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Post by RitaLittlewood on Sept 8, 2008 12:06:17 GMT
From the Sun:
It's Tate to be back
By SARA NATHAN and JEN BLACKBURN
Published: Today
CATHERINE Tate is being lined up for a shock Doctor Who comeback, TV Biz can reveal.
The 40-year-old comedy queen, who played the Time Lord’s dippy sidekick Donna Noble, will reappear in one of four Who specials planned for next year.
And fans will be delighted — and a bit scared — to learn Life On Mars star John Simm, 38, is also back.
He will reprise his sinister role as The Master — the Doctor’s sadistic rival Time Lord who was last seen dying in his arch-enemy’s arms.
Bernard Cribbins, 79, who played Catherine’s on-screen grandad Wilf will be back as well.
A show source said: “Fans will be delighted to see Catherine back. She was one of the wackiest companions of all time and she brought heaps of humour.
“And it’s great to have John back — he and David Tennant have a real nemesis chemistry.”
The last episode of this year’s BBC1 series saw the Doctor wipe Donna’s memory and return her to her family.
But our source said: “Anything can happen in Doctor Who. His assistants are always recurring and Donna is no exception. When you’re a Time Lord you can go back to any point in history and meet whoever you want.”
Next year’s specials replace the normal series, suspended so that Tennant, 37, could take time out for stage roles.
But we hear the wild-eyebrowed Scot is close to signing for a new full series of the sci-fi hit for 2010.
Our source said: “David loves filming Doctor Who. The upcoming specials have given him more freedom to work on other projects this year and now he’s ready to come back to film a proper series to go out in 2010.”
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Sept 12, 2008 5:44:29 GMT
From The Sun:
Paul McGann back as Dr Who
By JEN BLACKBURN
Published: 11 Sep 2008
FORMER Doctor Who Paul McGann is making a surprise comeback to the Tardis next year.
The star of cult movie Withnail And I played the eighth Doc in a one-off TV film collaboration between the BBC and Fox in 1996.
But a follow-up series was never made and when the sci-fi show eventually returned to the Beeb in 2005, it starred Christopher Eccleston, 44, as the new Time Lord.
But Paul, 48, reprised his role in several audio adventures — some broadcast on radio — and has remained a firm favourite with fans.
He is expected to begin filming in October or November for one of four feature-length specials to be shown instead of a series in 2009.
Flashback scenes will see him battered from the Time War and shorn of the long hair he had in the film.
An insider said: “Fans loved Paul’s Doctor and feel he was never given the proper chance to shine. Reference is often made to the Time War which wiped out the Time Lords and this will give them a taste of that.”
Current Doc David Tennant will also appear.
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Jan 28, 2009 12:00:24 GMT
From the Sun:
Exclusive
Doctor's double decker wrecker
By COLIN ROBERTSON
Deputy TV Editor
Published: Today
DOCTOR Who is in chaos after a classic bus being used for filming was EXTERMINATED.
Bosses hired two £20,000 double deckers which were central to the plot of the Easter special.
They shot scenes of star David Tennant on one in Cardiff — while shipping the other to Dubai for filming there.
But a crane operator managed to “total” the second 1980 Bristol VR model while unloading it in Dubai docks.
Series boss Russell T Davies exploded when he heard there was no way of getting a replacement in time.
Only last week he revealed the show revolved around the Doctor taking a “bus trip which takes an unexpected detour into danger”.
Davies was forced to rip up the script and write a new plotline.
An insider said: “This has thrown a massive spanner in the works — the bus was a key part of the episode.
“The scenes in the UK may well have to be scrapped. Russell is not best pleased and is trying to think of some way round it.”
To ship the bus to Dubai would have cost the BBC around £7,000. And production in the Middle East state is costing an estimated £30,000 a week.
The storyline for Planet Of The Dead sees Lady Christina de Souza — played by ex-EastEnder Michelle Ryan — pull off a jewellery heist and escape on the bus where she meets the Timelord.
The bus had already caused a headache with fans disrupting filming in Wales. They kept pressing the buttons at pedestrian crossings, causing the bus to stop.
