MATT LUCAS: Welcome to Doctor Who Extra.
Christmas style.
We have the surprise return of River Song.
She's just as badass as ever.
LUCAS: Get the heads-up with comic, Greg Davies.
So, that was my first experience, really, Doctor Who,
was being frightened by my own head.
LUCAS: Play with some new toys on set.
I hate to say it, but it could be the best.
LUCAS: And say farewell to filming Doctor Who in 2015.
Welcome to Doctor Who Extra.
(THEME MUSIC PLAYING)
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LUCAS: The holiday season wouldn't be the same
without another escapade in the TARDIS.
And this year is extra special,
because I'm in it! (EXCLAIMS)
Playing the leading role, of course, with my sidekick, the Doctor.
Is there anything on my head?
- Uh, well, yes. - Describe it.
Well, you've, sort of, got antlers.
- Antlers? - Yes, antlers.
LUCAS: Being part Of this festive tale was a thrilling experience
and brought out the seasonal spirit for all involved.
I love Christmas as a day, I love it as a festival,
I love that's it's dark and twinkly, and rich and red.
All those things I adore.
But I just like the fact that it's Christmas.
That's no hardship for me at all.
Do quite enjoy filming the Christmas episodes.
Uh, clearly, you know you're going to get snow and tinsel
and a tang of the festive season.
And it's always quite odd because
it's usually in September or October.
And your body seems to respond to these triggers.
I found myself worrying about whether or not I had bought all my presents.
Steven's written an awesome script.
It's a wonderful sort of slapstick caper.
There's a lot of great laughs.
There's a lot of fabulous River one-liners.
Oh, my God!
Well, I wondered why we didn't share a bathroom.
This episode, it starts Christmassy.
But after that, frankly,
its Christmassy element is that it's a comedy romp.
LUCAS: And there's no better person
to start this fam frolic than Nardole.
Will there be singing?
No.
LUCAS: Played by none other than me.
Hello.
Being met by Matt Lucas
in a wonderful wintry Dickensian street
with the TARDIS covered in snow,
was delightful because it was like a Doctor Who Christmas ca rd.
And Matt is such a fabulously funny person to have around.
So, that was delightful, I loved that.
In this scene, we have a regeneration
into me as the Doctor.
Um, we've bowed to public demand,
we've got rid of Peter, Peter Capaldi,
and now I'm playing the Doctor.
LUCAS: Yes, I, Sir Matt Lucas,
will regenerate into the Thirteenth Doctor.
So, obviously, that's a spoiler.
I wasn't supposed to give it away, but I did.
Yes, Matt is a very big Doctor Who fan.
I'm always delighted when we have Doctor Who fans
who are also wonderful performers showing up on the show.
Yes, we did talk about bits and pieces of Doctor Who that we enjoyed,
but I think we enjoyed each other's company more than anything else.
I'm always a great admirer of comedians,
and I think they have such a difficult job to do.
I thought that they should just play
last year's Christmas special again on Christmas Day
and just say that everyone was stuck in the time-space continuum.
And that it all happened again.
LUCAS: Well, it seems Steven didn't take my advice.
- Do I know you? - You most certainly do not.
LUCAS: Instead after a serious hiatus, he decided
to bring back the brazen River Song.
I was quite surprised when I was asked to come back.
It's such a great character,
and she's become so beloved by lots of fans.
And I've had a lot of fans saying,
"Oh, my goodness, it would be so great for her to be back,
"and to see her interacting with Peter Capaldi's Doctor."
So, I actually was really thrilled when, um,
Steven decided that he wanted to explore that as well.
The starship Harmony and Redemption.
Minimum ticket price, one billion credits,
plus, the provable murder
of multiple innocent life forms.
This is where genocide comes to kick back and relax.
Do try the fish.
River is very much the same River we've always known,
except what we've never seen,
and what I was very keen to write,
was what's she like when he's not there.
And that's what we see for most of the episode.
The slightly more ruthless, slightly more cavalier,
slightly less moral River
that isn't, sort of, on her best behaviour
because the love of her life, the endlessly pious Doctor, isn't around.
The restraints are off, she's misbehaving more.
- RIVER: Took me a week. - To fall in love?
(CHUCKLES) It's the easiest lie you can tell a man.
They'll automatically believe any story they're the hero of.
She's got quite a few husbands in this episode.
And, um, a lot of running around,
a lot of fabulous quick-fire dialogue
between her and Peter.
She gets to snog the most handsome man
in the world, whose name is (IN SPANISH ACCENT) Ramone.
Yeah, so it's all going on.
I've already picked out your swimwear.
RAMONE: Okay, but be careful.
Absolutely not!
You, with me. Bring the head.
She's just as badass as ever. So... (LAUGHING)
Uh, yeah, more of the same, I'd say.
- Sexy. - It's not sexy.
It's a little bit sexy.
Why is everything sexy now?
Speaking of which, Ramone, prep for emergency extraction. Two to go.
