Steven Moffat has admitted he was upset not to be able to persuade Christopher Eccleston to appear in the Doctor Who 50th anniversary special.

As has been widely reported before, the Doctor Who showrunner originally approached Eccleston to be in ‘The Day of the Doctor’ but the actor declined.

The episode aired on Saturday 23 November 2013 and featured the return of David Tennant as the Tenth Doctor, with John Hurt’s War Doctor introduced to fill the role left vacant by the Ninth Doctor.

Moffat told Empire in the movie magazine’s new issue: “I was sad we couldn’t get Christopher Eccleston back.”

He added: “Although he was a complete gentleman about it and, on the other hand, we got John [Hurt], so it’s hard to regard it as a complete loss.”

Last year a storyboard artist who worked on ‘The Day of the Doctor’ unveiled early storyboards featuring the Ninth Doctor.

Moffat also chatted to the magazine about the attempts to get The Lord of the Rings director Peter Jackson to film a Doctor Who episode.

Season 10 continues at 7.20pm this Saturday on BBC One with ‘Knock Knock’.

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