December 6, 2012

David's second Christmas special as The Doctor - The Runaway Bride, airing December 25, 2006 co-starred the lovely and funny Catherine Tate as the not so lovely Donna.  While at the time this was a one off story with Donna as the Doctor's companion we would happily see her come back as s full time cohort in the fourth season.

The show received an 84% ratings share with 9.4 million viewers on BBC One. The guest villain was Sarah Parish as the giant spider Empress of the Racnoss, she had previously starred with David in the series Blackpool and would be seen with him again in Recovery.

The episode was filmed between July 6, 2006 and August 3, 2006 and used several locations including the IPC Building's helipad for the Doctor and Donna's scenes on the rooftop to Atradius Building, which served as H.C Clements.  The Baverstock Hotel was the site of Donna's missed wedding reception inside and the New Country House Hotel served as the location for the outside shots at the reception.

Don't go looking for the ATM where the Doctor uses the Sonic Screwdriver to dispense the money - that was a prop, the location was in Wharton St, Cardiff near Waterstones.  The special bills that were used were a ten pound note with The Doctor's picture and a 20 pound note featuring the face of the show's producer Phil Collinson.  These frequently turn up on sale online and you can print your own copies from the BBC Doctor Who website.  The notes, marked not legal tender are issued from the fictitious London Credit Bank. On the £10 note it says "I promise to pay the bearer on demand the sum of ten satsumas" and under the small TARDIS is says "No second chances I'm that sort of a man."  David's initials appear at the bottom and instead of a treasure's signature the bill is signed by "Chief Numpty Peter McKinstry, who was the concept artist/design assistant on the show - he designed the bills.  The £20 note is the same except the 20 says "I promise to pay the bearer on demand the sum of twenty pounds" and has Phil's initials and his quote, "There's no point being grown up it you can't be a little childish sometimes."



The underground corridor scenes were filmed at the Millennium Centre and the Impound Station at the Newport Docks was the Empress's chamber.

The scenes with the flying TARDIS were filmed on the A4232.

Members of David's family his Mom, Dad, Sister-in-law and her two daughters were extras on the day they were shooting the exterior shots at the reception but the scene where you can see them was not shown, you can view it on the DVD extras.