Hello! Wakey wakey, It's Christmas.
It's Christ-maaas!
Song plays: Swedish House Mafia vs Tinie Tempah "Miami 2 Ibiza"
(Laughter)
Hi!
We're back. It's the Christmas ep.
Merry Christmas Mr Sardick.
I despise Christmas!
Confidential is back.
To bring you all the magic of a Doctor Who Christmas.
This is Doctor Who meets "A Christmas Carol" meets "Jaws".
It's a rich and Christmasy tale.
Yeah, right. Get him out of here.
We've got sleigh rides, we've got maidens in ice, and we've got monsters.
In the fog.
And Katherine Jenkins singing.
It's one of those moments again where you think
'What is happening today. Here I am, on the floor with a shark, singing to it.
And the festive fun continues when Cardiff is lit up by the Doctor.
Merry Christmas, Cardiff
It's not any old Doctor Who episode.
It's a Doctor Who episode you should only ever watch on Christmas Day.
And I will be watching it.
Confidential gets off to a dazzling start,
with a dollop of Christmas cheer.
Song plays: The Pogues & Kirsty MacColl "Fairytale of New York"
Karen: We're about to go on
and switch on the Cardiff Christmas lights!
I mean that's such a privilege, Darvill
Yeah, it's very very exciting.
Button.
Have you got a sonic? Merry Christmas Doctor Who Confidential.
"Fairytale of New York" continues
Announcer: Before our special guests come out this
evening. They're gonna want to know if you watch a program
apparently there's a program called "Doctor Who" these days?
Crowd cheers
Would you all welcome them on stage tonight.
Would you please welcome Arthur Darvill, who plays Rory Williams.
Karen Gillan, who plays Amy Pond.
And finally, The Doctor Mister Matt Smith.
Crowd cheers wildly.
Hello. How are you? Merry Christmas Cardiff
Happy November. Thanks for coming!
Are you having a nice time?
Is everyone right at the back having a nice time?
And are you looking forward to Christmas? Yeah!
Did you realise Arthur, just how big Doctor Who was?
No, I don't think you can realise how big.
I mean, until you walk out and you see this!
(Mumbles gibberish) "Oh, hello"
You know, it's amazing. It's constantly surprising.
Matt: 'I would just like to say quickly as well.
Thank you for making us so welcome in Cardiff,
'Coz it really does feel like home, so... (blows kiss)
Nice one. Thank you.
So, how do we do this?
The best thing we'll do Doctor... I have an idea.
You've got the sonic screwdriver
I have.
If I get the crowd to do... a count to five do we think, five?
All: Sounds good. Yeah, yeah, OK.
If I count to five, you have to raise the roof,
and we'll see if it's loud enough
for the sonic screwdriver to work, Doctor. What do you think?
I believe it will. Let's see, I hope so 'coz we need to turn the lights on. So...
Announcer: OK, so what if we do a five. Here we go.
Five, four, three, two, one... MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Matt: Yeah! Announcer: It works!
And look, the lights. Ladies and Gentlemen, the Christmas lights are on
in the capital city of Wales, in Cardiff
And would you join me in in thanking Arthur, Karen, Matt Rory, Amy, The Doctor
Thank you very much indeed to all three of them!
Cheers
"Fairytale of New York" plays again.
So the stars have set Cardiff alight, and the festivity begins.
But the real Christmas journey began way back in July,
when the script came alive for the very first time.
How're we doing? Got enough people here to start.
Sometimes it's the only time when the entire team sit in the same room.
MATT: Hello, everybody. Hello.
STEVEN: We're all gonna start. We're all gonna dive in.
So if you've got a name on the table, please sit at it.
Otherwise, sit where you like.
The read-through is the very first time that it begins to come alive,
and I think the energy and the excitement that brings,
is a really, really, helpful measure.
You kinda want to hear it aloud you want to hear it, umm...
you want to hear the story in sequence, the actors
and match voices to faces.
I like to sort of sit there and listen
have the story told to you instead of just reading it in your head.
We have Steven Moffat reading the stage directions, which is the best thing ever,
because he reads them like he's swallowed all volumes of Harry Potter
I want to describe, and it's a bit like that, he's brilliant.
STEVEN: Sardicktown. Night, the sky foggy, boiling clouds, it's night,
but the clouds are lit from below by the orange glow of a city.
Flickering street lamps and narrow streets, foggy and frosty, but no snow.
Hurrying figurers wrapped up tight against the cold.
Victorian in effect, but not in the details,
This is a colonised planet several decades on.
A city of iron - girders and rivets and rust- with narrow windows,
a twisting labyrinth of slanting alleyways
and raised walkways.
Fog hangs over the whole scene, and looming mournfully through it,
flamelamps, like streetlamps, like glass enclosed flames at the top.
Also Christmas trees, hanging decorations,
Speakers hanging from the streetlamps, and from them "Silent Night".
"Silent Night" plays, sung by a choir.
We got Michael Gambon, I just couldn't believe it!
