- 7 weeks ago
From heartfelt letters to auditions in Steven Moffat's kitchen, these are the stories of how every Doctor got cast in Doctor Who!
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00:00Hello everybody, Ellie here, and you might remember that earlier this year we looked at why every lead actor left
00:07Doctor Who.
00:07And now, with Shooty Gatwa's first season right around the corner, it's a good time actually to look at the
00:12exact opposite.
00:14So this is how every Doctor Who got cast.
00:17Yes, we know it's the Doctor, not Doctor Who, but whatever.
00:22Let's kick things off with William Hartnell.
00:25William Hartnell had been acting for over 30 years by the time he was offered the role of the First
00:29Doctor.
00:30A role in the 1944 war movie The Way Ahead secured him a fairly consistent career playing tough men,
00:36from army generals to hard-boiled detectives and sinister crooks.
00:40In 1957, Hartnell was cast in the sitcom The Army Game and became a household name.
00:46When The Army Game ended in 1961, Hartnell fell back into guest spots in other TV shows and a movie
00:52role that would change his life.
00:53Lindsay Anderson, a key figure in the British new wave of cinema,
00:57cast Hartnell as the elderly rugby scout Dad Johnson in 1963's This Sporting Life.
01:04Hartnell gives an astonishing performance here, displaying a tender interest in Richard Harris' Frank,
01:09which appears to go beyond rugby.
01:11It was Hartnell's performance as Johnson that caught the attention of Doctor Who's first producer, Verity Lambert.
01:16The first Doctor was imagined as an older man, and Hartnell's ability to play tough characters with a soft centre
01:22made him perfect for the role.
01:25Patrick Troughton
01:26Patrick Troughton was an incredibly gifted character actor in film and television,
01:31and had clocked up some impressive credits in the years before Doctor Who.
01:35A fascinating tidbit about his career is that he was the first actor to play Robin Hood on television,
01:40doing so in the BBC's 1953 serial of the same name.
01:44Doctor Who's producers believed that an actor of Troughton's versatility was a good fit to replace William Hartnell,
01:50and though he was initially unsure, he ultimately signed on the dotted line.
01:53Arguably, Troughton had the toughest role of any lead actor in the history of Doctor Who.
01:58Not only did he have to sell the concept of regeneration,
02:01he had to be markedly different to William Hartnell while staying true to the heart of the character.
02:06Thankfully, however, some of his more outlandish suggestions for the second Doctor,
02:10including a turban and darker skin, were shot down by the production team.
02:13Troughton blazed a trail for future incarnations,
02:16so it's understandable that Hartnell apparently noted that he was, quote,
02:19the only man in England who can take over.
02:22John Pertwee
02:23A former naval intelligence officer, John Pertwee served alongside James Bond creator Ian Fleming,
02:30perhaps influencing his own 007-inspired take on the Doctor.
02:33When the Second World War ended, Pertwee embarked on a prolific career on stage and screen.
02:38He was encouraged to inquire about playing the Doctor when it became clear that Patrick Troughton would be leaving.
02:43Producer Peter Bryant duly placed Pertwee's name on the list, right behind Oliver Star, Ron Moody.
02:49When Moody turned down the role, which was reportedly the single biggest regret of his career,
02:54Pertwee was a shoo-in for the Third Doctor.
02:57Before Doctor Who, Pertwee was primarily known for playing comedy roles,
03:01appearing in multiple carry-on movies and the beloved radio sitcom The Navy Lark.
03:05Mindful of this reputation, Pertwee was keen to play the Doctor as a more serious and heroic figure.
03:10This is largely why the Third Doctor is more straight in his first season,
03:14but quickly softens, allowing Pertwee to lean into his talents as a comedian.
03:19Tom Baker
03:19The story of how Tom Baker became the Fourth Doctor is the stuff of legend.
03:24In the early 1970s, Baker's career appeared to be in The Ascendant,
03:28after he was cast in movies like Nicholas and Alexandra and The Canterbury Tales.
03:32Unfortunately, the roles dried up by 1974, and Baker found work on a building site.
03:38Meanwhile, Barry Letts and Terrence Dix were casting the actor who would replace John Pertwee as the Doctor.
03:43They had considered actors like Bernard Cribbins, I mean, can you imagine?
03:47Graham Crowden and Fulton McKay, all of whom, incidentally, have appeared in Doctor Who in other roles.
