Peter Capaldi seems a little anxious in his role as Doctor Who at present, judging by his latest comments. He recently voiced his concern about the late Saturday evening scheduling of the popular science fiction programme, seeing 8:30pm as an unsuitable starting time for family viewing. Now he has expressed his thoughts on the impending departure of his female assistant Clara Oswald, by making a thinly veiled appeal to the show’s producers to avoid seeing it as an opportunity to reduce his action scenes on future episodes.
Coleman moving on
The effervescent Jenna Coleman, who plays Clara, is expected to leave the long-running BBC show at some point during the latest series.
She is already lined up to appear in an upcoming ITV production, where she is believed to be playing the part of the formidable Queen Victoria.
After three years playing alongside the time travelling Doctor in various incarnations of a similar character (Oswin Oswald, Clara Oswin Oswald and then ‘simply’ Clara), 29-year-old Coleman has decided to move on to new acting challenges. That leaves the role of the Doctor’s sidekick up for grabs.
Capaldi prefers a female replacement
Capaldi has made his own thoughts clear on the subject in an interview for the Radio Times. He hopes that Coleman is replaced by another female actress, as he is only too aware how his advancing years - the Glaswegian turned 57 last April – could be viewed as a drawback when the action scenes are doled out.
With that thought in mind he has stated: “I don’t want a bloke.” His main justification for an apparently blunt comment seems to be that a presumably younger male assistant would take all the exciting and energetic scenes away from him. That would potentially leave Capaldi “standing around spouting scientific gobbledygook.”
The twelfth actor to play the noted leading role sees that as an unwanted scenario from his point of view.
He asserted “I want to chase the Zygons.”
Whether Capaldi’s days of chasing the amphibious metamorphic humanoids and other assorted creatures across the space-time continuum are indeed coming to an end remains to be seen. But clearly he doesn’t wish for Zygons to be bygones as far as his action scenes are concerned!