We had a conversation with Andy Prior, our wonderful casting director.
"Do you think we could get Michael Gambon?"
'No, we'll never be able to get Michael Gambon, he won't do this!'
'You're crazy, he's Dumbledore he's Michael Gambon!'
And he just said yes!
I was never offered a role before, so there's no 'finally'. I just took a role in Doctor Who.
I like like Doctor Who. I remember it when... really, that's how old I am,
when it was Daleks, and cardboard (chuckles)
At the read-through, he just said his first line, and the whole room just went still.
Me and Beth I think exchanged a glance
going "Yay, we got Michael Gambon."
And Matt looked up at me and went...
On every world, wherever people are, in the deepest part of the winter.
at the exact midpoint, everybody stops and turns and hugs.
As if to say "Well done, well done everyone.
"We're half way out of the dark."
This amazing voice saying, you know, Steven's lines.
And it just really came alive, and you could really get a sense of
Kazran's character. And we knew that this was going to be very special.
Back on Earth, we called this 'Christmas'.
Or the winter solstice.
But you know what I call it? I call it expecting something for nothing!
Sir, Mr Sardick, we're only asking for one day.
Just let her out for Christmas. She loves Christmas.
Does she?! Oh, does she?
(Chuckles). Hello! Wakey wakey! It's Christmas! It's Christmas!
It's really exciting to work with somebody who's like a sort of walking legend,
as Michael, you know I've really liked his work in the past.
That was good. I think go for it.
And I think, if you wanna do a little tap on there, just tap there.
(Taps on glass)
Yeah, get really in there look right down the lens if you can.
(Tentatively) Hello. Wakey wakey. It's Christmas.
And you can kinda go "It's Christ-maaas", really annoying, go on, be really horrible.
I ask the director, who's brilliant,
what I have to do today and he tells me, and puts me straight.
So every day he gives me a little guide to where I am.
And I play that day's work, as much as I can.
And that's how it fits together.
And.... action.
Hello, wakey wakey. It's Christmas, It's Christ-maaas!
I think she's a bit cool about the whole thing.
(Michael Laughs) Director: That's good, and just one more.
And do the "It's Christ-maaas" a bit less aggressively.
And... action.
Hello, wakey wakey. It's Christmas, It's Christmas!
You know what? I think she's a bit cool about the whole thing.
(Laughter) That was funny.
I think, what we hadn't anticipated is just how good Matt and he would be playing, opposite each other.
Ohh! It's you isn't it? Everyone else looks surprised, you look cross.
What the hell are you doing here?
Ahh you see, cross. Don't be cross. Have a Jammy Dodger.
This is a great cast, and the crew... It's like a dream job really.
They just bring a big sense of fun to this story.
And, you know they are both very irresistible...
Yes, yes.
...characters in their...
They've both got a brilliant sense of humour
and it was amazing at the read-through because...
you know, Matt is brilliant at read-throughs.
He always sets a wonderful tone.
Because, sometimes you go to read-throughs and, you know, people are a bit shy,
they don't really want to put any wellie into it,
but Matt, you know, Matt's first few lines, he always says,
"I'm setting the tone for this read-through" by really giving it my all.
So I need your help then. Make an appointment.
There are 403 people in a spaceship trapped in your cloud belt,
without your help, they're going to die. Yes.
You don't have to let that happen. I know. But what the hell, I'm going to.
They plead to me for help, The Doctor does, "Please help these people". I say no.
Why? I don't know any of them. No? Never will either. Bye bye, bored now. Chuck!
Kazran is an old, Scrooge-like miser who has... his heart has been welded shut to Christmas.
There are 4,003 people I won't allow to die tonight.
Do you know where that puts you?
Where? 4,004
Was that a sort of threaty thing?
I'm sitting in my chair shouting at poor people with no money
"Get out of my house you filthy poor people." I don't like poor people.
I think in Doctor Who terms, Kazran is a totally atypical baddie,
'coz The Doctor is usually up against someone completely wicked
without any redeeming feature. He's never really tried to reform a Dalek.
Or a Cyberman, or a Sontaren.
Whatever happens tonight, remember...
...you brought it on yourself.
Yeah, yeah, right. Get him out of here.
And next time, try and find some funny poor people.
(Matt Laughing)
The little boy the doctor was speaking to, he glares at Kazran,
snatches up a coal, and hurls it at Kazran, catching at the back of Kazran's head,
Kazran freezes for a moment and then rises from his chair.
Kazran is stepping fast across, raising his hand to strike the boy.
No. Stop. Don't!
There is a critical moment in this show where The Doctor is thinking
"Right, you're a bad man, you've brought it on yourself."
He's off to bring him down, do whatever he does,
and it would be EASY for The Doctor to bring down Kazran Sardick,
'coz he's nothing compared to The Doctor.
And Kazran is towering over the boy, monstrous, his hand raised ready to strike
and something odd happens. He seems to hesitate.
And then he doesn't hit the boy.