03:52That was until BBC head of serials Bill Slater received a letter from Tom Baker, whom he'd previously worked with.
03:59Slater passed the details to Letts and Dix, suggesting they go see Tom's latest movie, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad.
04:05Letts and Dix were both captivated by Baker's performance, and offered the out-of-work actor the role of a
04:10lifetime.
04:11Baker recalls his last day on the building site in his autobiography in suitably quirky fashion.
04:16He says,
04:17That lunchtime I shook hands and swore eternal friendship with everyone, and full of tears and good resolution, I tottered
04:22off.
04:23I never saw them again. I was Doctor Who now. I was an alien. And the rest is history.
04:29Peter Davison
04:29In 1981, Doctor Who producer John Nathan Turner was grappling with how to replace Tom Baker.
04:36It was the biggest challenge for the show, since his predecessors had to seek out potential candidates for the second
04:41Doctor.
04:41John Nathan Turner approached Richard Griffiths, these days best known as Uncle Vernon in Harry Potter, about the role.
04:47But he wasn't available.
04:48An actor who was available, despite simultaneously appearing in two sitcoms, Holding the Fort and Sink or Swim, was Peter
04:55Davison.
04:55John Nathan Turner had worked with Davison before on All Creatures Great and Small, the show that had made Davison
05:01a household name.
05:02Davison's profile and his youthful appearance were deemed a winning combination by John Nathan Turner, who quickly offered the role
05:09to the initially reluctant star.
05:11Davison worried about being too young to play the Doctor, and was also concerned about becoming typecast.
05:16He needn't have worried, of course, as he would go on to become the most successful actor to have played
05:20the Doctor in the classic era.
05:22So much so that he's still working today in shows like The Gold, Gentleman Jack, and Good Omens.
05:28Colin Baker
05:29On the advice of Patrick Troughton, Peter Davison made the decision to leave Doctor Who after three years.
05:35As with the transition between Tom Baker and Peter Davison, John Nathan Turner was keen to cast someone who would
05:40provide a sharp contrast with their predecessor.
05:42Colin Baker, therefore, could not be more different from Peter Davison.
05:46Where Davison had generally played sympathetic everyman characters, Baker had carved out a career playing villains in acclaimed dramas like
05:53The Brothers and The Roads to Freedom.
05:55Not to mention his antagonistic role in the fifth Doctor serial, Arc of Infinity.
06:00It was Baker's strong performance here that ultimately led to his casting as the sixth Doctor, despite his concerns that
06:06Doctor Who generally didn't recast guest stars as the lead.
06:09Colin's fears proved to be unfounded, however, when John Nathan Turner offered him the role.
06:14John Nathan Turner and Baker had become acquaintances in the months following Arc of Infinity, and the producer increasingly believed
06:20that he would make a great Doctor.
06:22If only the BBC had agreed with John Nathan Turner's assessment at the time.
06:27Sylvester McCoy
06:28Sylvester McCoy had previously thrown his hat into the ring for the sixth Doctor, having been unaware that John Nathan
06:34Turner had already cast Colin Baker.
06:36Fast forward a couple of years and the BBC has fired Colin Baker, and John Nathan Turner is looking for
06:41a new Doctor.
06:42Again, Sylvester McCoy, via his agent, puts himself forward for the role, following a recommendation to John Nathan Turner by
06:48BBC producer Clive Droig.
06:50After seeing McCoy perform in The Pied Piper on stage, John Nathan Turner was convinced that he was the right
06:56man to play a Troughton-esque Seventh Doctor.
06:58McCoy had a knack for physical comedy, perfected during his years in the anarchic theatre group The Ken Campbell Roadshow.
07:05However, BBC One controller Jonathan Powell wasn't convinced that McCoy could lead a TV show, and nixed the casting.
07:11Undeterred, John Nathan Turner assembled a number of actors, McCoy among them, to record screen tests opposite one Janet Fielding,
07:19who had played Teagan opposite the Fifth Doctor.
07:21Viewing the tapes, Powell conceded that McCoy was the strongest performer, and so he was officially cast as the Seventh
07:27Doctor.
07:28Paul McGann
07:29Looking at the history of the 1996 TV movie, it feels like there wasn't a single actor in the UK
07:35who wasn't considered for the role of the Eighth Doctor.
07:38And not just UK actors either.
