By John O’Connor and Will York
In darkest London, the late October night had come to a crossroads. All right, it was Hammersmith and, as anyone in London can tell you, it never really gets dark.
However, we had outlasted the staff at the Indian restaurant and were standing outside debating where to go next. Steven Moffat, recently minted Hugo award winner (“It’s quite a big award, actually”), creator of Coupling and writer of several highly-regarded Doctor Who episodes, was locked in moral combat with the strapping, sexy upstart Tom MacRae, the writer of the two-part Cybermen episodes from Series Two of Doctor Who and the creator of Mile High. Two talented, devilishly good looking comedic writers had two very distinct views on where to go next. In the balance, was our evening and our ability to retain in our foggy brains whatever strained conversations we could at this time of night. Or was it morning?
Three of us had come from America- one by Virgin Air, two by Air Canada- and we were jet-lagged, tired, and more than a little tipsy. We had, several months earlier, bid on a dinner with Paul Cornell, Rob Shearman, and the aforementioned Moffat, writers for the first series of the revived (or is it re-generated?) Doctor Who. Cornell, who had organized the auction, extended the dinner invitation to whichever Doctor Who writers he could collect for the date in question. The funds we bid were for the benefit of a charity battling Crohn’s disease. (Crohn’s disease is a terrible affliction, and we were more than happy to support research and aid to its sufferers in our meagre way). We (John and Will) had won the dinner on eBay, with Will waking up shortly before dawn on July 4 to enter the winning bid. Once we realized that we had won, we found ourselves faced with planning a trip from sunny Los Angeles, California, to the putatively foggy environs of London, England. We had even brought along a—gasp—woman (John’s wife, Vanessa), who had to deal with a dinner table of drunken, talented, funny British men (poor thing).
Cornell had collected a who’s who (so to speak) of Doctor Who-related writers and production staff from the past, present and future to attend the dinner. We imagined that once Paul realized we were coming all the way from Los Angeles (a continent and an ocean away) for this, he scrambled to sign up some more people, but we were already thrilled at getting Cornell, Moffat & Shearman. We did wonder, however, whether they would be ok with us, actually. After all, the image of some Who fans flying 6,000 miles plus to meet you doesn’t exactly conjure up images of people on the proper side of sanity (and we’re Americans to boot). As the dinner approached and Paul added more names to the list, the two of us (who had been Doctor Who fans since before we were born—well, since before Billie Piper was born, at least – in fact, this was Will’s first trip to England since 1974, when he first discovered Doctor Who and fell in love with it) became more and more excited. We had become friends and bonded over a mutual love of Doctor Who, discussing favorite episodes (“Robots of Death”; “Masque of Mandragora”), favorite Doctors (Fourth and Seventh), favorite companions (Sarah Jane, Ace) and favorite lines (“There’s no point being grown up if you can’t be childish some of the time”; “You’re a very attractive woman…. probably”). Vanessa, on the other hand, had fallen in love with the reborn series and was just hoping not to interfere with the proceedings. She also turned out to be invaluable as a photographer and wrangler for the evening.
The original location choice was a restaurant called Chula, where Shearman, Moffat and Cornell (and Mark Gatiss) had met just after they had been told that they were going to write for the revived Doctor Who in 2003. They had a gentlemen’s bet to see who could get the restaurant’s name into their episode. Moffat won, by naming the makers of the McGuffin-ish nanites, which caused the “Empty Child syndrome” (in his episodes from Season One, “The Empty Child” & “The Doctor Dances”), the dreaded warrior race, the “Chula.” Sadly, the warrior race had not developed sophisticated communications technology, and never returned Moffat’s call, so we went with plan B, a different Indian restaurant in Hammersmith a few blocks from Chula. Tom MacRae told us later that he had walked by Chula, and there was a man out front wearing a Mexican sombrero and beckoning passersby. We’d like to think Tom was drunk at the time, but it was early, and we’re pretty sure he was sober.