I think he gets rather annoyed that she keeps flirting with people.
He probably hopes that all of that
flirtatiousness is solely for him,
but it's not.
It's good fun, and no matter how he tries to convince her
that he is the Doctor, she doesn't buy it.
- You know who I am, it's me! - (RIVER CHUCKLES)
Great. Who are you?
She was very charming, very clever, very funny and witty...
Great presence and, you know, a wonderful actress.
So, that was fantastic.
It was fantastic to see her bring River to life.
And I felt she brought such depth to the character.
The Doctor is not stupid enough or sentimental enough,
and he is certainly not in love enough,
to find himself standing in it with me!
(BREATHING HEAVILY)
Hello, sweetie.
LUCAS: As well as River Song,
we also saw the introduction of the unwittingly foolhardy Hydroflax,
played by fellow comedian Greg Davies.
Darling!
You're up and about.
False wife!
GREG DAVIES: What I love about my character is
that he very grandly takes his head off
as if that's empowering, but it leaves me headless.
You know, he's not very clever, Hydroflax, I don't think.
But I like that.
He's very grand and pompous and all-powerful,
but also a bit stupid with it,
in that he gives his head away,
and he just gets stuck in a bag.
It really made me laugh.
You will be crushed! You will be destroyed!
You will beg for my...
Oh. zip it!
I'm sort of a bit worried that I was the first person they thought of.
I'm very tall. That would've helped, I'm sure.
And this. I've got... This is just part of my face anyway.
So, that saved them on makeup.
I think that Hydroflax is great fun,
and the fact that it looks like an enormous Christmas toy,
like a robot that someone’s just unwrapped
at the bottom of the Christmas tree,
I think it's a plus.
With interchangeable heads,
which get lost during the plot. It's very clever.
You're gonna die!
One of the first things I saw when I walked into the makeup room was this.
It's so realistic, I think, that I asked Becca to cover it up
because it was really frightening me.
So, that was my first experience, really, Doctor Who,
was being frightened by my own head.
Yeah, so horrible.
This is the one with my eyes open.
And what they told me to do, expression-wise,
when I had this face mould made,
was I had to look sort of all-powerful and arrogant.
But it's just sort of a surprised chump face.
(LAUGHING)
I knew every time the Hydroflax showed up...
I knew we would have quite a lot of sitting around
(CHUCKLING) as we tried to get it in the right place.
But then, Doctor Who is always like that.
The monsters are actually difficult to operate.
But it was worth it because, you know, it looked amazing.
DAVIES: My costume is a nine-foot robot as people will know by now,
which I've come to hate, incidentally,
'cause it's incredibly uncomfortable to be inside it.
But I love how it looks. I think it's brilliant.
The initial scene, and I'm sure this will come across on screen,
Hydroflax the robot is poorly and on a medical bay table.
And the initial design was for me not to be in the suit,
for the suit to be laid out, just be filming it.
The suit is laid out and I'm underneath the table popping my head up.
But the angle that we had to film at
meant that my head was like this for the whole scene.
We filmed for more than the whole day with me in this position here.
So, if Hydroflax seems like he's in pain,
it's because he genuinely is. (LAUGHS)
Can you save me, surgeon?
Well, that depends on what's wrong with you.
There's something in his brain.
- You could have fooled me. - (WHIRRING)
Oh, oh, sorry.
And the TARDIS, I mean... Who gets to go in the TARDIS?
It's so exciting to be in the TARDIS.
Yeah, and to be literally inside the TARDIS, as I am at one point,
they have to cut a hole in one of the consoles,
so that it looks like the Doctor's just placed my head on the TARDIS console.
You could wipe out this solar system.
It wouldn't be the first.
It would be your last.
A fitting end for the glory of Hydroflax.
DAVIES: No, I've never had a job like this.
And I can't tell you how excited I was. It was brilliant.
RIVER: Time we were off, then.
LUCAS: Greg wasn't the only one who enjoyed hanging out in the TARDIS.
You're doing it wrong.
I am certainly not.
I think, actually, the favourite moment so far for me
was stepping back onto the TARDIS.
Because the interior of the TARDIS has changed yet again,
and I've been on two different TARDIS incarnations.
And to walk into this one and know that it's familiar,
because it is, it's exactly the same space,
so it's a familiar space,
but at the same time, it's different...
Uh, it's great, and I love this one.
I love it.
Everything works, which is really fun.
So, I stand there
just twiddling all the knobs and pressing all the buttons. It's great.
(GRUNTING)
LUCAS: It wasn't only the Doctor's new decor,
Alex was also impressed with the Doctor's recent sonic upgrade.
Look at this for a screwdriver.
I mean, that is something else, isn't it?
Look at that...
I hate to say it, but it could be the best.
So, this is my new sonic.
It is TARDIS blue,
which is very sweet.
And when you operate it and its light comes on,
you can see its resemblance to the TARDIS.
It has a slightly old-fashioned feel, which I quite like.
