Christian Cawley's Blog, page 260

Doctor Who Gets New Four-Legged Friend!

Drew Boynton is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Move over, K-9…there’s a new four-legged companion coming to the TARDIS!

Peter Capaldi’s love of classic Doctor Who has shone through once again, as the actor has convinced the show’s bosses to give his Doctor a new companion similar to that famous “tin dog”.

The new companion will be a cyborg cat, inventively named “Fuzz-E”.  He will make his debut in a New Year’s Special and will be a recurring character in series nine and beyond.

The top-secret special may also see the return of several beloved characters, including K-9.  There are whispers that Tom Baker is being wooed to make an appearance as The Curator (hot off his scene in The Day of the Doctor), possibly finding Fuzz-E timelocked in an ancient Time Lord etching.  If Baker is unable to appear, Ninth Doctor actor Christopher Eccleston—himself the owner of several dozen cats–is almost certain to return.

Fuzz-E will be portrayed by feline actor Peter Catapaldi, with CGI robotic parts added later.  He will be voiced by a succession of music stars, including George Michael, Miley Cyrus, and “various” members of One Direction, as most of the cat’s dialogue will be sung, due to a “malfunctioning” voice chip.  When asked about the show’s new four-legged companion, big man Steven Moffat had this to say:

“Fuzz-E will go boldly where no cat has, er, ever gone before.  Bold!  Cat!  …Scotland rocks!”

The New Year’s special, tentatively titled “The Night of the Animal Doctor”, is scheduled for broadcast on BBC One and Animal Planet on January 1st.  The rumored story involves Fuzz-E saving the Twelfth Doctor from near disaster as he mistakenly lands the TARDIS on Earth during April Fool’s Day.

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Pertwee Family Backs “Stupendous” Capaldi

James Lomond is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Sean, son of Third Doctor, Jon Pertwee, has said how his Musketeers co-star Peter Capaldi, will be “stupendous” as the Doctor. While filming the bloody period drama in Prague last Autumn he said,

I think he’s going to bring some real gravitas and weight, which only comes with age. Taking nothing away from Matt [Smith], who I thought was great, I just think he’ going to [be] stupendous.

And it turns out that Capaldi was known to Sean and indeed his father before. In the interview Sean talked about how John was “very fond” of Peter, that the Pertwee household were “delighted” at his casting and that he was,

…an extremely lovely gentleman. He was very kind to my family when my father passed away, he was big fan of my dad’s actually.

It’s no surprise that Capaldi – a fan since his childhood (and with some fan-boy articles under his belt, no less) held Jon Pertwee in high regard. And much comment has been made on the similarity between his and Pertwee’s costume (flashes of red lining anyone?) But it’s heartening to hear such warm things said of Capaldi in return. He consistently comes across as a complete gentleman and more than able to take on the mantle of childhood hero from our erstwhile Eleventh incarnation.

Speaking of which, what do you think about Sean Pertwee’s comment on gravitas? Many thought Smith wouldn’t be able to hold his own on screen being the freshest face in the role so far, but he surprised his detractors with some heavy-duty on-screen presence and powerful speeches.

Do you think there is something that only age can bring to a performance or is it all down to the actor’s skill? Is an older Time Lord better – what do you think?

(PA)

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Can You Hear Sutekh Whispers?

Alex Skerratt is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

The things that go on behind closed sarcophagi…

Some intriguing behind-the-scenes audio from Pyramids of Mars has emerged on Soundcloud. It features Bernard Archard as Marcus Scarman and Michael Sheard as his brother Laurence – as well as incumbent Time Lord Tom Baker – as the cast wrestle with the pronunciation of the script’s dialogue.

We’ve heard rumours that the whole thing is simply the work of Doctor Who voice actor and impersonator John Guilor, but you’d have to be a real Giza to fall for that one…!

Over to you, fellow Whovians…

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Doctorin’ The TARDIS at the Sci-Fi Weekender

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Several sci-fi events have taken place this past weekend on both sides of the Atlantic – some of you out there are more than likely nursing serious Doctor Who party time come downs!

