Matt Smith--The Biography

by Emily Herbert

  The Christmas special garnered over 10 million viewers and the promise of a return in 2011, although for the first time the series was to be split into two parts, the first half being shown in the spring and the second in the autumn. In the meantime, a ‘Doctor Who Experience’ opened in London’s Olympia 2 exhibition centre, a sort of interactive adventure lasting 25 minutes, in which children (and their parents) were allowed to fly the Tardis, ward of monsters, including Daleks and Weeping Angels and view a 3-D film of the Doctor and all the various characters and monsters he encounters along the way.

  Both Matt and Karen were building on their success elsewhere. Matt got plaudits for playing Christopher Isherwood in Christopher and His Kind; Karen, meanwhile, was cast as the Sixties model Jean Shrimpton in a BBC4 drama called We’ll Take Manhattan. But it was Who that continued to make the headlines, as details began to emerge about the forthcoming series, with Steven Moffat claiming it would be the scariest series yet. ‘We’re not lying. One of those four people [the Doctor, Amy, Rory and River Song] is going to die,’ he said. ‘The Doctor’s darkest hour is coming. Shows like Doctor Who should have big colourful, memorable moments that make you go, “What the hell?” It’s hard to create shock in Doctor Who when we’ve already blown up the universe a couple of times. What do you do next? You put the jokes in for the adults, and you make it scary to appeal to children.’ River Song, played by Alex Kingston, was the character who at some point was known to have been the Doctor’s wife; she was making a return to the series, the first episode of which was filming in the Utah desert.

  Of course, by now the characters of Amy and Rory were married, another first for the companions of Doctor Who. Steven said that added to the drama, too. ‘A married couple on the Tardis was always my plan from the off,’ he continued. ‘Previously, the Doctor always got his companions when they were young and was careful to put them back where he found them before he messed up their lives but here he is with a married couple on board and as much as he loves them both he does wonder if it isn’t time he got out of the way before something bad happens.’

  Karen was looking forward to it, as well. ‘If anything, she’s even more Amy Pond-ish!’ she said of her character. ‘It wouldn’t work for Amy to change completely now that she’s a married woman and I certainly don’t think she ought to become a subdued version of herself. I do think being married has helped to define the relationship between the Doctor and Amy more clearly and I can reveal that there’s something in the new series which makes Amy see Rory in a new light. I think he’s developed the most of any of the characters in the series. By the end of the last series he became a Roman centurion hero and had changed a lot. It felt like he would earn his place in the Tardis and it would be hard to imagine it without him now.’

  Amid all the anticipation, however, there was some sadness, when it was announced that the actress Elisabeth Sladen, an erstwhile Doctor Who companion who worked with more Doctors than any other, and more latterly the star of The Sarah Jane Adventures, had died at the relatively young age of 63 after a battle with cancer. The first episode of the series, The Impossible Astronaut, was dedicated to her, and Matt professed himself saddened, as indeed did so many of the people involved in the show.

  The episode certainly got the nation’s attention, featuring as it did not only the character of Richard Nixon, the US president who went on to be disgraced by the Watergate scandal, but the seeming death of the Doctor. Throw in the fact that Amy was pregnant and the latest series had clearly kicked off in style once more. With admirable timing, it was announced that Matt had been nominated for a Bafta for Leading Actor, a mere two years after becoming the Time Lord. In the event he lost out to Daniel Rigby, who had portrayed the late, great comedian Eric Morecambe in Eric and Ernie, but the kudos of the nomination remained.

  Certainly his co-stars had nothing but praise for him. Downton Abbey star Hugh Bonneville was making a guest appearance as a pirate, Captain Avery, who is being plagued by a beautiful siren, played by Lily Cole, and couldn’t have spoken more highly of him. ‘He has great enthusiasm and energy,’ he said. ‘It’s the first time I have acted with Matt and I have to say that he is an incredibly hard worker. They do these crazy schedules, preparing for the next episode while they’re shooting the current one, but Matt is the perfect host to guest stars. He and Karen Gillan were generous with their welcome. They’re obviously so pooped and could just go ‘ugh’ but actually they were terrific. For various reasons, the Doctor’s Tardis has programmed itself to land on my ship. As a 17th-century pirate, I’m furious that this thing has arrived. We’re becalmed at sea and the Doctor comes and upsets our equilibrium.

