New ‘Doctor Who’ companion Pearl Mackie was told to "run like a superhero" by her predecessor Jenna Coleman.
Pearl plays the Doctor’s latest TARDIS mate Bill Potts in the sci-fi series with her first episode ‘The Pilot’ kicking off this Saturday (15.04.17) on BBC One at 7:20pm.
The 29-year-old actress was sent a bouquet of flowers on her first day of filming in Cardiff by Jenna, who played Clara Oswald in three series beginning her tenure with Eleventh Doctor Matt Smith and leaving in 2015 after starring with Twelfth Time Lord Peter Capaldi.
Included with the flowers was a note from Jenna, 30, giving Pearl her top tips.
Speaking to RadioTimes.com, Pearl shared: "Jenna sent me a bunch of flowers of my first day of filming which was lovely. And yeah, it had lots of advice in it – practice your superhero run to comedy theme music. She also told me stuff like where to get nice food delivered in Cardiff and what not to eat in the canteen. Anything in the canteen!"
Pearl admits she avoided catching up on old episodes of the show before auditioning for showrunner Steven Moffat because she didn’t want to borrow aspects of previous assistants and keep Bill – who is revealed to be gay in her first episode – fresh.
She said: "Obviously every companion is completely different. But essentially there is a similarity between them because they travel with Doctor Who. So watching someone do the job that you’re about to do, brilliantly … all the companions have been amazing. You’d be mad as an actor not to go, ‘Oh that’s good, I’m gonna have that.’ So I thought obviously what I was doing in the audition was working and I thought even subconsciously I wouldn’t be able to stop myself from borrowing things from previous companions. So perhaps it is best to not do that, so I can continue being Bill as I would play her."
Doctor Who’s Pearl Mackie got ‘super’ advice from Jenna Coleman
