Running a marathon Izz-ard? Not for our Eddie

Last autumn I had the privilege to meet Eddie Izzard at the Labour Party Conference. I normally get really shy around celebrities, but I got chatting to his assistant at a party and plucked up the courage to ask her for an introduction. I didn't speak to him for long as I was a bit starstruck, plus he had squillions of other people clamouring all over him, but I did manage to give him a big handshake to congratulate him on managing to run a mind-blowing 43 marathons in just 51 days to raise money for Sport Relief that summer. 

He was extremely modest about his accomplishment, but having now watched two episodes of Marathon Man, which documents Eddie's mammoth challenge, I must admit I am completely blown away by his stamina, grit and determination. I'm by no means an athlete so I can't speak from experience (although I did manage a TWELVE MINUTE run recently), but from those crazy individuals I know who have run marathons, the last thing they'd want to do is to run another one the day after that, and the day after, and the day after. And so on. 

But Eddie manages to keep going. And the weird thing is, that he NEVER seems to be out of breath. After my 12-minute run I was (shamefully) gasping and could barely speak, yet Eddie seems to finish each of his marathons with no panting and can quite easily manage a conversation, seemingly without any need for recovery time. Fair enough if you're a professional athlete, but the whole premise of this challenge is that Eddie had never run more than 5 miles before.

 

It seems to me that, although Eddie is certainly not a natural athlete, he appears to possess a sort of super-human natural fitness that some professional sports competitors could only fantasise about. In the most recent episode (2 of 3), Eddie's support crew got a bit concerned about his diet as he didn't seem to be eating the right sort of food for the amount of calories he was burning off. A dietitian was drafted in, who convinced Eddie to consume a mountain of potatoes each night. But this regime only lasted one day before he was back on the ice creams, Calippos, coffee, pints and vodka shots along the way.

The programme is really inspiring, and I think my favourite parts of the documentary are when local people run or cycle alongside Eddie to encourage him to keep going. In Merseyside two young lads cycled the furthest they'd ever been, and one of the boys described it as the best day of his life (the crew called their mums to get their permission, then responsibly bought them cycle helmets and high visibility vests, which got my seal of approval. I trust they gave them a lift back home, too....).

If you haven't watched the programme I'd really urge you to do so. The first two episodes are on iPlayer, David Tennant is the narrator, and the final one is broadcast this Thursday at 10.30pm on BBC3 (bad scheduling in my opinion). Oh, and you can donate to Sport Relief here.

Image from Sport Relief.

Doctor Boo-Who

Let's just say I'm glad I had the flat to myself last night. David Tennant's final flourish as the tenth Doctor was always going to be emotional, but I hadn't prepared myself for full-on sobbing.

I have loved Doctor Who since it came back five years ago. I just about remember watching it as a child on and off (the Sylvester McCoy era mainly), and I'm always proud to tell people that the second - and arguably the best - Doctor was my Great Uncle, Patrick Troughton.

I thought Christopher Eccleston did a pretty sterling job during writer Russell T Davies's first series at the helm, but I always thought it was a shame that the BBC failed to keep it a secret that Eccleston was leaving after one series, as the moment when he regenerated into David Tennant would have come as a massive shock, a bit like when The Master regenerated into John Simm (or am I alone in thinking that they managed to keep that gem under their hats?).

Tennant was born to play the Doctor. Unlike Ecclestone, he's a huge Doctor Who fan and he knows the show inside out. It also helps that he's a talented actor (not that Ecclestone isn't). And acting was what it was all about last night. Tennant - and Bernard Cribbins as Wilfred - blew me away in the key 'knock four times' scene; a genuinely spine-tingling moment when the Doctor realised with bitter dread that he hadn't managed to escape his prophesised demise after all. The sobbing began at this moment for me, and continued for the rest of the episode. I've sensed on the web that many people thought that the final 20 minutes was a load of over-indulgent, sentimental crap. But I'm firmly in the 'sod it' (or 'sob' it) camp on this one. Yeah, it was all a bit 'get the violins out' as the Doctor travelled through time to say a few final farewells to those humans he had encountered over the previous few years, but it was good to have absolute closure for once in a television series.

All too often these days (US) TV shows like Lost, Heroes and Flashforward appear to be uber-clever and mysterious at first and suck in their audiences (and advertisers) for countless series, seemingly promising some kind of huge reveal and plot twist, but it quickly becomes apparent that the 'writers' actually have no idea where the story is going. But The End Of Time tied up all the little loose ends very neatly, and you have to applaud Davies for being able to do that so masterfully.

So on to the eleventh Doctor. Young Matt Smith - and I'm permitted to say 'young' as he is nine months my junior - made his first appearance at the end of last night's episode. I've never seen him act before (I have the Sally Lockhart Mysteries on order, in which he plays cheeky cockney lad Jim. If you haven't read the Philip Pullman books on which these TV dramas are based I would thoroughly recommend them) so I have no frame of reference. It's pretty impossible to tell what his characterisation of the Doctor will be like in such a brief appearance, but I hope he doesn't try and copy Tennant too much. I know he's youthful and all, but it would even be nice to see him as a more melancholy character, with less bouncing around. Here's a preview of the next series which hints at what is to come:

I notice that Alex Kingston is in there as the character River Song. My friend Carl, who is a MASSIVE Whovian, detests the River Song episodes (Tennant's Doctor didn't recognise her, but we were led to believe that he meets her at some point in the future and gets very close to her indeed), but I actually quite liked them. Interestingly, these episodes were written by the new main writer / producer of the forthcoming series, Steven Moffat, who also penned my favourite ever episode, Blink (the Blink statue baddies are in the series preview too, woop!), and another brilliant episode, The Girl In The Fireplace, in which he falls for Madame de Pompadour. I think the fate of the next series lies largely with Moffat rather than Smith, so here's hoping for some more top-notch writing.

But, for now, let us as a nation mourn the passing of the tenth Doctor; for he was fun, he was handsome, he had good hair and wore good clothes and - most importantly - he was a proper geek. And we loved him.

Sonic relief

Funny Dunlop family joke earlier. What with Doctor Who being 'in the blood', my mum, dad and I were waiting with baited breath for the BBC's over-dramatic televisual announcement of the actor who has been chosen to portray the Eleventh Doctor. The build-up was anti-climactic (apart from some well-deserved airtime for Great Uncle Patrick Troughton), with the selected actor being unveiled as the relatively unknown Matt Smith. He is going to be the youngest ever Doctor. He's younger than me for goodness sake! Now I do feel old.

Anyway, my brother was out at the time of the announcement so we concocted a plan, and decided to tell him when he got back that Lenny Henry had got the job.

The build-up was perfect - resulting in a game of 20 questions for him to work out who it was. He got to Lenny Henry after about ten questions....and was absolutely delighted! "I'm definitely going to watch the next series now!" he proclaimed, with the widest possible grin on his face. The rest of us completely cracked up and broke the news to him that sadly it wasn't going to be Lenny Henry after all, although in hindsight I kind of wish we had let him go on believing it in order to cause maximum embarrassment.

Congratulations young Mr Smith - don't let us down!!