ONE’S a gun-toting super spy, the other is a police box-dwelling Time Lord – and David Tennant has recently discovered he was almost cast as both.
The actor has learnt he was on 007 producer Barbara Broccoli‘s shortlist to play James Bond back in 2002, around the time he accepted the role as Doctor Who.
Chatting on the Acting For Others podcast, David said: “I worked with a director recently who had worked with the Broccolis who was like, ‘Yeah, you were on the list that time.’
“I was like, ‘What time? What are you talking about?’ He went, ‘Yeah, the last time.’ I suppose it must have been Daniel Craig, before that I would have been a child.”
The revelation came as a surprise to David, who had never known he was in the running.
But he’s unsure if he would’ve been able to handle that level of fame.
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He went on: “I think it was quite a long list and I don’t think I was ever near the top of it. But apparently so.”
“I think it’s probably a bit of a game changer, that level of celebrity. I don’t know.”
Discussing how his life changed since becoming the Doctor in 2005, David added: “There is that bit where you lose your anonymity, certainly.
“It’s a different scale to anything I’d done before in terms of the general public being aware of you. You can sort of be known in the industry and then suddenly you’re in people’s living rooms and they have a kind of ownership over you in a way. It’s a multi-faceted experience and lots of it are very nice.
“Doctor Who you can sort of be anywhere in the world and there’s someone. Even if the show is not a big deal in that country and you think ‘oh this is fine’ there’s always somebody, there’s always somebody with a DVD that needs signing.
“But I’m not going to complain about that. It’s a very privileged place to be.”
David will reprise his role as the Tenth Doctor for a series of 60th anniversary specials in 2023 for the BBC.
With his trusty Sonic Screwdriver, not a Golden Gun, I assume.
SHE is fast becoming one of telly’s busiest personalities – and now Emily Atack has joined up with comedian and Love Island narrator Iain Stirling for the second series of his sitcom Buffering.
The actress, who first found fame playing Charlotte Hinchcliffe in The Inbetweeners in the late Noughties, pouted for the camera as she arrived on set to begin filming for the ITV2 sitcom.
And Emily is something of an old hand at comedy of course, having made three series of her own stand-up show for ITV2.
Later she grabbed a selfie with Iain and wrote: “Thrilled to be joining Buffering today!”
THE Masked Dancer panellist Peter Crouch has been offered to play the lead role in a sitcom about his exploits post-football.
The show, which was pitched to him by two of BBC1 fundraiser Sports Relief’s writers, would imagine the former England striker trying to break into acting.
Crouchy, wed to model Abbey Clancy, said: “I liked it. Elements of both The Office and Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon‘s The Trip.
“The scripts were excellent, written by James Kayler and Steve Lawrence who I’d worked with on Sport Relief.
“One mooted episode was called Eat, Pray, Love, and involved me going on a spa trip, only to accidentally join a cult. The final line in the blurb will stay with me for quite a long time: “Can Crouchie escape before he’s killed?’ “I may yet do it.”
WHILE ITV is busy rebooting Big Brother, Channel 4 is planning a brand new reality format of its own.
Alan. Must. Win. will see a larger-than-life cast move into a house, where they compete in a popularity contest. So far, so familiar. But the E4 show, which will land in 2023, has a cheeky twist.
Living next door will be a group of celebs who control the action – with a secret goal to ensure one contestant, called Alan, wins.
The celebs will set tasks, introduce twists and master the art of manipulation to ensure Alan’s triumph.
Commissioning Editor Mel Bezalel said: “We’re excited about taking the reality genre in a sneaky new direction.”
EUROVISION host Graham Norton has criticised Liverpool hoteliers for their “outrageous” price rises since the city was announced as host of next May’s contest.
He told an online audience: “What’s happened with the hotel rooms is quite crazy, it’s outrageous.”
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But he added about Britain’s Eurovision success this year: “If you send the right act, stage it properly, the right running order, all those elements need to come together, and this year the UK did, and it looked and sounded brilliant.
“It’s that thing that Eurovision does – it’s such a silly, camp thing but it can sometimes cut through and do something really moving and profound, like it did that night. I love that it did that.”
