (5) but early in the one after that, it’s quite possible that I might have written an episode. And if I had, it would originally have been called The House of Nothing. But it definitely isn’t called that anymore.

May 2010

I don’t know what it’s like to be God, obviously. Until that very first moment when you get to sit down and type the words in your script: INTERIOR: TARDIS. Suddenly I got a very good idea of what it must feel like. I went “I’m writing it now, this scene in the TARDIS! I’m writing it!”. And that was amazing. It was wonderful.

It’s going to be shooting in August and we were going through it, and figuring out ways that money could be saved, and ways we could have some things happen faster. It was a little bit flabby.

Doctor Who has never pretended to be hard science-fiction. At best, Doctor Who is a fairytale, with fairytale logic, about this wonderful man in this big blue box, who at the beginning of every story lands somewhere where there’s a problem.

Alex Kingston (2010)

Here are some quotes from interviews with Alex Kingston, who’s about to return to ‘Doctor Who’ as River Song. Mild spoilers ahead:

On watching ‘Doctor Who’ as a child

I used to watch through a crack in the door. I would drive my mother crazy, because she would say ‘Oh, turn it off if you get so scared!’, but no, no, I want to watch it. But that’s children. That’s how you learn to conquer your fears, by sort of safely putting yourself in that thrill zone.

There was one where the Daleks invaded the London Underground. And still, if I’m waiting for a Tube, I look down the hole and I can see the Daleks coming through – I still have that.

On working with David Tennant

We hit it off immediately. We just clicked. I’ve done guest roles on other shows, but rarely have I felt such a warm bond.

On the differences between ‘Doctor Who’ and ‘ER’.

The budgets are smaller (on ‘Doctor Who’) but everyone works just as hard. Someone told me I’m going to get a River Song action figure. I don’t quite believe it. You don’t get that on ‘ER’.

On returning for season 5.

When I first accepted the role of River Song, I thought it was just going to be those two episodes, particularly because she died at the end. So when I was asked to come back, I thought it was a little strange, but when I read the scripts for these two episodes it made total, perfect sense why she’s back. And I’m really happy to (come back), because I think the character is a really strong, meaty character, and I think we can run quite far with her, if Steven Moffat chooses to.

I’m not sure if I can tell you the story of her comeback to the series. All I can say is that in the ‘Silence in the Library’ episodes, she arrived with her diary, with her little blue diary, and in that diary she has pictures of all the Doctors. And she asked the David Tennant Doctor, what adventures they had been on, and so she asked questions like ‘Have we done the crash of the Byzantium?’, ‘Have we done the opening of the Pandorica?’, and he didn’t know what he was talking about. Well, the two episodes we’ve just finished filming are the crash of the Byzantium.

River has been released from jail. She has a special dispensation to be released from jail for this mission, because no-one else can do this mission, no-one else has the qualifications. She basically has a hunch that one of these Weeping Angel statues is in the hands of a private collector, and she needs to confirm that it is one, and she needs the Doctor’s help for that.

On the Doctor’s real name

I haven’t even told Matt what his real name is. I might tell Steven Moffat.

On working with Matt Smith

I think they were very clever shooting these episodes out of sequence, because for Matt, and for Karen who plays Amy, the pressure on them to have found their feet in the first episode, when everybody’s going to be watching – the press, the media, critics, everyone – is going to be huge, so that sort of took the pressure off them. And I think that’s maybe why I was brought in, because I’d done it before… to support them, really, and particularly to support Matt. But, to be honest, he didn’t need it. He sails through, absolutely sails through. He’s fantastic, absolutely fantastic. He has a very large pair of shoes to fill, that David Tennant left, and he’s going to fill them easily.

On her future in ‘Doctor Who’

All I can say is: the opening of the Pandorica (smiles).

Matt Smith & Karen Gillan (2010)

There have been loads of Matt Smith / Karen Gillan interviews recently, focusing on the new (2010) series, but this one’s particularly great since the interviewer is a showbiz reporter on Fox News. Turns out, ‘Doctor Who’ is as big as ‘Two and a Half Men’, and maybe even bigger…

Q: Welcome back, we have two guests from ‘Doctor Who’, Matt Smith and Karen Gillan.

Matt Smith: Thanks for having us on.

Q: So the show premieres on Saturday on BBC America, and I was lucky enough to get a preview last night, I got a sneak peek, and I loved it. But since ‘Doctor Who’ is much bigger in the UK, I wasn’t even sure who Dr. Who is. So since you two are the stars of it, who is Dr. Who?