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Jan 28, 2009 12:04:34 GMT
From the Sun:
Exclusive
Look Who's back again
By COLIN ROBERTSON
Published: 27 Jan 2009
DOCTOR Who will be reunited with ex-sidekick Martha Jones yet again, TV Biz can reveal.
Bosses are lining up Freema Agyeman to make a surprise return in one of this year’s four specials marking David Tennant’s last hurrah as the Timelord.
The move has surprised fans as Freema, 29, reportedly annoyed Who chiefs after she signed up for ITV1’s Law and Order: London.
Show creator Russell T Davies was then forced to tear up scripts for Who spin-off Torchwood, in which she’d been given a starring role.
But sources confirmed the Londoner will reprise Martha for the BBC1 hit later this year. An insider said: “Freema’s on board. It’s early days so it’s unclear what exactly Martha will be up to in the new show.
“Whatever happens it’s good news for Freema and shows that whatever friction there was between her and Who bosses has gone.”
Freema has a chequered history with Doctor Who after signing up in the third series, replacing Billie Piper, 26.
She only lasted one series before she was replaced as 37-year-old Tennant’s sidekick by Catherine Tate, 40.
However bosses still featured guest appearances by Martha in five episodes of the last series, as well as putting her in the second Torchwood series.
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Mar 1, 2009 14:14:18 GMT
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Mar 20, 2009 10:41:02 GMT
From the Sun:
Exclusive
Billie's back on Doctor Who
By COLIN ROBERTSON
Published: Today
BILLIE Piper will return to Doctor Who with ALL the Time Lord’s former companions as part of David Tennant’s final episode.
Billie, 26, will again play Rose Tyler and teams up with other sidekicks Donna Noble (Catherine Tate) and Martha Jones (Freema Agyeman).
The trio will join forces to take on the Doctor’s revived arch-enemy The Master, played again by John Simm.
The episode sees the Timelord regenerate into the new Doctor (Matt Smith).
An insider said: “This will be the most exciting episode Doctor Who have ever done. We really wanted to get all the companions back on board as a fitting send-off to David.
“And of all the enemies for him to face in his final episode it makes sense for The Master to be the main one. Getting Billie to agree is a real coup, but she loved working on the show so much it didn’t take much convincing.”
Rose — who left after series two — formed the strongest bond with the Doctor out of the female companions. She returned for a few episodes in the last series where she was reunited with the Doctor.
Rose then returned to Earth with a separate half-human version of the Time Lord.
Since she left Doctor Who, Billie has gone on to star in the raunchy ITV2 drama Secret Diary of a Call Girl. She plays a high-class hooker in the risque show, which is currently on its third series.
We revealed yesterday how her three brothers and sisters are embarrassed about her success.
David, 37, will quit the show after the last of the four specials.
Meanwhile the red London bus set to feature in the first special has been damaged in Dubai by schoolkids.
The double decker, which was smashed up shortly after arriving in Arab state for filming, was stripped for “souvenirs” after producers parked it outside a school.
A show source said: “This really is the unluckiest bus in the universe.”
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Post by sootycat on Mar 21, 2009 13:00:34 GMT
This sounds as if it's going to be a packed episode.
Thats three Doctors Rose has known.
I'm still not sure about this new one, I said I would wait until he actually appeared, but ever thing I read about him, and every photo I see of him, the less sure I am that I am going to like him.
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Mar 21, 2009 14:24:45 GMT
Bit repetitive though to the end of the last series. All companions, regeneration (except it happens this time). Good riddance RTD. He's so unoriginal, even recycling his own scripts again and again.
Patsy
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Post by Nick on Mar 21, 2009 16:10:25 GMT
Mm I'm not keen on the idea of everyone appearing for the end of DT...the idea of regenerating is that you never know when it his going to happen...(I was shocked the last time it happened to me  ) If Billie wants to keep popping up why did she leave? |
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Mar 21, 2009 17:02:16 GMT
LOL!
It's Baker/Davison syndrome but gone too far. The HAVE to be involved in some stupid, OTT RTD plotline rather than part of his memory before regeneration.
