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The Guinness World Records once listed the BBC’s Doctor Who as the “most successful Science Fiction television series in the world,” and, in November 2023, the show turned an impressive 60 years old. Doctor Who originally ran from 1963 to 1989 and was relaunched in 2005.

Despite its grand age, it’s not demonstrating any signs of slowing down.

Former showrunner Russell T Davies (fresh from his success with It’s A Sin) returns to the franchise following last year’s Christmas specials with fan-favorites David Tennant and Catherine Tate. With the 14th season — which, for the first time ever, will premiere simultaneously worldwide thanks to Disney+ (on Friday at 7 p.m.) — Ncuti Gatwa (Sex Education and Barbie) officially becomes the newest incarnation of the errant Time Lord.

But, what about those who have already played the role of The Doctor (a.k.a. Doctor Who) over the past seven decades? Below is your 101 to all of the lead actors.

On January 6, notable filmmaker and film historian Peter Bogdanovich died at the age of 82. One of the “New Hollywood” directors, Bogdanovich had great love and respect for older cinema, and established relationships with many of the major players from the Golden Age, most notably Orson Welles, which is reflected in his works. At the age of 32, he directed the film for which he will be best remembered. It was 50 years ago that he received his only Oscar nominations, for directing and writing that film — “The Last Picture Show,” a black and white ensemble coming-of-age drama set in a small Texas town in the 1950s.

SEECelebrity Deaths 2022: In Memoriam Gallery

Let’s flashback to the Academy Awards ceremony of 1972 to celebrate 50 years since that event.

“The Last Picture Show” tied for the most Oscar nominations that year with eight. The epic musical “Fiddler on the Roof” and the crime thriller...

Brian Cox, the Scottish actor known for playing formidable media baron Logan Roy on HBO’s “Succession,” is making his directorial debut in film with “Glenrothan.” The project is being co-developed by Lionsgate and London-based “Keeping Faith” producer Nevision.

The Emmy, Golden Globe and Olivier Award-winning “Succession” actor will also star in the film, which is billed as a “love letter to Scotland.” The project marks the second time Cox is going behind the camera: He previously directed an episode of HBO series “Oz” in 2000.

“Glenrothan” is set in a distillery town in the Scottish Highlands, and tells the story of two estranged brothers reuniting in the land of their birth. The last time they spoke was on the day of their mother’s funeral when, following a violent exchange with their father, the younger of the two left their Highland home for America. Forty years later, the brothers finally reunite,...

Jena Malone (“Neon Demon”), Danny Huston (“Wonder Woman”) and Dame Janet Suzman (“Nicholas and Alexandra”) are among the cast of AGC Studios’ supernatural horror-thriller “Consecration,” Variety can reveal.

The film, first reported by Variety back in July, is currently shooting in London and Scotland. The pic is fully financed and co-produced by Stuart Ford’s indie operation AGC Studios.

The movie is centred on the suspicious death of a priest, whose sister (Malone) goes to the Mount Saviour Convent in Scotland to find out what really happened to her brother, with the help of Father Romero (Huston). There, she soon uncovers murder, sacrilege and a disturbing truth about her own shadowy past that brings long-buried trauma to the surface.

AGC International, the international sales and distribution arm of AGC Studios, is handling worldwide sales.

Christopher Smith is directing the project from a script he co-wrote with Laurie Cook. Meanwhile, Xavier Marchand...

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By Fred Blosser

Kino Lorber Studio Classics has released “Mary, Queen of Scots” (1971) in a new Blu-ray edition. A Hal B. Wallis production starring Vanessa Redgrave in the title role and Glenda Jackson as Queen Elizabeth I, the picture opened on a limited basis in Los Angeles on December 22, 1971, in order to qualify for the 1972 Academy Awards. General release in the U.S. followed on February 2, 1972. The filmmakers’ hopes were high, since a previous Wallis production about the 16th Century British monarchy, “Anne of the Thousand Days,” had been a critical and commercial success two years earlier, with the same screenwriter (John Hale) and director (Charles Jarrott). As if more cred were needed, a weighty biography by Antonia Fraser, “Mary Queen of Scots” (no comma), had been a best-seller in 1969. Since Mary was a historical figure in the public domain, the filmmakers...