MS: Dr. Who is a 907-year old Timelord who travels through space and time in something called a TARDIS, which is a time machine. And what’s brilliant about all this is that one week he can be in the past, the next week he can be in the future. And he does all this with a companion, played by…

Karen Gillan: And that’s where I come in! I play Amy Pond, his companion, and she’s really his best friend, and he meets her in the first episode in a really interesting way. And they go on adventures together.

Q: ‘Wired’ magazine has the sonic screwdriver on the cover. What does it do that’s so amazing?

MS: The sonic basically works on anything except wood. Anything electrical. So for example, if I wanted to do something to your computer, I could go ‘Bzzzzz’ and make it work in a really fantastical way. If I’m running away from an alien, I can point it at the door and it locks the door. So essentially it sort of unlocks and opens doors. It does everything that we need it to, narratively.

KG: Don’t tell them that!

MS: But it doesn’t work on wood.

Q: Karen, I understand your character’s Scottish. Were they debating whether to have your character be a Scottish person?

KG: Yeah, she is. Well originally she could have been from anywhere, and I auditioned for the role in two different accents, and then we just went with my own ’cause it just seemed to work. You don’t hear that on television so much.

Q: And we see the younger version of you, the 7-year old version.

KG: Who’s my cousin!

Q: Tell us about that.

KG: Well, they needed someone to play a younger version of me, and because I have a sort of weird Highland accent and ginger hair, and that’s not easy to find, they asked me if I knew anyone, and I put her forward and she nailed it.

Q: Had she acted before?

KG: No. Nothing. So it’s really incredible, what she’s done.

Q: Is she just in that one episode?

KG: That’s a secret.

Q: ‘Doctor Who’ is so big in England. It’s huge. It’s as big as something like ‘Two and a Half Men’, but even bigger than that. Did you guys get nervous?

MS: Well, yes, in England it’s the number one show. We didn’t want to break it, basically. We’ve had an overwhelming response, and we really hope you guys in the US will pick it up and dig it. I mean, it’s the longest running show on television, well, sci-fi show ever.

Q: What number Doctor are you?

MS: I’m number eleven.

Q: So how does the character change, is it like a (James) Bond thing?

MS: Well that’s the principle, we see him regenerate from one man to the next.

Q: Oh perfect, so it’s actually a logical transformation.

MS: Yeah, I mean he’s a 900-year old alien with two hearts. It’s mad, it’s bonkers. He’s James Bond but cooler. James Bond gets a boat, the Doctor gets a time machine.

Q: Can you play it for more than a year?

MS: Oh yes, I think the longest ever Doctor played it for seven. So you can really do a stint.

Christopher Priest (1995)

Here’s Christopher Priest talking about his brush with ‘Doctor Who’ in the late 70’s and early 80’s. He wrote two scripts, neither of which ended up getting made, and apparently ended up in a major argument with John Nathan-Turner and Eric Saward:

“I’ll take on almost any writing job, provided it sounds interesting. Doctor Who was like that. The programme is a challenge to a writer: a tiny budget, a more or less fixed cast of characters, a fairly inflexible storyline … and millions of fans who’ll beat the shit out of you if you overlook a crucial fact mentioned in an undertone by a minor character in the second part of a story first transmitted in 1968…

“I wrote two scripts. The first was while Douglas Adams was script editor, before the Hitchhiker books burst on the world. Douglas rang me up one day and said the producer felt the show was drifting away from the heartland of sf, and wanted some ‘real’ sf writers involved. I went in and met Douglas, and he commissioned a four-parter called ‘Sealed Orders’. I wrote this, and it was accepted but never produced. This was because of upheavals in the show while I was writing. Douglas Adams pissed off to become rich and famous, the producer also moved on, and by the time I delivered my story the ‘brief’ (the background story) had changed.

“The BBC commissioned a second story called ‘The Enemy Within’, because of the first going wrong. Again it was written and paid for, but once again upheavals in the BBC wreaked havoc. They inflicted a total of three different script editors on me, who all mucked around with the story and demanded different things … and the new producer [John Nathan-Turner] turned out to be an appalling little [censored by original interviewer], who was more interested in being a media star than actually working with a lowly writer like me. It all led inevitably to a bust-up. I grabbed a parachute and took a header through the nearest emergency hatch.”

You can (and definitely should) read the full interview here, it goes into a lot more detail about his career.

Matt Smith (2010)

Here’s a transcript of Matt Smith on Jonathan Ross’s chat show last night. Among other things, he talks about how long he might be playing the role, how big the new TARDIS is, and David Tennant’s memory:

Q: When did you audition for this role? When and how did you find out you’d got it?

