Entertainment Weekly has done an
interview with Steven Moffat covering a wide range of topics from Series 8 to the Sherlock.
ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: When do you hope to announce the identity of the new Doctor?
STEVEN MOFFAT: Unless we have an insane plan,
we’ll announce a new Doctor within days of finalizing the new Doctor.
Because it’s very very hard to keep any kind of a secret. The last time,
when we chose Matt, we had to hold over on that one, because there was a
Christmas
Doctor Who special called “The Next Doctor” for which Russell (T. Davies, former
Doctor Who showrunner) was playing the game of pretending it was going to be David Morrissey. So we couldn’t deflate that. [
Laughs]. But I think we’ll go public pretty fast.
Have you at least narrowed down the sex of the actor who will be playing the new Doctor?
I’m not going to comment at all on the direction we’re going. Sorry!
Are you hoping the new Doctor will appear in this year’s Christmas special?
Yes. That’s not the hope — that’s the
plan. It’ll be
the traditional regeneration. You know, the eleventh will fall and the
twelfth shall rise. And you’ll see that in the closing moments of the
show. I mean, you sometimes sit and think, “Are there better ways of
doing it? Is there a different way of doing it?” But quite honestly what
could be better than that? It’s just too exciting.
[Laughs]
Is Matt going to have to wear a wig when he films the
Christmas special? He seems to have had a very severe haircut for his
role in Ryan Gosling’s How to Catch a Monster.
We’re sprinkling fertilizer on his head as we speak. I don’t
know. If you care to take a look at “The Angels Take Manhattan” there
are a couple of scenes that Karen Gillan came back to do in the
graveyard after she’d had her radical haircut and she is wearing what
seems like a strategically draped otter on her head. [
Laughs]
However, we effect it, the Doctor
will turn up in his trademark coif. We can’t have Matt’s last stand in the TARDIS without his proper look. So,
thank you, Ryan Gosling…
Am I right in thinking that the new series—the first post-Matt shows—will be broadcast in late summer 2014?
I think that’s probably right. But these things change so often.
How did you find out that Matt was leaving?
Well, I’ve known broadly speaking for a very long while because
I knew how long, when he first came in, he was broadly speaking
intending to do. And obviously, being the man I am, I always tried to
persuade him to do longer and to do more and he [stayed] a little bit
longer than he intended to. I knew that he would do what most of them do
and do his three years. It’s a difficult thing for any departing
Doctor.
Curiously enough, it was really to me that David Tennant resigned.
Because he was considering whether to continue now that I was taking
over. And both of them went through he same experience. It’s not like
leaving any other part, it really isn’t. It’s sort of like abdicating
[the throne] and it’s genuinely emotional, it’s upsetting. It’s an
upheaval in your life. It’s something you really have to contemplate.
And I remember what both of them said during their period of anguish —
when they were contemplating letting somebody else into the TARDIS —
they both said, “There’s part of me, I would just stay doing it forever.
So, if I don’t leave now, maybe I’ll just carry on forever. And that
wouldn’t be right for me or the show.” It was a difficult, emotional
experience for both of them.
When did he actually tell you that he was leaving?
We discussed ages ago that we would do three series and then he would do the 50
th
and then he’d do Christmas. That was Plan A for a very, very long
while. That may sound cold that it was so far in advance but you’ve got
to plan a career. [
Laughs] The question was, “Will I be able to
talk him out of it?” We went out for lunch and he said that he’d come
very close to doing another series but it was the same argument: “If I
do another series, I think I might do two more series, or three more
series. I think I might never leave.” It’s that thing of wanting to
leave while you’re a huge hit and not let it tail off. It’s part of the
ecology of the program, it’s part of the DNA of the program, that there
is going to be a new Doctor now and then.
None of them ever want to outstay their welcome, and Matt certainly
didn’t. Not that I think he was in any danger of that, frankly. It’s
also, it has to be said, an overwhelming schedule for the actor playing
the Doctor. As a workload it precludes you doing anything else. It
precludes theatre, it precludes any significant other television or film
work really. And even trying to crowbar some time in for him to do
other things — which was part of our charm offensive — in the end he
wanted to go and develop the other parts of his career.
