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A QUESTION FOR PETER CAPALDI
This past spring Peter Capaldi was a guest at the Regeneration Who 4 convention in Baltimore MD. If I got an opportunity to ask him a question, I wanted it to be a good one — a question that I hoped he'd find interesting to answer as well as one that would interest the other people in the room.
I've always been fascinated by Capaldi's physical portrayal of the Doctor. So I thought — I’ll formulate a question about his physicality as an actor: How he developed his portrayal of the Doctor. Why he felt that the brew of elegance & awkwardness he hit on was who his Doctor was.
"I didn't get in to drama school they said: You're too big, Your eyebrows are too active, Your face expresses too much."
That’s what Peter Capaldi was told when he auditioned for RADA. Decades later, when he was in his forties, he realized that he should:
Celebrate being different. In the end, my Glasgow accent didn’t matter. The fact I was different would provide me with the employment I’ve had. Embrace everything. My mother said: “If you fell in the Clyde you’d come out with fish in your pocket."
From the very first moment we met Capaldi’s Doctor in "Deep Breath," his debut episode, his portrayal was filled with vitality & with vigor. His posture & poses were quite distinctive, always well-defined & forceful. He utilized an imaginative range of hand & arm gestures that complemented & elaborated on the expressions of his very expressive face. Every moment & gesture he made seemed finely honed & beautifully timed to his line delivery.
The Twelfth Doctor Emerges | Deep Breath | Doctor Who | BBC https://youtu.be/V6e7jHwIok8
Capaldi was constantly on the move, covering every inch of the space available to him inside the frame. I've heard Rachel Talalay say that he preferred to be moving around the set when he was delivering lines ~ particularly during his Big Speeches ~ which was why so many of his scenes were done as medium shots &/or fluid tracking shots. Those Big Speeches are as much riveting dance performances as they are marvelous monologues reminiscent of tour de force solos in a classic ballet or play.
The Doctor's Speech | The Zygon Inversion | Doctor Who https://youtu.be/BJP9o4BEziI
Sometimes Capaldi turned a moment of drama or comedy into a duet with the kind of spatial dynamic that you see between two tango partners. Most frequently his dance partner was Missy ~ like the encounter between them in "Dark Water" that ends with a kiss on his nose...
Missy Kisses The Doctor | Dark Water | Doctor Who https://youtu.be/6UsUSx8rfsc
...and the moment in "The Doctor Falls" when they subtly advance & retreat, briefly grasping hands.
"Where I Fall" Speech | The Doctor Falls | Doctor Who | BBC https://youtu.be/xnouj9Yz-Gs
It was quite marvelous to watch Capaldi manipulate props. It is one of the outstanding things about his performance in "Heaven Sent." Spade, spoon, skull, flower...
Breaking The Wall | Heaven Sent | Doctor Who | BBC https://youtu.be/sl9pTDK8PAk
...trousers, jacket, waistcoat, shirt, boots — every object was held with precise intent and his gestures echoed in the subsequent revelations of what each object meant to the unfolding drama and resolution of the episode's story.
"What do you think of the new look? I was hoping for minimalism, but I think I came out with magician."
From the moment he showed off the red silk lining of his coat, I was struck by how Capaldi incorporated into his performance the actions of putting on his coat, buttoning his shirt & adjusting its cuffs.
In his hands, those everyday actions, meticulously rendered, sometimes delineated a shift in tone — always signaling the sombre, determination of a Time Lord whose crisp, buttoned-up to the top white shirts and well-fitted jackets were his armour. Never truer and never more heart-rending than at the end of "Hell Bent," when, after coming the long way round to his home world, he leaves it behind again, this time bereft of companionship as well as memory.