A: Well, my mum randomly texted me and said ‘You should be the next Doctor’ about a week before my agent rang and said ‘Do you fancy auditioning for the part?’, and I said ‘Yeah’. We had two secret auditions…

Q: There’s massive secrecy around ‘Doctor Who’…

A: Yes! We’re showing the new episode on the third, and it feels like a massive security breach. So, anyway, I auditioned, and I thought nothing more of it, it was in a very trashy hotel, and then my agent called and said ‘You can go again’, so I went for the second audition, and I just tried to do it as clearly and as creatively and as honestly as I could, which is all you can ever do.

Q: When you audition for ‘Doctor Who’, do they give you a new script, or something that’s been out already?

A: They gave me ep one. At first it was just some sides, then it was the whole ep. And I read it, and I was of that barren age where it wasn’t on TV…

Q: The Dark Years, we call them.

A: Right. I mean, what were they doing? It’s ‘Doctor Who’, it’s the best thing ever. Anyway, I digress, I got the part, they told me, and then of course I couldn’t tell anyone for three months!

Q: So they told you, and you couldn’t tell anyone?

A: I told my mum, my dad and my granddad on Christmas Eve, and they were very excited, and I told my sister, and that was it.

Q: How excited are you to be the new Doctor?

A: Ah, man, I’m thrilled. I mean, to my mind it’s pretty much the best part in British televisual history. And what’s really truly incredible about it is that it’s not bound by space or time or genre or logic, so as an actor it sort of influences you, really…

Q: You can be Shakespearean one week, in the future the next, you can even be a different character. In the David Tennant years, and they were wonderful, sadly they’re over –

A: He was wonderful!

Q: And Christopher Eccleston was brilliant –

A: I loved Chris as well, yeah, I thought Chris was great.

Q: But there was one story strand where he completely forgot he was the Doctor.

A: Who? David did? In the show?

Q: Do you not watch the series?

A: Oh, you mean in the show, as a narrative structure –

Q: Not in real life! But you have infinite possibilities with this series.

A: Yeah, and I think it’s something that you probably realise more and more as the series goes on, and I think as the series evolves my Doctor becomes more assured, and develops. And of course there are infinite narratives and infinite multitudes of the character that you can explore. And this is the new sonic screwdriver!

Q: Did you practice with that at home?

A: I did. I tossed it a few times.

Q: You like that?

A: Yeah.

Q: So they gave it to you, to take away and make it your own thing?

A: Yeah, I think with anything dramatic, you have to take it away and sort of make it your own thing.

Q: Now the TARDIS is different as well, isn’t it?

A: It is, yeah. You’re gonna love that.

Q: How is it different?

A: Well, again I can’t give too much away. It’s bigger. It’s bigger on the inside than it was bigger on the inside before. It’s bigger.

Q: But the outside is still the same?

A: It’s still a police box. But there’s a different tint.

Q: That’s not the most exciting revelation I could have teased out of you.

A: It’s got levels. I’ll tell you that. It’s got different rooms, it’s got a pool and a library.

Q: Is there a hot tub in there for smoochy nights?

A: For some alone time with me and Amy, yes.

Q: So Amy is the new companion?

A: Yes, played by Karen Gillan.

Q: They’re gone for a ginger companion again.

A: Yes, a fiery red.

Q: Do you feel this is a proactive thing? Are they trying to welcome them back? Because a ginger person can get a hard time in the UK, so they’re saying ‘Look, the Doctor loves a red-haired person’…

A: Yeah, redheads are cool. Yeah, I mean you’ve seen her, she’s a 10.

Q: Sober 10 or drunk 10? So how many have you shot? Have you shot them all?

A: Yeah, we’ve shot thirteen. It takes up all your time, because the line-learning is extraordinary. So it’s strange now.

Q: You can relax a little bit.

A: Yeah.

Q: So this clip is from episode six?

A: Yes, it’s called ‘Vampires in Venice’. We shot it in Croatia, which doubles up rather superbly.

Q: So you film in Wales, but you also go off on location?

A: Yeah, we went to Puzzlewood, and we went to Stonehenge, which is rather glorious, we got to go in the middle of them.

Q: Were you at all tempted to carve your initials in there?

A: Absolutely. I wanted to climb on one of them, but they weren’t having any of it.

Q: And the bow tie, is that part of the costume?

A: It is. One thing I will say about this particular Doctor is that I think his costume will evolve. I’d quite like a hat.

Q: You should have a word with them.

A: I have had a word.

Q: Can you bring in your own things?

A: Yeah, I mean I brought in the tweed jacket and the braces, and then we put on the bow tie and it just sort of sat right.

