Drag

“I was very certain that I didn’t want David to appear in Jodie’s costume. I think the notion of men dressing in ‘women’s clothes’, the notion of drag, is very delicate. I’m a huge fan of that culture and the dignity of that, it’s truly a valuable thing. But it has to be done with immense thought and respect.

With respect to Jodie and her Doctor, I think it can look like mockery when a straight man wears her clothes. To put a great big six-foot Scotsman into them looks like we’re taking the mickey.

Also, I guarantee you it’s the only photograph some of the papers would print for the rest of time. If they can play with Gender in a sarcastic or critical way, they will.

We could have The Doctor dressed as A Knight, or dressed as God, or dressed as William Hartnell, and the only photo they’d print would be of David in what they considered to be women’s clothes. 

Then it becomes weaponised — as a mockery of feminine traits, a mockery of drag, of that culture. 

So that was never going to happen.

Knowing that David was coming in, I was absolutely certain that the clothes would regenerate. 

Nothing would’ve changed my mind.”