Doctor Who Season 9 - The Doctor and the TARDIS Reunite https://youtu.be/DO92cm1Kf_s
One of the things that always interested me the most about Capaldi's physicality, his gestures and his movement through space, is that despite the jokes about how oddly he runs — as Bill Potts, his Season 10 companion, pointed out, he runs "like a penguin with it's arse on fire" —
Twelve - The Penguin With Its Arse on Fire! || Doctor Who https://youtu.be/0mj2CotG8O4
Capaldi is actually a very graceful mover. He is quite as elegant as the well-tailored clothes he wore throughout Season 8 and returned to at the end of Season 9 as well as during Season 10. There's an astonishing moment at the beginning of "Thin Ice" when he steps out of the TARDIS and smoothly pivots around, extending his hand to Bill as she steps out for the first time into the past. Every time I watch that moment, I marvel at how someone who has, throughout his acting career, run in the most ungainly fashion I've ever seen a person run, can be the same person who pivots as nimbly as the best basketball players I've ever seen on a court.
Walking on the River Thames | Thin Ice | Doctor Who | BBC https://youtu.be/4VOr-2K9PN4
Capaldi's Doctor was someone who brought a spoon to a sword fight in"Robot of Sherwood” and wielded it with as much agility as he did a pratfall in"Deep Breath," and with as much nimbleness as he used a piece of chalk to draw in "Listen," "The Pilot" and "Oxygen." His gestures, movement & face as much as his voice expressed the emotional tone of a scene, be it dramatic or comic.
The Doctor Fights Robin Hood | Robot of Sherwood | Doctor Who https://youtu.be/DnedB2-WoTM
I noticed that whenever Capaldi drew a caricature of himself as the Doctor, the figure was always spindly and precariously balanced.
I thought if those figures were animated, they'd run in the same ungainly fashion as his Doctor and other characters he has portrayed throughout his career. I wondered why he draws himself like that as it represents only this one odd characteristic of his physicality ~ his seeming inability to run gracefully.
Or is it his ability to run awkwardly? Perhaps it's a reminder, to himself & to us, that what we think are our faults can become our attributes, if only we can be brave enough to celebrate and embrace them. Then perhaps we will also find that we'll come out with fish in our pocket if we fall into the Clyde.
I really don't know whether there is any question I could have asked Capaldi at ReGeneration Who that he might have found remotely interesting to answer — least of all a question about how he embodied the persona of a character that is not his anymore. I suppose that what I really wanted to do is thank him and tell him that I know for sure that his pockets are always full of fish.
Photo Credits: “Peter Capaldi in Motion” Design by Stuart Manning | Portrait of Peter Capaldi by Paul Stuart, National Portrait Gallery, London UK || All clips are property of the BBC. No copyright infringement intended.
#peter capaldi#doctor who#regeneration who#fangrrl#celebratebeingdifferent#embraceeverything#twelfthdoctor
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1913 Love Tragedy at Glasgow with a Happy Ending
Yesterday I was googling 'ice cream + capaldi' ~ because my besties Karen Weeks & Liam Cairney are tooling around Glasgow ~ and I discovered that it's a twist of fate that blessed us with Peter Capaldi.
“Researchers at the British Newspaper Archive have unearthed a report about the actor's grandfather Giovanni, who left his Italian village at the turn of the century and ended up in Scotland selling ice-cream.The story, headlined 'Love Tragedy at Glasgow', tells how Giovanni's heart had been 'set aflame' by his landlady's daughter Agnes Dougan and he shot himself in the chest after she rejected him. he survived and went on to marry her.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2732709/Peter-Capaldi-s-grandfather-shot-rejected-landlady-s-daughter-survived-went-marry-her.html
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Make It So!
I was startled by Joel Coen's response to questions regarding Hail Caesar's snow-white cast of main characters: "“You don’t sit down and write a story and say, ‘I’m going to write a story that involves four black people, three Jews, and a dog’ — right?” It sounds like the set-up for a bad joke ~ maybe it is, with the punchline being what Manohla Dagris said of Mannix, the studio's fixer in Hail Caesar, which seems true of the brothers: "He’s an embodiment of the industry’s self-delusion and self-mythology, the kind of executive who invokes vision and bullies the help." It's true that in several instances, in some of their films ~ notably Miller's Crossing ~ the characters are distinctly of a particular ethnicity & the actors cast are of the same ethnic background. However, not all their characters are written as ethnic specific &/or played by actors who ethnicity matches that of their character, notably Oscar Isaac & Carey Mulligan in Inside Llewyn Davis. I am disappointed that the Coen brothers think "diversity is important" but don't feel that they should make an imaginative & pragmatic effort to diversify their creative ventures.
