"Oh, I could just do this all day! Watching David Tennant's tight arse run around set like a bat straight out of hell," one of the mums to my right positively gushes.
"I'm just chuffed little Lucy dragged me into this business," responds the other who's either wearing an excessive amount of blusher or on the verge of a heat stroke. "My little star, maybe she'll be one of the Doctor's assistants some day!"
I've been listening to them chatter on the past few hours, having to stop myself from outwardly nodding along to their horny commentary on David Tennant's "tight arse" and "'fuck me' hair" and positively delicious--
It's tough business.
"Say," leans in the first mum, saddling me with a curious look.
I think it's the first time I've been acknowledged since the hoard of cooing I received upon my fold-out chair falling to bits when I sat on it this morning. The set grunts were none too pleased to find me splattered on the floor next to their prop chair, but at least, I was reassured, it was made to fall apart and my arse isn't as enormus as Jane's always telling me.
"You don't look a day over 30," she continues, and I'm only slightly offended, considering I'm 25. "Either you've lucked out in the gene department, or you've snuck yourself onto set and none of these kiddos are really yours," she winks, nudging me conspiratorially. "Come on then. Which is it?"
Horny and criminal enthusiasts! Should these mums somehow worm their way up from parental supervisors to the underage set-dressing to BBC writers' room, I'd love to see what they'd do with the tenth Doctor.
Close ups on his clenched fists as he helps Rose out of the TARDIS. Shirtless jaunts around fancy castles, to be sure. Oh, and a wholly unnecessary shower scene with his naked back turned straight towards the...
Hm?
Oh yeah.
"No, actually, I'm here with my niece while her mum's at work," I say, pointing her out in the crowd with a grin.
Her mum's job had nothing to do with it, really. I begged my sister Jane to either let me take Dottie to set or be scorned by me for the rest of eternity. Lemon bars were then employed in equal measure, but seeing as I forgot Jane's allergic, I think it was Dottie and her affinity for sweets that eventually sealed the deal.
But the mums didn't need to know that.
"She's that one over there. With the gorgeous hair."
"I see," muses the mum on my left (Barbara, so I've gathered), her metal chair groaning as she slides forward to squint at the children.
"The blonde one, yeah? Beautiful girl," she assesses with an impressed nod.
"Ah, no…" I cringe. "Next to her with the—"
"Ooo the ginger?" Either Marcy or Maggie—I can't remember—butts in. "Oh, she'll be a real heart breaker, that one!"
I frown, more confused now than anything. "I'd like to think so...but no, the girl with the plaits and beads, you see? Right next to her?"
"Oh," Barbara says flatly. No comment on how Dottie's a literal goddess in the making. Strange.
"I see the resemblance now!" Marcy/Maggie effuses, perhaps too kindly. "The curls, yes! The curls are there."
Barb snorts. "She's…well, I s'pose she is just your niece. Is her father...darker?"
I sigh. I don't know why I expected better from Barbara. Marcy/Maggie shoots her a pointed look down her equally pointy nose.
"Yes," I confirm, though there's no use because David's just strut his way back on set and I'm overwhelmed by a chorus of whooping and cheers from the mums. The chairs make riotous music as they wriggle with enthusiasm, and I grip the seat of my own a little tighter, just a smidge traumatized from the morning.
Adorably, David grins back. He gifts us a swoon-worthy smile and a gracious wave before hopping up on a wall to mouth the words on his script.
"Studious mother fucker," I nod approvingly.
"If only," a mum sighs.
The mums give another hoot as he flips a page and I can't help but smile, too. I suspect the Queen herself couldn't get a response like that out of these ladies.
But I get it. He's lovely. Like really lovely.
We'll see him around set with that camcorder of his, chatting up the crew and cast for the DVD featurette BBC wants to publish once the second season airs. He's great with the kids, too, encouraging them to pet that metal dog that keeps running into walls when its minder isn't looking.