Which is very good, very evocative.
I'm an archaeologist.
Look, I've got a trowel.
LUCAS:: Yes, Peter wasn't the only one with a new sonic device.
We also saw River whip out her sonic trowel.
This is a thing of beauty.
Look, the craftsmanship, the weight...
Mahogany. It's fantastic. This is mine.
My personal sonic trowel.
Great for serving slices of cake... Marvellous.
LUCAS: And now I think it's time for me
to take you for some sightseeing backstage
in my rather fetching mask.
LUCAS: Let's have a look and see what's going on.
I never knew. I thought that was a wig.
Is that yours?
This is Alex's 348th appearance as River Song.
Yes, and I'm 106.
That's why I have to wear a cloak, so you don't see my face.
LUCAS: I think Alex's cloak looks a bit like,
um, Freddie Mercury's in the Queen encore.
I love River's costumes because they're
a little bit more out of the ordinary.
They're eccentric, but they're practical.
And also, I think they encapsulate her very well,
her character, her faithfulness,
but also her sort of tough-chickness,
as you can see from my leather jacket. (CHUCKLES)
She's a returning character,
so she liked the fact that they're new,
but they also tap into her history on Doctor Who.
What all the costumes have to do is work practically.
She needed to fall through ceilings, she was in explosions,
she had to wear harnesses, and work artistically.
So, she was thrilled with them.
So, I'm always very happy when we have to create a new look.
And certainly, in this episode, she has quite a few costumes.
There is a bit of bling. More bling than this.
And she gets to sort of, you know, strut her stuff a bit.
Particularly towards the end.
It was very funny to be suddenly shopping
for sequin-beaded dresses, lovely dresses,
after doing 12 adventurous episodes.
So, it was really nice, and it was lovely for Alex, as well.
So, you go into a different world with that one.
- Here. - Ow!
I don't suppose you mind if I freshen up?
Not bad for 200, eh?
How fabulous is that? It's just like a little spritz
of what looks like perfume.
It looks like a little perfume bottle. It's just a little spritz,
and she's in a total new do.
New do, new outfit. Marvellous. Every woman should have one.
LUCAS: Of course, no Christmas episode would be complete
without the seasonal trimmings.
Working with snow is amazing
because as soon as it all starts to fall,
your body believes it.
Even though it's really made up of
tiny compressed little pieces of paper,
it comes in big sacks from a factory somewhere.
Your body starts to think it really is snowing, and you start to get cold.
And you start to worry about if you've got your Christmas tree
and when you're gonna put your decorations up.
The snow here is pulverised paper, I think,
the snow that's laying on the ground.
And it looks great because it's got that
fabulous crunchy feel to it and look to it.
The problem with it is that the snow machines
that throw the snow into the air are noisy.
So, people will say, "You'll have a silent night,
"a lovely silent setup."
Then someone will say, "Put on the snow machine."
And you get... (MIMICKING SNOW MACHINE WHIRRING)
MAN: Snow on.
(SNOW MACHINE WHIRRING)
CAPALDI: And you know that all the dialogue that you're doing
is not going to be usable.
And you're going to be in a recording studio in a few months' time,
rerecording all of that dialogue.
KINGSTON: The snow that falls... That's bubbles.
It's like being in a giant bubble bath.
This way.
The very last night we spend together is
at the Singing Towers of Darillium.
That wouldn't be true, would it?
Spoilers.
On one level, the story wraps everything up, in a way.
But then again, the last episode I was in,
I thought completed River's story.
Times end, River, because they have to.
Because there's no such thing as happy ever after.
It's just a lie we tell ourselves because the truth is so hard.
But who knows what happens with the story of River Song.
It's a mysterious, ranging, roving story
that she can appear anywhere.
So, who knows? Who know what goes on
in the mind of the great Steven Moffat?
LUCAS: It wouldn't be right to wrap this series up
without a final surprise present.
We know you'll like the present.
We actually had to steal it from your flat.
(ALL LAUGHING)
CAPALDI: Thank you very much. A guitar case!
(ALL LAUGHING)
This is a wonderful gift.
But the best gift
would be us all being back together.
LUCAS: Well, that's it.
I guess there's nothing left to say, except...
Happy Christmas, everybody.
Right. Are we done?
Whose idea was that? Absolutely ridiculous.
(THEME MUSIC PLAYING)
So, Matt, I have a bag of goodies for you.
Here we go.
Lovely. Ooh!
Exciting.
Tinsel. Cheap. That's very cheap.
(GASPS) A Christmas boot.
"Describe your perfect Christmas."
Well, I should say that chocolate money would feature.
And chocolate everything else.
My perfect Christmas would be with all the people that I love,
and they know who they are.
And there would be a lot of roast potatoes and gravy involved.
Snow. If we were somewhere snowy,
in the Alps or somewhere like that,
uh, around a fantastic log fire.
Receiving lots of presents,
preferably. um, chocolate money again.
And real money. I always like real money.
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