We met Paul Cornell in front of the restaurant. He had a long history with Doctor Who , writing several novels for Virgin Books in the dark ages between 1989 and 1995, when Doctor Who had disappeared from television, including several that are considered both revolutionary for the whole concept of “the Doctor,” and groundbreaking Science Fiction, full stop. Several of his books have consistently been at the top of reader’s lists for ages, and his views of Doctor Whohave been vastly influential, even if his favorite monsters are the long-forgotten Sea Devils. For the new series, he had written the critically acclaimed “Father’s Day,” which had been nominated for a Hugo award for Science Fiction and is a breathtaking work of television. Paul has a deep, soothing voice, was visibly nervous when we walked up to him, and yet is probably the nicest man we’ve ever met.
He led us into the restaurant. Within an hour we were joined by the entire group of writers, including, in rough order of appearance: Tom MacRae (“The Rise of the Cybermen”, “The Age of Steel”), unfathomably young and sporting a faux-hawk haircut that would make David Beckham proud; Rob Shearman, who had written the episode re-introducing the Daleks for Season One (Rob had lost 6 stone in the last year, but that had not dulled his sublime, sarcastic wit); Stephen Greenhorn, a renowned playwright working on an episode for Season Three, who managed to reveal almost nothing about it despite much pleading; the aforementioned Hugo award-winning Steven Moffat; Gary Russell, current script editor on the new series as well as Torchwood and a man as responsible for keeping Doctor Who going through the dark ages of the nineties as anyone with his production of the Big Finish audios featuring many of the former Doctors and several of the writers and plots that filled the first two seasons of the revived series; and, last but not least, Terrance Dicks.
Terrance Dicks is the man who invented many of the concepts that define Doctor Who as we know it today. In the Patrick Troughton finale “The War Games” (1969), Dicks created the whole concept of the Time Lords, the Doctor’s race. He then served as script editor during the Jon Pertwee era (1970-74) and later wrote several classic Tom Baker episodes (“The Horror of Fang Rock”, “The Brain of Morbius” and “State of Decay”, which even included a character originally named O’Connor). He wrote the twentieth anniversary episode, The Five Doctors (which was the first Doctor Who episode that John saw) as well as several novels for both Virgin and BBC Books. He is, in fact, one of the most published writers in the English language, having written just about every novelization of the old Doctor Who episodes in existence, as well as many novels for children and serious works of non-fiction. In many ways, while we were there to see and talk with the writers, many of the writers were there to see him.
We had slightly divergent goals for the evening: John’s goal was 1) not to make a fool of himself; 2) remember as much as possible by surreptitiously making notes; 3) keep pace with the beers being drunk by Stephen Moffat. He failed at each of these. On the other hand, Will was just hoping to soak up as much as possible, turning up the gregariousness knob to eleven. Several of our friends rolled with laughter when Paul Cornell, in his recap of the evening, said that Will was the loquacious one and that John was the quiet one. We might confess that one of us was a little intimidated by the accumulated talent and wit.
The images of the dinner swarmed by, and each of us moved around the table, trying to soak up as much conversation as possible. At one point John was talking with Terrance Dicks about writing “The Five Doctors” and its forced last minute re-write when it turned out that, in fact, Tom Baker would not be returning. His part in the plot – encountering the Master, and being transmatted into the Dead Zone—went to the Fifth Doctor (Peter Davison), which, Terrance said, made more sense in that the show was being broadcast during his tenure. Terrance also recounted his first convention, from back in the 70s, where he was treated like a god. He talked about how the convention was rolling out the red carpet to him, and he then bragged about it to Tom Baker. The next day, Baker was on a flight to the convention.
Later, Stephen Moffat was discussing the casting of the new series, calling the casting of Christopher Eccleston and Billie Piper like “John Wayne meeting Kylie Minogue in space.” Which is apt, of course.
Gary Russell spent some time trying to talk Vanessa out of visiting New Zealand (“It’s so boring”). He also spent some time talking about the Big Finish audios with Will, who has been a huge fan, recommending what audios to get and discussing the whole scope of the series now that he’s left to work full time on Doctor Who . In fact, Gary spent a fair amount of time talking about how happy he was to be working on the show; that it was the fulfillment of a life-long dream, a sentiment echoed by all the new Who writers.
Paul Cornell spent a fair amount of time resisting any urge to discuss his script for the Third Season (as did Moffat and Greenhorn… and Russell). In fact, we barely learned anything about Season Three, other than that Mark Gatiss is fantastic and is acting in Greenhorn’s episode and that Moffat is writing the one without so much of the Doctor in it (similar to Series 2’s “Love and Monsters”). Stephen Greenhorn seemed quite pleased to be in the mix, and he was trying very hard, it seemed, not to say much of anything, since his episode was in production when we were there (he did say that a certain actor in his episode looked magnificent).
