10 Doctor Who Moments That Were Improvised

4. Chunky Gilmore (Remembrance Of The Daleks)

Doctor Who Remembrance Of The Daleks Seventh Doctor and Ace
BBC

Considering how quick-witted his Seventh Doctor is, Sylvester McCoy seems like he'd be a right cheeky chappie to hang out with. You get the impression that he could buff up the majority of his lines with a clever turn of phrase or a funny joke, and that's exactly what he did with this particular example in Remembrance Of The Daleks.

In the third episode of this serial, the Doctor and Ace walk through a school yard, and Ace questions him on what exactly they're supposed to be doing there. In response, the Doctor says that they're "keeping an eye on Group Captain Chunky Gilmore", adding that he has no idea why his men call him "Chunky".

At home, many viewers were also left wondering where that "Chunky" nickname came from, and the answer lies behind-the-scenes.

During filming, actor Simon Williams - the man who played Gilmore - misunderstood the script's description of his character's "chunky service revolver", which earned him the nickname "Chunky". Afterwards, McCoy thought it would be funny to ad-lib this into the episode, and so, he changed Gilmore's name to "Chunky Gilmore" on the day.

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Danny has been with WhatCulture for over ten years, and is currently Doctor Who Editor and WhoCulture Channel Manager, overseeing all of WhatCulture's Whoniverse coverage. In 2022, he took charge of WhoCulture and has grown it into the biggest Doctor Who channel on YouTube, and one of the biggest Doctor Who communities on the web full-stop. He has been writing and video editing since his early teens, and first got a taste for content creation after making his own Doctor Who trailers, off the back of a burning obsession with the Matt Smith era of the show. Like many his age, he first got into Doctor Who with the 2005 revival, but has since gone back and fallen in love with the classic years too. If you need someone to recite every Doctor Who episode in order, or to give you a random factoid about the making of Gridlock, Danny is the person to ask!