HOWZAT

“Well, every episode has a key word we all refer to if we feel like we’re getting lost,” Davies says. “And the word for this one is… DISASTER MOVIE! I want you all to think of fat old Shelley Winters swimming down the tunnel, God bless her, Steve McQueen looking handsome in The Towering Inferno. Hopefully, we’ve got Kylie Minogue as the sexy alien waitress [the room cheers], but we’ve got Claire Goose on speed-dial, in case Kylie can’t do it.” More laughter.

Davies begins reading the script aloud, while each department chips in their problems in making it happen. Among a flurry of technical, logical and narrative queries, the most urgent seems to be an ecumenical matter: what do angels wear underneath their robes? The Christmas special has its own robot angels – the Host – and no one knows the specifics of their heavenly underwear.

“What happens when they fly and we see up their skirts?” Collinson asks. “Are we going to see the lot? Imagine their meat and two veg coming at you. On Christmas Day. Brrrr.”

The tone meeting is adjourned by 4pm. Outside, Davies – a man who smokes cigarettes in much the same blithe, joyous way as a child eats an orange – lights up and joins in the excited chat about Kylie. All the crew have been buying new shirts, he laughs.

“They all think they’re going to marry her,” Davies says, lighting a second. “Even the gays. Especially the gays.”

July 2007

First Script read-through, Tottenham Court Road, London. The script meeting is like this: everyone who was at the tone meeting is here, plus the cast, plus people who’ve blagged their way in so they can meet Kylie. Everyone is very, very excited. The smell of aftershave is palpable. New shoes squeak. New shirts rustle.

Russell T. Davies enters. “Kylie! Kylie!” he says to the room at large, waving his hands in the air, voicing everyone’s hysteria. David Tennant enters shortly afterwards, looking rock’n’roll in jeans and a Lou Reed T-shirt, to a hubbub of “David!” It’s a bit like a jubilant Fonz walking into Al’s diner.

Julie Gardner bustles into the room. “Guess what!” she hoots with excitement. “Security found a Sun photographer hiding in a cupboard! Trying to get Kylie! They’ve just thrown him out!” This provokes an outraged hubbub – topped only a minute later when someone discovers that there are no plastic cups for tea.

Five minutes later, Kylie finally enters the room – bang on time, and with an entourage of one, her PA. She’s in jeans and a silky top and her hair – still short and curly, growing back from the chemotherapy – is pinned close to her head. Her eyes are an unusual, beautiful, mineral-water blue. She looks nervous – understandably, as she has just walked into a village of people who’ve known each other intimately for three years – and hovers by the conference table, not quite knowing where to go. David Tennant bounds over and slaps his script down on the table next to her.

“I’m going to sit next to you,” he says, beaming. She smiles up at him, and they sit down together. She puts her pencil box and make-up bag on the desk and fiddles with them as if it’s the first day at school. Davies smiles at her encouragingly, and only looks a little bit like a giant grinning at a tiny sugar mouse.

Everyone introduces themselves, from the tea boy up. “I’m David Tennant, and I play the Doctor,” Tennant says, to huge yells. “And I’m Kylie Minogue,” Kylie says, to a gigantic roar of approval.

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