Michelle Gomez plays down thoughts of Missy dallying with the Doctor

Updated
2015 Comic-Con - Entertainment Weekly Party
2015 Comic-Con - Entertainment Weekly Party

Doctor Who actress Michelle Gomez said she never imagined any sexual chemistry between her character Missy and the Doctor, but was aware of how daunting her role as a female time lord would be.

Gomez said she immediately realised the consequences on the dynamic of the Doctor and Missy's relationship when she is revealed to be the female regeneration of John Simm's time lord, The Master.

"I'm a Doctor Who fan first and foremost, and then an actor. I knew what it meant to change the Master's gender. But I didn't want to be daunted by that. I couldn't think too deeply about it," she told Radio Times.

Gomez, 49, said that a female time lord "blows open all these new possibilities for different relationship that couldn't have happened before" but denied the idea of sexual chemistry between Missy and the Doctor. "You're reading into it something I've never even thought of," she said.

She dismissed the kiss that her character and Peter Capaldi's Doctor share in the second to last episode of the eighth series. "Oh, she'll snog anything! She'd snog a dalek," she said.

The Master is the arch-enemy of the Doctor and, as Missy, attempted to turn deceased humans into an army of Cybermen at the end of the last series of the BBC sci-fi show. Her character was seemingly vaporised, but returned alive again in the first episode of the new series of Doctor Who on Saturday.

The Green Wing actress, who has lived in New York for the past eight years with her husband Jack Davenport and their son, also spoke about her difficulties of getting work in America, especially as a woman over the age of 35. She said she fell between two categories: "I'm not young and I'm not gnarled. So we tend to disappear."

After rising to fame on shows including Channel 4 comedy The Book Group, Gomez said she missed British TV.

"British television gets it right, I don't think there's anything better. It's all about the money (in America). Here, it's more about - this sounds really poncey - it's more about the art, it's about the skill, and I suppose I miss that a bit," she said.

The full interview appears in this week's Radio Times, on sale Tuesday September 22.


Don't Expect a Full-Frontal from 'Doctor Who's Michelle Gomez
Don't Expect a Full-Frontal from 'Doctor Who's Michelle Gomez

Advertisement