I hope Steven Moffatt drops the lurve bollocks, I really do. It's completely unnecessary but I have a feeling now they've cast a 29 year old it will get worse! I will watch these specials and give Steven's first series a chance but can't wait to see the back of Mr Ego!
Patsy
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Apr 5, 2009 18:25:06 GMT
From The Sunday Times
April 5, 2009
Why David Tennant and Russell T Davies are leaving Doctor Who
Easter special Planet of the Dead marks departure, to be replaced by 11th Doctor Matt Smith and writer Steven Moffatt
(Mark C. O'Flaherty)
The end is nigh. Doctor Who returns at Easter for the first of four 2009 specials that will culminate in the 10th Doctor, David Tennant, regenerating into the 11th, Matt Smith. When Tennant leaves, so does Russell T Davies; Steven Moffat will replace him as head writer and executive producer.
The partnership of lifelong Whovians Tennant and Davies has seen the show cement itself in the national psyche, exterminate all competition in the ratings and scoop award after award. During a break from making the next special in Cardiff, Tennant and Davies steeled themselves with a tray of BBC sandwiches to consider past, present and future. Very Who.
Tell us about the Easter special, Planet of the Dead.
Russell T Davies People are going to be Doctor Who-deprived this year, so it’s got everything in it: CGI monsters, prosthetic monsters, army, police, an alien planet . . . It’s our last chance to have a bit of a laugh. Now the Doctor’s facing the end of his life, it’s going to get dark.
David Tennant Some of it was filmed in Dubai, and there were sandstorms . . . We were despairing. I’d look into the distance and go (Acting), “What is this strange alien world?” Well, I couldn’t actually open my eyes to look at it. The Exfoliation of Doom would be a good subtitle. My hair was full of sand. And blonde. I looked like Tina Turner.
Come the final curtain, will there be a dry eye in the house?
RTD I should f***ing think not!
DT Well, I cried (when I read it).
Did you make a pact to leave together?
DT We talked about it. It wasn’t a pact . . . I’d sort of decided. But then I nearly changed my mind again.
RTD We had dinner and chatted about it a few years ago. It just felt right. The BBC asked me to do a series five, but I didn’t shift at all.
DT I kept my options open as long as I could!
Your run on Doctor Who saw you bring back plenty of old favourites: K-9, the Master, Davros. Anything you didn’t get round to?
DT We certainly ticked rather more fan-boy boxes than I expected. The second episode I shot had (the 1970s companion) Sarah Jane and K-9 in it. My 10-year-old self melted rather when (the Sarah Jane actress) Elisabeth Sladen came in.
RTD I would have loved to have done a Star Trek crossover. The very first year, we talked about it. Then Star Trek finally went off air. Landing the Tardis on board the Enterprise would have been magnificent. Can you imagine what their script department would have wanted, and what I would have wanted? It would have been the biggest battle.
Didn’t George Lucas try to recruit you, Russell, as a writer for his Star Wars TV series?
RTD He came knocking on every single writer’s door in the whole land. And there are British writers working for him on this Star Wars series. But I’m not allowed to say who. The writers are out there now, at Skywalker Ranch (in California). Yesterday, they were allowed into the props room; they were playing with lightsabers. It’s a lovely job. But I’m not going to do a sci-fi series that’s second-rate compared to Doctor Who (hoots of laughter).
DT Do you feel you want to do something with grown-up people having sex?
RTD Yes. And I’d like to write something like that, too. Boom, boom!
DT Woo-hoo! He can still tell ’em, ladies and gentlemen.
Both of you must have been offered other sci-fi reboots.
RTD Oh, I get those. Someone did ask me about (the 1960s television series) Lost in Space, and that could be brilliant. Obviously, I said no. I’m sorry, I’ve done the best. But Lost in Space did make me think for a moment. If they got that right: a family, a robot, a villain, trapped on a spaceship . . .
DT I’ve been offered a sci-fi thing — that I’m not allowed to discuss.
David, your Hamlet attracted a new crowd for the RSC. Teenage girls dressed up like they were off down the disco, apparently.
DT Dressing up? No! Which tabloid have you been reading?
Come on, hundreds of people camped out overnight for tickets.
