John Eccleston is a puppeteer, writer and presenter known for his work as lead puppeteer of Rygel in Farscape, Groove in The Hoobs and his many roles on British children's television alongside Don Austen. He was also behind the ITV character Gilbert the Alien, who was voiced by Phil Cornwell, He also performed Worth the Dog in the Woolworths adverts (again opposite Don Austen as Wooly The Sheep), Mervin J Minky on MTV's FURtv and Rattus Rattus on the CBBC Horrible Histories series.

His 'in vision' television career started as one of the original presenters of the UK version of the Mickey Mouse Club, Disney Club, the success of which led to him presenting Run the Risk, The Big Dish, children's magazine show Brill, and Get The Picture for Nickelodeon. It took seven years for him to realise he didn't like being pointed at in the street and he has remained off screen ever since. He worked alongside Don Austen on the Saturday morning children's show What's Up Doc? He and Don provided the voices and operated the puppet wolves Bro & Bro. Their writing skill on this show garnered a spin-off ITV show called Wolf It! What's Up Doc?. John was approached to provide new characters for the BBC flagship series LIVE & KICKING once again teaming up with Don Austen and Darryl Worbey to create THE LEPRECHAUNS - Mr Sage and Mr Onion. The characters appeared across six years - outliving three sets of presenters. John, Don and Darryl teamed up yet again to create Scratch and Sniff (with John playing Sniff) on Ministry of Mayhem (later reworked as Holly and Stephen's Saturday Showdown) and the Hyenas recorded 15 episodes of the gameshow Scratch 'n' Sniff's Den Of Doom for Granada Kids. John appeared in the award winning short film The Box, directed by Michael J. Bassett and also starring Paul Hendy, Richard Orford and Laurence Akers. He also is the puppetor for Rattus on the CBBC program, Horrible Histories.

John Vincent Hurt, CBE (born 22 January 1940) is an English actor and former voice actor. Among other honours, he has received two Academy Award nominations, a Golden Globe Award, and four BAFTA Awards, with the fourth being a Lifetime Achievement recognition.

Hurt is known for his leading roles as Joseph Merrick (billed as John Merrick) in The Elephant Man, Winston Smith in Nineteen Eighty-Four, Mr. Braddock in The Hit, Stephen Ward in Scandal, and Quentin Crisp in The Naked Civil Servant and An Englishman in New York. Recognizable for his distinctive rich voice, he has also enjoyed a successful voice acting career, starring in films such as Watership Down, The Lord of the Rings and Dogville, as well as BBC television series Merlin.

Hurt initially came to prominence for his role as Richard Rich in the 1966 film A Man for All Seasons, and has since appeared in such popular motion pictures as: Alien, Midnight Express, Rob Roy, V for Vendetta, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, the first, penultimate, and last Harry Potter films, the Hellboy film series, and Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy. Hurt is one of England's best-known, most prolific and sought-after actors, and has had a versatile film career spanning six decades. He is also known for his many Shakespearean roles. His character's final scene in Alien is consistently named as one of the most memorable in cinematic history.

Christopher Eccleston (/ˈɛkəlstən/; born 16 February 1964) is an English actor, best known for his role as the ninth incarnation of the Doctor in the British television series Doctor Who. In addition to his extensive television work, he has appeared on stage and in films such as Let Him Have It, Shallow Grave, 28 Days Later, Gone in 60 Seconds, The Others, and G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra.

Born into a working class family in the Langworthy area of Pendleton, in Salford, Lancashire, Eccleston is the youngest of three boys born to Elsie and Ronnie Eccleston. His brothers, Alan and Keith, are twins eight years his senior, born in 1956. The family lived in a small terraced house in Blodwell Street until the late 1960s, when they moved about 7 miles away to Little Hulton. Eccleston attended Joseph Eastham High School, Little Hulton, where he became head boy^{[citation needed]} At the age of 19, he was inspired by television dramas such as Boys from the Blackstuff to enter the acting profession. Eccleston completed a two-year Performance Foundation Course at Salford Tech, before going on to train at the Hampstead-based Central School of Speech and Drama. As an actor, his early influences had been Ken Loach's Kes and Albert Finney's performance in Saturday Night and Sunday Morning, but he soon found himself performing the classics, including the works of Shakespeare, Chekhov and Molière. At the age of 25, Eccleston made his professional stage debut in the Bristol Old Vic's production of A Streetcar Named Desire. Underemployed as an actor for some years after graduating school, Eccleston took a variety of odd jobs at a supermarket, on building sites and as an artist's model.

John Scot Barrowman (born March 11, 1967) is a Scottish–American actor, singer, dancer, musical theatre performer, writer and television personality. Born in Glasgow, he grew up in Illinois following his family's emigration to the U.S. Encouraged by his high school teachers, Barrowman studied performing arts at the United States International University in San Diego before landing the role of Billy Crocker in Cole Porter's Anything Goes in London's West End.

Since his debut in professional theatre, Barrowman has played lead roles in various musicals both in the West End and on Broadway, including Miss Saigon, The Phantom of the Opera, Sunset Boulevard and Matador. After appearing in Sam Mendes' production of The Fix, he was nominated for the 1998 Laurence Olivier Award for Best Actor in a Musical and, in the early 2000s, returned to the role of Billy Crocker in the revival of Anything Goes. His most recent West End credit was in the 2009 production of La Cage aux Folles.

David Tennant (born David John McDonald; 18 April 1971) is a Scottish actor. In addition to his work in theatre, including a widely praised Hamlet, Tennant is best known for his role as the tenth incarnation of the Doctor in Doctor Who, along with the title role in the TV serial Casanova (2005) and as Barty Crouch, Jr., in the film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005).

Tennant was born in Bathgate, West Lothian, Scotland, the son of Essdale Helen (née McLeod) and The Rev. Alexander McDonald (known to family and friends as Sandy McDonald). He grew up with his brother Blair and sister Karen in Ralston, Renfrewshire, where his father was the local Church of Scotland minister. Tennant's maternal great-grandparents, William and Agnes Blair, were staunch Protestants from Derry in Ulster, the northern province of Ireland, and were among the signatories of the Ulster Covenant in 1912; William was a member of the Grand Orange Lodge of Ireland. Tennant's maternal grandfather, footballer Archie McLeod, met William and Agnes's daughter Nellie while playing for Derry City.