  The Time Lord has to walk the plank and that’s the end of the Doctor. Or is it? As for the rest of the episode, I just swan around in the background with a pistol, looking a bit bemused. The feeling I get about the whole story of this series is that it does address big universal themes, as well as being a roistering adventure along the way. The canvas is so broad and open that writers are queuing up to write for it. There is this overarching theme questioning mortality and identity and who we are in this universe.’ Indeed.

  Matt’s relationship with Daisy was still going strong at this stage, with the two of them making regular appearances in the gossip columns as they attended music festivals, lunched and dined together and were pictured together in the park, but in truth, ultimately, it was not going to last. And there was another upset in store, too. The Daleks, temporarily at least, were going to be banished from the Doctor Who set, as Steven Moffat explained in his usual inimitable way. ‘We thought it was about time to give them a rest,’ he told the Radio Times. ‘There’s a problem with the Daleks. They are the most famous of the Doctor’s adversaries and the most frequent. Which means they are the most reliably defeatable enemies in the universe. They have been defeated by the Doctor about 400 times. Surely they should just see the Tardis approaching, say: “Oh it’s him again” and trudge away.’

  ‘Exterminated!’ shrieked the headlines, but Moffat was not only a great innovator, but now entirely charged with keeping the Doctor Who flame alight, and he wasn’t going to risk endangering the show. He and Matt had successfully regenerated the Doctor once more and he had every intention of continuing to gain plaudits and praise. And Matt was just getting better every time he stepped into the role.

  CHAPTER 15

  MOST STYLISH DOCTOR

  As the year wore on, Matt was becoming an increasingly established figure on the celebrity landscape. He won GQ’s award for Most Stylish Man, while his interpretation of the Doctor continued to win praises across the board. The season was building up to a spectacular finale, in which River Song was revealed to be Amy Pond’s daughter (with time travel, anything could happen), and Matt was enjoying himself along the way. ‘As a journey for me it’s always going to be interesting and similarly for Steven [Moffat], who is tailoring his writing more and more for me, but also the characters around me have just got married. That changes him immediately,’ he said. ‘Their stories affect and change him, so I think this season has seen the Doctor on the back foot in many ways being sort of like the odd part. Of this universe that he is at the centre of, he is the oddity. He doesn’t quite know where he is. Where is his home, for instance? Is he lonely? I think he fills his time really well! He’s proactive. I think he risks being lonely and it’s interesting to glimpse him when he’s like that. He’s a bit more existential; “why am I here and how do I fit into all of this?”

  ‘If you look at the context of his life, all the choices he’s made where he’s lost people along the way, they have to have an impact on him at some point, and he’s lost countless people. Every week there’s a cleric who falls off the bandwagon! There’s a bigger picture to think about. So what then happens is that all this stuff happens to resonate in his head.’

  Off stage, Matt and Karen had built up a jokey camaraderie, which seemed to be serving both well. After Matt saying that (the stunningly
beautiful) Karen’s looks were ‘a five out of 10. And you can tell her I said that’ – his co-star hit back. ‘He’s got an amazing head, that boy,’ she said. ‘It looks like it’s made out of rubber. He’s really lucky to have that face. His looks, combined with his severe acting talent, are a force to be reckoned with.’ The two were actually getting on famously, although by this stage Karen was becoming aware that the time was coming for her to leave the show. In the meantime, there was speculation that Doctor Who could be turned into a film, the first time since the 1960s, when two Doctor Who films were made.

  However, in November 2011, there was upset when it emerged that Matt and Daisy had split up after 18 months together. Initial reports had it that work commitments were to blame, with the two of them forced to spend quite a lot of time apart, but it soon emerged that Matt had been wary of further commitment. He was a young man, after all, with the world at his feet and opportunities opening up to him everywhere. Even so, it was a shock to the couple’s friends, who had seen them as a couple very much in love. Daisy’s mother Pearl, herself very much accustomed to the spotlight, was philosophical. ‘If I had any choice in the matter, I would have got Daisy to be a doctor,’ she said.