Cornell and Moffat spent a fair amount of time singing Terrance Dicks’ praises—for example, extolling the genius of “The Horror of Fang Rock,” how things were in the old days, etc.; Dicks, for his part, was very impressed with the new series and discussed some of MacRae’s latest work and knew that MacRae would be working on a new Marple series (which, as it turns out, will feature Fifth Doctor Peter Davison in a small role).
Tom MacRae was actually quite nervous at the beginning. This was his first descent into Who fandom, and he was relieved that these Whovians could construct sentences and behave in a rational manner and discuss things other than Doctor Who (when forced to). He did ask for nightlife recommendations in Los Angeles, for when he travels to the Gallifrey convention in February.
Rob Shearman had to leave early since his wife was somewhat unwell. Rob, aside from being literally half the man he used to be, is twice the liar anyone will ever be. He had Vanessa eating out of his hand: “Oh yes, it’s five hours to home from here.” “Really?” “No. Not at all.” and “I was sick at that point and almost died of dysentery.” “Oh my god, that’s awful.” “No, that didn’t happen.” Earnest insincerity aptly describes our friend Rob. Gary Russell, who had driven out from Cardiff, where he had been furiously editing Moffat’s script, left to catch up on some sleep. Dicks had had enough of the hero-worship and headed home as well.
And so it came to where to go next. We were exceedingly flattered that the writers had decided to keep us around, for at least a few hours more. Our reduced cast had Cornell, Moffat, Greenhorn and MacRae. And here we reached the cross-roads. MacRae suggested going to a private club—the BBC private club—about a mile away. Moffat suggested the strip club around the corner, and immediately asked for votes. Vanessa (surprising none of the American contingent) voted for the strip club (but then, she’s always had a soft spot for funny Scotsmen). Sadly, John and Will’s inherent dorkiness surfaced, since one could, you know, talk at a private bar. And it seemed fairly unlikely that we would be able to talk at the strip club (at least not to each other). Crestfallen, Moffat acquiesced, apologizing repeatedly to Vanessa, and reminding us at several points as we walked the several blocks to the club that we could already be inside, warm, and watching naked women. (Cornell also sided with us, though Greenhorn seemed fine to go where the wind took us).
Surprisingly, we found a very nice table at the private club and kept drinking. From what we can remember, we discussed more Doctor Who with the writers, learning that they did not think that writing for Tennant was any different from writing for Eccleston; that a horse on a spaceship “is” Doctor Who ; and that Tom MacRae is of legal age. And just like that, the club was closed and we were turned out onto the streets.
What did we learn? Well, quite a few things, actually. Who writers, to a man, are very modest about their talents. Each writer individually confessed that he did not think he was worthy of writing on Doctor Who . Moffat even intimated that he thought, after so much success, he was due for a failure. On the cryptic side of things, we learned that good things come in brown packages, that MacRae almost ended Rose Tyler, and that women in London restaurants can overhear a heated discussion about X Factor and approach a table full of drunken writers to ask questions about that show. Beyond that, we learned nothing, and, besides, we wouldn’t want to know more; we’re happy to be surprised (Will more so than John). As Moffat said, could you imagine if no one had known that Eccleston was leaving at the end of the last episode of the first series? A twist ending like that would have been talked about for generations to come. We agree.
Somehow, we had not made fools of ourselves. We had come over from America, a place where Doctor Who was not ingrained in the blood and where the word association for “Behind the couch” is not “Dalek”; Doctor Who Magazines and Annuals are not a part of our heritage, and blue boxes just look like funny-looking phone booths (whatever those are). Nevertheless, we held our own, though much of the next day was lost to our collective hangover. And when we said we would be happy to take the writers out to dinner when they next came to Los Angeles, they did not run for the hills (though let’s not forget, these are very polite Brits). What we had also learned is that Who had made friends, or, at least, acquaintances, of this group of people—Moffat was Cornell’s best man after all—and had brought us across the world to share some time with them, all joined by our love of a Timelord, his rackety old type-40 TARDIS and the heights to which imaginations can soar. It was an evening that will live in our memories forever, and for that, we are truly thankful.