Yvonne Blake, designer of the iconic costumes for the 1978 box-office hit Superman, has died. She was 78.

Blake died Tuesday in Madrid, a spokesperson for the Spanish Film Academy told The Hollywood Reporter. She had been the academy's president since October 2016 but suffered a stroke in January.

She shared an Academy Award with Antonio Castillo for the three-hour-plus 1971 costume drama Nicholas and Alexandra, directed by Franklin J. Schaffner. "I suppose all one can say is that if it wasn't for the Russian Revolution, I wouldn't be here," Blake said when accepting her award.

Her work ...

Historical adviser on films such as Barry Lyndon and The Charge of the Light Brigade, who turned designer for the sci-fi epic

John Mollo, who has died aged 86, received his first credit as costume designer on Star Wars (1977). Until then, he had served as historical adviser, with a special interest in costumes, on films including The Charge of the Light Brigade (1968), Nicholas and Alexandra (1971) and Stanley Kubrick’s Barry Lyndon (1975). On the last of these, he was responsible for the authenticity of costumes worn by around 250 soldiers from the Irish army who had been hired as extras to portray the forces of England, Prussia and France in the seven years’ war.

But it was Star Wars that transformed Mollo’s career, as was the case for most of the people who worked on it. The artist Ralph McQuarrie had come up with the original paintings for the characters; it was...

The scope of this slice of wartime history is so small, it’s almost the movie equivalent of a one-man show. There are perhaps only a dozen speaking roles. Brian Cox is impressive as The Man Who Saved England in its Darkest Hour, but the drama reduces both the man and the historical crisis to trivial status, as little more than a personal emotional crisis: “Winston, the Haunted Imperialist.”

Churchill

Blu-ray

Cohen Media Group

2017 / Color / 2:39 widescreen / 105 min. / Street Date October 3, 2017 / 30.99

Starring: Brian Cox, Miranda Richardson, John Slattery, Ella Purnell, Julian Wadham, Richard Durden, James Purefoy.

Cinematography: David Higgs

Film Editor: Chris Gill

Original Music: Lorne Balfe

Written by Alex von Tunzelmann

Produced by Claudia Bluemhuber, Nick Taussig, Piers Tempest, Paul Van Carter

Directed by Jonathan Teplitzky

No, it isn’t Gary Oldman as Winston Churchill … that’s another movie, Darkest Hour. This is the Brian Cox Churchill movie.

Any...

The producer and production manager associated with Chinatown and Groundhog Day, died on Wednesday from heart complications.

Born on December 17,1923, C.O. ‘Doc’ Erickson was living in Las Vegas when he died from heart complications, according to The Gersh Agency.

Erickson began his career at Paramount Pictures, serving as production manager on five Alfred Hitchcock films during the mid-to-late 1950s, including Rear Window, To Catch A Thief, The Trouble With Harry, The Man Who Knew Too Much and Vertigo.

The producer left Paramount in the early 1960s to become John Huston’s associate producer on The Misfits, Freud, and 1967s Reflections In A Golden Eye.

He went on to serve as production manager on Joseph L Mankiewicz’s There Was A Crooked Man and also spent three years supervising film production for Brut Productions.

He would later become associated with Robert Evans on Chinatown, Players, Urban Cowboy, and Popeye.

Other producer-production credits include 55 Days At Peking, [link...

“The gods of Greece are cruel! In time, all men shall learn to live without them.”

Sunday, May 7 marks the 4th anniversary of the legendary visual effects guru Ray Harryhausen’s death. Read what We Are Movie Geeks thinks are Harryhausen’s top ten films Here

To celebrate this master of illusion, Comet TV (www.COMETtv.com) is running a Ray Harryhausen Marathon of movies on Sunday, May 7 beginning at 11:30am Est/8:30am Pst. The complete marathon will run as follows:

11:30am Est / 10:30am Ct / 8:30am Pst – The 7th Voyage of Sinbad

In many ways the ultimate combination of stop motion animation, adventure, and overall production quality, 7th Voyage Of Sinbad is still one of Harryhausen’s most popular works. It was also a turning point for Harryhausen, establishing the framework for not only his other Sinbad films, but all animated adventure films in general...