Since the leak about David Tennant being cast as the Doctor with Chris Eccelston stepping down (he will be missed!), half the internet's been calling him weasel this, weasel that. I can kind of see it, if I'm being honest. The beanpole, eyebrow thing. But he's nothing short of a sexy weasel at that. Either way, things have quieted since the release of The Christmas Invasion back in December. The haters have mostly been overshadowed by, you guessed it, the horny mums. And me (honorary horny aunt).
I'd never been much of a Whovian before the reboot. I've always found the reruns of the classic a wee bit...twee. It's just, with the pepper pots, and the costumes, and—Let's just say I tuned in when the Doctor started wearing leather and leave it at that, hm?
Anyway, with my lack of enthusiasm for the earlier stuff, I somehow missed the whole regeneration thing and got my entire nervous system handed to me when the Doctor died in The Parting of Ways. Full on clutching the TV remote with one shaking fist, stuffing my nostrils full of tissues with the other. Inconsolable for weeks, me.
I'd never fallen in love with a TV show faster, and here I am, on the set of Doctor Who with a hoard of mums watching my niece play a school girl in what's bound to be a whole 3 seconds on screen, just to catch a glimpse of it all.
It's been an honor, to say the least.
They've started setting up another scene. Something with a car. The kids are standing around, unneeded, and getting antsy.
I tune into a conversation happening between two boys by the wall. The one David's sat at.
"How long is it going to take?" A pudgy boy whines, tugging on his trousers like he's got to take a piss. I wonder which of the mums is his. Barbara, perhaps? They've got the same blue stare-into-your-soul eyes. I find her looking into a powder compact and fixing her lipstick. I wonder if she's found her soul yet, but when she doesn't put it down for another minute, I conclude she's still searching
His mate shrugs. "How would I know? Ask him," he suggests, pointing to David Tennant, who's moved on from his script to the camcorder that he's pointing at the set. "He's Dr. Who!"
A clever observation, indeed.
"Who's driving, Dr. Who?" Asks the boy.
"A stuntman," David answers. He's smiling, too, having heard them whisper something about him being off an advert. I could only hope it was Harry Potter and not Casanova.
"Dr. Who," another kid shouts, "can we sit on the wall with you?"
"No," replies David firmly. I'm surprised.
So are they. "Why not?"
"Because someone will go mad."
"But you sit up on the roof of your trailer!"
"But that has railings," he asserts kindly, not entirely uninspired by their plight. "And I'm an adult."
Honestly, I would've let them up without a second thought. 'Spose that makes him a better aunt than me. The mums are finally tuned into the conversation, too, and the single ones (at least I'd hope) have already started cooing about how good of a father David would make to their children.
"Quiet, please," calls out one of the assistant directors—Jon, I think?—and everyone, surprisingly, shuts up. "Ready for a take."
We're inside now. Half the kids have been wrapped. The surviving mums sip on their complimentary water bottles, bragging that their kid is still here, like it's a competition. I join them, because it absolutely is.
They're shooting. Students, students. More students. The Doctor, Sarah Jane, Rose, and Mickey stand in the middle of the throng looking with purpose. "It's time I had a word with Mr. Finch," the Doctor gives his line before swerving into the school foyer.
"CUT!" The director yells and everyone stops in their tracks to look at him for notes. "The kids are walking in too fast. It needs to be five times as slow."
"He's right. I've never seen anybody so keen to get to school," I murmur to Marcy (not Maggie), and she chokes on a bit of the complimentary water with a drowned laugh. I thump her on the back.
As if in time with my own thumping, Mickey Smith's actor bangs K9′s head so hard that one of its ears snaps off.
"Be nice to the doggie!" The producer, Phil Collinson (just like the TV credits! AH!), yells too late. "Is it broken?" He asks the prop crew. "How long will it take to fix?"
Ten minutes, they tell him.
Everyone's dispersed. The mums are checking up on their children and I'm chatting up Dottie.
"No, Aunt Kitty, look! You see how the strap is out like that?" She's holding up her wrist to me in utter despair. She was toying with the wristband when it popped out, and now I'm sweating because Jane's going to blame me for not being a better supervisor even though, last time I checked, watches don't require 18+ supervision.
"Have you broken it?" Someone says from behind us.
I turn around.
It's David.
