Did The Doctor’s former companion Martha Jones borrow his TARDIS to travel back in time to the 1980’s to help Carrie Bradshaw become the shoe-obsessed sex columnist we know (and love/hate) from Sex and the City?
Of course not. But actress Freema Agyeman is making her debut on U.S. television in The Carrie Diaries, a prequel to Sex and the City based on Candace Bushnell’s book. Agyeman plays Larissa Loughlin, a style editor for “Interview” magazine. She meets a young and innocent Carrie (played by AnnaSophia Robb) in a department store, where the young girl’s colorful personalized purse draws her eye.
A friendship quickly forms, and the magazine editor invites the young girl to join them at restaurant Indochine, where Carrie discovers a world of artists, writers, and fashionistas. Champagne and creativity flow freely as a young Carrie begins to discover the New York nightlife so ubiquitous in the raunchy but cleverly written HBO show.
Agyeman is listed as being in all 13 episodes of the new series, and her character has been set up to serve as Obi-Wan Kenobi to Carrie’s Luke Skywalker. Editor Larissa Loughlin is a party gal with a flair for fashion, and she works in publishing, and anyone who watched the original series knows that Carrie grows up to be these things as well. But will Agyeman’s character turn Carrie to the Dark Side instead? She’s already responsible for keeping the teenager out past her curfew and allowing her to drink champagne.
Since her days as the Doctor’s companion in Season 4 of Doctor Who, Agyeman has appeared in Law and Order: U.K. She recently said that she won’t be returning for the 50th anniversary of Doctor Who: “I’m doing two things for the 50th but nothing to do with being in the drama,” she said, further explaining, “It’s in terms of conventions and interviews and things like that, which we’re all doing stuff to promote the 50th. We have to. It’s the Doctor Who family and we want to.”
The Carrie Diaries airs every Monday 8/7pm on The CW channel. The Doctor Who 50th anniversary is scheduled to be celebrated later this year.