The Internecine Project

Blu-ray

Kino Lorber Classics

1974 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 89 min. / Street Date January 3, 2017 / available through Kino Lorber / 29.95

Starring: James Coburn, Lee Grant, Harry Andrews, Ian Hendry, Michael Jayston, Christiane Krüger, Keenan Wynn, Julian Glover.

Cinematography: Geoffrey Unsworth

Film Editor: John Shirley

Original Music: Roy Budd

Written by: Barry Levinson, Jonathan Lynn from a book by Mort W. Elkind

Produced by: Barry Levinson

Directed by Ken Hughes

Don’t let the ugly Italian poster art on the disc box throw you — The Internecine Project is a clever plot-driven murder tale in an espionage vein that gathers a string of B+ stars from the early 1970s for ninety minutes of suspense. It’s not the kind of suspense that makes you wonder what’s going to happen next, but the kind that points to a finish that we know will employ a big surprise, a killer-diller last-minute twist. Or three.

The...

Actor cites differences with board; Costume designer Yvonne Blake appointed as acting president until election can be held.

The actor Antonio Resines has resigned as president of the Spanish Film Academy.

He had been in the post since May 2015 after producer, distributor and exhibitor Enrique González Macho resigned during his second mandate at the head of the organisation.

Vice president Edmon Roch, producer of Capture The Flag, has also resigned.

Resines, who has shot the upcoming The Queen Of Spain with Fernando Trueba, described it as an “honour” to have held the position but also explained the reason for his departure in a statement released by the Academy: “This decision has been taken due to serious differences with part of the board of directors, differences that have made our task at the Spanish Film Academy presidency impossible.”

The board of directors is formed by two representatives of 14 different specialities in the Spanish film industry. Tensions escalated...

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, Sam Moffitt, and Tom Stockman

Special effects legend Ray Harryhausen, whose dazzling and innovative visual effects work on fantasy adventure films such as Jason And The Argonauts and The 7th Voyage Of Sinbad passed away in 2013 at age 92. In 1933, the then-13-year-old Ray Harryhausen saw King Kong at a Hollywood theater and was inspired – not only by Kong, who was clearly not just a man in a gorilla suit, but also by the dinosaurs. He came out of the theatre “stunned and haunted. They looked absolutely lifelike … I wanted to know how it was done.” It was done by using stop-motion animation: jointed models filmed one frame at a time to simulate movement. Harryhausen was to become the prime exponent of the technique and its combination with live action. The influence of Harryhausen on film luminaries like Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Peter Jackson, and...

Alan Rickman. Alan Rickman dead at 69: Professor Snape in 'Harry Potter' movies Alan Rickman, best known for his role as Professor Snape in the Harry Potter movies, died of cancer on Jan. 14, '16. Rickman (born on Feb. 21, 1946, in London) was 69. Rickman first played Professor Severus Snape – who looks like a villain, walks like a villain, and talks like a villain, but who turns out to be anything but – in Chris Columbus' Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001). One of many British stage and screen stars featured in the franchise toplining Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, and Rupert Grint, Rickman would remain part of the Harry Potter gang until the final installment, David Yates' Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011). Alan Rickman movies Beginning with the Bruce Willis actioner Die Hard (1988), in which he plays the leader of a criminal gang, Alan Rickman was featured in nearly 50 movies.

The day monster kids have dreaded for some time has arrived. Mournful, nostalgic, and melancholy – it’s the end of an era for more than one generation of horror fans. It seemed like Christopher Lee would live through all eternity, but unlike some of the characters he played, there’s no bringing him back to life this time. He made it to 93 and went out on a high note, appearing in the final Hobbit film just this past winter. He had an amazing career of fantastic performances and remains the greatest villain actor in film history. Rip to the last classic horror star and thank you for all the monster memories.

Christopher Lee was married to his wife Birgit (Gitte) for 54 years.

