The Doctor From Gallifrey 

The first details of casting for the 90 minute Mark Gatiss penned "genesis of Doctor Who" drama An Adventure in Space and Time have been announced: 

• David Bradley (Soloman in Dinosaurs on a Spaceship) will play William Hartnell
• Brain Cox (The Bourne films) will play Sydney Newman, BBC's Head of Drama
• Jessica Raine (Call the Midwife) will play Verity Lambert, the show's producer
• Sacha Dhawan (History Boys) will play Waris Hussein, directer of the first episode. 

Matt Smith is making his directing debut on Sky Arts programme Playhouse Presents. The current Doctor is directing the one-off drama entitled Cargese and was written by award-winning playwright Simon Stephens. 

Sky Arts describe the drama as a "unique piece of poetic realism which mines the tragic seam of adolescent love and loss". It stars Craig Roberts (Submarine), Joe Cole (Skins, The Hour) and Avigail Tlalim (The Town) as a group of disaffected teenagers in south London. The name comes from a village on the West Coast of Corsica which one of the characters mentions. 

“Sky Arts offers creative opportunities that many other channels don’t," Smith said. "To collaborate with Simon Stephens in this capacity was a thrilling and rare opportunity and one we both were keen to embrace.” 

The drama starts filming next week and is due to air on 25th April 2013. Idris Elba (Luther) and Marc Warren (Elton Pope in Love & Monsters)  are also making their directing debuts for the new series of Playhouse Presents, which starts in March and features Anna Friel, Vanessa Redgrave, Ricky Tomlinson, Suranne Jones (Idris in The Doctor's Wife), David Harewood, Ian Hart, Mathew Horne and Kylie Minogue (Astrid in The Voyage of the Damned).  

We think this is great news and look forward to the time Matt Smith directs an episode of Doctor Who itself. If he is sucessful as a directer than surely that is inevitable isn't it? 

[Source: Radio Times]

Today the BBC confirmed that Mark Gatiss will be writing a one-off drama for BBC Two about the genesis of Doctor Who. It will be 90 minutes long and will all aspects of the show from it's first broacast in 1963. It will have a close connection with the modern show too, with Steven Moffat and Caroline Skinner producing it.

Mark Gatiss said: "This is the story of how an unlikely set of brilliant people created a true Television original. And how an actor - William Hartnell - stereotyped in hard-man roles became a hero to millions of children. I've wanted to tell this story this for more years than I can remember! To make it happen for 'Doctor Who's 50th birthday is quite simply a dream come true".

And Steven Moffat of course has to have the last word: “The story of Doctor Who is the story of television - so it's fitting in the anniversary year that we make our most important journey back in time to see how the TARDIS was launched.” 

Details on broadcast and casting will be announced next year so expect the show to air around November time or even the day of the anniversary, 23rd November!

[Source: BBC Doctor Who]

Now we don't normally write very much about shows that aren't Doctor Who but a new announcement today has so many Doctor Who connections we felt we had to talk about it. 

A new eight part ensemble drama called "Broadchurch" has been commisioned by ITV and is written by Doctor Who and Torchwood writer Chris Chibnall. It will explore what happens to a small community when it suddenly becomes the focus of a major event and is subjected to the full glare of the media spotlight. 

It stars David Tennant (10th Doctor), Olivia Colman ("Mother" in The Eleventh Hour) and Vicky McClure. Tennant takes the role of DI Alec Hardy; an out-of-town, newly promoted police detective who takes the job local girl DS Ellie Miller (Olivia Colman) believes should have been hers. 

There's also a fantastic supporting cast of British actors including Jodie Whittaker as Beth, Andrew Buchan (Who was hotly tipped to be the 11th Doctor) as Mark, Will Mellor playing Stephen Turner and Arthur Darvill (Rory Williams) as the town priest Paul Coates.

“Broadchurch focuses on a small British community which finds itself at the eye of a storm. In the wake of one boy’s death, the residents of Broadchurch come under scrutiny and suspicion,” said writer Chris Chibnall. “It’s a story of scale and intimacy, as the lives of the characters are laid bare,” he added.

So it's written by a Doctor Who writer and stars David Tennant and Arthur Darville. What's that, you want a couple more Doctor Who links? Well Doctor Who directer James Strong will direct four of the episodes can Torchwood producer Richard Stokes will produce it!

We reckon that this is going to be a great drama which will be well worth watching. You can expect it on your screens sometime in 2013. 

[Source: Unreality TV]

Children's magazine show Blue Peter will be airing a Doctor Who exclusive next week. It will air a mini-episode written by three of the show's viewers, the winners of this year's Script to Scene competition. 

(A still from the launch video of the competition)

The edition will air on Thursday May 24th at 5:45PM on CBBC. It's the first new material featuring Matt Smith as the Doctor since Christmas Day! 

Tonight's Britain Got Talent featured a dalek impersonator. Martyn Crofts had the judges in stitches with his Who inspired "song" and caused "daleks" and "#exterminate" to trend on Twitter. Here's the, er, performance...

 

Every kind of dalek, except this one, will be appearing in the Series 7 opener. Check out our guide to series 7 for more.

Matt Smith popped up on tonight's edition of CBBC show Blue Peter to launch this year's Script to Scene competition where primary school children have the chance to write a mini-episode of Doctor Who. Last year they created Death is the Only Answer which you can view on our Mini-episodes page.

Here's the Matt Smith clip which oddly enough is a sort of sequel to the Second Doctor story "The Mind Robber". It's set in the same place anyway!

It was revealed today that Doctor Who Confidential, will be axed. The BBC Three behind the scenes show launched in 2005 alongside Doctor Who's revival. 

BBC Three controller Zai Bennett is reportedly keen on focusing investment on original commissions in the future.

In a statement, a BBC spokeswoman said: "Doctor Who Confidential has been a great show for BBC Three over the years, but our priority now is to build on original British commissions, unique to the channel."

The final episode, When Time Froze, is on BBC Three on Saturday after The Wedding of River Song airs on BBC One.

Due to all the Doctor Who excitement you may have missed news of the fifth and final series of it's spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures, starring the now late Elisabeth Sladen who filmed three stories last year before her sad death.

"Sky Part 1" airs on October 3rd, just two days after the Doctor Who finale with the concluding part following the next day. Details about the story and the titles of the other two stories can be found here.

And in the meantime, here is the trailer for the series:

On the Site now: Behind the Scenes Pictures from the filming of series 6.

Coming Soon: Later today we will have the prequel to Let's Kill Hitler and probaly some exciting news from today's press release!

- SFX asked Arthur Darvill (Rory) if he would be returning for series 7. He said: “I will be coming back at some point… There is an involvement in some way.” This does sort of suggest that he is not returning full time but I guess we can't really assume anything!

-Well known actor Phil Daniels has recorded a voice for the next Doctor Who Adventure Game, "The Gunpowder Plot". He said:  'It was great to do! You get to go through the gunpowder plot in various ways...'  'It's really interesting... It'll be fantastic!'

- Matt Smith has been spied filming for upcoming BBC drama "Bert and Ernie". He is playing Bert Bushnell, one half of the rowing team that won the gold medal in the 1948 Olympics in London for the double scull.

- Black Dog Murals has released 4 new Doctor Who wallpaper murals. The price is £25 per square metre and you can get more details here.

- Let's Kill Hitler will air in Australia on ABC1 on Saturday 3 September 2011 at 7:30pm.