DT Well, I suppose there were people who wouldn’t have necessarily come to see the RSC do Hamlet. But there was never a sense that people were there for the wrong reasons. There was not anybody dressed up as a Cyberman in the front row. (Thinks) I’m not suggesting Doctor Who didn’t sell a few tickets, but. . . Who fans are clever people.
RTD They’re intelligent, literary people. I thought it was magnificent. Can I say that? And I do not want to sit through three and a half hours of Shakespeare. I said, “If I fall asleep, hit me.”
DT Thanks for that. What if the cast had seen you? “Aren’t you Russell T Davies?”
In Stratford, some shops had Doctor Who-themed promotions.
DT There was a chip shop that put up a poster — “Exterminate Your Hunger!” But this story has got out of proportion.
Will you concentrate on theatre after Doctor Who? You’ve said: “Theatre is my default way of being.”
DT Only because it’s always felt like my normal job. For the first few years, I’d do the odd episode of Rab C Nesbitt, but theatre paid the rent. (Not entirely convincingly) I have no idea what happens when I finish here. It’s a blank canvas. (Knowingly landing Davies in it)What about you, Russell? (Davies roars with laughter, ignores the question) Do you ever see yourself just producing and not writing?
RTD No. Though, if the right thing . . . maybe . . . No, no. NO. I hate other people’s scripts. (Laughs) I’m only in it for me.
The working title “MGM” — More Gay Men — has been mentioned for your next television project. Something more along the lines of your 1999 drama Queer As Folk?
RTD Yes, maybe.
DT You just made that up one day.
RTD Well, it wouldn’t be about just any gay men. If I said I was going to write about chipmunks, I’d spend the next six months being made president of the Chipmunks Society and would have chipmunks turning up at my door, saying, “Can we have work?” So, maybe I’ll write about gay men.
DT Not a bad idea, though, a chipmunk drama.
RTD You’d be a chipmunk, wouldn’t you? A gay chipmunk?
DT I can’t wait.
Doctor Who has done wonders for Cardiff, where it is filmed. Last month, the BBC awarded the University of Glamorgan £20,000 to investigate the Doctor Who effect.
DT What is that? You mean the effect on Wales itself?
RTD Tourism. Millions of quid have come into Cardiff ’cos of the people visiting here; in the bars, the clubs and the hotels. Taxi drivers take people round on tours now. Let alone the industry that we bring in to work on Doctor Who.
DT The Royal Hotel now does a Doctor Who weekend.
RTD Keeps you busy, doesn’t it?
DT Every weekend. . .
RTD . . . the honeymoon suite!
DT I’m exhausted. The perks of this job are magnificent. No. Apparently, you get a room — obviously — a ticket to the (Dr Who) exhibition and a remote-control Dalek awaiting you on your bed.
RTD That’s not bad, is it? I know, it’s funny: the boats do go up and down Cardiff Bay now, with Dalek voices . . .
It’s been a bad year for the BBC — Sachsgate, the University Challenge debacle. There were even complaints about your colleague John Barrowman on the radio, getting his penis out.
DT It’s never in.
RTD That’s just normal!
DT (As if the world's gone mad) It was on the radio.
RTD It’s getting quite ferocious now. It’s the papers. And, remarkably, we live in a BBC that listens to the papers. If the BBC holds its nerve for another 10 years, those voices will be gone. But I don’t know if the BBC will hold its nerve for another 10 years. And I’ll tell you another thing (bangs table), all those people who said “Get rid of the licence fee”, they haven’t said a word since advertising collapsed and the entire commercial sector’s in danger. ’Cos then you look at the BBC and think, “This is remarkable.” The trouble is, the BBC doesn’t have the nerve to stand up, because it’s so apologetic. It doesn’t fly its own flag and say, “Look how brilliant we are, and look what you’d lose if you attacked us.”
DT As someone who works for the BBC, of course I’ve got a vested interest. But as a consumer who has grown up in Britain, and someone who aspired to do the job I do by everything the BBC did, f*** we’d miss it if it goes.
The episode of Doctor Who Confidential when Matt Smith’s appointment was announced got more viewers than the FA Cup match on ITV.