On The Doctor, watching.
Get him out of here!
Get that foul-smelling family out of here. Now! Now!
And he thinks "Oh! He's not completely bad."
"He's damaged, he's not bad.
Kazran has been affected by the loss of love. And by his father.
We zoom in fast, right into The Doctor's eye.
Now cutting round, freeze frame details of the room The Doctor has already noticed.
An oil painting of a man who looks very like Kazran.
He's had a horrible life really, his father hurt him and beat him.
You're scared of him and being like him and good for you,
you're not like him, not really.
It all comes back to him during the performance.
Merry Christmas, Mr Sardick.
I despise Christmas!
You shouldn't, it's very you.
It's what? What do you mean?
Halfway out of the dark.
Halfway out of the dark, simply refers to, that's originally what Christmas was.
The thought of the halfway point of winter, sort of 'Hooray'
'Now we're climbing back towards the light, as opposed to deeper into the dark.
But it's also a metaphor for The Doctor, for Kazran. Someone who's halfway out of the dark.
Not completely bad. Savable.
He knows there's a little bit of good in Kazran's heart.
And he has to restore that, so it's The Doctor's chance to do the Christmas Carol really.
A Christmas carol. A what?
It's A Christmas Carol!
Dickens at Christmas. A Christmas Carol is probably my favourite Christmas story of all time.
And of course we know that The Doctor's met Charles Dickens.
Charles Dickens! Yes! Nice to meet you. Fantastic.
We can't pretend that he doesn't know the story of "A Christmas Carol."
We can't do an adaptation of "A Christmas Carol". The Doctor must be consciously aware
that he's sort of recreating the plot of that story.
Because Dickens is a character in his universe.
You're brilliant you are. Completely 100% brilliant.
I've read 'em all. "Great Expectations", "Oliver Twist", and what's the other one, the one with the ghost?
In the Dickens original you've got the ghost of Christmas Past, the ghost of Christmas present,
and the ghost of Christmas yet to come.
There is kind of time travel in that story, it lends itself to Doctor Who.
Who are you?
Tonight, I'm the ghost of Christmas past.
The Doctor comes back and takes him back, in time to his younger self.
To try and soften that Christmas heart.
Get out, get out of my house now!
OK, but I'll be back.
Way back.
Way, way back.
He's got a time machine, so he can take you back to the past.
Christmas past.
Who are you talking too? You.
He uses the story of "A Christmas Carol".
And the idea that past, present and future ghosts to rewrite Kazran's memories.
Now, your past is going to change.
That means your memories will change too.
Bit scary. But you'll get the hang of it.
I don't understand.
I'll bet you don't. I wish I could see your face.
Well, that never happened!
It DID!
The Doctor is absolutely altering Kazran's past.
He's rewriting Kazran's past.
New memories.
How can I have new memories?
He's not revealing memories to Kazran.
Those things genuinely didn't happen.
The Doctor is constantly announcing that he cannot interfere with history or time,
and yet never does anything else.
Just because it's... I mean every time he arrives on a planet
he changes the history of that planet, usually by kicking the alien invaders off.
He says he shouldn't interfere with other civilisations, but he does.
So Kazran has almost two lives in his head.
He remembers what his life used to be, he remembers what has now been rewritten to be,
and has to cope with that.
So we had to do the three different stages of Kazran's life,
so we obviously had three different actors.
And, Laurence was playing the youngest version of Kazran.
Who's annoyingly better than me in every scene,
it's true isn't it Laurence?
My character is young Kazran Sardick,
So, the young version of Michael Gambon.
Muffled staging directions
Don't speak. And... Action.
Right then, your bedroom.
Let's see. You're 12 years old so we'll stay away from under the bed.
He had this great ability to kind of capture the story,
and really kind of draw you in with his big eyes.
Right, so.
What are we gonna do?
Eat crisps and talk about girls?
I've never actually done that, but I bet it's easy. Girls? Yeah!
Are you really a babysitter?
I think you'll find I'm universally recognised
as a mature and responsible adult.
It's just a lot of wavy lines.
Shorted out. Finally a lie too big.
Ok, not really a babysitter. But it's Christmas Eve, you don't want a real one, you want me.
Why? What's so special about you?
Have you ever seen Mary Poppins?
No. Good, 'cause that comparison would have been rubbish.
So! Fish in the fog, fish in the clouds.
Ok, and.. cut there. Cut there!
When you're talking back to him, you say "Why, what's so special about you?"
I think that's the line where you'd still be unsure about him.
It's like what? Why? What's so special about you?
Kind of like, he's really close to you.
This weird guy, you just don't know who he is yet, know what I mean?
Just feel, disconcerted.
He was a real pleasure to work with, and it came very naturally to him as well.
Ok, not a babysitter.
But it's Christmas Eve, you don't want a real one, you want me.
Why? What's so special about you?
Laurence was a dream, I mean for his age
I think he's 14,
wonderful wonderful actor, going to be very interesting I think.
