DOCTOR WHO - GUARDIAN (UK): Alex Kingston Interview - ''I feel quite motherly towards Matt Smith'
The actress talks about appearing on the London stage and her recurring role in Doctor Who
by Tom Lamont
Sunday 12 June 2011
That hair – you could pick Alex Kingston out of a crowd of hundreds thanks to her distinctive crescent of curls. It makes her simple to spot in a theatre cafe in London, slugging bottled water during a break in rehearsals of her new play.
She's performing at the Donmar in Luise Miller, an 18th-century work by Schiller that's not often staged in the UK. The six-hour running time sees to that, but Kingston will perform in a streamlined translation: two hours. The story, she explains, "is like Romeo and Juliet without the early frisson. We meet our lovers already crashing and burning. That's Schiller for you!"
... All change in her latest TV job. As a recurring character in Doctor Who, Kingston steals scenes; she makes off with entire episodes. Matt Smith "gets very jealous," she says, "as I get all the best entry and exit lines." And she does, playing a time-travelling adventurer with a tantalisingly vague backstory. Kingston actually died on screen in her first appearance, in 2008. "After that, I thought, job over." You forgot about time travel, I say. "I forgot about time travel!" So she's been returning for years, grateful for the liberties of science fiction.
She howls when I tell her the chemistry between her and Smith has become almost indecently sexy for a kid's TV show. "Matt's a great flirt. But I feel… I'm going to make myself sound old, but I feel quite motherly towards him." Smith is 28. "Maybe not motherly. Actually, I hope he doesn't regard me as a mother." She's still chortling and shaking her water bottle. "Older sister, perhaps..."
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