Dr. Who Does 'A Christmas Carol'

BBC America announced that it will be premiering the DOCTOR WHO Christmas Special A Christmas Carol on the same day it airs in the UK—Christmas Day!

BBC AMERICA TO PREMIERE
DOCTOR WHO SPECIAL ON CHRISTMAS DAY

Harry Potter’s Michael Gambon Guest Stars in the Holiday-Themed Adventure
Following Matt Smith’s appearance on The Late Late Show with Craig Ferguson on Tuesday November 16, BBC AMERICA announces that the new Doctor Who Christmas Special will premiere in the U.S. for the first time on Christmas Day. The festive Dickens-inspired adventure, A Christmas Carol, is penned by award-winning lead writer and executive producer Steven Moffat (Sherlock, Coupling) and premieres Saturday, December 25, 9:00 pm ET.

Behid the Scenes Photo © BBC Television
Behind the Scenes Photo © BBC Television

Newlyweds Amy Pond (Karen Gillan) and Rory Williams (Arthur Darvill) are joined by Harry Potter’s Michael Gambon and Opera diva Katherine Jenkins, for what may be the Doctor’s most Christmassy adventure yet.
Lead Writer and Executive Producer, Steven Moffat, commented on the upcoming special: “Oh, we’re going for broke with this one. It’s all your favorite Christmas movies at once, in an hour, with monsters. And the Doctor. And a honeymoon. And … oh, you’ll see. I’ve honestly never been so excited about writing anything. I was laughing madly as I typed along to Christmas songs in April. My neighbors loved it so much they all moved away and set up a website demanding my execution. But I’m fairly sure they did it ironically.”
Perry Simon, General Manager, Channels, added: “Doctor Who has become a key part of the BBC AMERICA schedule, and having the opportunity to air A Christmas Carol on Christmas Day is like receiving our very own holiday gift. The Timelord may travel through time and space, but he’s certainly found a home at BBC AMERICA.”
Doctor Who is currently filming in Utah for next season’s two-part premiere set in the U.S. during the late ‘60s. Matt Smith, Karen Gillan, Arthur Darvill, Alex Kingston and guest star Mark Sheppard are all in production stateside. The next season premieres spring 2011 on BBC AMERICA.
In the run up to A Christmas Carol on Christmas Day, BBC AMERICA will be running a marathon of the series, beginning at midnight on December 24 and leading up to this year’s special. The marathon includes previous Christmas specials and a selection of favorite Doctor Who episodes from recent seasons.
Christmas Day will also see the premiere the Doctor Who Prom, a live concert featuring stars Matt Smith, Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill as hosts. The Doctor Who Prom was filmed earlier this year at the world renowned Royal Albert Hall and features appearances from the Weeping Angels, Daleks and the TARDIS. The BBC National Orchestra of Wales, who record the soundtrack for the series, present a selection of intergalactic music – including Murray Gold’s music from the TV show, plus a selection of classical favorites.
Fans can catch up on the new Doctor’s first season with Doctor Who: The Complete Fifth Series Blu-ray and DVD, both are now available in stores.

Dr. Who Season 6 — Behind-the-Scenes Clip

Check out this Behind-the-Scenes clip from the shooting of the  Season Six premeire  of DOCTOR WHO.
In the video, a group led by actor Mark Shepard (BATTLESTAR GALACTICA) corner River Song (Alex Kingston) in what looks to be a building under construction or renovation. They exchange dialog regarding some kind of invasion of America.  Trapped, Song chooses to fall backwards off the structure — no doubt expecting another timely rescue by the Doctor.
 Mark Shepard’s character is called  Canton Everett Delaware III, according to BBC America. Some scenes in the two-part epiode will be shot in the USA.

Click to Enlarge
Click to Enlarge

As can be seen in the photograph from the site, River Song seems to have markings on her arms, possibly ‘tally marks’ as a record of her incarceration in Stormcage Prison, for crimes not yet made clear — although we know they include killing a man that was a “hero to millions.”
Was that man The Doctor, and was River Song ever married to the Time Lord? All we know for sure is that they have some unusally deep bond.
Clip by Timeboyy, Photo by alun_vega, all via Doctor Who TV

Dr. Who To Shoot in U.S.

Matt Smith as Dr. WhoBBC AMERICA issued this statement today.

