'Doctor Who' Writer Mark Gatiss Teases 'Sleep No More' in Tumblr Q&A

Longtime Doctor Who scribe Mark Gatiss received a Whovian welcome in New York on Nov. 9, when he attended a special screening of his new episode, “Sleep No More,” at the Museum of the Moving Image. Of course, that museum’s single theater couldn’t contain the multitudes of Doctor Who fans around the world. So Gatiss hopped onto Tumblr after the event for an hour-long Q&A session that covered his episode (which airs on Nov. 14 at 9 p.m. on BBC America), as well as the pleasures and challenges that accompany being part of a global phenomenon. Here are some of the highlights of that online conversation.

Back to the Future
Many of Gatiss’s past episodes of Who have taken place in…well, the past. But in “Sleep No More,” he’ll rocket the Doctor (Peter Capaldi) into the future. “It’s my first futuristic Doctor Who — something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. Set in the 38th century in orbit around Neptune!” The episode also marks the Who debut of one of his colleagues from the beloved sketch show, The League of Gentleman, Reece Shearsmith. “I wrote the part especially for Reece,” Gatiss revealed. “It’s very helpful writing with a specific actor in mind. Reece has been badgering me for years to be in Doctor Who!”

Boundary Issues
Given that being a Time Lord allows the Doctor to defy all conventions of time and space, there’s theoretically nowhere that the show can’t go. But Gatiss says that the writers do have to have certain boundaries when it comes time to put words to paper. “There is a boundary, in that the show has to be feasible in terms of how it’s made, but also the story has to be coherent and make its mark.”

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Picking Favorites
Because Gatiss is a Who fan as well as a Who writer, he definitely has his favorite episodes. Specifically, “The Green Death” (from Season 10 of Classic Who, starring Jon Pertwee as the Third Doctor) and “The Empty Child” (from Season 1 of New Who, starring Christopher Eccleston as the Ninth Doctor). Naturally, Gatiss has favorites in other franchises as well. Asked to pick his favorite James Bond, he pointed to Sean Connery, but added that his favorite Bond movie is actually On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, starring George Lazenby.

Regrets, He Has a Few
As in life, compromise comes with the territory when you’re making television. Asked whether there’s anything from his past episodes that he’s sorry didn’t make the final cut, Gatiss replied, “There’s always a lot of give and take- sometimes you have to change an idea for budgetary reasons, or characters get merged for the story. There was a scene we were going to shoot for An Adventure In Space And Time [a made-for-TV film that dramatized the early years of Doctor Who] which would have recreated the end of the Daleks’ master plan. Jean Marsh is aged to death in that story (which no longer exists) and Jean had agreed to come back and play the part again briefly, but this time as a woman in her 70′s. It would’ve been lovely but we couldn’t afford it.”

Girl Power
As popular as Capaldi is proving to be as the current Doctor, many Whovians have been vocal about hoping that his eventual replacement will reflect the increased diversity of the show’s fandom. One Tumblr user even made her own casting pitch: Tilda Swinton for the Thirteenth Doctor. “I think it will be wonderful to have a female Doctor, and there’s absolutely no reason why not!” Gatiss replied enthusiastically. “I feel very strongly that it should be because the right person comes along though, not because there is pressure to tick a box. I have a list of potential female Doctors as long as my arm!”

Doctor Who airs Saturdays at 9 p.m. on BBC America.