Earlier this month, THN headed down to the BFI Southbank to join Peter Capaldi, Jenna Coleman and Steven Moffat on the first stages of their Doctor Who World Tour. This wasn’t just your standard Q&A session though as an eager audience of fans, writers and BBC folk all got their first full look of ‘Deep Breath’, the opening episode of the 12th Doctor’s reign.
For our review of the opening episode, just head over here, but I have to say it’s one of the strongest opening episodes of the new Doctor Who so far and coupled with superb writing from Moffat, they had the added bonus of direction from SIGHTSEERS’ Ben Wheatley, plus the usual hard working BBC team to fully launch Capaldi into the history books of Doctor Who.
Before the audience got their chance to speak to their new Doctor, the ever-welcoming Boyd Hilton hosted an insightful, interesting session that was full of laughs, Moffat having his usual entertaining rants over bizarre questions from one or two – “Why would we do a movie? Wouldn’t you rather have 12 episodes than ONE film every two years?!” – and Capaldi revealing more about his huge love for Doctor Who and how he thought he’d messed up the audition but, very thankfully, he didn’t at all. Check it out in full below:
Boyd Hilton: Peter, how does it feel to be ‘The Doctor’?
Peter Capaldi: Wonderful. [Laughter from all] I’m going to be selfish and say that it’s an extraordinary privilege and when you see it all going together like that, you’re thinking is that really me? Being Doctor Who? I’m just so proud to be a part of all of it; I think it’s a wonderful, wonderful programme.
BH: Jenna, how was it working with a new Doctor?
Jenna Coleman: I wanted to be an open as I could possibly be, and to change and to allow Peter in whichever way he wanted to. It’s brave and bold and I think the show feels rejuvenated.
BH: You do spend a lot of this episode being quite angry…
JC: [Laughs] I know! I think that’s what’s so wonderful is that it’s thrown everything off-kilter and on its head. Especially for Clara as she’s faced with this man she can’t figure out, she can’t control and he doesn’t respond in the same way as she’d used to. So, that is really frustrating and confusing for her to figure out how it all works, it’s so different and there’s an interesting story to tell through this new series.
BH: That scene in the restaurant, it’s quite a long scene where you’re working each other out.
PC: Well, that’s a well written scene and that’s one of the great things we’ve had, is extremely strong scripts. When you have material that good, you can concentrate on the acting without the damage control [you have] when the script isn’t quite up to it. It’s great! We just surfed through it.
JC: It’s also unusual to have a scene where we’re just sat talking for so long…
PC: And also, it’s about Jenna and I getting to know each other as the programme unfolds. We didn’t know each other before, so it’s also Peter and Jenna getting to know each other…As the Doctor and Clara.
BH: There does seem to be a different pace, tone, with longer scenes and was that planned?
Steven Moffat: To different degrees, that carries on throughout the series but that was a very explicit and clear idea. I was starting to think there was a danger we were getting faster every year and so soon the episodes would be over in 4 minutes, I thought I had to do something else [laughs] and not that I didn’t like that before but every idea has its day and there has to be a new one.
It’s at this point Steven asks everyone to not give away the major spoiler that’s in the opener of Deep Breath, the return of Matt Smith…
BH: Yes, that’s a very bold thing to do, to have the old Doctor come back…
SM: Fastest return ever! [Laughter] It just feel utterly right, and right for both the old and new that he would think of that just as he was dying, so we shot that during The Time of the Doctor. I wrote that first and it felt right. I did wonder when we sat in the cutting room, ‘Does this seem strange?’ but you remember you’re making Doctor Who and say ‘Yes!’ [Laughter]
PC: I love Matt Smith and all of us thought it felt right.
Steven Moffat was then asked about the casting process, to follow Matt Smith…
SM: I realised we couldn’t go for another Matt Smith character, another quirky young man with interesting hair; people would start to notice [Laughter]. I just…I’d know Peter for quite a few years and when Doctor Who was coming back, In The Thick of It had just started and Peter came looming up to me in a sinister fashion and I wanted to speak about that but he wouldn’t let me, he just kept going on and on about Doctor Who. Many years later, he came into my mind and I spoke to Mark Gatiss, saying ‘make me a list’ of who you think he should be, and he spent the next seven days solidly writing names, a space underneath and then Peter’s name, and everyone agreed. Then, we got Peter round to my house, as this is what I do with my life, when he has his Musketeer’s beard…
PC: I thought my audition was a disaster, I’d done it so badly and was out of the loop – pardon the expression – but I’d enjoyed the experience so much and thought if that’s as far as it goes, well, that was worth it.
SM: I did [wrote] three daft scenes that weren’t based on a ’12th Doctor’ but a mix of Tennant and Smith and, sorry to say this Peter, to do Doctor Who, you have to be able to talk absolute insanity [Laughter] and really mean it, and look at him, it was obviously him; he’s been rehearsing this since he was in his bedroom.
