Tennant Talks New Who

[fringey]

Russell T. Davies, executive producer of Doctor Who, and star David Tennant insist they didn't consciously set out to make the 10th Doctor different from his predecessors. Tennant (U.K. TV's Casanova) took over the role from Christopher Eccleston, who left at the end of season one; the second season of Doctor Who airs in the United States on SCI FI Channel starting Sept. 29 at 8 p.m. ET/PT.

"To be honest, I write them the same," Davies said at a press conference in the United Kingdom to promote Tennant's season-two debut. "I think you can get very ---- up on those adjectives: He's foppish, quirky, eccentric, but it's better not to talk about it. I write it, and he does it, and somewhere in the middle of that, it sort of works. I think it's a big mistake to sit down and say, 'Oh, let's make him allergic to bananas and left-handed,' because you just end up with a list of adjectives and not a character at all. He is a man reborn in some ways, so he's got a lot of energy, and it's interesting to watch that."

For his part, Tennant agreed. "I think there's always a danger with characters that are this kind of open-ended of being self-conscious and cocky," he said. "I think you can trap yourself in 'Oh, he must always hop on a Tuesday,' and you're then left with this rather ugly mannerism that you have to stick with for however long you're doing this."

Davies said that the Doctor is always the Doctor. "And there is a huge amount that you just can't change," he added. "He goes into a situation and is the hero and takes the moral high ground as well, and you're just not going to get away from it. There's no point to trying to come up with differences."

But one character trait that was decided from the beginning was that Tennant would not use his own Scots accent as the Doctor. As Davies explained, "There's a line that got cut from the Christmas special, with Mickey saying that he [the Doctor] picked up Rose's accent; when you're very close to somebody, you pick up their accent, and lo and behold, out of the entire special, we didn't shoot that scene."

Whenever anybody asked that question, added Tennant, "We kept saying, 'Oh, it will all explained in the Christmas special,' and that line was cut!"

A long-time Doctor Who fan himself, Tennant grew up with the series, not realizing that he'd one day be starring in it. "Tom Baker was the one that I grew to love as a kid, and Peter Davison as well," Tennant said. "I was 10 when he took over. I haven't really drawn from either of them, but I suppose having a knowledge of the show and what's gone before [helps], and, as Russell said, the Doctor is the Doctor, so everything that he's been before feeds into what he is now in terms of the character and probably the performance. I don't consciously think, 'Oh, I'll do this bit like Tom did!' But I'm sure it's all in there."

Tennant said that he actually heard from both actors during his first day of filming on "The Christmas Invasion," in which his Doctor is introduced. "One of our dressers on the show came fresh from [the British TV show] Monarch of the Glen and came clutching a little good-luck message from Tom Baker, which was very well received, and somebody else came in with a very nice message from Peter Davison, so I was very honored and very thrilled to hear from them," he said.

Season two of Doctor Who commences on SCI FI with "The Christmas Invasion." Doctor Who will air Fridays at 8 p.m. —Joe Nazzaro

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Patrick
a.k.a. Fringey, The Fringe Element
"A life lived without passion is a life not lived.