DT Ha, ha! You see? It’s the final victory! It’s the final victory of spoddy kids like me, who grew up not understanding football and liking Doctor Who, and being ridiculed and seen as geeky, and finally . . .
David, will you be leaving Matt Smith a Bush-to-Obama style note? “From 10 to 11”?
DT We did chat on the phone. And we may well again, I suppose. But there’s nothing to say. He’ll do it his own way. He’s too good and too interesting an actor to want to know from anyone else how to do it.
You cooked up the Doctor’s wardrobe together, based on, of all things, Jamie Oliver appearing on Parkinson. How would you
like the Doctor’s look to evolve?
RTD Oh, I wouldn’t presume to say.
DT He’s quite a natty dresser, is Matt. He could probably delve into his own wardrobe for something fairly . . . They may have to tone him down, actually. He’s quite wacky. In a very stylish way, of course. Makes me feel old.
RTD Maybe they should do something different every story. Have him dress like a real person.
DT “Like a real person?” You crazy heretic. He’s already got quite Doctoresque hair.
RTD Yes, but it’s not as good as David’s.
DT Ha! It’s different.
RTD It’s good hair. I like his hair.
DT It is quite . . .
RTD The poor man. We’re discussing his hair!
DT Well, so’s the rest of the country. We may as well join in. I’m just glad it’s somebody else for a change.
Will you, Russell, have any steer in Matt’s character?
RTD Absolutely none. I wouldn’t want to write a single word for him. When he appears, every word will be written by Steven Moffat. He’s Steven’s, and Matt’s, character.
Will you pinch any souvenirs from the set?
DT I never have done.
RTD A whole Tardis. Ha!
DT A sonic screwdriver would be nice. But there’s only two. And they’re worth a fortune.
RTD That would be lovely, wouldn’t it?
DT We’re angling now: “What we’d really like . . . presented in a nice gift box.”
The level of media speculation the show generates has never died down. It’s perhaps rivalled only by James Bond. Remarkable, considering it is, or was, a children’s show.
DT Because it’s got that cross-generational appeal, which few other things have. It’s not a working-class thing, it’s not a middle-class thing. The competition winner from Doctor Who magazine was on set today, a 15-year-old girl. When I was a kid, 15-year-old girls didn’t watch Doctor Who.
RTD It’s hard to express the joy of that. For 20 years, this thing was a joke. It was slightly embarrassing admitting liking it. In fact, very embarrassing. You’d see comedians taking the piss out of it. It would crop up on I Love the 60s shows, where they would make it look like rubbish. And to see it being what it always was in our hearts is just amazing. You mentioned it in the same sentence as James Bond. My God, that’s impossible!
DT The next special has Lindsay Duncan in it. Lindsay Duncan wins Tony awards. This is one of the poshest actors there is.
RTD That just feels so nice. But I always knew it was this good.
DT Are we going to sound terribly smug and sycophantic now?
RTD (Mock heroically) They can take the piss out of what we’re saying. But they’ll never touch us. (Thinks) The whole thing never lost its excitement for me. Otherwise I’d have been gone. That’s not why I’m going now. I’m going “in case”.
DT I would agree with that. I’m going in case it becomes a job. Because it still doesn’t feel like one.
A good rumour: Prince Charles was going to appear.
DT We did ask!
RTD He turned us down, bless him.
DT He didn’t reply personally?
RTD No. You don’t get past a serf.
DT He came to see Hamlet, though. I should have collared him . . . (quickly) That was nothing to do with me. He’s a patron of the RSC. He comes to most things.
Would you work together again?
DT Only if he asks me.
RTD Oh, do shut up. Yes, please. I would love to.
The Doctor Who special is on BBC1 on Saturday
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Deleted
Deleted Member
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Post by Deleted on Apr 6, 2009 9:01:18 GMT
I know trailers can be highly misleading, but this one-off looks promising.
Here's hoping!
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Apr 6, 2009 11:54:02 GMT
I hope so, despite The Fly rip off. The bus still makes me wonder if it's Iris Wildethyme. Have to see.