PC: You wrote a hilarious regeneration scene in which he couldn’t see his face and he kept questioning Clara about it ‘How’s the face?’ ‘Does it look good?’ and she was ‘…it’s okay’ – and ‘What do you mean, okay?’ OLD? And she couldn’t say. [More laughter]
BH: I read that when you got the part, you said you went to Forbidden Planet? AND as I saw you there, so I know it’s true…
Peter Capaldi tries to then say that he didn’t but then admits he did but at the time no-one really noticed him…
SM: I once met John Barrowman in there, and we were stood next to a Dalek talking and no-one noticed. John was wearing glasses so maybe it works?!
JC: I was at the airport recently and there was someone sat next to me making a paper TARDIS literally sat next to me, and I was just watching them. [Laughter]
Boyd then moves towards the comments about relationships in Doctor Who, and the flirting, he then opens up the question as to whether that was considered again or the approach this time now it feels like a return to the early days of Who…
PC: I remember thinking in my own head that wasn’t [a moment] that we weren’t going to do it, but it was different – not subconsciously – 
SM: David Tennant was a magnificent, flirty doctor and when Matt came in, he decided he’d be rubbish at flirting and he said every time he’d do it, it was a disaster. He never gets it. The whole thing with River…I don’t think we’ve had a properly bullish doctor for years, and no, the idea with Peter [was different] but there’s still that scene with David and Billie on the beach in Doomsday, so it keeps changing…
Mr Moffat continued; It’s got to be said, for those who have poured over the classic series, flirting didn’t begin in 2005, Patrick Troughton for example… [More laughter]
BH: [Tell us about the] decision to bring in Ben Wheatley…
SM: He actually got in touch with us, he’s a brilliant director and I have to say he didn’t come in saying ‘I have to make Doctor Who like my movies!’, he was very concerned about making it right, but we knew he’d deliver on the creepiness, and my god, does he deliver on blowing up Daleks – he was so happy!
Peter then chirps in very quickly;
PC: I like the blowing up of Daleks. I actually wasn’t scheduled to be on the set at that point (you’ll see) but I went to see. The call sheet said ‘Dalek Attack!’ and you got to go to see that…I’ve never seen so many men, professional men, transformed back to their childhood while doing an honest day’s work.
BH: When you got the role, did you think you really wanted to blow up a Dalek?
PC: (Already nodding) YEAH. [Laughter]
BH: Did you speak to Matt [Smith] and David [Tennant] about the experience of being the Doctor, what did they say?
PC: Yeah, it’s a very unique and small club. Ha, yeah, Matt and David have been fabulous because it’s a unique position to be in and they also know the personnel – and they’ve been wonderful. I took Matt to lunch and he turned up on crutches…I said ‘What’s happened to you, mate?’ he was ‘This show! This show!’ and he’s younger than me and on crutches, so what am I going to do with it?! [Laughter] David said to me subtly ‘So, is it true?’ and ‘Well, yeah…might be true. They’ve both been great.
BH: And the Scottish question, the accent – what about that?
SM: One of the things we talked about that day [of the audition] was you saying what does it mean? His accent must be acquired randomly so…
PC: The idea that that he doesn’t have an accent is ridiculous and I thought it was important to ‘bring the Doctor to me’ and a lot of actors say, they don’t become the part; the part becomes them, which pulls it more closely. I think the Doctor is closer to me than Malcolm Tucker [from In The Thick Of It] was, there was a bigger leap with him, and this is closer to me.
BH: You’ve finished filming, what’s the most fun thing for you?
PC: Jenna has been absolutely incredible. I have to say that, first of all, the welcome I got from the entire crew and all the people in Cardiff has been fantastic but working with Jenna has been great. She’s an incredible actress, so funny and so moving, and what she has to do this season is so demanding, and she does it with grace and class and so my favourite thing has been working with Jenna. [Big round of applause]
BH: And Jenna?
JC: Err, the return of S…nah [laughter] …no, as you can see, the generosity that Peter has from day one has been, you know, I feel really excited about all these screenings because I feel like I’ve watched over 8 months of what Peter has been doing and it’s been great to now see it properly, and watch that new Doctor being born. Also working with Peter, it’s interesting in how fearless he really is and also someone who is totally unafraid to make all these plans and then abandon them if he doesn’t feel they’re working, it’s incredible to watch.
BH: Is different Steven when you see it played out, after you’ve written it?
SM: Oh, it’s always better than it is in my head. I mean that’s the point when you see and go ‘Oh, I didn’t know the scene was about that!’ and yeah, I was just watching the restaurant bit and I remember that in the briefing and realised we were onto something.
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And then followed a few questions from the audience but all positive and mostly wanting a moment or an idea of what the series will bring. The overall feeling was of something fresh and new and even after 50 years of Doctor Who, it doesn’t look like slowing now – Capaldi is going to be one hell of a Doctor and we can’t wait to see where his adventures take us next.
For more Doctor Who coverage, which include our first episode review blog, head right here.
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Photos by Getty Images.