Q: David was there for four years, I think the longest-serving Doctor was Tom Baker…

A: Seven years, wasn’t it?

Q: How long will you be in the role?

A: I hope to do at least another year, and ideally a couple more, we’ll see. It’s a wonderful part and I want to keep it. I’ve sort of got my teeth into it now.

Steven Moffat (2010)

There are a lot of interviews around at the moment, plugging the new series – which looks stunning, judging by the trailers. Anyway, I’ve tried to make a kind of ‘Best Of’ series, and the first is Steven Moffat. I’ve not bothered with all the ‘everyone’s great’ stuff that often pads out interviews and press conferences, I’ve gone for the more interesting stuff (imho):

On the Doctor and Amy

You take two attractive people and they will probably be a bit romantic about each other. It is a complex story between Amy and the Doctor – it is not simple. It is not a story you have ever seen between the companion and the Doctor before.

On the Doctor’s love life

The modern Doctor, is he sexualised? He’s aware of them. He loved Rose, but he didn’t seem to be doing anything about it. So I’ve just said, ‘We’re actually making a more definitive statement about this: the Doctor may long, he may notice but he doesn’t do.’

On returning characters and monsters

The more you back-reference, the more it feels like a sequel and the sequel is never as good as the original. But old favourites can return, provided you can do something new and exciting with them. There are no past characters coming back in this series, but I imagine that kids would love to see Captain Jack meet the new Doctor.

Abominable Snowmen loose in the London Underground! That was one of the most bizarre ideas in the history of television. What smoke-filled room did that come from, and what was in the smoke?

The Ice Warriors have yet to make a return.

I don’t think the Nimon is going to make it back. I haven’t got much hope for the Bandrils or the Garm. There are loads of monsters that didn’t work.

On the new series

The funniest thing ever in Doctor Who is Matt Smith trying to contain his enthusiasm in the face of all those vampire girls.

There is an episode in this series that I showed to my 10-year-old son and he said there is one scene that is the scariest thing that has ever happened in Doctor Who.

There is another episode that will make you gasp, then want to press rewind so you can see it all again.

Those scary statues (the Weeping Angels), I should warn you – and your children – are on their way back and they’re way way worse this time.

Soon you’ll see the Doctor grappling with Silurians, an enemy from Jon Pertwee’s time as The Doctor, who have a particular reason for wanting to take over the earth.

On The Eleventh Hour

That was quite a highly pressured script to write. Not so much the new era of Doctor Who as the new Doctor and the new companion. I had to find a way to make that work because it’s an entirely new cast. Any of those things that you call challenges are also rather good fun, to be honest. You become a writer because of those sort of things, don’t you? And you can’t be intimidated or worried by it. It’s hard work. That’s a hard working script. There’s a lot going on in it and you’ve got to make it fun and interesting. But, do you know, I’m not going to complain about that. Here’s a brand new Doctor, a brand new companion, a brand new TARDIS. That’s EXACTLY the job I wanted.

On the 2010 season finale

I question your tactics if you are saying we should promote a Doctor Who season finale with the words ‘Now smaller than ever!’

I hadn’t done a finale (before) – that was a hoot, practically everything happens, and some of it twice.

What is Doctor Who?

Doctor Who isn’t just Hammer Horror or sci-fi. It’s also a little bit The Generation Game, a little bit showbiz. It’s a weird show. It’s half scary Gothic castle, half shiny floorshow. And that’s part of it. Any show can be one or the other, but Doctor Who manages to be both and have a burping wheelie bin and an absolutely heart-breaking scene in the same episode.

I mean, imagine the sheer nonsense of devising a show, one of whose mission statements was to terrorise eight-year-olds! I’m not sure we could pitch it now. But then two things that have a mission statement to terrorise children that I can think of are Doctor Who and Harry Potter and they’re both huge.

Doctor Who literally is a fairytale. It’s not really science fiction. It’s not set in space, it’s set under your bed. It’s at its best when it’s related to you, no matter what planet it’s set on. Every time it cleaves towards that, it’s very strong.

When I started watching it, I never stopped. And clearly I haven’t exactly given up on it now. I just love Doctor Who. I know you’re supposed to discriminate and say, ‘I like this bit better than the other bit.’ But it’s like James Bond films, I just like them all. Shut up about having opinions. It’s great. The most entertaining thing that British television has ever done. Full stop.

Is Doctor Who a children’s show?

Although it is watched by far more adults than children, there’s something fundamental in its DNA that makes it a children’s programme and it makes children of everyone who watches it. If you’re still a grown up by the end of that opening music, you’ve not been paying attention.