Here, according to Movie Geeks Jim Batts, Dana Jung, Sam Moffitt, and myself, are Christopher Lee’s ten best roles.

10. Frankenstein

It’s only fitting that The Curse Of Frankenstein,...

'Nicholas and Alexandra': Movie starred Michael Jayston and Janet Suzman 'Nicholas and Alexandra' movie review: Opulent 1971 spectacle lacks emotional core Nicholas and Alexandra is surely one of the most sumptuous film productions ever made. The elaborate sets and costumes, Richard Rodney Bennett's lush musical score, and frequent David Lean collaborator Freddie Young's richly textured cinematography provide the perfect period atmosphere for this historical epic. Missing, however, is a screenplay that offers dialogue instead of speeches, and a directorial hand that brings out emotional truth instead of soapy melodrama. Nicholas and Alexandra begins when, after several unsuccessful attempts, Tsar Nicholas II (Michael Jayston) finally becomes the father of a boy. Shortly thereafter, he and his wife, the German-born Empress Alexandra (Janet Suzman), have their happiness crushed when they discover that their infant son is a hemophiliac. In addition to his familial turmoil, the Tsar must also deal with popular...

Twilight Time is celebrating its 4th anniversary with a major promotion that sees some of their limited edition titles reduced in price through April 3. These are the titles on sale.

Group 1

Retail price point: $24.95

Picnic

Pal Joey

Bite The Bullet

Bell, Book, And Candle

Bye Bye Birdie

In Like Flint

Major Dundee

The Blue Max

Crimes And Misdemeanors

Used Cars

Thunderbirds Are Go / Thunderbird 6

Group 2

Retail price point: $19.95

Rapture

Roots Of Heaven

Swamp Water

Demetrius And The Gladiators

Desiree

The Wayward Bus

Cover Girl

High Time

The Sound And The Fury

The Rains Of Ranchipur

Bonjour Tristesse

Beloved Infidel

Lost Horizon

The Blue Lagoon

Experiment In Terror

Nicholas And Alexandra

Pony Soldier

The Song Of Bernadette

Philadelphia

The Only Game In Town

Love Is A Many Splendored Thing

Sleepless In Seattle

The Disappearance

Sexy Beast

Drums Along The Mohawk

Alamo Bay

The Other

Mindwarp

Jane Eyre

Oliver

The Way We Were...

Feature Alex Westthorp 9 Apr 2014 - 07:00

In the next part of his series, Alex talks us through the film careers of the second and fourth Doctors, Patrick Troughton and Tom Baker...

Read Alex's retrospective on the film careers of William Hartnell and Jon Pertwee, here.

Like their fellow Time Lord actors, William Hartnell and Jon Pertwee, Patrick Troughton and Tom Baker also shared certain genres of film. Both appeared, before and after their time as the Doctor, in horror movies and both worked on Ray Harryhausen Sinbad films.

Patrick George Troughton was born in Mill Hill, London on March 25th 1920. He made his film debut aged 28 in the 1948 B-Movie The Escape. Troughton's was a very minor role. Among the better known cast was William Hartnell, though even Hartnell's role was small and the two didn't share any scenes together. From the late Forties, Troughton found more success on the small screen,...

One of the most Our Kind of Shows-friendly networks, The CW, has done us a few more favors, bless ‘em. They’ve given us not only the dates for the season finales of all Our Kind of Shows that they broadcast – that’s Arrow, The Tomorrow People, Supernatural, The Vampire Diaries, The Originals, Star-Crossed, and The 100 – but tacked on a new one as a bonus!

Well, it’s not a new series, but Labyrinth is a four-hour miniseries, and it stars so many familiar faces. The War Doctor! The Winter Soldier! Draco Malfoy! Defiance‘s Datak Tarr! Winter’s Tale‘s Beverly! More info about that below, along with the season finale dates and times. The SciFi Mafia Calendar (see the Calendar tab above) has also been updated.

The CW Sets Season Finale Dates And Kicks Off Summer With Four-hour Event Series “Labyrinth” Labyrinth Makes Its Broadcast Television Premiere Across Two Nights on Thursday,...