He just acted me off the screen in many scenes.
Reluctantly.
Both: Merry Christmas! Doctor!
Merry Christmas! Doctor!
Merry Christmas! Kazran!
And The Doctor has to bring love back into his life.
You've grown. Yeah. And now you're blushing.
I'm sorry. That's ok.
Well, Katherine Jenkins what a perfect fit.
She embodies a princess, and then she has the voice of an angel.
Well I can't concentrate when I have to do a scene with her,
I just don't know my lines, I can't even think straight.
I get overwhelmed by her.
I got approached about possibly being in the Christmas special of Doctor Who.
I think it was a couple of days before my 30th birthday in June.
And I've never done any acting,
not ever really thought that I ever could do anything like that.
And because of all the singing stuff that I've got going on,
It wasn't something that I particularly wanted to do,
but then when I heard about it being Doctor Who
and it's such an iconic show,
it suddenly made me think "That is something I would love to try."
So I asked them if I could come in and read the script.
And I thought, "Well, if I'm rubbish, they're not going to trust such a big episode with me."
So I went in and I read.
And I got the news on my 30th birthday, that I got the part.
And that was the best present ever.
Best Christmas Eve ever.
Aww, 'til the next one.
I look forward to it. Now I'd like to say goodnight to Kazran.
Of course, yes.
Oh, oh...yes, right I'll, um... I'll go then.
Good night... Good luck...night!
Good night.
He stumbles away, almost colliding with one of the cylinders. (Sorry).
But Kazran is pursuing, pulls The Doctor aside, whispered confab.
But Doctor, I, uh... I think she's going to kiss me.
Yeah, I think you're right.
I've never kissed anyone before. What do I do?
Well, try to be all nervous and shaky and a bit rubbish.
Why? Because you're gonna be like that anyway.
Might as well make it part of the plan, then it'll feel on purpose.
Off you go, then.
Ohh! That kiss!
No, I don't mind really, it's just like...
(Nervous laugh) Oh it's a chore, having Katherine Jenkins fall in love with you.
It's... it's a really hard job that.
I've never done that kind of on-screen thing before.
And it's obviously very different when you've got a huge crew of people watching you.
We tried to have a bit of a joke about it,
and a bit of a, you know, a bit of a laugh.
Uh, they were having a good time, I mean we both laughed a lot.
In between takes and, you know it's all a bit ridiculous.
Her boyfriend's quite big as well, so...
Now? I...I kiss her now? Kazran, trust me.
It's this or go to your room and design a new screwdriver.
Don't make my mistakes. (Laughter around table) Now go!
Song plays: Kate Perry Teenage Dream
You don't just film it once.
It gets filmed again, and again and again.
And I think we probably had to snog for about an hour and a half.
Song continues.
Yeah, yeah, it's great fun.
I'm gonna be a hero back home I think.
So, now I know him very well.
Song continues.
I'm embarrassed now, you've got to move on.
Yes. Moving swiftly on to um, more kissing.
Once they got started, there was no stopping them.
Psst! Guys! Guys, oh!
We've really got to go quite quickly.
I just accidentally got engaged to Marilyn Monroe.
How...
How do you keep going like that?
Do you breath out through your ears? It's... guys!
Sorry...hello?
Guys! She's phoned a chapel, there's a car outside,
this is happening now!
(Distantly: Yoo-hoo) Yoo-Hoo!
Right. Fine, thank you. I'll just go and get married, then shall I?
See how you like that.
Marilyn! Get ya coat!
And Abigail and Kazran part.
And now we see that their faces are streaked with tears.
What are we going to do?
There is nothing to be done.
Of course the tragedy of Abigail is that she was dying when she went into the ice,
and we practically seeing her very limited afterlife.
She's got eight days.
And, lucky her, she gets eight Christmas eves
and falls in love, and does all that.
But she is dying from the moment he meets her.
Now look at me.
Better a broken heart than no heart at all.
Try it, you try it!
Why are you here? 'Cause I'm not finished with you yet.
You've seen the past, present...
..and now you need to see the future.
Fine, do it. Show me!
So, what do you think?
Standing there, next to the TARDIS watching is his 12 year old self.
Young Kazran is staring at his own future in tearful horror.
Old Kazran just struck dumb with the horror of this.
And now young Kazran is approaching staring at his older self,
eyes brimming, incredulous.
Old Kazran doesn't know what to say, can find no words.
And now his younger self is standing right in front of him.
Then he raises his hand to strike his younger self and freezes.
And that's the moment it happens, he just changes
he can't be this way any more.
That's what really the story's all about,
it's the sort of defrosting of his soul.
I'm sorry. I'm... I'm so, so sorry.
As the course of the story and The Doctor does his meddling
he softens, and he starts to find kindness,
and umm, love in his heart again.
It's a very bad man who eventually gets shown the light.
(Both) Merry Christmas!
What are we gonna do?
Scene in the street outside. Young Kazran and Abigail.
They're both working at one of the rickshaws,
fitting a harness between its shafts.