“Coen brothers: diversity is important, the Oscars are not” Nigel M Smith, @nigelmfs, The Guardian
http://www.theguardian.com/film/2016/feb/05/coen-brothers-diversity-is-important-the-oscars-are-not?CMP=share_btn_tw
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Echoes of Heaven Sent
While doing some research for a piece on the relationship between poetry & painting, I came across a poem by Denise Levertov entitled "Psalm Concerning the Castle." For me it had echoes of *Heaven Sent,* with the castle in Levertov’s poem not The Doctor’s bespoke torture chamber but rather his real home which is for The Doctor neither Gallifrey nor Earth but rather the TARDIS.
[Room 12]
(The Doctor runs back down the stairs and opens the doors. The masonry blocking the way has gone. As he enters, he slaps his fingers against his palm to count the seconds. The Veil is coming. The Doctor walks down the smooth narrow passage and puts his sonic sunglasses on. He takes them off when he reaches the wall of crystal at the far end with the word *Home* carved in it. But the word disappears after a few moments. A dark rectangular shape can just be made out through the crystal.)
DOCTOR: Of course. The last square on the board. What else would it be? The Tardis. One confession away.
Psalm Concerning the Castle by Denise Levertov
Let me be at the place of the castle.
Let the castle be within me.
Let it rise foursquare from the moat's ring.
Let the moat's waters reflect green plumage of ducks, let
the shells of swimming turtles break the surface or be
seen through the rippling depths.
Let horsemen be stationed at the rim of it, and a dog,
always alert on the brink of sleep.
Let the space under the first storey be dark, let the water
lap the stone posts, and vivid green slime glimmer upon
them; let a boat be kept there.
Let the caryatids of the second storey be bears upheld on
beams that are dragons.
On the parapet of the central room, let there be four
archers, looking off to the four horizons. Within, let
the prince be at home, let him sit in deep thought, at
peace, all the windows open to the loggias.
Let the young queen sit above, in the cool air, her child in
her arms; let her look with joy at the great circle, the
pilgrim shadows, the work of the sun and the play of
the wind. Let her walk to and fro. Let the columns uphold
the roof, let the storeys uphold the columns, let there
be dark space below the lowest floor, let the castle rise
foursquare out of the moat, let the moat be a ring and
the water deep, let the guardians guard it, let there be
wide lands around it, let that country where it stands be
within me, let me be where it is.
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The Saga of Eleven Little Weeping Angles
Eleven little Weeping Angles went out to dine;
Two looked at each other and then there were nine.
Nine little Weeping Angles sat up very late;
One found a crack in the wall and then there were eight.
Eight little Weeping Angles traveled to Devon;
One fell in a Dalek sewer and then there were seven.
Seven little Weeping Angles shopping for bricks;
One buys a cybermat and then there were six.
Six little Weeping Angles playing with a hive;
One got stung by a wasp and then there were five.
Five little Weeping Angles visiting Trenzalore;
One jumped in The Doctor's timestream and then there were four.
Four little Weeping Angles sail a pirate ship to sea; Siren sings, & then there were three.
Three little Weeping Angles walking with an Ood;
The Beast ensnares one and then there were two.
Two little Weeping Angles sitting in the Akhaten sun;
One got frizzled up and then there was one.
One little Weeping Angle left all alone;
Finds a vortex manipulator and then there were none.
Thanks to Christel Dee @CaptainChristel the creator of the *Weeping Angles*
https://twitter.com/CaptainChristel/status/722726013134893056
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Welcome to Rachel Talalay's Mind Palace
Made to celebrate Rachel Talalay being seated in the BBC Sherlock director's chair as she takes charge of the opening episode of the fourth run of the detective drama: She’s got great game!
A woman director in the chair is a first for the Gatiss/Moffat television series based on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes detective stories.
Talalay has directed four episodes of Moffat’s Doctor Who: Dark Water and Death in Heaven – the double bill of episodes which concluded series eight – and the series nine two-part finale, which included the innovative episode Heaven Sent. She also has directed episodes of the CW’s DC Comic series - Arrow, The Flash, Legends of Tomorrow - as well as Supernatural. She’s set to helm an episode of the CBS television series Supergirl.