To ease your path back to sanity, here’s a superb moment from the Sci-Fi Weekender 5, in which some dancers give their own interpretation to The Timelords’ “Doctorin’ The TARDIS” during the evening’s entertainment…

(With thanks to Kopic)

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Rani Actress Kate O’Mara Dies at 74

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Actress Kate O’Mara, whose career included many interesting appearances alongside her role as renegade Time Lady the Rani in Doctor Who, has died aged 74, it has been announced.

A vegetarian and animal rights activist, O’Mara was born 10 August 1939 and made her first appearance on stage in a 1963 production of The Merchant of Venice and went on to feature in many shows on TV and on stage. During her career she was married to actors Richard Willis and Jeremy Young, and was sister to actress Belinda Carroll.

Also known for her appearances in Dynasty as Caress Morell (sister to Joan Collins’ Alexis Carrington), as Laura Wilde in Britain’s “answer to Dynasty” Howards’ Way, the bad-as-it-sounds cross-channel ferry soap opera Triangle (not to mention an early career high in a pair of Hammer Horror movies before winning a role in the popular BBC series The Brothers opposite Colin Baker), O’Mara might have been more familiar to modern TV viewers from appearances in Bad Girls and Absolutely Fabulous. Most recently she played Marlene Dietrich in a stage play entitled Lunch with Marlene and Mrs Cheveley in Oscar Wilde’s stage play An Ideal Husband (both 2008).

Kate O’Mara’s two televised appearances as the Rani in Doctor Who were in The Mark of the Rani (1985) and Time of the Rani (1987), the latter marking the introduction of Sylvester McCoy. (She also appeared in Dimensions in Time in 1993 for Children in Need and reprised her Time Lady villain in 2000′s audio The Rani Reaps the Whirlwind. All of the Rani’s appearances except Dimensions in Time were written by husband and wife duo Pip and Jane Baker, who famously had the actress imitating Bonnie Langford’s Melanie Bush (quite convincingly, it should be added) in Time and the Rani.

The Rani first appeared against Colin Baker’s Sixth Doctor in the entertaining 1985 serial The Mark of the Rani (which also featured Anthony Ainley as the Master in an evil Time Lord double team against the Doctor). Baker today recalled the actress, tweeting:

Oh my goodness. Kate O'Mara is no longer with us. Sad sad news. A delightful, committed and talented lady and actress. We are the poorer

— Colin Baker (@SawbonesHex) March 30, 2014

It seemed that O’Mara had hoping for a possible return to Doctor Who, observing the importance of age in a female villain during 2013′s 50th anniversary celebrations:

I think it’s quite an interesting concept and if you remember things like Grimm’s Fairytales, the older woman is often the villainess, often the terrifying figure – why I do not know, but often she is. I think it’s an idea to be exploited.

Not only an actress but a writer as well (two novels and two non-fiction works to her name) the actress had been unwell recently, although she had been performing her one-woman show “An Evening With Kate O’Mara” until late 2013.

Perhaps one of Britain’s most underrated actresses, Kate O’Mara had a lot of fans around the world (most notably among Doctor Who and Dynasty fandom). She’ll be missed.

The post Rani Actress Kate O’Mara Dies at 74 appeared first on Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews.

Mark Gatiss: The Doctor Could Meet Jane Austen!

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

We seem to have been chatting about Mark Gatiss’ trip to Brazil throughout March, a trip with BBC Worldwide to promote Doctor Who and Sherlock in South America’s biggest economy where popularity for both shows is steadily increasing.

Indeed, we shouldn’t overlook the trip – as well as promoting the show, it could prove to be a dry-run for future events in the country featuring the stars from both shows.

Among the many quotes to have been collected in Gatiss’ travels there, the following possibility was offered when the writer revealed he was penning two scripts (something he’s since clarified):

One of the things which new Doctor Who sort of invented was the idea of a celebrity historical – Charles Dickens, Agatha Christie, Winston Churchill, Shakespeare. There’s three writers there so I think Jane Austen stands quite a quite a good chance actually…

I’m not quite sure what the adventure would be. Maybe an alien posing as Mr Darcy.

Having Jane Austen haunted by aliens posing as her characters might well be the way to go, but would you prefer a different writer – Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, perhaps?

(Cbnfoz, via DoctorWhoTV.co.uk)

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Is There Cold On Mars?