On being the showrunner

There is nothing scarier than watching Doctor Who as a child. Scarier than Tomb of the Cybermen or Terror of the Autons? Are you mad? No, those are truly terrifying. Look, I always say it was really scary taking on the job and doing the job. But, really, it’s just exciting. You can waste an awful lot of time being frightened and nervous of things like that. But if you do, you’ll never kiss the girl, will you? It just won’t happen. You cannot worry about things like that. It could all go to disaster but, you know, it won’t. It’ll be great.

I’m not going to get into what I do with scripts, for heaven’s sake. That would be vulgar and wrong. But there’s no-one got a credit on this show for writing it, that didn’t write it. My role is making sure that every script is good and none of the writers are cross with me. We’re all very good friends. Now and then I might take a pass at some element of a script or I might suggest some plot or whatever. But the writer is fully involved at all times. No-one is upset, I promise you – you can ask them. That’s the job. It’s totally collaborative.

On the Doctor Who brand

To me, a ‘brand’ sounds evil, reminiscent of men in tall hats running factories and beating small children, but you have to be across it. All those things should be joyous – those toys should be terrific – because the active creative engagement of children with Doctor Who is unlike any other show that they watch. When Doctor Who is over, they get up, invent their own monster, their own planet, their own Doctor and play. I know because my son recently designed a new Tardis control room. If anyone said to me ‘invent a new monster so we can sell more toys’, I’d kick them out of my office.

On the BBC

I hope the Tories don’t win. Let’s not beat around the bush. (But) I’d hope that anyone who becomes prime minister would look at the organisation and ask themselves if the world would really be better off without it. Are we really going to put James Murdoch in place of (the BBC)? Can you imagine how shit everything would be? Never mind the fine and glorious things that the BBC does, imagine how shit everything would be! Stuff would be shit! Let’s not have really good restaurants, let’s have Kentucky Fried Chicken!

Pennant Roberts (Various)

Here are various Pennant Roberts quotes, covering two stories from his time as a ‘Doctor Who’ director:

The Sunmakers

Bob Holmes had written in these giant credit cards, and I thought it would be amusing to have them look like Barclaycards, so the designer used the same coloured stripes. When we got into the camera rehearsal, Graham Williams said ‘Pennant, that looks like a giant credit card’, and I said ‘Yes, Graham, that was the idea’. And he decided that it wasn’t on at all, saying the BBC would be giving Barclaycard free publicity. Design had to change the card, which I thought was a shame, considering the nature of capitalism as represented in the story.

Warriors of the Deep

With the Silurians, we discovered that the actors could only be in costume for something like fifteen minutes at a time, because they were overheating hugely inside their rubber suits. And so I’ve got this very vivid memory of the make-up team coming out between takes to cool the Silurians down between takes.

In Johnny Byrne’s storytelling, we quite clearly needed the Silurians to speak text, to tell themselves what was happening in order to get the story moving forward. So that’s how we ended up with the flashing lights, to identity which Silurian was saying what to whom, because you couldn’t actually see their lips move – because their lips didn’t move! Looking at it now, it seems very dated.

The three Silurians sound as if they’ve been to a very minor public school, and they’ve been taught elocution from a very early age. I don’t think you’d attempt to do that sort of thing today.

Johnny Byrne (2008)

Here’s Johnny Byrne talking about ‘Warriors of the Deep’ and, in particular, his approach to the Silurians and the Sea Devils (who he refers to as aliens!). His comments about the need for the Silurians to have a more human face are interesting, given certain rumours about the new series…

“At some point in ‘Doctor Who’, monsters became mandatory whether they were needed or not, because there was some sort of weird belief among the higher echelons that this was what made children flock to the show. There should have been a better way to represent the aliens in ‘Warriors of the Deep’ (the Silurians and the Sea Devils), rather than the way we did. I think to make the story believable, the Silurians needed to be more humanoid in their form, in their aspect, so we understood them in a human sense, and the Sea Devils should have been much more of a physical threat. Instead of the Sea Devils being hunters and killers, SAS types, we got these sort of lumbering chaps doing their best in very heavy costumes.

“Did we really need the Myrka? It’s a question I don’t think I can answer, even though I wrote the Myrka. Would it have been better without the Myrka? The Myrka would come into any situation that required physical force, and the Myrka would cause chaos, and then the Silurians would come in and say ‘Oh, isn’t this dreadful, we shouldn’t have done this but we had no choice’. The Myrka, as it appeared, rather destroyed that illusion, because first of all it showed the Silurians to be idiots, to have created anything so pathetic and ineffective, and it became the most despised and hated creature in the history of ‘Doctor Who’.”