David fucking Tennant.
With his tight arse, fuck me hair, and positively delicious accent.
"Ooh dear," he leans in closer to examine the damage, and I suspect I've dissolved into a puddle next to him. "The whole show will collapse now! We're gonna have to cancel cos you've broken your watch."
Dottie giggles cutely and I guffaw less so. I'm about to say something (I haven't a clue what) when the director starts shouting that the ten minutes are up.
"We're going to go again," he projects. "I've got notes for the dog! And we lost the end of your last line, David. And it could have been a bit better, frankly."
"How rude!" David says. For the call out or for being interrupted, I'm not sure. But he's smiling at me and I'm certain my puddle-self has just evaporated into a mist, or something equally vaporious, like a ghost—yes, I've just died and it's ectoplasm dribbling down my chin, not drool. That sounds right.
Dottie jabs me in the stomach as he walks away. "Quit ogling! It's embarrassing."
"Ooo," I pinch her cheeks. "Ogling. New vocab word?"
"Miss?"
I'm eating one of the sugar cookies. The kids are doing their last take, so I'm told, but everything seems to take a lot longer than they say. I pull Dot's broken watch out of my pocket to see how late it's gotten.
"Miss?"
Another biscuit couldn't hurt…
"Miss?" I feel a tap on my shoulder and turn. It's that assistant director, Jon Older.
"Oh," he says upon seeing my face. Then he chuckles. "Prop chair?" He asks.
My face flames. "Or you know, Kit. That's my name. But whatever works," I say, taking his outstretched hand for a shake.
"No, Kit will do just fine," he laughs heartily. "You're one of the guardians, right? I was wondering if you'd be interested in some background work yourself?"
I pause my biscuit eating, realizing this is a conservation that requires fewer crumbs. "Me? But I've never done any acting?"
Jon holds out a clipboard. It looks like some sort of contact sheet. "Not a problem in the least. We mostly go through the casting sites and such for background hires, but sometimes it's just more convenient to cast like this. Like the kids," he gestures to the school children, "they're all in drama programs at different schools nearby. Non-union and," he turns slightly sheepish, "cheaper, frankly."
I'm getting a chance to return to the Doctor Who set! I mean, who's going to turn that down? I just had to make sure… "I won't have to say any lines, will I? Because I'd be rubbish. Like proper rubbish. Last time I was on a stage, it was 2nd year, I'm dressed as a Coke can, and I just freeze," I shake my head at the memory. "They'd allowed us to go on stage with scripts in hand, but I'd gotten cocky, thought I could do it from memory. Then I ran off stage bawlin', I did."
"No words," Jon smiles, amused. "We just need your look. You're in the age range we need and, it's not specified, but the hair and makeup team begged us to find people with curls if we could."
"Oh?" I say.
What would a curly-haired relevant plot look like in Doctor who terms? Mer-people? Medusa? A species of tentacle-headed aliens?
"Top secret," Jon whispers conspiratorially. "All I can say is it's an episode set in the past and the crew wants to cut down on wigs if possible."
I take the extended clipboard from Jon's hands, giving it another once over. "And I just fill this out?" I'm trying to sound cool and professional, rather than Doctor-Who-fangirl. Surely they can't fire me until after I'm hired?
"Absolutely. And just hand it to Katie there when you're finished," he points at a blonde woman. "I look forward to seeing you on set again, Kit," he smiles before leaving to tell off Mickey for playing with K9 again.
I take another biscuit in celebration.
I'M GOING TO BE ON DOCTOR WHO AND NO ONE WILL EVER HEAR THE END OF IT!
If you haven't read Doctor Who Magazine, I highly recommend! I've taken a few snippets from actual onset behind-the-scenes of School Reunion and incorporated it into this chapter (and later on I'll be referencing David's vlogs, too). I can't tell if what I've done is some really thorough research or lowkey plagiarism (can you do that for real events?), but hopefully citing my sources will help lol!
Thank you to mizgnomer on Tumblr for uploading these gorgeous BTS :)
mizgnomerDOTtumblrDOTcom/bts
(replace "DOT"s with .)