You are out of your mind this will NEVER work!
Oh! Don't think shark. Think dolphin.
The rickshaw was fun.
Song plays. Led Zeppelin "The Immigrant Song"
We harnessed the shark and we're riding through the sky.
And so we filmed that on a green screen.
Song continues.
Just a bit of gentle rocking like that,
and then I'll go much more extreme for the last one, OK?
Where we shoot past.
We've got our actors in this rickshaw which we've got on a...
...gimbal here, which we're steering from left to right
just so that it gives that sensation of flying.
It's the centrepiece of the Christmas special in a way
it's where things lift and are magical
and it's like a kind of, science fiction sleigh ride.
We were being thrown all over the place, as if we were really being driven though the air.
And in the beginning I want you all tense like that,
just as if you're going down the steepest, steepest hill,
and you're looking ahead, even though we're above you.
And as it lands, as it lands parallel to us. BANG!
You all kinda go whoa! And then you'll be like sort of fwoom, wa-aey, like that
just controlling it.
And the camera is, kind of Zzzzhhhhhooom!
So it starts up there, it's back, back back back back back and forward, forward, BOOM!
OK, and so we go like....
Zzzzhhhhhooom! Ooh!
Yeah yeah, like that's brilliant, yeah!
The rickshaw was great, the wind machine...
...was great. Just a lot of screaming and...
...hanging off really, with me and young Laurence, and Katherine.
It's great! When d'you get to do things like this in television,
you never, you know. Doctor Who is the only show,
where you can really do full blown adventure, you know.
A shark sleigh ride. It's never been done before in television.
And there we are, with our rickshaw doing it now.
Song plays Led Zeppelin "The Immigrant Song"
You get that sort of rush, like from a roller coaster. It's really cool.
Song continues
And I got to do it with Matt, and I also got to do it with Michael Gambon.
So I had two goes.
For Michael Gambon.
What I like best is when you're both laughing.
Both laugh
It would be nice to get you both looking at the same time, almost simultaneously.
So we'll do a visual cue?
When you, it doesn't matter when 'coz when the camera comes in there...
...are you looking at Kieran, do you ever see him?
Yeah! Kieran, when you feel the camera come into there...
Go, go... yeah! Then we, what do we do then? Do we...?
You look at each other, just a brief look at each other.
When Kieran sticks his tongue out. Oh! OK? Good.
Both laughing.
Because we can't get underneath this rickshaw here, we built a model
that we can raise up very easily and do all the shots looking underneath.
Three, two, one. Lift.
We can do this in CGI, or we can try and get something that's a bit more physical, a bit more real.
And there's a sense of realism about it,
something so fantastical as a rickshaw being pulled by a shark,
just needs every help it can get to make it feel as real as possible.
It's great fun being able to do it in a more traditional way,
just like the old Doctor Who series when they used models back then.
And also it's like there's a tradition of model uses in science fiction.
With "Star Wars" and stuff like that.
I've never been able to do it before, normally it costs a lot of money,
and you use motion control rigs,
and that kind of stuff. While we're just doing our way with our camera operator.
just pushing it along on a track getting all the timings right,
getting a bit of puppeteering in there.
and the whole thing will just come together and give it this natural feeling,
hopefully look fantastic. Three, two one. Lift.
(In background, softly) Yaaaay! Weeeee!
It's one of those things you go home of an eve...
and you say "What did you do today dear?"
"Well I was doing this, and I did this and this."
and they say "What did you do?"
"Well, I was on a rickshaw,
with a wind machine,
pretending to be flying through space.
We had a new designer, Michael Pickwoad,
who started his time on Doctor Who
with the Christmas episode.
And for Michael, creating the look of "A Christmas Carol"
involved sketching the whole episode,
scene by scene.
Confidential went back to the drawing board to reveal where it all began.
It's rather pleasing, that in fact now there are three generations
of my family have been working on Doctor Who
because not only has our daughter painted the portraits
but, designing it, my father,
who was an actor, his stage name was William Mervyn,
he was, in 1966, he was in an episode of Doctor Who
with William Hartnell called "The War Machines".
Michael really brought his own sense of eccentricness...
...to the whole piece.
It took an interesting while to say what makes this planet strange.
Together we worked out a kind of
image system of how the village worked, you know,
that the town was kind of an amphibious world
where it's half sort of, water and half kind of land based.
Creating the town and the feel
was a really vital element
because you always have to create truthful worlds.
No matter how unreal or surreal
or excitingly different these stories are
I think finding the truth to it is incredibly important.
And we just tried to think through what it would be like
if you had to share your daily life with fish flying around in the fog.
You'd want grills on your windows you'd want to cover the chimney pots,
so they wouldn't swim down.
So, all those sort of elements of logic,
we tried to bring into it
and give a reality to this fantasy world.
We used the metaphor of round windows,
which has a slightly nautical feel, which then of course links with the fish.
It's a sense of some strange pattern of building,
that all the windows we ever see are round or half round.
