Vincent and the Doctor

210 – "Vincent and the Doctor"
Doctor Who episode
Tony Curran, as Vincent van Gogh, is compared to a self-portrait of his character.
Cast
Doctor Matt Smith (Eleventh Doctor)
Companion Karen Gillan (Amy Pond)
Others Tony Curran – Vincent van Gogh Bill Nighy – Dr Black (uncredited) Nik Howden – Maurice Chrissie Cotterill – Mother Sarah Counsell – Waitress Morgan Overton, Andrew Byrne – School Children
Production
Directed by	Jonny Campbell
Written by	Richard Curtis
Script editor	Emma Freud Brian Minchin
Produced by	Tracie Simpson Patrick Schweitzer
Executive producer(s)	Steven Moffat Piers Wenger Beth Willis
Production code	1.10
Series	Series 5
Running time	45 minutes
First broadcast	5 June 2010 (2010-06-05)
Chronology
← Preceded by "Cold Blood" Followed by → "The Lodger"

"Vincent and the Doctor" is the 10th episode in the fifth series of British science fiction television series Doctor Who, which was first broadcast on 5 June 2010. It was written by Richard Curtis, and deals with the Doctor and Amy travelling to Provence, meeting Vincent van Gogh and joining forces with him to fight a dangerous alien which only Van Gogh can see.

Plot

The Doctor has taken Amy to the Musée d'Orsay in Paris, where they admire the work of the post-impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh. The Doctor discovers a seemingly alien figure in a window of the painting The Church at Auvers, and decides they must travel back in time to speak to Vincent. In 1890, they find Vincent at a cafe in Arles, a lonely man with a bad reputation, but he opens up when he notices Amy, sensing a loss she herself is not aware of. They discover that recent murders, the victims ravaged by some type of beast, have been blamed on Vincent, and the two resolve to help him.

At Vincent's home that evening, the artist confesses that his works have little value to anyone else, but he believes the universe is filled with wonders that he must paint. Amy is attacked by an invisible beast that Vincent is able to see and sketch for the Doctor, who identifies it as a Krafayis, a vicious pack-predator likely abandoned on Earth. Knowing the beast will appear when Vincent paints the nearby church the next evening, the Doctor and Amy plan to join him, after which they will leave. Vincent becomes distraught at this news and shuts himself in his bedroom, saying that everyone leaves him in the end. The Doctor and Amy set out to capture the beast, but Vincent soon joins them, eager to help. He confides to Amy that if she can "soldier on, then so can Vincent van Gogh".

Vincent begins painting the church and soon spots the beast inside. The Doctor demands that Amy stay back as he enters the church alone, but she and Vincent both agree they should help the Doctor. Vincent is able to save the Doctor and Amy, describing the beast's actions as they hide in the confessionals; the Doctor soon realises from Vincent's description that the beast is blind, the likely reason it was abandoned. The beast is impaled on Vincent's easel when it tries to lunge at the artist. The Doctor attempts to soothe the dying creature while Vincent empathises with its pain. After the creature dies, the three return outside the church, and Vincent describes the night sky as he envisions it, deep blue, framed by swirling air.

The next day, the Doctor and Amy prepare to leave. Vincent asks Amy to return and marry him should she leave the Doctor. As Vincent turns to leave, the Doctor offers to show him something. The Doctor and Amy take Vincent in the TARDIS to the present and the Van Gogh exhibit at the Musée d'Orsay. Vincent is stunned at the display, and becomes emotionally overwhelmed when he overhears Mr. Black, an art curator, say that Van Gogh was "the greatest painter of them all" and "one of the greatest men who ever lived". They return Vincent to the past, and say their final goodbyes. When Vincent renews his proposal to Amy, she tells him she really "isn't the marrying kind". As the Doctor and Amy return to the present, Amy hopes that there will be several more paintings by Vincent waiting for them, but instead learn that Vincent still committed suicide at the age of 37 years. The Doctor explains that life is a mixture of bad and good, and while their brief encounter with Vincent couldn't undo everything wrong, they added some good to his life. The evidence is in Vincent's displayed works: the face no longer appears in The Church, and now Vase with 12 Sunflowers bears the inscription, "For Amy".

Continuity

Images of the First and Second Doctors are displayed on the Doctor's mirror device and printout from the TARDIS' typewriter.

Comparing his own bow tie to Dr. Black's, the Doctor again asserts that "bow ties are cool", having previously used that phrase in "The Eleventh Hour" and "Amy's Choice".

Tony Curran portrays Dutchman Van Gogh using his native Scottish accent. Upon meeting Amy he asks if she is also from Holland, to which the Doctor answers in the affirmative. "The End of the World" establishes that the TARDIS allows the Doctor and his companions to comprehend both themselves and others in English.

Amy makes comments on places the Doctor has taken her to see recently, including 'Arcadia'. The episode presents these trips as the Doctor's compensation to Amy for her fiancé Rory Williams' death in the previous episode, which Amy herself does not remember since Rory was consumed by a crack in the universe and thus erased from time. Van Gogh is able to sense Amy's sadness at Rory's death, and the Doctor later accidentally addresses Vincent and Amy as Amy and Rory respectively.

