Though Doctor Who fans met Ncuti Gatwa’s Fifteenth Doctor in Christmas special “The Church on Ruby Road,” he’ll be setting out for his first proper season of adventures next month—and the early teases have signaled a big change for the show beyond the new star and the Disney dollars: the Doctor’s incredible range of outfits.
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While distinctive style is nothing new for the Doctor—add your own fez and/or bow tie joke here—the fact that Gatwa is such a fashion plate in his own personal life played a big part in shaping how his take on the Doctor would dress on-screen. In Entertainment Weekly’s new Doctor Who cover story, Gatwa explains even more about the character’s sartorial shift. The magazine writes that—because Gatwa believed he’d be wearing the same outfit throughout the season, as is generally tradition—he “bookmarked photos from Ralph Lauren’s collaboration with Morehouse and Spelman Colleges, a collection that celebrated historically Black colleges and universities” to figure out a good starting point.
“That was the one costume idea I had because I had in my mind that I was only going to have one costume,” Gatwa told EW. “I went in and showed the producers, and they were like, ‘This is lovely. What else have you got?’ And I was like, ‘Oh.’” That led to a friendship with Doctor Who costume designer Pam Downe, as well as tons more looks for the character. “She laid out her sketches on the table, and I saw kilts and skirts and all kinds of gender-pushing, societal-pushing outfits. And I was like, ‘Yes, let’s do all of them,’” Gatwa recalled.
But there’s more to it than just lots of cool costume changes, the star explained. “The show is so quintessentially British, and it’s a show that has accumulated the power to reflect where Britain is societally. I was like, ‘It would be really interesting to travel through all the subcultures of Britain that it’s had in the past up to now through his clothes.’ This character represents the UK in a weird way, almost like Captain Britain. So, how do we tell that story through fashion?”
Read more from Gatwa and his Doctor Who cohorts over at Entertainment Weekly, and prepare for the feast of eye candy—your cosplay options will be endless!—when the show’s returns Friday, May 10 at 7 p.m. to Disney+ worldwide, unless you live in the UK—where you can catch it Saturday, May 11 at 12 a.m. GMT on BBC iPlayer and BBC One.
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