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The Doctor Who series 9 episode that used Ikea cutlery drawers

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As much as it’s impressive to see the elaborate digital effects that modern day Doctor Who employs, for those of us who grew up with the show in the decades before, it’s the low-tech ingenuity that always feels that bit special.

If you’re with us on this one, then you might like this story too. The new issue of Empire magazine – that goes on sale tomorrow – sees Mark Gatiss, Steven Moffat and Peter Capaldi looking back over several episodes from their run on the show. And there’s a lovely anecdote in there centering on Gatiss’ series 9 story, Sleep No More.

Gatiss, in the article, talks about working with the constraints of found footage as a narrative device. But then Capaldi chips in with this nugget.

“If you look really closely at the corridors in the episode, the bottoms are lined with this mechanical-looking thing”, he said. “I examined it on set and it turned out to be Ikea cutlery drawers. They’d obviously bought 20 of them and screwed them on. I love that stuff”.

Us too, Peter. Us too.

The full article is well worth a read, and picking up a copy of the magazine for.

Empire.