One of the components of the TARDIS' centre console is shown to bear the logo of Magpie Electricals, the business featured in "The Idiot's Lantern".

The Doctor fondly describes the hypothetical child of Amy and Van Gogh as "the ultimate ginger". The Doctor expresses the wish to be ginger in both "The Christmas Invasion" and The End of Time after his respective regenerations into the Tenth and Eleventh Doctors.

Outside references

Vincent van Gogh's paintings featured in the episode include Wheatfield with Crows, Sunflowers, The Starry Night, The Church at Auvers, Cafe Terrace at Night, Prisoners' Round, Bedroom in Arles, Self-Portrait with Straw Hat, Berceuse and Portrait of Dr. Gachet.

The visual scenery of the episode makes reference to many of the paintings: Vincent van Gogh himself and his hat, his chair, pipe and handkerchief, the entire set of his Bedroom in Arles, the café. Later an entire scene builds up to show how Vincent sees The Starry Night.

• 
  The malevolent face appeared in The Church at Auvers.
• 
  Cafe Terrace at Night: the café in Arles where the Doctor and Amy meet Vincent.
• 
  The Starry Night: the vision shared by Vincent with the Doctor and Amy.
• 
  Vase with 12 sunflowers now bears the dedication, "For Amy", after their encounter with Vincent.

The Doctor states that he has met Michelangelo whilst working on the Sistine Chapel ceiling and Picasso during his Cubist phase and refers to classificatory disputes about art in stating that one of the "proper painters" like Thomas Gainsborough would have given him an image of the Krafayis which his device would find easier to recognise.

The song played while The Doctor and Amy show Vincent his paintings in the museum is "Chances", by the British band Athlete from their album Tourist.

Production

"I'm terrifically moved by the life and fate of Van Gogh. He's probably the single great artist – in all formats – who received no praise whatsoever for his work. If you look back at Dickens, Chaucer, Shakespeare, Michaelangelo, Leonardo Da Vinci...all hugely famous in their lives. And then this one incredibly popular artist with no praise at all, literally selling the one painting. It was that thought which initially made me wonder whether or not we could use time travel to put that right. That was the initial inspiration for writing the episode."

Richard Curtis

Writer Richard Curtis was previously executive producer on the Doctor Who spoof The Curse of Fatal Death, a one-off comedy special written for Comic Relief by current show-runner Steven Moffat. Based on this experience, Moffat asked Curtis to write an episode of Doctor Who. Curtis had enjoyed the show's historical episodes and felt comfortable writing one. He had the idea of a story centred around van Gogh for "a long while" and was particularly interested in the fact van Gogh never knew he would be famous, as well as his inspirational story.. Moffat was "enthusiastic" about the story idea.

Curtis asked Moffat to criticise "anything and everything" and later said he was very honest. Executive producer Piers Wenger and director Johnny Campbell. Moffat told him that it needed to "start quicker" and that the meeting with the Doctor and Vincent was "dull" and needed to be something "cute" like Curtis had done in his films. He also noted that the Doctor did not talk as much as Curtis had written and recommended Curtis watch some episodes to see he was "rather efficient in the way that he talked". He enjoyed the experience, commenting that it was "fun" to work within boundaries rather than doing it all himself. After seeing a read-through performed by leads Matt Smith and Karen Gillan Curtis made more changes. He commented that it was easy to write for them as they were "so delightful and modern and relaxed". Curtis's original title for the episode was "Eyes that See the Darkness" but he said this was vetoed.

Curtis wanted to write for Doctor Who because he thought it would be "something my kids would like." When writing "Vincent and the Doctor", Curtis put up prints of Van Gogh paintings around the house as well as a board with index cards outlining the plot. His children helped him come up with some ideas. Gillan commented that the story had a different style and approach and was more character-driven. Though it was a subject he knew "quite a lot" about, he still read a 200-page biography of van Gogh, which was more research than he normally would have done if working on other projects; he took van Gogh very seriously. As such, he wanted to be "truthful rather than cruel" and refused to write any jokes about van Gogh's ears after he famously cut one of them off. However, he did incorporate other humor as he naturally wanted to "try to make things funny".

Curtis stated that casting an actor to play van Gogh was done carefully, as he wanted him to feel to the audience as van Gogh, not "like a bloke they’ve seen acting lots of other parts, in an orange wig". Tony Curran was ultimately cast as the part; Curtis called him a "wonderful actor" and "really could not look more like" van Gogh. Curran, Smith and Gillan got to know each other very well, which Gillan hoped would come out in the episode. Bill Nighy appears uncredited as Dr Black, the Musée d'Orsay's expert on van Gogh. Nighy was considered for the role of the Ninth Doctor when the show was revived.

Scenes set in Provence were filmed on location in Trogir, Croatia in the same production block as "The Vampires of Venice", which sees Trogir depicting 16th-century Venice. Filming took place around November 2009. Some of the sets were intended to reference paintings, such as van Gogh's bedroom.

