DOCTOR Who has moved on from the days of wobbly sets and threadbare monsters but the previous custodian of the Tardis says the show is still like “a cobbled-together B-movie”.
Peter Capaldi, who played The Doctor from 2013 to 2017, says the international sci-fi export remains at the mercy of budget constraints.
The contrast was laid bare for Peter filming new movie The Suicide Squad alongside Margot Robbie, Idris Elba and Sylvester Stallone.
Peter said: “There was more money. On Doctor Who, we don’t really have enough. Everything falls to pieces.
“All the props fall to pieces and the costumes have to be stuck together with duct tape and Velcro and stuff. I like the B-movie, cobbled-together quality of it. There’s never really quite enough money but the ideas are often very special. That’s what I like.”
Speaking to Digital Spy magazine about the big-budget production of The Suicide Squad, Peter added: “It’s nice to be somewhere where they DO have enough money to make the monsters look scary.”
Peter handed over the keys to the Tardis to Jodie Whittaker — who became the first female Doctor in the process.
Since then, Peter has taken on a string of eye-catching projects including Amazon Prime Video’s upcoming thriller The Devil’s Hour.
The Hartswood Films production reunites him with Doctor Who’s former showrunner Steven Moffatt, who has made similar comments about budgetary limits affecting the show.
In 2018, after he’d left Doctor Who, Steven said: “The big challenge of Doctor Who is running the risk of looking as cheap now as it did (in the Sixties, Seventies and Eighties) compared to what the rest of TV is doing — unless they put a whole lot more money into it.
“A show that generates as much money as Doctor Who should be getting more of it back, frankly.”
Total respect for their honesty. They have the show’s best interests at heart.
Rich not made of money
RICHARD Madeley has no problem forking out for his fake tan and blond highlights.
But his daughter Chloe says Richard used to hide his money worries from her when she was young.
Chloe said: “It wasn’t until I was eight or nine that my parents started making good money. Before that, they had four kids, a crippling mortgage and we didn’t have much money to play with.
“Holidays were caravans in Cornwall. I vividly remember being nine, standing in the checkout line with my dad around Christmas and it came to a big amount, like £100, and I remember him leaning down and whispering in my ear, ‘It’s so nice to pay this and not have the fear of God struck into me’.”
The fitness guru told Russell Kane’s podcast: “I don’t want to be that girl who relies on her parents for money. I never want to ask them for money.”
Tot may be end for Lou
SHE has only just left EastEnders to focus on life as a new mum.
Now Louisa Lytton– whose first child is due in September – is unsure about returning at all, although the soap’s writers left the door open for her to come back.
Louisa, who plays Ruby, says she faces a dilemma so many women have to grapple with when they become a parent.
She told the Made By Mammas podcast: “I’m at home being a mum. I’m doing the thing I’ve wanted the most in life, so I don’t think I’ll be in a rush to go back to work.
“But then, at the same time, I don’t know because that is who I am. So will I have that moment of, ‘I need a bit more of myself back again’? I’m gonna stay home, give it a year, I think, of me not working. But if I decide to go back before or after, we’ll work it out from there.”
Denise has flex appeal
SUPPLE Denise Welch shows the world she is still very much a Loose Woman.
The actor and Loose Women panellist, who plays Trish Minniver in Channel 4 soap Hollyoaks, bravely had a go on this painful-looking set-up.
And she might have regretted it.
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Posting a video on her Instagram account, Denise said: “So today is my first trapeze class, after which I’m having a trip to the dentist . . . and do you know, I can’t wait to get that drill in my gob sharpish.”
Her saucy husband Lincoln Townley was one of the first to reply, saying: “I’m setting this up in the bedroom tonight.”
Let’s just hope Denise is still in one piece.