December 5, 2012

David's first Christmas special as The Doctor was The Christmas Invasion which aired on BBC One December 25, 2005 and marked the first day an originally commissioned episode of Doctor Who appeared on Christmas Day.  The programmed received an 84% ratings share with 9.84 million people tuning in to see the new Doctor.

The show was filmed from July 22 - August 22, 2005 with the TARDIS wardrobe scene filmed on October 8, 2005.

Filming locations included Wallis House in Brentford and the Brandon Estate in Kennington, used for the housing estate where Rose lived, and Clearwell Caves where the Sycorax ship scenes were filmed.

Kevin and David rehearsing

The sword fight was with broadswords, which are heavier than the normal fencing swords, the fight coordinator was Kevin McCartie.  The day the scene was filmed it was extremely warm and the now infamous photo of David topless, in his pajama bottoms, was taken between takes.
During the TARDIS wardrobe scene David can be seen wearing the Doctor Who scarf that producer, Phil Collinson's, Gran knitted him as a boy.

The Radio Times featured the TARDIS in a snow globe on the cover of the Christmas issue it was the first time in 16 years that the magazine devoted a Christmas cover to one specific show. Since 1923 when the publication started publishing  this had only ever happened ten other times, usually the Christmas cover a general festive image.

Peter Davison, the 5th Doctor, visited the set on July 29th when they were filming in Kennington, to wish David good luck.

The name of the villains in this story, the Sycorax, comes from Shakespeare's The Tempest, it is the name of Caliban's mother.