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Remember when the Doctor tried to stop time from taking its course? The Waters of Mars is a defining moment of Doctor Who, and it’s hard to believe that it is over four years old!

Today we’re going to be taking a look at the 2009 special, the penultimate televised adventure for the Tenth Doctor before The End of Time (a sidestep to the future in The Day of the Doctor notwithstanding). In the video above, actors Sharon Duncan Brewster and Michael Goldsmith (Maggie Cain and Roman Groom in the episode) recall the extreme conditions of filming The Waters of Mars.

To celebrate this superb story, we’re going to be offering readers a special feature later this week, complete with videos, images and recollections. Don’t miss it!

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Mark Gatiss Clarifies “Two Episodes” Statement

Christian Cawley is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

As reported previously, Mark Gatiss’ BBC Worldwide trip to Brazil has revealed that the writer and actor has been tasked with writing two episodes for Doctor Who.

However, while we initially took this to mean Series 8, it seems that isn’t necessarily the case…

Speaking on Twitter this week, Gatiss offered clarification:

To clarify. I've been commissioned to write two episodes of 'Doctor Who'. That doesn't mean they'll both necessarily be in this season.

— Mark Gatiss (@Markgatiss) March 27, 2014

There have been rumours that Gatiss is writing the Christmas episode this year, which would be the first time since Doctor Who returned in 2005 that task has been given to a writer other than the showrunner at the time. This in turn has even strengthened support for Gatiss to take over from Steven Moffat when he eventually leaves (although we suspect the show will revert to a more traditional production model when this occurs).

Better still, this clarification tells us that Doctor Who Series 9 is in pre-production!

 

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She’s Not Madame Nostradamus, But Tara Carstensen Is A Witty Little Knitter!

Jonathan Appleton is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

Are you keen to knit your own Tom Baker scarf, but in need of guidance? Chances are that long-term fan Tara Carstensen can help!

Tara is the go-to specialist when it comes to Fourth Doctor scarves and her site includes patterns for every item of woollen neckwear worn in the Tom Baker era, plus a couple of curiosities that never made it on to the screen.

Something of a perfectionist, Tara initially based her designs on photographs and videos but found the results “crude and totally incorrect”. She stuck at it, however, even if British fans haven’t always been brimming with enthusiasm:

In the UK, it has a bit of a negative connotation. People who wear them are often branded as ‘nutters.’ I’ve worn a Who scarf several times in the UK and received a not-so-warm welcome among other Who fans.

As well as every scarf featured in seasons 12 to 18, Tara’s pattern collection also includes the ‘Shada’ scarf from the famously uncompleted 1979 six-parter. If you never knew that Tom’s scarf in that story (‘a very odd duck’ according to Tara) never appeared again, you do now. She can also help you out with a non-canon but tasteful ’Blue Variant’.

Visit Tara’s Witty Little Knitter site to explore the full range and read her interview (happily, she does concede that UK fans have warmed to her work) at Geek Mom.

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Tom Baker Autobiography Now Available on Kindle

Nick Kitchen is a writer at Kasterborous Doctor Who News and Reviews - All the latest Doctor Who news and reviews with our weekly podKast, features and interviews, and a long-running forum.

It can be said, without debate, that Tom Baker’s turn as the Fourth Doctor is one of science fiction’s most iconic performances. The booming voice, the alien-like persona, the cocksure attitude; every bit the “genuine article.” However, if all you know of Baker is his time in the TARDIS, then you are certainly missing out. As incredible a performer Tom Baker is, he is equally an immensely interesting person. And now is the best time to get to know him!

Originally released in 1997, Who On Earth is Tom Baker?: An Autobiography gave an incredible insight into the life of the most popular actor to portray our beloved Time Lord. Of course, now it’s 2014 and books tend to disappear and go out of print over time; what’s a curious modern Whovian to do? Fear not, dear reader! The autobiography is now available in Kindle format from Amazon!

Detailing his life before, during, and after Doctor Who, the book is a must read for fans, new and old. Who On Earth is Tom Baker? is currently available for the fantastic price of £4.94. Now, dear reader, the question is this: have you read the book and what did you think? If you haven’t read it, are you planning on picking it up? Sound off below!

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