Doctor Who: 13 Cool Details Revealed In Steven Moffat's Time Of Angels Commentary

12. Alex Kingston And The Body Doubles

Doctor Who The Time Of Angels River Song
BBC

Alex Kingston's River Song is a lead character throughout the entire two-parter, but as it turns out, she wasn't always present to shoot her scenes.

At separate points during the commentary, Moffat takes great amusement in pointing out certain shots in which River is onscreen... but Kingston isn't.

The first is the above shot of River wielding a futuristic blow torch gun, which comes roughly a minute into the episode. Throughout this entire scene, there are tons of shots of River's legs, feet, and hands, which clearly made it easy for the crew to get away with using a stunt/body double.

Then, when the scene cuts to a close-up shot of River's eye, Kingston stepped up.

Doctor Who River Song Alex Kingston The Time Of Angels
BBC

The next example of a Kingston body double comes later on, when River is in the TARDIS with Amy and the Doctor, and we learn more about her TARDIS-piloting skills.

There's a quick shot here of River's back, and according to Moffat (and confirmed by Gillan) this is actually a double. Sneaky.

Doctor Who The Time Of Angels River Song Amy Pond Eleventh Doctor TARDIS
BBC

Gillan also adds that the double learned all of the necessary lines for the scene, allowing the actors to perform the whole thing normally.

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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!