In a 25-year career in film and television, Talalay has an eclectic set of credits including Tank Girl, Freddy’s Dead (Nightmare on Elm Street 6) and more than 75 hours of television in the US, UK and Canada from Ally McBeal to Without a Trace and Touching Evil. She has also produced films including Hairspray, Cry-Baby, Nightmare on Elm Street (parts three and four) and The Borrowers.
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Th'day is PeterCapaldi's birthday!
Caw oan th' tranny Pick up a spurtle Pat doon yer cup 'n' dae a bawherr dance!
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Celebrity Gossip Note: The lovely young lady in the clip is Elaine Collins. She's an actress, writer and producer. She and PCap met in 1983 whilst in a touring production of the Paines Plough Theatre Company. They married in 1991.
1993 Soft Top Hard Shoulder: PCap starred in this film which he also wrote. The film won two Scottish BAFTAS, one for Best Film and one for Best Actor to Peter Capaldi. Director Stefan Schwartz won a London Film Festival Audience Award. #whovian #DoctorWho
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Peter Capaldi becomes a Local Hero in 1983
Arriving back at his Glasgow digs worse for wear after a night out, PCap met Bill Forsyth who was chatting with Capaldi's costume designer landlady. Forsyth was casting the film Local Hero, starring Burt Lancaster. He impulsively put Peter in a major role and the film proved to be a big hit. "I didn’t know who he was," Peter recalled. "Maybe he thought I was funny, gawky or idiotic, but whatever it was, it was enough."#whovian
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Peter Capaldi in 1982
Every actor has to start somewhere. PCap is no exception to that rule. He's definitely a newbie In his 1st film role Living Apart Together (1982). There’s some singing and also some snogging, as well as those eyebrows that can take off bottle caps.#DoctorWho #whovian
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Peter Capaldi in 1979
In 1979 PCap was a punk rocker gigging with The Dreamboys.
Capaldi wanted to be an actor but The Royal Academy of Dramatic Art* didn't want him. Luckily he had a knack for drawing & a teacher helped him get a portfolio assembled. He passed the exam to get into the Glasgow School of Art. Second year in he discovered punk rock.
*"I dinna get in to drama school. They said: You're too big. Your eyebrows are too active. Your face expresses too much." ~ Peter Capaldi, the Glaswegian actor who went on to play #MalcolmTucker in The Thick of It & is currently The Doctor in #DoctorWho
BTW: All the characteristics that RADA dinna like are what I adore about Capaldi's acting. #whovian
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My Head in My Hands
"Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him"
On one of my re-watchings of Heaven Sent I was captivated by the dissolve from The Doctor's head to a skull. One of the many things I love about this episode is how the story is so often moved forward visually and then delineated further by a line of dialogue. I use ‘dialogue’ purposefully because it does seem to me that The Doctor is having a conversation with himself, as well as with his memories of Clara. It was an added albeit ghoulish treat that when I searched for an image to accompany my comment, I discovered that the prop was in fact modeled on Capaldi's skull. It's no wonder that, for me, the shots of the skulls invoked sadness as well a creepiness. On a subliminal level ~ after two years of intensely gazing at Capaldi's visage in Who episodes, photographs as well as youtube clips of him in other roles and personal appearances ~ I must have seen what The Doctor realizes: "This place is my own bespoke torture chamber, intended for me only. And all those skulls in the water. How could there be other prisoners in my Hell? The answer, of course, is there never were any other prisoners."
http://www.radiotimes.com/.../guess-who-modelled-for-the...
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A little Bird told me the Truth will set you free or How I've learned to love #BTS
It all started when I discovered that Rachel Talalay had illustrated the concept of how she wanted the Veil's hands to sizzle away in Heaven Sent to the Doctor Who production team by showing them how bath bombs dissolve in water. Proof of Concept: Bath bomb molded in a rubber glove on a stick dissolving in a water bath: https://twitter.com/rtalalay/status/679398466355748865
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