07:40Americans like Jurassic Park's Jeff Goldblum and Twin Peaks' Kyle MacLachlan were also potential candidates.
07:46Paul McGann eventually emerged as the frontrunner for the role, due to the BBC's desire to have a British actor
07:51as the lead.
07:52McGann taped his audition for the TV movie in September 1994, but even that wasn't enough to secure the role.
07:58Fox wanted a big name like Sting. Yep, seriously, can you imagine Sting as the Doctor?
08:03The BBC and producer Philip Segal, however, vetoed this wild casting suggestion.
08:08Eventually, Segal offered to cast a big name as the Master, if Fox agreed to Paul McGann's casting as the
08:14Doctor.
08:15Peter Capaldi later revealed that he turned down the chance to audition for the TV movie, believing that he would
08:20have to, quote,
08:21jump through hoops for something I'd never get.
08:23He's an astute man, that Peter Capaldi.
08:26Christopher Eccleston.
08:27Oh, Christopher Eccleston and Russell T. Davis.
08:30Where did it all go wrong?
08:32In 2003, it was announced that RTD would be reviving Doctor Who for a brand new series.
08:38Also in 2003, RTD and Christopher Eccleston collaborated on the ITV drama The Second Coming, which depicted the return of
08:45the Son of God.
08:46When he discovered Russell was reviving Doctor Who, Eccleston expressed his interest in the title role.
08:51Speaking about this during promotion for his first and only series, Eccleston stated that he was excited to do something
08:57for a younger audience.
08:58Eccleston was also a suggestion made by executive producer Mal Young.
09:02However, before he received Eccleston's interest, Russell T. Davis never believed that the actor, best known for gritty and challenging
09:08work, would ever do Doctor Who.
09:10Which is presumably why more, quote, obvious names like Hugh Grant and Bill Nighy were pursued by the team prior
09:16to Eccleston's casting being announced.
09:19It was a game-changing bit of casting that signalled Doctor Who wasn't just going to be phoning it in,
09:24and helped ensure the show's overnight success back in 2005.
09:27David Tennant has always cited Doctor Who as one of the key influences on his decision to become an actor.
09:35In fact, Tennant had played multiple roles in big Finnish audio dramas in the years before he was cast as
09:40Doctor No. 10.
09:41Alongside these audio dramas, Tennant's TV career was taking off with a breakthrough role in 2004's Blackpool, opposite the next
09:49Doctor, David Morrissey.
09:50Tennant also got the chance to work with Russell T. Davis on the 2005 show Casanova, which is what led
09:56to his casting as the 10th Doctor.
09:58When Christopher Eccleston decided not to return for Doctor Who Series 2, Russell T. Davis had to find a replacement
10:04fairly quickly.
10:05So it was a good job that he'd literally just worked with an incredibly talented actor, who had also been
10:10dreaming of playing the Doctor since he was a little kid.
10:13Not wishing for their new lead to leave as quickly as Eccleston had, the BBC signed Tennant for multiple series.
10:18Not that he would have minded, the man just can't keep away!
10:21Matt Smith
10:22When Stephen Moffat took over Doctor Who in 2010, he was keen to cast an older Doctor to differentiate the
10:29character from David Tennant.
10:30A reverse Peter Davison manoeuvre, if you will.
10:32Instead, he cast the youngest actor to ever play the Doctor.
10:36Matt Smith had previously auditioned for the role of Watson in Moffat and Mark Gatiss' Sherlock, but was turned down
10:41because he was more of a Holmes figure than a Watson.
10:44Smith proved this when he turned up to audition for the Doctor and completely won over Moffat, convincing him that
10:50this young actor could still embody the Doctor's centuries' worth of experiences.
10:54It's said that Stephen Moffat and his producers had their hearts set on one particular actor before Matt Smith walked
11:00into the room, leading to much speculation over the years.
11:03Peep Show's Patterson Joseph and Voyage of the Damned's Russell Tovey also auditioned for the role of the 11th Doctor,
11:09eventually losing out to Smith.
11:10It's even been rumoured that Chiwetel Ejiofor was offered the part, but turned it down.
11:15It's certainly a tantalising what-if, though who can deny that Smith was utterly perfect casting?
11:22Peter Capaldi
11:23Stephen Moffat had apparently considered casting Peter Capaldi as the 11th Doctor back in 2009, but it never came to
11:30be.