  Matt rose above it all. He filmed a Christmas special in which the Doctor took up residence in an old house to help cheer up two children who were unaware they’d lost their father; around the same time it was confirmed that Karen would be leaving the show. It was a blow to Matt, as well – she, after all, had joined at the same time as he and the two had given each other much needed support as they edged into the public eye. They had also both joined just when Steven Moffat had taken over. ‘It is very disappointing,’ said Matt. ‘We took over the show and had to hold hands and help each other.’ But the show was, as he acknowledged, about change and regeneration. Doctor Who always had to keep one step ahead. Steven Moffat, however, warned that the departure would be ‘heartbreaking.’ The fans gulped.

  Matt himself was very enthusiastic about it. ‘Well, the show,’ he told the Guardian. ‘OK. It focuses around the Doctor meeting a family, in particular two young children, and their mother, played by Claire Skinner, and of course they enter a world which perhaps they shouldn’t have entered, in good faith, and…well, a jolly old time of it. Around the Second World War. I’ve got huge hopes for it; the director Farren Blackburn, who just did The Fades, has given it great scale and colours – it’s almost Tim Burton-esque. It’s quite strange because I go away and do other jobs and then come back to this and, honestly, there’s really nothing quite like playing the Doctor.’

  The Doctor wasn’t going anywhere himself, though, with Matt confirming he had no intention of leaving the show. He and Karen were both nominated in the National Television Awards, Matt for best male performance and Amy for best female (the show itself was up against Downton Abbey, much to the critics’ delight), both of which they won, amidst speculation that he and Daisy were managing to patch things up, speculation which was ultimately to prove unfounded. There was also increasing curiosity about who would be the Doctor’s new assistant: ‘He is going to meet someone in the very last place he could ever have expected,’ was all Steven Moffat would say.

  Filming for the new series began again in February 2012, with Karen scheduled to leave half way through the run, and Jenna-Louise Coleman, the former Brookside actress, confirmed as the new companion. ‘It always feels like a miracle when you find the right person because we saw a lot of brilliant actresses,’ said Steven. ‘There was a moment I remember from the second time she came in, and they were auditioning together and they both looked frightened…and it just was an instant poster.’ Karen, meanwhile, said that she feared appearing like a ‘jealous girlfriend,’ when her successor joined the show. Daisy, meanwhile, was spotted with a new man.

  Matt’s characterisation of his famous role was developing as well. ‘As the doctor ages he gets younger and sillier,’ he said. ‘He’s over 1,000 now, I think. And – oh, I just like him. His lack of cynicism. He’s like a baby. He wants to sniff, to taste, everything; he’ll never dismiss anything. As we get older – perhaps I’m just speaking for myself – we can get too cynical. If he had a bath, it would be filled with rubber ducks which could talk or something; he’d find a way to reinvent the common bath. And I admire that.’

  Matt’s continuing popularity was highlighted when he became one of a host of celebrities to carry the Olympic torch in the run-up to the summer games in London. Fittingly, it was in Cardiff, where Doctor Who was filmed, and a huge crowd turned up. ‘It’s a great privilege,’ Matt said of the occasion. ‘I can’t believe the number of people who turned up. I thought I would just be waving to the ducks. I would do it in my underpants…it’s the Olympic torch! I would probably get a bigger crowd for that.’

  Indeed: life outside Doctor Who continued as well. Matt signed up to play the 1948 London Olympic gold medalist Bert Bushnell for the BBC1 drama Bert & Dickie, scheduled to run just before the 2012 Olympics, alongside Sam Hoare as Richard ‘Dickie’ Burnell. The duo won gold at the double sculls at the 1948 and there were some wry smiles when the two of them were pictured in the water. ‘Just staying in the boat is a very hard skill, because it’s all about balance,’ said Matt. ‘If you’re not working as a team, then you’re in trouble, because the moment one of you tips, you’re dead and buried.’ But there was assistance: ‘There were four rowers who helped us,’ said Matt. ‘And how they row at that level for six minutes [the duration of a race] is extraordinary. The courage, will power and barrier of pain that you have to get through, which I hope is all present in the film, is wonderful.’

