ACTOR Christopher Eccleston will take the Lord out of Time Lord when he steps into the Tardis for the first time on Saturday evening.

The 41-year-old from Little Hulton will be the first actor in the show's history to give the Doctor a northern accent. And he says he has done so deliberately.

"I never really watched Doctor Who when I was a kid. I think part of the reason was that as a Little Hulton lad I could not relate to these Doctors who were speaking in a very precise manner, very middle-class.

"With the new series, we really wanted to reach out to children and send the message that it does not matter what accent you talk in - heroes don't have to talk in that posh kind of way.

"I want the kids in Bolton to now think 'I could be Doctor Who. I could save the world'!"

Eccleston, more famous for gritty roles in TV programmes like Cracker, Hillsborough and the Second Coming and movies like Jude and Shallow Grave, was speaking to the Bolton Evening News just two days before the long-awaited return of the iconic BBC science fiction series after a 16-year absence.

Eccleston, whose family still lives in Little Hulton, said he had e-mailed Russell T Davies when he heard that the writer of Bob and Rose and The Second Coming was at the helm of the 21st Century Who.

"Yes, I got in touch because I felt that it was time for me to take a challenge like this. There is a lot of responsibility here. The Doctor is in virtually every scene and I wanted to do something like that.

"My character will be funny, brave and heroic, but also very angry. It's what makes the role so exciting - that and being able to travel in time to anywhere in the universe. How fantastic is that?"

Eccleston spent eight months in Cardiff filming 11 day fortnights for up to 14 hours a day for the 13, 45 minute episodes, which reputedly cost £1 million each.

It means that the days of wobbly sets are long gone.

"We were keen to get away from that image. The production values are very strong and the crew and cast has really worked so hard on this programme.

"That is one of the reasons I have been giving so many interviews. It is important to me that their work is recognised and seen by as many people as possible."

He also has high praise for his co-star Billie Piper, former pop starlet and wife of Chris Evans.

"She is a great actress and we really enjoyed working on the show. Hopefully that will come across. There is a lot of rubbish talked about 'chemistry' between actors. It is the high quality of the writing that makes the so-called chemistry and the quality of the writing here is great."

Although Eccleston says he didn't see much of the programme in the 60s and 70s when he was growing up in Salford. His earliest recollection of the show was second Doctor Patrick Troughton. "He was quirky, but had an edge to him." Among the many new and strange creatures the Doctor has to face in the new series are two old adversaries.

In the first episode, he battles the Autons, lumps of plastic brought to life by the Nestenes, an evil alien intelligence. It results in some nightmarish scenes, reminiscent of the programme in its 'golden age' as Jon Pertwee and Tom Baker fought off all manner of monsters trying to invade Earth.

But the enemy on fans' most wanted list are the dreaded Daleks.

And Eccleston is the first to warn: "The Daleks are back and, make no mistake, they are scary. It's not as much their appearance, it's more their psychology.

"They are the Doctor's Achilles heel. They force him to change his behaviour.

"In that episode you see a completely different Doctor than the lighter side in episodes one and two. I hope it is very interesting," says Eccleston. When rumours that the Daleks may appear again in the final episodes of the new series, he deftly sidesteps the question.

"Over the next few weeks the Daleks could be anywhere.

"Around any corner, at the bottom of the next flight of stairs..."

And as for Saturday night at 7pm - what will he be doing as the rest of the nation settles down to Doctor Who?

He says: "Well, I really don't like to watch my own performances, but I am hoping to be at my parents' home in Little Hulton watching them watching me."

Doctor Who is on BBC1 on Saturdays at 7pm.