Doctor Who Star to Become Survivor

Freema Agyeman Set to Star in Remake of 1970s Sci-fi Series

It was announced toward the end of May of 2008 that Freema Agyeman, who co-starred alongside David Tennant in the third season of the hugely popular Doctor Who television series, would be appearing in a remake of the 1970s science fiction series, Survivors. Freema played Martha Jones in the third season of Doctor Who, becoming the newest companion of The Doctor after the departure of Billie Piper's Rose Tyler character. Freema continued in her role as Jones throughout the third season and returned this year for five episodes alongside David Tennant's Doctor character and Catherine Tate's Donna Noble, the latest companion of the Time Lord that travels through Space and Time.

The original Survivors was written by Terry Nation, whom Doctor Who fans know as the creator of the Daleks. The Daleks, which Nation created for the second ever serial of the series in the 1960s, became hugely popular and provided Doctor Who and the BBC with its very first merchandise boom. In this series, the story follows a group of people who have survived a plague on Earth. Although considered by some to be science fiction, it is probably best described as apocalyptic. The original series ran for three years and the almost forty episodes were produced by Terence Dudley.

The original series followed the adventures of Jenny Richards (played by Lucy Fleming) and Abby Grant (played by Carolyn Seymour) as they searched for other people who survived the plague, which was accidentally released by an unnamed Asian scientist. Jenny was a working class woman living in London and Abby was the wife of a corporate executive living in a privileged community. Abby went searching for her son, Peter, and Jenny was wandering through the countryside. Eventually others were found and the characters of Abby and Jenny finally met. A new community was founded by the survivors, who try to live together in the strange, new world they find themselves in.