And having been to the Mir steelworks as a possible location,
we came to the conclusion really that this planet
was constructed of metal.
Everything was very, very metal.
So it's harsh,
and the whole town, as it were, is built of iron,
and a slightly rusted feel
there's this strange fog that pervades everywhere.
And so once you put rivets and steel... you know,
it made the steelworks look inhabited.
The production value out of a steelworks
I mean, the years and years of heavy industry
being here has built up metal work on the walls
which is exactly what we were after.
The colonisers basically built the town out of the ships that
they came in. So its that kind of feel of everything riveted,
plate riveted together.
We've had to bring in the elements that make it busy,
and Christmas like, with the twist of it being that it's on a different planet.
So we've tried to create a classical Christmas with a little twist.
Christmas carol plays "Deck The Halls"
We kept this Dickensian industrial air,
and people living... in poverty. In rather nasty conditions.
And also we had, you know,
sort of like, Bob Cratchett's house.
Abigail's house. Was the iron version of that.
We made it look as though it was in a basement.
We look down into it.
And in one of the shop windows I made rather like a bay window,
So it had a touch of old curiosity shop.
so there were elements of Dickens,
sort of floating within it.
And of course the nature of the story, is not...
It doesn't take much to realise where it's come from.
Which is rather nice, so you're...
it's an allegory, on Dickens on another world, at another time.
Carol crescendos
As the centrepiece of his design is Kazran's study,
and that has to be a grand space.
There were gonna be a lot of scenes where we had Michael on his own,
in this space, and we wanted to feel at times where he could feel dwarfed by it.
Where he's a small man in a big space.
Other time he wants to be able to show that he's a powerful man,
That he's a rich person, that he's got grandeur and money about him.
It needed that sort of totalitarian sense.
So you go for that classical style which all dictators use.
And you create something that says "I own this place."
Here we are, we're in Kazran's study.
I don't make the rules. Oh, no, hang on... I do.
And this is obviously Kazran Sardick's big, evil chair.
We had this chair extended, so we'd have this kind of loomy, evil quality about it.
The chairs, of course, the chairs.
Stupid me, the chairs. Chairs?
And the idea is that these are all made of copper
that's all been oxidised and turned sort of green, and we've got a red curtain,
(laughs)
All kind of combined to make the Christmas colours.
Here is the portrait of Elliot Sardick.
The Doctor's already noticed an oil painting of a man
who looks very like Kazran.
Oh, there's a big portrait of me over there.
And they took a picture of me,
They were photographed, and then we printed them
very palely on canvas.
But I didn't have my beard on,
so she's painted the beard over the painting.
And here we've got the weather machine.
Now what's this then? Oh, I love this.
A big, flashy, lighty thing.
This is based on a church organ,
these controls are all isomorphic.
That means it responds only to me.
I'm the only person in the world,
in the whole universe, who knows how to use this.
On... Off.
Even Doctor Who doesn't know how to use it.
Isomorphic. There's no such thing.
Kazran flicks the switch, the lights all go on again.
These controls are isomorphic.
We've got this logo that appears quite a few times
through Sardicktown, that's sort of the Sardick emblem.
And that's also in here above the fireplace.
Here we've got the stairs.
Now up those stairs goes up to young Kazran's bedroom.
(Whispered) Confidential.
They don't lead anywhere.
So as you can see they just lead off.
And... action!
But they just make it feel less like a set.
But here we are. This is our big set,
and I think it's looking fantastic, and I hope you enjoy it.
Yeah, right. Get him out of here!
Filming is about to heat up,
as The Doctor makes an explosive entrance.
Are we doing a fall down the actual chimney as well?
Oh yeah! Yeah.
That was one of my favourite moments reading the episode,
I thought "Yeah Steven. Thank you"
"One of the best entrances ever."
Just doing Matt's big entrance, The Doctor's big entrance,
for the Christmas special, he's supposed to come down this chimney here,
and falling to frame down there.
That was great you know, you get to be Santa.
And I think it's a great idea for The Doctor that...
The Doctor gets to come in sorta like Santa Claus.
'Coz he loves Santa I think he loves Christmas.
So I was just... I felt a huge sense of personal satisfaction at that bit of writing.
Then we're gonna cover you in ash,
so the moment you get up your consumed with... right?
Uh! Oh! Hello,
You sort of busy yourself and then realise where you are.
Yeah, yeah.
"B" Camera... And... Camera!
We just put the soot down. Soot.
Everything just went "Ka-boom" Like that. Fantastic, looking job.
Well I didn't actually get to do the roll,
or the land on the hot coals,
that was all Gordon,
our wonderful stunt man.
I was gonna ask, do you want that spring up again
like I did in that rehearsal?
Yeah, may as well, yeah yeah.
It fills the frame again doesn't it. Yeah.
(All talk at once)
Do the spring up, and then spring back out of frame.
And hopefully he'll just come down here,
knock all these coals away and land in great big heap.