Patsy
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Apr 23, 2009 20:24:15 GMT
What's the betting it's the Rani? From Yahoo news:
Anderson set for Doctor Who
6 hours 55 mins ago
WENN The X-Files star Gillian Anderson is set to return to her sci-fi roots - TV bosses are lining her up for a cameo role in Doctor Who. Skip related content
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The 40 year old starred alongside David Duchovny in the cult 1990s show and two subsequent movies in 1998 and last year.
TV executives are reportedly keen to sign Anderson for a special one-off episode of hit show Doctor Who - playing a villain to do battle with the Time Lord in the ultimate sci-fi showdown.
A source tells the Daily Express, "Gillian obviously has a massive sci-fi following following and it's felt it would be a major coup to have her appear in Doctor Who.
"The team behind the show are keen for the next Doctor to have lots of new enemies and Gillian would be a glamorous and impressive addition to the list.
"It would undoubtedly be regarded as one of those great sci-fi moments if the star of The X-Files gets to clash with the Doctor."
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Post by RitaLittlewood on May 14, 2009 10:19:31 GMT
From the Daily Mail:
She's seduced a galaxy of stars, now she has an out-of-this-world role... as Doctor Who's mum
By Michael Thornton
Last updated at 9:08 AM on 14th May 2009
On a closed film set in Cardiff, amid tight security, a 78-year-old actress with a celebrated past and the ghost of her once great beauty hovering in her dark eyes steps before the camera.
Claire Bloom has been a star for 57 years, since Charlie Chaplin chose her to be his leading lady when she was just 21.
She has won awards, conquered the West End and Broadway, as well as the British cinema and Hollywood, and counted Richard Burton, Laurence Olivier, Yul Brynner and Anthony Quinn among her lovers.
Yet all three of her marriages were disasters. Her first husband, the Oscar-winning Hollywood star Rod Steiger, was a chronic depressive who took his violent screen roles, including Al Capone and Benito Mussolini, home to his wife.
Her second husband, the Broadway producer Hillard Elkins, pocketed most of his wife's star salary, while 'he owned more shoes than Imelda Marcos and more suits than Liberace'. In the end, he cheated on her.
Her third husband, Philip Roth, considered to be America's greatest living novelist, forced her to sign a humiliating prenuptial agreement, drove her daughter by Steiger from the house, manoeuvured his wife out of both marital homes and bombarded her with menacing faxes. After their divorce, he exacted a final literary revenge by pillorying her as a bitch in a novel.
Now living alone with her cat in a flat in Fulham, South-West London, Bloom has astonished her friends by taking the modest cameo role of Dr Who's mother in David Tennant's final TV outing as the Time Lord.
Bloom's U.S. manager has confirmed she is filming the role, though the BBC declines to release details.
'The script is a closely guarded secret, as the producers are desperate for Claire's appearance to be a surprise,' says one of the actress's friends. 'She may have had a phenomenal career, but the truth is that she needs the work.'
Many of Bloom's emotional disasters had their origin, she believes, in the early defection of her father.
Patricia Claire Blume was born in Finchley, North London, on February 15, 1931. Her grandparents were Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe. Her father, Eddie, was born in Liverpool, and her mother, Elizabeth, was a Cockney.
Eddie was addicted to cards and lost so many jobs they were forced to move house constantly. When Claire was 16, he emigrated, divorced Elizabeth and remarried. His daughter never got over it.
Five years later, by which time Claire had become a star, Eddie returned to London with his new wife and came to visit her.
'He introduced her as my stepmother,' she said. 'Recoiling as though I had seen a cobra, I said that I had no stepmother, as my own mother was still alive. When they invited me to supper, I refused.'
Three days later, Eddie died in his sleep. 'My callous behaviour in the theatre killed him. I afterwards learned he had known he had a serious heart condition. His visit home had been, quietly, to say goodbye,' said Bloom.
At the age of 18, she had met the 23-year-old Richard Burton - who was married to his first wife, Sybil - in a West End play. She described him as 'an extraordinarily beautiful young man - certain of his powers and sure of his sexual self'.