Tom Baker is 80! National treasure, cult legend and Doctor Who's longest-serving lead, Tom is now an official octogenarian.

To celebrate, Digital Spy has compiled eight of Baker's greatest moments from both the small and silver screens - Happy Birthday, TB!

1. Tom breaks big with Nicholas and Alexandra

In the early '70s, Baker got his big break, taking on a role he was surely born to play - the mad monk Rasputin - in historical epic Nicholas and Alexandra. He was recommended for the part by Laurence Olivier, donchaknow.

2. "The definite article, you might say…"

"Well, here we go again..." In 1974, Tom Baker replaced Jon Pertwee as the star of Doctor Who and television history was made. Alright, so Tom's debut adventure 'Robot' is unlikely to lead any fan's top 10 list, but his commanding charisma had viewers hooked from the off. Jon who?

3. "Do I have the right?"

Perhaps...

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, Sam Moffitt, and Tom Stockman

The film career of legendary English actor Sir Christopher Lee began in 1948 and continues to the present day. Lee is best known for his roles in horror films, especially the string of seven Dracula movies he starred in for Hammer Studios between 1958 and 1974, but be may be best known to younger audiences for his roles in the Star Wars, Lord of the Rings and Hobbit films. Almost all of the roles that Lee has played have been villains and here, according to We Are Movie Geeks, are his ten best.

10. Frankenstein

It’s only fitting that The Curse Of Frankenstein, the film that truly began England’s Hammer Studios’ theatrical run of full color gothic horror epics, should team (well, they’re both in the 1948 Hamlet, but have no scenes together) their greatest stars, Peter Cushing as Baron Victor Frankenstein...

Article by Jim Batts, Dana Jung, Sam Moffitt, and Tom Stockman

Special effects legend Ray Harryhausen, whose dazzling and innovative visual effects work on fantasy adventure films such as Jason And The Argonauts and The 7th Voyage Of Sinbad passed away last month at age 92. In 1933, the then-13-year-old Ray Harryhausen saw King Kong at a Hollywood theater and was inspired – not only by Kong, who was clearly not just a man in a gorilla suit, but also by the dinosaurs. He came out of the theatre “stunned and haunted. They looked absolutely lifelike … I wanted to know how it was done.” It was done by using stop-motion animation: jointed models filmed one frame at a time to simulate movement. Harryhausen was to become the prime exponent of the technique and its combination with live action. The influence of Harryhausen on film luminaries like Steven Spielberg, George Lucas, Peter Jackson,...

Trying to humanise pigheaded royals running full-tilt towards death is a tough call. Luckily the other side weren't much better

Nicholas and Alexandra (1971)

Director: Franklin J Schaffner

Entertainment grade: C+

History grade: B+

Nicholas II Romanov became tsar of Russia in 1894. His reign was beset by social and political unrest, culminating in the Russian revolution of 1917.

People

The film begins in 1904, with the tsarina, Alexandra (Janet Suzman), finally giving birth to an heir, Alexei. "I thought we'd go on having girls forever," she admits to the tsar (Michael Jayston, a dead ringer for the real thing). They have already produced four little grand duchesses. Meanwhile, at a political meeting, stony-faced Lenin (Michael Bryant) and exasperated Trotsky (Brian Cox) meet a bubbly young Borat lookalike calling himself Stalin (James Hazeldine). The film has elided a couple of events here: the Bolshevik-Menshevik split of 1903, in Belgium, and the All-Russian Bolshevik Conference of 1905, in Finland,...

Reel Important People is a monthly column that highlights those individuals in or related to the movies who have left us in recent weeks. Below you'll find names big and small and from all areas of the industry, though each was significant to the movies in their own way.   Conrad Bain (1923-2013) - Actor best known for his TV roles as Phillip Drummond on Diff'rent Strokes and Dr. Arthur Harmon on Maude. He also appears in the films Bananas, Postcards from the Edge, Coogan's Bluff and C.H.O.M.P.S. (see him in the trailer below). He died on January 14. (Deadline) Sir Richard Rodney Bennett (1936-2012) - Composer nominated three times for the Oscar for his scores to Far from the Maddening Crowd, Nicholas and Alexandra and Murder on the Orient Express...

