By 2005, the French-born film-maker, Roman Polanski was keen to produce a child-friendly cinematic version of Charles Dickens' Oliver Twist - actually the first adaptation since the Oscar-winning musical, Oliver! in 1968. This new rendition, shown on Film4 today, was shot entirely in the Czech Republic.
Literary classic Oliver Twist (also known as The Parish Boy's Progress, and originally published monthly in Bentley's Miscellany from 1837-39) was only Dickens' second novel.
The cast here was headed by Sir Ben Kingsley as Fagin, with the famous orphan now portrayed by Barney Clark (picutred left), and also featured these ten Doctor Who cast connections:
- Ian McNeice (Limbkins) played Winston Churchill in Victory of the Daleks, The Pandorica Opens and The Wedding of River Song (a role reprised for Big Finish's The Churchill Years), and also voiced Zeus for Immortal Beloved (2007), and Reginald Harcourt for The Renaissance Man (2012)
- Chris Overton (Noah) voiced Terrill and Levek for The Brood of Erys (2014)
- Jamie Foreman (Bill Sykes) was Eddie Connolly in The Idiot's Lantern
- Timothy Bateson (Parson) was Binro in The Ribos Operation
- Joseph Tremain (Hungry Boy) was Jim in The Empty Child and The Doctor Dances
- Peter Copley (Master) was Dr Warlock in Pyramids of Mars
- Gerald Horan (Farmer) was Clark in Human Nature and The Family of Blood
- Patrick Godfrey (Bookseller) was Tor in The Savages, and Major Cosworth in The Mind of Evil
- Frank Mills (Officer) was the Radio Telescope Director in Terror of the Autons
- Paul Brooke (Grimwig) voiced Paolo for The Ghosts of N-Space, and Toby the Sapient Pig for Year of the Pig (2006)