Four years later, at the age of 22, while playing Ophelia to his Hamlet at the Old Vic, she lost her virginity to him. 'We made love quietly in my room - with my mother sleeping upstairs,' she said.
'I was almost ignorant about sexual matters and found this first experience perplexing. Richard was tender and considerate, and later we laughed and joked in relief at getting over this first hurdle.
'Richard left me in the early morning to go back home, and I went to sleep happy and childishly thrilled that I was a "woman" at last.
'I felt absolutely no guilt because I knew that to make love with Richard was something that had to happen.'
Their affair was to continue off and on for five years, until the 1958 screen version of John Osborne's Look Back In Anger, in which they co-starred.
'Our old intimacy quickly came back - too quickly,' she said. 'I viewed the resumed affair with some suspicion: Richard already had some of the airs of a practised roué.
'This suspicion proved only too well-founded when I opened his door one day without waiting to knock.'
She found him locked in 'a fervent embrace' with the American actress Susan Strasberg, seven years her junior, who bore a striking resemblance to Bloom. Claire paused only long enough to yell 'F*** off, the pair of you!' before slamming the door.
'I was left with a profound sense of loss, panic and humiliation,' she said. 'We never said goodbye, but parted on terms of mutual animosity.'
Six years later, they appeared together for the final time in the film The Spy Who Came In From The Cold. By that time, Burton was married to Elizabeth Taylor.
'She was extremely upset by my reappearance in Richard's life - she was always on hand during our scenes together. Her commanding, if unmusical, call for "Richard!" sent him scurrying to her side,' said Bloom.
Twenty years later - by which time Burton had been twice divorced from Taylor - Charlie Chaplin's widow, Oona, was on the same flight as a grey, deeply-lined man she scarcely recognised. It was Burton.
He asked if she was still in touch with Bloom. When she said yes, he told her: 'Then please give her my undying love.' He died shortly afterwards from a cerebral haemorrhage at the age of 58.
It was Chaplin's selection of the 21-year-old Bloom to play a suicidal young ballerina saved by an ageing clown in his film Limelight that had made her a star.
She received rave notices and won her first Bafta as the year's 'most promising newcomer to film'.
Laurence Olivier invited her to costar with him in his film of Richard III. Bloom, who had just appeared on the cover of Life magazine, found that playing opposite Olivier, 24 years her senior, was 'like being caught in an electric current'.
'Although deeply under [his] spell, I was never remotely in love with him, and never, for one instant, confused my feelings for him with my love for Richard [Burton],' she said.
Olivier's marriage to Vivien Leigh was in meltdown. 'Perhaps he was trying to show her he could still enjoy success with young girls. In other words, for our own purposes, we were using each other.'
Bloom claims she was later to become Vivien Leigh's 'devoted friend'. Perhaps, but when they appeared together in Duel Of Angels in 1958, Leigh vetoed every photograph in which Bloom, 18 years her junior, looked younger than her, while Bloom vetoed every picture in which Leigh looked more beautiful.
After dodging a sexual overture from Elvis Presley ('Honey, when I want something, I want it quick'), the 27-year-old Bloom began an affair with Yul Brynner, her co-star in The Brothers Karamazov.
'I had reached an age where I began to fear I would be left on the shelf,' she said. 'To meet a man who was neither married nor gay was extremely difficult.'
In 1959, she starred opposite the burly Hollywood icon Rod Steiger on Broadway. They began an affair and when they returned from a holiday in Sicily, she discovered she was two months pregnant with their daughter, Anna Steiger, now an internationally acclaimed opera singer.
Bloom's ten-year marriage to Steiger was not easy.
'He was utterly absorbed in the roles he played,' she said. 'I couldn't understand how anyone could take himself so seriously.'
After their first Oscars ceremony, at which Steiger lost out to Lee Marvin as Best Actor, he and Bloom were banished to a table in the deepest recesses of the ballroom.
'The absolute disregard with which losers are treated in that city came as a great shock to us both,' she said.
Later she would observe: 'I like to work in Hollywood, but I don't want to live there. I'm too young to die.'
Steiger was prey to chronic depression. 'Rod lay on the sofa in the living room and watched sports programmes on TV.