Read More...

Composer and pianist whose work included film scores, opera and jazz cabaret

The composer Richard Rodney Bennett, who has died in New York aged 76, pursued multiple musical lives with extraordinary success. He was one of the more distinguished soundtrack composers of his era, having contributed to some 50 films and winning Oscar nominations for his work on Far from the Madding Crowd (1967), Nicholas and Alexandra (1971) and Murder on the Orient Express (1974).

But it scarcely seemed credible that this knack for writing for a mainstream audience in a melodic, romantic style co-existed with his mastery of serialism and 12-tone techniques. From 1957 to 1959, Bennett was a scholarship student with Pierre Boulez in Paris and soaked up the latter's total serialism techniques as well as his infatuation with the German avant garde. He also attended the summer schools at Darmstadt, the mecca for diehard atonalists.

His tremendous facility as a pianist would prompt the...

One of the film industry's last great composers has passed away at age 76. Sir Richard Rodney Bennett died this week in New York. The prolific composer was part of a now bygone age when spectacular and memorable film scores were a routine part of the motion picture industry. Bennett was nominated for three Oscars for his work on Far From the Madding Crowd, Nicholas and Alexandra and Murder On The Orient Express. He was also nominated for numerous BAFTA awards for his work in film and on television. Bennett was also acclaimed for his non-film work that included writing symphonies and operas. His other feature film scores include Billy Liar, Equus, Billion Dollar Brain, Four Weddings and a Funeral and The Devil's Disciple. For more click here...

Oscar-nominated composer Sir Richard Rodney Bennett has died, the Guardian reports. Bennett passed away on Christmas Eve. He was 76 years old.

Bennett received Oscar nominations for his work scoring "Murder on the Orient Express," "Nicholas and Alexandra," and "Far from the Madding Crowd." He was also nominated for two Grammy awards -- Best Original Score Written for a Motion Picture or Television Special for 1973's "Nicholas and Alexandra" and 1976's "Murder on the Orient Express."

Bennett had an illustrious career, writing scores for films such as "Four Weddings and a Funeral," "Equus," and "The Nanny." The English-born composer was honored Cbe in 1977, and knighted in 1998.

"He was, I think, the last of his kind," Bennett's publisher, Music Sales Group's Gill Graham said, The Guardian reports. "He wrote 32-bar jazz standards, the most complex serial music, and everything in between."

Bennett reportedly died in New York City.

For more, head over to The Guardian.

Actress Joyce Redman, Oscar nominated for both Tom Jones and Othello, died in Kent, England, earlier today. The Newcastle-born Redman, who was either 93 or 96, had been suffering from pneumonia. Film lovers will remember her as Tom Jones‘ Mrs. Waters, stealing the movie while “sexting” — as in, sex while eating — Albert Finney. Mostly a stage and television performer, the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art-trained Redman appeared in only a handful of movies. Yet, her brief film career was notable because of her two Best Supporting Actress Academy Award nominations. In fact, Redman brought "Oscar luck" to her movies and fellow players: Best Picture Oscar winner Tom Jones (1963) earned five nominations in the acting categories (Joyce Redman, Albert Finney, Diane Cilento, Dame Edith Evans, Hugh Griffith), while the filmed version of Britain’s National Theatre presentation of Othello (1965) earned four (Joyce Redman as Emilia, Laurence Olivier, Maggie Smith, Frank Finlay). Regarding the nominations for the Othello actors,...

With the Oscars nearly here, Glen looks back to the 70s, and argues that it was the decade when the Academy got its Best Picture decisions consistently right...

It’s widely acknowledged that the 1970s was one of the best periods in American cinema. It’s little surprise, then, that the Academy Awards gave the Best Picture award to some of the best films during its 84 years. But as is often the case with the Oscars, the 70s wasn’t without its controversies, as a number of great films missed out on the award or even failed to be nominated. Even so, the run of Best Picture winners from 1970 to 1979 was incredibly strong.

The decade started with Midnight Cowboy scooping the Best Picture award at the 42nd Academy Awards on 7th April 1970, but as the film was released in May 1969 it doesn’t really count as an example of the...