And I just sort of roll up at the end and pop into shot.
so I finish it off, really.
That's all ya get of me sadly, smoke and mirrors.
OK guys, so stand by please to shoot this.
261 take 1, "A" Camera. Mark.
Song plays Johnny Cash "Ring Of Fire"
Action
Song continues
Cut it there. Great, great.
Applause from crew
Young Kazran's Bedroom
On the door, as it's slowly eased open, The Doctor peering 'round,
the sonic hanging where we last saw it.
And absurdly, hanging in mid-air, facing it,
a fish is nibbling at it, just a small one,
like a cod or something.
The room is full of fog directly behind the fish,
he moves slowly, carefully into the room,
fascinated. Interesting!
Crystalline fog, hey?
Maybe carrying a tiny electrical charge.
Is that how you fly, little fishy?
What is it? What kind? Can I see?
Just stay there a moment. Is it big?
Nah. Just a little one.
A step closer, he now bends,
almost nose to nose with the tiny little fish.
So, little fella, what do you eat?
And wham!
The little fish disappears as a set of mighty jaws slam shut over it.
The Doctor stumbling back now,
and a shark is hanging in the centre of the room.
It's just come crashing through the window
and now it's just hanging there staring at The Doctor.
I was very, very frightened of sharks when I was a kid,
but I had a very particular nightmare that sharks
could come out of the sea.
I used to worry about that.
I used to read about evolution or hear about evolution at school,
and think what would happen if sharks evolved so they could actually
come out of the sea and chase me.
It's gonna eat us! It's gonna eat us!
It's gonna eat us!
The actual idea of a shark turning up in my bedroom
is from my childhood nightmares.
I absolutely had that as a nightmare,
there might be a shark in my room.
It was quite a complicated layered effect
that we had to achieve, and
what we did was an amalgamation of
physical effects of the papers blowing around...
And, three, two one. Action.
...also we had to do a layer where we
did the actual sonic screwdriver against green screen.
Welcome to the aquarium.
Getting the sonic to move was, uhh
really just taking, in this case a pen that's green
and just tapping the front of the sonic screwdriver
as if it's a nibbling fish.
So we have the screwdriver over a green screen
and we had one of our guys just off-set, and quite low
in this instance just tapping the top like that.
So, little fella, what do you eat?
The most important part was Matt's performance and how
he interacted with the shark, that wasn't there in the room at the time,
but he sort of brilliantly evokes the fear, and, umm
The Doctor's, uhh, surprise at seeing such a huge predator in the room with him.
How little?
Um... Can I come out?
No, no! Maybe just wait there for a moment.
What colour is it?
Big. Big colour.
What's happening?
Well, concentrating on the pluses,
you've definitely got a story of your own now.
Well Clive, is our newly founded codename for the shark.
His name's Clive. Nicknamed Clive so people don't find out about him.
Secret. Top secret Clive.
Clive is one of the best guarded secrets on the Christmas special,
so that's why we came up with a really odd sounding name for him.
Where d'you want the tail?
Up there, in there.
You can't really put 'Shark' on your call sheet.
Or stand outside a location where the public may be nearby.
and say "Oh, can we get the shark in please?"
Down there, that's good.
Because you really run the risk, even more-so to give it away
so we gave him a name, and he just looked like Clive, or Clyde or, well, we loved him.
I don't think he had a second name.
and then it swapped round to something else
Clive, was it Percy or then back to Clive, I dunno,
but I think Clive was the one that stuck.
And then we're gonna put blankets round it aren't we? Yes.
Indistinct
Uhh, no we can dress... let's rehearse, do a quick rehearsal chaps.
When you come to film a scene
the first thing you do is always the line run
which is just a chance to go over the lines for the first time
to hear them out loud, and to sort of get a sense of
the shape of the scene before you actually attempt to block it and
to start walking around and act it.
Doctor, I think she's dying.
Half my screwdriver's still inside, but,
yeah. She is.
Well, I mean I was doing it as though I'm
(Bangs table rapidly) concentrating on this, and then I notice him.
Oh. As though, look, half my screwdriver's still inside of it, yeah,
I think so. I doubt they can survive long outside the...
...cloudbelt. Oh yeah, that's good. 'Coz I can see that he's crying.
Can't we get it back up there?
I just wanted to see it. I didn't want to kill it.
It was trying to eat you.
It was hungry.
I think that should be really soft and still sad.
Not kind of... combative you know?
It's like, you're not having an argument.
You know, (sadly) "She was hungry" you know?
You're just defending it. It was just an animal that didn't mean to hurt you.
I just wanted to see it. I didn't want to kill it.
She was trying to eat you.
She was hungry.
Yeah. That was my first day with the shark.
Umm, and it's amazing, really, really life like, and
It... it's really easy to get upset
'coz it feels like a real animal.
You can't save her.
Could take her back up there but she'd never survive the trip.
We need a fully functioning life-support.
OK.
Well I sing to the shark.