The BBC announced today that season six of  DOCTOR WHO, which delivered record ratings for BBC AMERICA earlier this year, will open with a spectacular two-parter set in the U.S. and penned by ‘Who supremo’ Steven Moffat.
In the special two-parter co-produced with BBC AMERICA, key scenes will be filmed in Utah for a story set in the late ’60s in which the Doctor, Amy and Rory find themselves on a secret summons that takes them on an adventure from the desert in Utah— right to the Oval Office itself.
Production on episodes one and two of the new season starts in Cardiff this month and Matt Smith, Karen Gillan and Arthur Darvill will then travel to America in mid November to shoot pivotal scenes. They will also be joined by Alex Kingston who reprises her role as River Song.

Moffat_BBC
Writer/Producer Steven Moffat

Showrunner and lead writer, Steven Moffat, said: “The Doctor has visited every weird and wonderful planet you can imagine, so he was bound get round to America eventually! And of course every  DOCTOR WHO fan will be jumping up and down and saying he’s  been in America before. But not for real, not on location—and not with a story like this one! Oh, you wait!”
Piers Wenger, Head of Drama BBC Wales and Executive Producer, added: “Steven’s scripts generally inspire us to go that extra mile – this time we’re going that extra four thousand. Thanks to our friends at BBC AMERICA and to the continuing ambition of our lead writer and production team, the first two episodes of Matt Smith’s second season as the Doctor are going global and look set to become Doctor Who’s most action-packed and ambitious season opener yet”.
The new season follows on from the DOCTOR WHO Christmas special guest starring Katherine Jenkins and Michael Gambon which is due to premiere at Christmas. Season six will start airing on BBC AMERICA in spring 2011 and has been split into two blocks, with the second block airing in autumn 2011. By splitting the series Moffat plans to give viewers one of the most exciting DOCTOR WHO cliffhangers and plot twists ever, leaving them waiting, on the edge of their seats, until the autumn to find out what happens.

As noted above, earlier DOCTOR WHO episodes from the original and revived series (The Gunfighters, Dalek,  Daleks in Manhattan) took place in the United States, and might have even shot second unit footage here.  However,  it’s the first time the principle actors have been in front of the cameras in America. Dalek was also set in Utah, albeit in an underground complex.
The 1996 FOX Network DOCTOR WHO movie with eighth Doctor Paul McGann was set in San Fransisco, but filmed in Canada (Vancouver, BC).

'Dr. Who' To Have Spilt Season

According to the UK’s The Guardian, the BBC’s DOCTOR WHO  will have, for the first time, a ‘split season’, airing half of the sixth season of the revived show with a mid-season cliff-hanger and break.
Moffat_BBCAt the Media Guardian Edinburgh International Television Festival, producer Steven Moffat (SHERLOCK) , explained DOCTOR WHO would run as two separate series (or seasons as we call them) , which will allow him to have two season premeiere and two cliff-hanging seaspn finales.  He promises the mid-season finale will be “an earth-shattering climax”.

“I kept referring to a mid-season finale. So we are going to make it two series – seven episodes at Easter building to an earth-shattering climax, a cliffhanger we could never normally do because it would be too long before it came back. An enormous game-changing cliffhanger that will change everything.

What I love about this idea is that when kids see Doctor Who go off the air, they will be noticeably taller when it comes back. It’s an age for children. With an Easter series, an autumn series and a Christmas special, you are never going to be more than few months from the new series of Doctor Who.

Tart that I am, we will now have two first nights and two finales, twice as many event episodes as we had before.”

DOCTOR WHO will run for seven episodes in Spring 2011,and then return in the Fall for another six on the BBC. It’s not clear as yet how BBC AMERICA will be handling the break.

Matt Smith and Karen Gillan in DOCTOR WHO
Matt Smith and Karen Gillan in DOCTOR WHO

The SyFy Channel has been following this pattern for several years, often doing 20 episodes of a series, and spilting them into two seasons of ten episodes with a break of several months between them.
Steven Moffat also said that he would be staying with the show for now, not planning on leaving “for a while yet”.
Co-star Karen Gillan (who plays  Amy Pond on the series). also attending the media event, said only that she was committed to DOCTOR WHO for the 2011 season.
Note: There is a video clip of Steven Moffat discussing the season break at the event to be found at the link above, which could not be embedded here.