'He was never unkind to me or Anna. He simply was unable to communicate with us, or anyone. He couldn't rouse himself out of his near-catatonic state.'
Starved of conversation, Bloom struck up a friendship with the gay writer Gore Vidal.
Her last film with Steiger, Three Into Two Won't Go, in 1969, was the story of a marriage that had reached the end of the road, as theirs had.
Shortly after they divorced and against the advice of all her friends, Bloom married the 40-year- old Broadway producer Hillard Elkins.
'Dressed in far too youthful a manner for his age, he had the frenetic air of a ringmaster added to a threatening and intimidating sexuality,' she said.
He introduced her to cannabis. 'I found it made me much less self-conscious. Indeed, it released all my inhibitions,' she said.
It seems also to have clouded her judgment. Though she starred in acclaimed U.S. productions of Ibsen's A Doll's House and Hedda Gabler, and won awards for a London revival of A Streetcar Named Desire, her husband allowed her only a pittance of her high earnings as an 'allowance'.
Their marriage came to its predictable conclusion in 1974, when a stranger called her to say his wife and her husband were lovers and were holidaying in Sardinia together.
Sex seems to have been Bloom's downfall. Though she detested Anthony Quinn, her costar in Tennessee Williams's The Red Devil Battery Sign, they ended up in bed.
Despite a string of accolades in the Eighties - an Emmy nomination for TV's Brideshead Revisited, in which she starred opposite her former lover, Laurence Olivier, a Bafta for Shadowlands and a Bafta nomination for Intimate Contact - no official recognition came her way.
When she married Philip Roth in 1990, he insisted on a prenuptial agreement 'which appeared to me glaring in its absence of any provision for me should Philip decide, for any reason whatsoever, to seek a divorce'. Amazingly, she signed it.
Their five-year marriage rapidly turned into a nightmare. A Jekyll and Hyde character emerges from her portrait of Roth, who forced her daughter out of the house because her conversation bored him.
As he plunged into depression, Bloom was manoeuvured out of their homes in Connecticut and New York.
When Roth was admitted to a psychiatric hospital, he sent faxes demanding the return of everything he had given her.
'His list included 150 dollars an hour for the "500 or 600 hours" he had spent going over scripts with me. And, for refusing to honour my prenuptial agreement, he levied a fine of 62 billion dollars - a billion dollars for every year of my life.
'He reiterated that he just wanted his belongings back, but most of all he wanted the money: "Just send a cheque." '
After Bloom's memoir, Leaving A Doll's House, was published in 1996, Roth threatened legal action if she continued to give interviews to promote it.
He then hit back with his novel, I Married A Communist, in which he created the character of Eve Frame, a spoiled, social-climbing, anti-Semitic Jewish actress who ruins her husband's life by writing a kissand-tell autobiography.
After their divorce was finalised, he wrote to Bloom: 'Dear Claire, can we be friends?'
When, at his request, she met him in a New York restaurant, she asked: 'Philip, why do you want to be friends with me?'
He replied: 'Oh, perversion.' She left the restaurant.
'Now begins the rest of my life' are the words that conclude her post-Roth memoir.
And so it did. There were two films with Woody Allen and another with Martin Scorsese. In 1996, she appeared with Sylvester Stallone in the Hollywood disaster epic Daylight.
Other screen roles saw her star alongside Joely Richardson, Antonio Banderas, Emma Thompson and Emilia Fox.
Some may consider a TV cameo to be a comedown rather than a comeback. Yet at an age when most of her acting contemporaries are ensconced with their scrapbooks, Bloom is still out there pitching.
Travelling through time, facing monsters and righting wrongs must seem natural, because Claire Bloom has faced enough demons of her own.
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Post by RitaLittlewood on May 16, 2009 12:54:40 GMT
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Oct 5, 2009 15:35:30 GMT
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Post by Nick on Oct 5, 2009 16:44:54 GMT
yes it is..must be just after he has regenerated
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Oct 5, 2009 20:21:49 GMT
So they're filming out of order. Interesting.
Patsy
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Post by RitaLittlewood on Nov 13, 2009 8:11:36 GMT
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