And it's my singing of "In The Bleak Midwinter"
that sort of gets the shark better.
And then faintly, growing in volume
they hear sing. A lone female. Absolutely pure and beautiful.
Take it away!
Singing and laughter.
Yeah. That's exactly what it's gonna be like.
Young Kazran is hearing it too. Looks up. That doesn't make any sense?
On The Doctor, elsewhere in the cave, clambering to his feet, clutching his head.
He's hearing it too, from somewhere in the mist.
Singing Katherine Jenkins "In The Bleak Midwinter"
The singing calms the fish.
As it would to hear Katherine Jenkins sing
I think that is a common experience all around
an invigorating one as well.
It's one of those moments again where you think,
What is this. What is happening today.
Here I am, on the floor with a shark,
singing to it.
Singing continues
The climax of the story you have
Katherine's song comes out well Abigail's song.
When we first read the script, Steven had written...
And then she sings...
A new Doctor Who carol. Just for Christmas.
And we hear Abigail's voice, singing purely and beautifully.
It sounds like a carol. A brand new, lovely one.
But not one we've ever heard before,
a brand new Christmas carol, written especially for Doctor Who.
And we all went "yay!" and then thought, "Hang on"
We've gotta film this in about three weeks,
I got a call from Beth, saying
"Have you read the script" and I said no.
And she said "Did you know there's a song?"
And he went' "Yep, no problem." and I thought "Ooh, that was a bit of a short response."
Does he get what I mean, It's not singing a carol that already exists.
And I said "What song?" and she said "One you've written."
And I said. "Oh, well that's interesting."
And she said, "So if you could get it to us."
And then about three weeks later she rang again, a little bit more anxious,
And I said, yeah yeah, it's fine. it's fine, it's for Christmas,
And she said "Well we're filming it next week.
And I said, "Oh, when do you need it by?"
And she said "Well also, Katherine Jenkins is in it."
And I said, "Oh, that's nice. Wouldn't it be nice if she sang the..."
She said "She is singing the song."
"And she needs it before she goes away. Which is on Friday"
And this was on Wednesday.
So I had a quick read of the script and
put something together.
She recorded a demo, in Cardiff,
of what I sent through,
so that she could mime to it on set.
I did a very rough vocal that we used when we were filming
and I was actually singing as well,
when we did the filming,
because I always feel that that is what looks more honest.
You can always tell when somebody's vocal chords aren't quite moving.
It was supposed to be a demo, but you get this track back
and you press play, and
she's just got an amazing voice.
Singing Katherine Jenkins "Abigail's Song"
Her demo's blow most people's finished work out of the park, so...
Singing continues
And we did it on the first day.
I couldn't think... I had to stand right next to her,
really close, (whoa) and she was singing,
and she's a beautiful singer as everyone knows.
I couldn't think straight.
So when you ask me a question about that scene,
I couldn't tell you anything about it,
I just couldn't take my eyes off her.
(Chuckles)
Singing continues
She really does deliver the sort of voice
that you believe could somehow save the universe.
So, with the demo in the can, and
the filming all complete,
there was one thing left to do.
Get in that studio, and record it for real.
I'm hear in Air Studios, in London
because I'm gonna be doing some of the singing
the revocaling of the songs for the Christmas special of Doctor Who.
(Katherine Jenkins sings Doctor Who Carol)
It's a lovely, warm, mellow mezzo soprano
From a point-of-view of a composer,
it's really the sort of voice
you sometimes hire other people
trying to emulate, and Katherine's the genuine article.
(Song continues)
(Dramatic piano)
It's a great episode, but the end is... uhh...
We haven't done this before,
we haven't had someone sing a song in Doctor Who in that way.
And here we have something where
the song is integral to the plotting,
and that's gonna be... really nice to watch.
(Katherine Jenkins continues)
We're flying normally.
Can you land?
I...I can even land well.
(Inaudible)
So we take this to the National Orchestra of Wales
The whole thing needs a new arrangement
(Katherine Jenkins sings with full orchestra)
It's gonna have really fluttery strings and flutes
so it will be much gentler and softer
(Orchestra plays Katherine sings)
My plan is that the third... that the fourth verse
the big crescendoing moment
brings in all the guitars and drums,
sort of aiming for it to sound a bit like "Muse"
(Music crescendos)
(Choir sings)
The feel of the orchestration for this is just very fluid.
And very gentle.
It's very fluid, and it's very feminine.
(Singing recommences)
I think it's touching, it's beautiful, it's very special.
And it's perfect for Christmas Day.
It's something for everyone, and it's a real... I think it's a classic.
Where are they, Kazran and Abigail?
Off on a little trip, I should think.
Where? Christmas. Christmas? Yeah. Christmas.
(Amy chuckles)
The Doctor looking up to the sky
for a moment they almost see a shark
darting through the clouds
pulling a rickshaw with maybe two passengers.
Hard to tell.
Halfway out of the dark.
(Confidential Theme Plays)
(Shark Growls, Kazran and Katherine laugh)