Six Images from BBC America's "Outcasts"

BBC’s OUTCASTS promises to be an addictive new space western, and now we have six new stills to back it up. (Click to enlarge)

OUTCASTS

OUTCASTS
OUTCASTS

OUTCASTS

OUTCASTS

OUTCASTS

The drama will focus on a group of colonists who are forced to leave an uninhabitable Earth and start a new settlement elsewhere. The BBC provides this official description:

With Earth no longer habitable, a group of courageous pioneers have traveled to another planet to begin again. They’ve built the town of Forthaven on Carpathia and have the unique opportunity of creating a new and better future on another planet. Led by President Tate (Liam Cunningham via Clash Of The Titans) and his core team of Stella (Hermione Norris, MI-5), Cass (Daniel Mays, Atonement) and Fleur (Amy Manson, Being Human), they’re determined to run the civilization in a democratic way, but some tough decisions in the past may prove divisive.
As the series begins, it’s a moment of incredible anticipation. Forthaven has lost all contact with Earth but the arrival of the last known transporter, with Julius Berger (Eric Mabius of Ugly Betty) on board, signals fresh hopes and dreams. But why does President Tate seem anxious about the imminent arrival of Berger and will the transporter land safely with Stella’s husband and daughter, who she heartbreakingly left behind?
Meanwhile those appointed Expeditionaries, Mitchell (Jamie Bamber, Battlestar Galactica) and Jack (Ashley Walters, Hustle), have a mission to explore the new planet and bring back vital information to the settlement. Will they find other life out there, or do they truly have the planet to themselves?
The settlers are a diverse group of individuals who left their old lives behind in extraordinary circumstances. They’ve been promised a second chance but are far away from home, friends, family and their pasts. Passionate about their jobs, confident of their ideals and optimistic about the future, they work hard to preserve what they’ve built on the planet they now call home.
Carpathia offers the possibility of redemption as the new inhabitants try to avoid the mistakes made on Earth. Inevitably they cannot escape the human pitfalls of love, greed, lust, loss, corruption and a longing for those they’ve left behind. As they continue to work and live together, they come to realize this is no ordinary planet. Is there a bigger purpose at work? Is the peace of Forthaven more fragile than they think?

OUTCASTS begins airing on BBC America in December.

DR. WHO Season Finale Begins

–Watch the Trailer–

The two-part season finale of DOCTOR WHO begins tonight on BBC America, with The Pandorica Opens.

From the official description: “According to legend, the Pandorica contains the most feared being in all the cosmos, a monster soaked in the blood of a billion galaxies. The Doctor’s friends unite to send him a terrible warning—the Pandorica is opening.
But what’s inside, and can even the Doctor stop it?”

Matt Smith stars as the Doctor, with  Karen Gillan (Amy Pond) and Alex Kingston as River Song. Other characters from the series may also appear.DW_Pandorica (We’re trying to keep things relatively SPOILER-free; however, the trailer reveals some of the surprises.)
The Pandorica Opens was written by series producer Steven Moffat and directed by Toby Haynes
DOCTOR WHO  airs Saturdays at 9:00 PM (8:00pm Central) on BBC America.

'Primeval' Season 4 (& 5?) Cast

Digital Spy reports that Season Four (or Series 4, as the British say) of PRIMEVAL has been completed, and that production of Season Five has begun.
Don’t get too excited, Season 4 is seven episodes, and Season 5 will be six episodes, for a grand total of thirteen.

These new seasons will feature a mixture of old and new members of the Anomaly Research Centre’s team. One might say they’re survivors and replacements of the time anomaly investigating group, as characters have a tendency to get killed off, erased from the timeline, or stranded in the past/future. primeval_s_4_cast
From left to right, the picture shows returning cast members have Abby (Hannah Spearritt) and Connor (Andrew-Lee Potts), newcomer Matt (Ciarán McMenamin), returning Captain Becker (Ben Mansfield) and new recruit Jess (Ruth Kearney).
(Click pic to for larger version)
The ITV-produced show will now be showing on ITV1 and UKTV’s new entertainment pay TV channel WATCH, with the premieres of seasons four and five split between the two.
PRIMEVAL has, ironically enough, been shown in the US on BBC AMERICA— commercial ITV and the public-funded BBC being long-time rivals.
The once-cancelled PRIMEVAL was actually saved by a new production deal in which BBC America and BBC Worldwide became production partners with ITV, Impossible Pictures and German broadcaster ProSieben.
Alex_Siddig
Perhaps to add more American interest, Alexander Siddig (DEEP SPACE NINE) will be joining the cast as a scientist named Philip Burton, an individual with a proprietary interest in the ARC.
BBC America plans to broadcast the two mini-seasons in 2011.