Broadcast

The episode was watched by 6.76 million viewers (6.29 million on BBC One and a further 0.47 million on BBC HD). The programme was the 2nd most watched on BBC One for the week ending 6 June 2010, beaten only by an episode of EastEnders. Across all channels, it was the 17th most watched programme of the week. For Saturday, 5 June 2010, Doctor Who was the 2nd most watched programme of the day, ranking behind the final of Britain's Got Talent with 12.81 million viewers; more than double the rating for Doctor Who. All chart placements exclude the BBC & ITV HD Channels. After the original broadcast, viewers were offered a helpline if they had been affected by the issues raised in the program, possibly the only time this has been done for a Doctor Who episode.

Home video releases

A Region 2 DVD and Blu-ray containing this episode together with "The Lodger", "The Pandorica Opens" and "The Big Bang" was released on 6 September 2010.

Reception

Reception of the episode in the British media was mostly positive. In the mainstream press, Tom Sutcliffe in The Independent praised the episode as "first ingenious and then decidedly poignant", though he felt some aspects of plot would have wider implications not addressed in the episode, and remained "coldly unfeeling" towards the death of the Krafayis. Keith Watson in the Metro was surprised by the "impressive imagining of Van Gogh's world", praising Curtis' humour throughout the episode. He also praised the performance by Tony Curran as Van Gogh, feeling that, with regards to Van Gogh's depression, the producers "pulled it off" against the odds.

Sam Wollaston of The Guardian liked the episode, considering Curtis' dialogue to be "witty and clever" and, despite feeling that some of the moral sentiments expressed during the episode were "as schmaltzy as sugary gloop", described how the emotion of the episode eventually got to him. Later treatments in print version of The Guardian included a review by Mark Lawson praising it as "exceptionally good" and "thrilling and funny, as well as educational", noting its "historical rigour" and its "good arty jokes", whilst Deborah Orr wrote that it was "hardly original for someone to alight on [Van Gogh's] tale as a tear-jerker, although it is pretty shrewd to think of placing it in a popular time-travel context" and that "the feeling that I'd been gently monstered into life-affirming feel-good sobs by Richard Curtis was not new, not in the least".

One of the most negative reviews in the press came from Gavin Fuller in The Telegraph, who criticised it as a "bland, inconsequential episode that, once it set up what was a decent enough premise...completely failed to run with it". He compared it unfavourably with the third series episode "The Shakespeare Code" in being centred round a historical "tormented artist" but wrote that it lacked that episode's "narrative drive", with "a serious plot hole" in Van Gogh's ability to see the creature and the Krafayis was "the most pointless monsters ever to appear in the series' long history". He also criticised Smith's Doctor and wrote that Van Gogh still committing suicide despite the trip to the Orsay was "nonsensical". He did, however, praise "the Doctor's homily about good things and bad things" (though Sam Wollaston criticised this speech in The Guardian) and was grateful that Curtis "avoided turning the Doctor into a bumbling Hugh Grant character from his romcoms", concluding however "he did little else right and a crushing disappointment was the result". Sue Carrol in The Mirror took issue with the helpline that the BBC promoted for viewers affected by issues in the programme following the end of the episode, sarcastically commenting that most people "were affected only by the issue of Van Gogh's Scottish accent."

Reviews online were also largely positive. On The Guardian film blog, Peter Bradshaw considered "Vincent and the Doctor" to be a "terrifically clever, funny, likeable wildly surreal episode", and a return to form for Richard Curtis after his poorly received 2009 film The Boat That Rocked. He praised the "unmistakeably Curtis dialogue" and the "uproariously emotional ending of the sort only Richard Curtis could get away with". Dan Martin on the same paper's regular Doctor Who blog was more critical, writing that its "main problem [was] that it doesn't feel much like a Doctor Who story" and would have worked better if "the middle section with the monster had been stripped out". He also criticised the script for its "lashings of weapons-grade sentimentality" and for "throwing up possibilities that weren't followed up" and the monster as an "afterthought [posing] ... no tangible threat". However, he did praise Curran's "great performance" along with the episode's treatment of depression, concluding like Wollaston that he enjoyed the episode despite his misgivings. Tom Wilson, writing on TV.com, praised the portrayal of Van Gogh, and described the final scene set in the museum as "quite epic". John Moore, writing on Den of Geek, also took a positive stance towards the episode, describing it as "life-affirming" as a Doctor Who fan, and, though he did criticise some elements of the plot, likewise wrote positively about the ending, ultimately finding the episode "utterly useless, but absolutely art". It was also voted the best Doctor Who episode of 2010 in Blogtor Who's Readers Poll.

"Vincent and the Doctor" was nominated for the Bradbury Award for Outstanding Dramatic Presentation in the 2010 Nebula Awards and for the 2011 Hugo Award for Best Dramatic Presentation (Short Form).

External links

• Vincent and the Doctor on Tardis Wiki, the Doctor Who Wiki
• "Vincent and the Doctor" at the BBC Doctor Who homepage
• "Vincent and the Doctor" at IMDb
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Reviews

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