11:30Four years later, Moffat revisited this notion and offered Capaldi the role after a private audition at Moffat's home.
11:37It's widely believed that Capaldi was always the first choice for the role, which was why he auditioned in Moffat's
11:43Kitchen rather than in a more official setting.
11:45However, other options were being explored for the unlikely possibility that lifelong Doctor Who fan Capaldi would turn down this
11:51most coveted of characters.
11:53Actor Ben Daniels revealed that he had been asked about succeeding Matt Smith as the 12th Doctor.
11:58Meanwhile, bookies slashed the odds on James Bond actor Rory Kinnear being cast as the Doctor, believing that it was
12:04a dead cert.
12:05While these potential candidates had been rumoured and leaked to the press ahead of the big swanky primetime reveal in
12:11August 2013, Peter Capaldi was always at the top of the list.
12:15Jodie Whittaker
12:16The short version of how Jodie Whittaker was cast as the 13th Doctor is that she had worked with Chris
12:22Chibnall on Broadchurch, but it's a bit more complicated than that.
12:25Doctor Who was never on Whittaker's mind, even when Chibnall contacted her for a meeting.
12:29She assumed it was to discuss the final season of Broadchurch and was surprised when Doctor Who was brought up.
12:35The actress was then put through months of auditions, reading specially designed script pages to test whether she could handle
12:41the Doctor's many sides.
12:42She recorded a self-tape where she pretended to defuse a device, a typical Doctor scenario, and successfully bagged the
12:49role.
12:49Several other mystery actresses also auditioned.
12:52Rumours emerged prior to Peter Capaldi's final series that he would be replaced with Tilda Swinton or Phoebe Waller-Bridge,
12:58which obviously never came to pass.
12:59Whatever the truth of those rumours was, Chibnall has stated that he was always going to cast a female Doctor,
13:05and that Jodie Whittaker was always his number one choice.
13:08David Tennant
13:09Again
13:09The story of how the COVID-19 pandemic inadvertently led to David Tennant being cast as the 14th Doctor is
13:17a fascinating one.
13:18The chain of events is as follows.
13:20Former Doctor Who magazine writer Emily Cook organised tweet-alongs to several popular Doctor Who episodes to keep fans entertained
13:27during lockdown.
13:28After a tweet-along for The Runaway Bride in December 2020, Catherine Tate texted Russell T. Davis and indicated she'd
13:34be down to do more Doctor Who.
13:36Russell T. Davis loved the idea, and upon learning that David Tennant was also up for it, he informed the
13:40BBC.
13:41With the future of the show uncertain and no clear plan in place for Chibnall and Whittaker's successors, the promise
13:46of new episodes with Tennant and Tate must have been music to the Biebs' ears.
13:51RTD soon agreed to return as showrunner, bringing with him a bold vision for the show that is currently unfolding
13:56before our very eyes.
13:57The return of David Tennant as an older, weather-beaten incarnation of the Doctor was the perfect way to reinvigorate
14:03wider public interest in the show during Doctor Who's 60th anniversary year.
14:08Shooty Gatwa
14:09Shooty Gatwa was already becoming a huge star when he auditioned for the role of the 15th Doctor.
14:14Rising to fame playing Eric Effiong in Netflix's Sex Education, Gatwa had also snagged a small role in 2023's blockbuster
14:22hit Barbie.
14:22This led to him making a cameo during the I'm Just Ken performance at the 2024 Oscars, in what is
14:28surely one of the most iconic moments for a Doctor actor.
14:30Casting director Andy Pryor told Digital Spy that Gatwa, quote, blew everyone away during his audition.
14:37Pryor also revealed that the auditions took place over a couple of days, and that there were other actors they
14:42would happily have cast.
14:43Elsewhere, Russell T. Davis revealed to the Radio Times that Shooty Gatwa was the last actor to audition for the
14:50role, and that the showrunner had already cast someone else in his head.
14:53He said,
14:53I thought someone else was a guaranteed hit, and then in Shooty came, and that person will never know.
14:59Cue decades of speculation over who RTD would have cast if Shooty Gatwa had turned left and never auditioned for
15:05Doctor Who.
15:06And there you have it.
15:07Now, at the beginning, I mentioned that this list was inspired by a previous video, so go check out why
15:12every lead actor left Doctor Who.
15:14In the meantime, I've been Ellie for Who Culture, and in the words of Riversong herself, goodbye, sweeties.
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