Janet Suzman was one of the giants of the British stage in the 60s and 70s. She might have made it in Hollywood too – if she hadn't looked so good in a tiara

'See Pooh bear up there?" says Janet Suzman, pointing to a little doll on the bookshelf. "That was a present from Judi Dench when Josh was born. Isn't it sweet?" We're sitting in what was once her son's nursery at Suzman's Hampstead home. Now little Josh is Dr Joshua Nunn, 30-year-old father to a seven-month-old daughter. He's a postdoctoral research associate at the cool-sounding Ultrafast Group at Oxford's physics department and is currently researching the field of quantum memories. Perhaps Dr Nunn will tell us some day if quantum memories are like the human ones that suffuse this room – memories of 30-year-old kisses and of bedtime stories read by one of the RSC's most seductive voices, all locked,...

Ferociously intelligent actor who reigned supreme in Stoppard and Shakespeare

John Wood, who has died aged 81, was one of the greatest stage actors of the past century, especially associated with his roles in the plays of Tom Stoppard. But a combination of his enigmatic privacy and low profile on film – he cropped up a lot without dominating a movie – meant that he remained largely unknown to the wider public.

As with all great actors, you always knew what he was thinking, all the time. Wood was especially striking in the brain-box department. Tall, forbidding and aquiline-featured, he was as much the perfect Sherlock Holmes on stage as he was the ideal Brutus. He exuded ferocious intelligence, and the twinkle in his eye could be as merciless as it was invariably amused.

As the Royal Shakespeare Company's Brutus in Julius Caesar in 1972, he was undoubtedly the noblest Roman of them all,...

'I didn't ever decide I was going to be a composer. It was like being tall. It's what I was. It's what I did'

Sidney Lumet's 1974 film version of Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express was something of a landmark in crime cinema. The star-studded cast (Bacall, Bergman, Connery, Finney, Gielgud, Redgrave . . .) and lavish production values provided both the template for later movie adaptations of Christie's work and paved the way for the successful trend of high-end television crime series. Richard Rodney Bennett, who had been writing for the screen since he was 18, and who was a technically brilliant classical composer with a deep knowledge of 1930s popular music, was an ideal choice to write the score.

"Stephen Sondheim recommended me," recalls Bennett. "And as soon as I saw the rushes I told Sidney that no one in their right mind was going to be scared out their wits by Agatha Christie.

The Pillars Of The Earth. Dave's One Night Stand. Mark Gatiss. Buzzcocks. Sanctuary. The Inbetweeners. Movies. It's a busy week of British telly ahead...

For the second week running, there's a lot to get through over the next seven days of UK telly, so we'll be short and, hopefully, sweet in helping you set your reminders early.

8 Out Of 10 Cats bids farewell to Tellyville tonight, Friday, October 15th at 10:00pm on Channel 4. The show, hosted by Jimmy Carr with team captains Sean Lock and Jason Manford, will, no doubt, get the groans going amid the giggles, with this week's guest comedians Rufus Hound and Russell Kane seeing the current series out.

The Pillars Of The Earth debuts on Saturday, October 16th at 9:00pm on Channel 4. The mini-series, set in 12th century England, stars Donald Sutherland, Ian McShane, Rufus Sewell and Hayley Atwell and looks like a...

The Tom Baker era arrives with a visually-stunning entry for Doctor Who...

When it was announced that Matt Smith was stepping into David Tennant’s shoes as the Doctor, all I remember saying is “Huh?” With dozens of potential big names being thrown into the ring, I wondered who on Earth this new guy with the bizarre haircut was. Guilty as charged – in the end, I didn’t have to worry, since Smith has proved to be a great success in the role. But I wonder how many viewers in 1974 uttered a collective “Huh?” as Jon Pertwee’s features blurred into those of a relative unknown.

Step forward, Tom Baker. At the time, Baker wasn’t big news. He’d played the mad monk Rasputin with great gusto in the film adaptation of Nicholas And Alexandra. He’d also been in a few ropey horror films such as The Vault Of Horror and The Mutations.