David Tennant wins BBC Audio Award

The former Doctor Who actor won the BBC Audio Award for Best Actor, for his performance as “Kafka” in the BBC Radio 4 production of Kafka: The Musical, the score for which was also composed by Murray Gold (Doctor Who’s composer since 2005). David Tennant also hosted the awards ceremony.

Tennant’s fellow award winners included Rosie Cavaliero (Jam and Jerusalem), who scooped up an award in the Best Actress category, for her role as “Ruthie” in Lost Property: A Telegram from the Queen.

Listen to David Tennant’s introduction speech…

Audio courtesy of David-Tennant.com

Andrew Scott was named as Best Supporting Actor. The 35-year-old won the award for his role in the audio play Referee, after having recently come to the wider public attention for his performance as Jim Moriarty in BBC One’s Sherlock (created and written by Steven Moffat and Mark Gatiss). The BBC Audio Award was presented to Scott by David Tennant and June Whitfield (Absolutely Fabulous, Doctor Who ‘The End of Time’).

Actor Richard Wilson (One Foot In the Grave, Doctor Who ‘The Empty Child’) presented the writer Hugh Hughes with the award for Best Scripted Comedy Drama for Floating.

Best Sound was awarded to the play Bad Memories, directed by Julian Simpson (Doctor Who ‘The Rebel Flesh’/’The Almost People’).

 

Read the full list of BBC Audio Award winners:

> BBC News

Russell T Davies: Children’s TV is “Endangered”

Russell T Davies, the man behind five of Doctor Who most popular years, has given an interview in today’s Observer, in which he explains how he believes today’s children’s television is in danger of disappearing and why he feels he must support it.

Davies explains how the failure of society to recognise the talent of children's writers "allows us to diminish and marginalise their work" and gives further details about Aliens VS Wizards, the upcoming new children's science-fantasy drama created and written by himself and Phil Ford (The Sarah Jane Adventures, Torchwood).

Davies's heart lies with children's television. His latest project, Aliens Vs Wizards, is being talked about as one of the biggest new dramas for children to come out of Britain. It combines medieval wizardry with alien-fantasy – think Harry Potter meets Doctor Who – and will be screened by the BBC this autumn.

Davies arranged to meet his close collaborator on Doctor Who, the writer Phil Ford, for dinner in a Los Angeles restaurant to talk about new ventures. "When you try like that, usually you never have an idea," he said. But by the time the two men had finished their main course they both knew they had come up with a "really geeky idea, the cleverest of the lot", which taps into the latest film and TV craze, mashing up different genres – as seen in the film Cowboys & Aliens, starring Daniel Craig and Harrison Ford, released last year.

They decided to focus the new drama on two 16-year-olds, Tom and Benny, one secretly in possession of magical powers, the other a super-bright scientific brain, who does not believe in magic. They combine their skills to battle a tribe of aliens, called the Nekross, to save the world. From the dark side of the moon, the Nekross set up a base to scan the earth, looking for magical skills to buttress their power and, naturally, destroying anything that stands in their way.The idea was quickly turned into a first script, then an order for 26 episodes.

Davies said: "Magic and science fiction are never combined. For example, the only thing that could make Harry Potter better, in my view, would be if a big spaceship arrives at the door of Hogwarts, but it never does. It does in ours, in episode one." The wizard teenager is descended from a family of wizards, but he keeps this a secret and attends a comprehensive school. Aliens Vs Wizards will also feature lots of prosthetic monsters, as in Doctor Who, and not just computer generated imagery.

The lavish multimillion-pound series, which starts filming in the Cardiff drama studios of BBC Wales in March, is being financially backed by Fremantle Media Enterprises (FME), to supplement CBBC budgets. In return for the investment, Fremantle, not the BBC, has global sales rights, as well as rights to DVDs, merchandising and book publishing.

> Read the FULL article - The Observer 


Aliens VS Wizards will begin filming around Spring to Summer this year and is due to broadcast on CBBC this Autumn.

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Being Human – Hal & Tom Prequels

POSSIBLE SPOILERS if you haven’t seen the Series 3 finale…
Hal (Damien Molony) is an elderly gentlemen (only a few centuries old!) of the blood-sucker variety. But the late John Mitchell wasn’t unique in his decision to stay off the resist the addiction – Hal is also on the wagon, as it were, and (much like Mitchell) has also lived in a housing arrangement with a ghost and a werewolf, the origins of which we are shown in his prequel.
Those of you familiar with Being Human, particularly the third series, will already know Tom. Tom MacNair (Michael Socha) is a vampire killer, and his on-going hunt may indeed be fuelled now by vengeance, following the murder-by-vampire of his adoptive father. With the introduction of newbie Hal into Honolulu Heights, this doesn’t bode well. So now his wild forest lifestyle has died with his ‘father’, how will Tom fit into society?

Hal’s Prequel

Tom’s Prequel

Being Human Series 4 begins on Sunday 5th February on BBC3 at 9PM and is expected to broadcast overseas later in the year.

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Being Human – Series 4 Trailers

In the run-up to the new fourth series of Being Human, we’re treated to four trailers for the start of a new era in the fantasy-realism “comedy drama”.

As has become tradition with each series of Being Human, each of the main triumvirate have their own individual teaser trailers as well as the main one…

Being Human Series 4 Launch Trailer

Being Human – Series 4 Episode Titles

With DWF’s new look comes a new variety of posts! From now on, although this is still primarily a Doctor Who-based fansite, we will be also reporting on exciting news elsewhere in TV and film with news of other productions that also interest a great deal of Whovians, including myself!

In the exciting build-up to the fourth series of BBC Three’s hit fantasy-drama Being Human, the full list of episode titles has been released, as well as a few of the early synopses…

1. Eve Of The War (5th Feb) by Toby Whithouse

In an old B&B in a sleepy seaside town, we join Annie, her housemate George and their new friend. They’re reeling from the loss of their best friend Mitchell, Tom’s father-figure McNair and the tragic departure of George’s girlfriend, Nina. But with a newborn baby to look after, it’s never been more difficult to live life under-the-radar as a ghost and two werewolves. There are also the vampires to deal with: lurking in every corner of society, waiting for the Old Ones to arrive and take over the world with brutal force. Can they fight them off? And at what cost? One thing becomes clear – the vampires believe that the child of two werewolves is important in their own mythology. Can this little baby really be the saviour of humanity? And what exactly are Cutler’s ‘alternative’ plans for world domination?

2. Being Human 1955 (12 Feb) by Lisa McGee

Hal, Leo and Pearl – another werewolf, vampire and ghost – turn up at the house. Leo is dying and this supernatural triumvirate believe the secret to saving the old werewolf’s life resides in Honolulu Heights. While Annie is confident that she can channel the power to help him, Tom isn’t so sure. Nor is he best pleased at having the disdainful and arrogant vampire Hal in his home either. But to fulfil Leo’s dying wish, the two are forced on a mission together. A fracas with a pawn shop owner bonds them temporarily, but later when Tom discovers Hal standing over baby Eve’s crib, Hal’s ultimate motives are called into question.

Who Wins at the National Television Awards

Tonight the annual National Television Awards took place and our favourite show won a couple!

Karen Gillan won the award for Best Female Drama Performance.

Matt Smith won the award for Best Male Drama Performance.

Doctor Who unfortunately lost to Downton Abbey in the Best Drama category.

Coverage:

• RadioTimes
• Digital Spy
• The Guardian

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