  It was certainly a hard, physical challenge. ‘I had three or four duckings, which weren’t just cold and uncomfortable, but embarrassing, too,’ he confided. ‘When you consider the dangerous situations the Doctor manages to survive in space, it’s pathetic I couldn’t even keep afloat 10 yards from the river bank. Almost as bad were the injuries. Doctor Who skips away at the end of every episode without a scratch. But after all that rowing – and unintended swimming – I was physically drained, my muscles ached and my hands were covered in calluses.’ But he had become enormously physically fit, impressed the reviewers and proven that he was capable of taking on a very different role from Doctor Who.

  But it was his main role that continued to garner the most interest. Further details of co-stars for the new series emerged, including Dame Diana Rigg and her daughter Rachel Stirling, who was playing her daughter in the show. Further details of monsters were also forthcoming: this time there were to be dinosaurs. There were also to be cowboys. ‘The Doctor will come face-to-face with some of the most monstrous creatures evolution has produced, on some of the most monstrous sets we have ever built,’ Steven Moffat said.

  Indeed, everyone involved was getting pretty good at hyping up expectations. ‘Fans can expect a gut-wrenching, heart-wrenching time, saying goodbye to the Ponds,’ said Matt. ‘But, we’ve also got dinosaurs, we’ve got Daleks, we’ve got weeping angels and we’ve got New York. It feels, in scale, as big and bold as ever it has. That’s the thing with Who. It’s got to get better, all the time. Hopefully that’s what we’re doing. Steven Moffat’s in great form, Karen and Arthur are in great form and there are great directors and great monsters. That gives you a good chance.’

  Matt, Karen and Arthur Darvill, who played Amy’s on-screen husband Rory all pitched up at July’s Comic-Con convention in San Diego, California, all three confessing to tears when Amy and Rory’s departure was filmed. Matt himself was adamant that he was as happy as he’d ever been in the role, saying he wanted to do it forever and given that it was the run-up to the show’s fiftieth anniversary, there was certainly no appetite for change at the top.

  Indeed, Matt seemed enthused by it all. He talked excitedly about the fact that the makers of the show had made the Daleks scary again, something they perhaps hadn’t achieved in the first season. He talked about how his costume was evolving, revealing that he’
d originally wanted a long coat, but that the powers that be were worried it would make him look too much like the joker. As for a new companion – ‘That is the nature of the show,’ said Matt, adding that companions come and go and, indeed, Doctors come and go. You had to accept it, he said, although he added that he’d miss Karen and Arthur desperately. He didn’t forget to praise his new companion, however – the Doctor was also a diplomat.

  Matt’s endearing charm, however, remained entirely unchanged. Refreshingly, he appeared to be as down-to-earth as he ever had been, not swept up in the razzamatazz and still very much a genuine person. It is easy, with such success, to allow it to go to the head, but Matt hadn’t done. He remained resolutely still the same modest guy. He certainly maintained a healthy attitude towards it all and his attitude towards the show’s greatest fans might be the reason behind that. ‘I like children,’ he told one interviewer. ‘I like spending time with children, because they’re interesting, and they’re interested. They’re not cynical. I trust the responses of children. I trust their honesty. I watch children to see how they react to stuff. They don’t miss much! What’s nice is, they’re interested in the character and not the celebrity. To children, I’m just that silly old man who travels around in a police box.’ Not that old, of course, and with quite a future ahead.

  So what next for Matt? As the youngest ever Doctor, he should have a career lasting the best part of half a century in front of him, so what challenges is he looking for now? And does he ever worry that he will be forever associated with this so very famous role? A good 40 years after he played the part, Tom Baker is still best known for his own interpretation of the Time Lord – does Matt worry this will happen to him?