Allegedly, that's your line-up of returning Doctors for the 50th Anniversary, according to a poster at GB with a decent (but not perfect) record when it comes to Spoilers. Two fakes, one who they obviously called in when Eccleston said no and the one you always knew would be back. There's supposed to be Official news in the coming week so we'll soon see if they were right or not.
So by what method would they bring one and two in? Stand in actors? CGI tricks? Still hard to believe they cant get 4,5,6 or 7 at all to appear in it.
By using the two actors who've already been cast to play the actors who played the parts, one would assume. Can't get or don't want?
More specifically, this source has suggested 1, 2, and 8 in 7B and 10 in the special. Also, Ian, Susan, Leela, Peri, and Ace, with no specifics as to where. I'm thinking this is more like the same source's "Harriet Jones is the red Dalek"/"an elephant steps on the TARDIS/McGann is back in the 2009 specials" than like his actual scoops, but you never know.
David Bradley's already been cast as William Hartnell for the docudrama Reece Shearsmith has also been cast as Patrick Troughton For the anniversary special they'd just play the 1st doctor and 2nd doctor.
Like I said, not perfect. It's April in a few days and unless they shoot entirely in the Studio real information will start to come out soon enough.
Can't comment on Shearsmith yet, but there's something quite appealing and funny about the thought of Bradley actually appearing in an episode as the real Doctor.
I would say that it's very difficult to believe they could keep McGann appearing in Season 7b a secret, and even harder that they might keep an upcoming appearance from Tennant a secret during filming, but then again, they managed to keep Coleman a secret.
I doubt the goal is to keep anything about the special a secret; if they're doing multiple Doctors, they'll want to promote that. They'll probably announce whatever attention-getting casting the special has before the (imminent) start of its filming. And as StCoop says, there's buzz about a big announcement in the next few days. I think a small cameo from McGann (or any other past Doctor, though all four surviving classic Doctors apart from McGann have recently reiterated that they haven't been asked to do anything) might have been managed without it leaking. Of course, a small cameo would only leave fans complaining that it wasn't something larger...
The only thing that seems a bit strange about this is that it seems a little random. If they'd got 8 thru 11 they could always argue the 'just the time war era+' Doctors. Shame if we won't see any of the others, but all 11 always did seem a stretch, even if we'd got a 90 minute film.
Assuming for the sake of argument that it's correct, there'll be plenty of publicity for AAIS&T that will have 1&2 in people's minds. It's easy for folks like us to forget but most people watching the series now have never seen any Original Series episodes or not seen them since their transmission and don't have any special attachment to the old Doctors. EDIT: 50th Anniversary Offical News tomorrow for definite.
Don't believe it all due to the source's credibility on past rumors. Harriet Jones Is the Red Dalek! made this source the laughing stock of OG/DWF back in 08. If true (unlikely), weird, disappointing line-up. Two Richard Hurdnalls for four surviving actors is a shit deal, advanced age or not.
Coleman in "Asylum" would have been an easier secret to keep. First, all of her shots were studio-bound. Second, she may not even have filmed her scenes at the same time as the rest of the episode. Odd day for an announcement. They have "The Bells of St. John" going out, so why waste two things -- the episode and the news -- on a single news cycle? From a messaging standpoint, Monday would be the better day to break the news. They can trumpet the success of "Bells" and then segue into their 50th-anniversary announcement. That would be two news cycles. No, this timing is suspicious. Either it's a delayed reaction to the Private Eye report or they're trying to get in front of a different story.
Some at Gallifrey Base have noticed a discrepancy between two reported runtimes for "The Bells of St. John" (42 minutes vs. 45), and speculated that there's an extra scene that wasn't in the press screening version. I doubt it, but if so, said scene might reveal something that the big announcement would then give more details of.
I can see a certain logic to it. As already suggested, they can use the actors playing Hartnell and Troughton in Adventures in Time and Space to play their respective Doctors. And with McGann and Tenant you won't have the age issues. Tennant hasn't aged that much since 2009 and we never saw the Eighth Doctor when he regenerated so you don't have to pretend he's not as old as he clearly is. I'm assuming that while time differential worked fine as a hand wave to explain Davison being older in Time Crash's ten minutes, it mignt be seen as too much of a stretch explaining four Doctors for an hour. And while they won't have the age issue with Eccleston, they do have his history with the show to deal with.
I guess Moffat didn't want to run into the same troubles Terrence Dicks had with The Five Doctors. Trying to find enough for all those actors to do.
There's any number of sci-fi, handwave explanations as to why they're visibly older. I'll say it again; if we get only two out of the seven surviving Doctors (or six almost-certainly-would-appear-if-asked Doctors) and an equal amount of Richard Hudnalling, it's an incredibly disappointing line-up. I'd take Bradley and Shearsmith as the First/Second Docs if they were in addition to the genuine articles, but if Tom/Peter/Colin/Sylvester don't appear and they do... *shakes head* What an absolute joke. That's all taking for granted, of course, that this is true. The source this came from has been very, very flaky in the past and in particular, has been trying to push "OMG HINT, PAUL MCGANN IS COMING BACK " since 2009, so to say the very least, I'm skeptical. But if it is true, Rassilon help us all.