What can you tell us about this November’s Doctor Who 50th anniversary show?
[
Laughs] Oh, well, very, very little. It will feature
of course Matt and Jenna Coleman, but in addition there’ll be Billie
Piper and David Tennant and John Hurt. But we’ve been really quite
careful. We have a philosophy that anything we shot outside we had to
own up to but the rest of it…You’re just going to have to wait until
November to find out about.
What is the format of the 50th anniversary special? Is it movie-length?
It’s a special episode. I think you could call it movie-length,
yeah. I mean, I’m saying that with a slight hint of vagueness because I
don’t know the finished running time. [
Laughs] It’s certainly well over an hour.
What was it like having Matt and David together?
They really loved each other and had a huge laugh together. And
of course they’ve been through this experience that only the two of
them can talk about, really, in the modern world. They are the two
people that have played that part at a time when the series is this big.
They spent the entire time just sitting together talking animatedly.
Could you talk about how their Doctors relate to each other?
Traditionally, there’s been a bit of edge when Doctors have met each
other onscreen?
Well, when you’re talking to yourself, there’s no filter! You
don’t spare yourself! They’re quite a fun pairing, I would say. There’s a
bit of the normal joshing of each other but they’re both such
enthusiastic Doctors. While they might be sort of competing slightly,
they’re both standing there saying, “Oh god, it’s so cool, there’s two
of me!” So, it’s very different. I think the other one that worked
brilliantly was Jon Pertwee and Patrick Troughton. They were incredibly
funny together. This is very different from that but it’s a sublime
double act.
What was it like working with John Hurt?
He’s wonderful. That’s hardly a headline: “John Hurt is a very good actor.” But he’s terrific. It’s a lovely 50
th anniversary treat, I suppose. You get a whole new Doctor played by a proper screen legend.
The Tom Baker-era monsters the zygons are coming back?
Oh yes, that’s confirmed. We had to do a scene with the zygons
outside, so there was no point in pretending they weren’t there. We kept
very close to the original design. It’s a cracking monster.
I grew up in the ’70s and the zygons loom very large in my
memory. I was quite surprised to recently discover they only really
appeared in one episode.
That’s right. Only one story. Despite the fact that they are clearly one of the most successful monsters the show has ever had.
The other main part of the 50th anniversary celebrations is the TV movie An Adventure in Space and Time,
which details the creation of the show and actor William Hartnell’s
tenure as the original Doctor. What else can you tell us about that?
Oh, it’s gorgeous. It’s a very, very different celebration of
Doctor Who.
Are you aware that David Bradley (who plays Hartnell in the
movie) is now a thousand times more famous in America than he was a
couple of months ago thanks to his pivotal role on the recent season of Game of Thrones?
Oh, brilliant. That’s excellent. I love David. He’s such a
clever actor. And we’ve had him in the proper show as well. He’s in
“Dinosaurs On a Spaceship.”
How much longer do you yourself intend to stay with the show?
I think a year at a time. I’ve signed up for this next year,
with the new Doctor. It’s one of those jobs when you know when you’ve
had enough. At the moment I haven’t had enough and I’m thoroughly
enjoying it. I’m very excited for the challenge of the new Doctor and
establishing that new Doctor. So, no plans to leave as yet. But that
doesn’t mean I’ll be here for 20 years. There will come that day when I
think it’s time someone else had a go and it’s time I did something
else.
You’re also the executive producer of Sherlock. Have you finished shooting the new series yet?
Oh, I wish! We’ve done two. But we’ve now got a small gap — a
small gap? A large gap! — while Martin (Freeman) goes back to New
Zealand to film a bit more of the
Hobbit and then he’ll return to us. Hopefully, by that time, I’ll actually have finished the
Sherlock script I’m writing and we’ll make another one.
We’ll, I’d better let you go off and do that.
[
Laughs] Yeah, that might be an idea.
