Doctor Who #10 - David Tennant (2005–2010)
David Tennant (born David John McDonald; 18 April 1971) is a Scottish actor and voice actor. In addition to his work in theatre, including a widely praised Hamlet, Tennant is best known for his role as the tenth incarnation of the Doctor in Doctor Who, along with the title role in the TV serial Casanova (2005) and as Barty Crouch, Jr., in the film Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005).
Doctor Who returned to British screens in 2005, with Christopher Eccleston playing the role of the Ninth Doctor in the first series. Tennant replaced him as of the second series, making his first, brief appearance as the Tenth Doctor in the episode "The Parting of the Ways" (2005) at the end of the regeneration scene, and also appeared in a special 7-minute mini-episode shown as part of the 2005 Children in Need appeal, broadcast on 18 November 2005. He began filming the new series of Doctor Who in late July 2005. His first full-length outing as the Doctor was a 60-minute special, "The Christmas Invasion", first broadcast on Christmas Day 2005.
Tennant has expressed enthusiasm about fulfilling his childhood dream. He remarked to an interviewer for GWR FM, "Who wouldn't want to be the Doctor? I've even got my own TARDIS!" In 2006, readers of Doctor Who Magazine voted Tennant 'Best Doctor!', over perennial favorite Tom Baker. In 2007, Tennant's Doctor was voted the "coolest character" on UK television in a Radio Times survey. When Tennant was cast as Eccleston's successor, he had wanted to use his native Scottish accent and become "the first kilted Doctor" according to an interview in the Daily Star, but writer Russell T Davies did not want the Doctor's accent "touring the regions", so he used Estuary English instead.
Tennant had previously had a small role in the BBC's animated Doctor Who webcast Scream of the Shalka. Not originally cast in the production, Tennant happened to be recording a radio play in a neighboring studio, and when he discovered what was being recorded next door managed to convince the director to give him a small role. This personal enthusiasm for the series had also been expressed by his participation in several audio plays based on the Doctor Who television series which had been produced by Big Finish Productions, although he did not play the Doctor in any of these productions. His first such role was in the Seventh Doctor audio Colditz, where he played a Nazi lieutenant guard at Colditz Castle. In 2004 Tennant played a lead role in the Big Finish audio play series Dalek Empire III. He played the part of Galanar, a young man who is given an assignment to discover the secrets of the Daleks. In 2005, he starred in UNIT: The Wasting for Big Finish, recreating his role of Brimmicombe-Wood from a Doctor Who Unbound play, Sympathy for the Devil. In both of these audio productions Tennant worked alongside Doctor Who alumnus Nicholas Courtney, who reprised the character of Sir Alastair Gordon Lethbridge-Stewart. He also played an unnamed Time Lord in another Doctor Who Unbound play Exile. UNIT: The Wasting, was recorded between Tennant getting the role of the Doctor and it being announced. He also played the title role in Big Finish's adaptation of Bryan Talbot's The Adventures of Luther Arkwright (2005). In 2006, he recorded abridged audio books of The Stone Rose by Jacqueline Rayner, The Feast of the Drowned by Stephen Cole and The Resurrection Casket by Justin Richards, for BBC Worldwide.
He made his directorial debut on the Doctor Who Confidential episode that accompanies Steven Moffat's episode "Blink", entitled "Do You Remember The First Time?", which aired on 9 June 2007. In 2007, Tennant's Tenth Doctor appeared with Peter Davison's Fifth Doctor in a Doctor Who special for Children in Need, written by Steven Moffat and entitled "Time Crash". This was the first "multi-Doctor" story in the series since The Two Doctors in 1985 (not counting the 1993 special Dimensions in Time). Tennant also later performed alongside Davison's daughter, Georgia Moffett, in the 2008 episode "The Doctor's Daughter" with her taking the titular role as Jenny.
Tennant also featured as the Doctor in an animated version of Doctor Who for Totally Doctor Who, The Infinite Quest, which aired on CBBC. He also starred as the Doctor in another animated six-part Doctor Who series, Dreamland. Tennant guest starred as the Doctor in a two-part story in Doctor Who spin-off The Sarah Jane Adventures, broadcast in October 2009. Tennant continued to play the Tenth Doctor into the revived program's fourth series in 2008. However, on 29 October 2008, Tennant announced that he would be stepping down from the role after three full series. He played the Doctor in four special episodes in 2009, before his final episode aired on 1 January 2010. The Daily Mirror reported that Tennant was forbidden from attending Doctor Who fan conventions while playing the role. This was done to avoid the chance that Tennant could accidentally let slip any plot points during filming of the series.
David Tennant Stamp
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
