Given that beloved sci-fi series Doctor Who has been on air for over 60 years now, countless actors have featured either in major roles or as guest stars.
From Simon Pegg playing a villainous editor in ‘The Long Game’ to Andrew Garfield facing off against aliens in ‘Daleks in Manhattan’, the seemingly endless list also includes Get Out star Daniel Kaluuya, Oscar winner Olivia Colman, and Black Panther’s very own Letitia Wright – to name but a few.
The question is then – who would showrunner Russell T Davies love to have on the series in a guest role, who hasn’t been featured before? Putting that to the man himself in a recent interview ahead of Doctor Who season 2 hitting our screens, Davies is puzzled at first admitting to GamesRadar+ that “almost everyone has been in it”. And he’s right – hell, even pop star icon Kylie Minogue even showed up for the Titanic themed episode ‘Voyage of the Damned’.
Soon enough though Davies makes his decision, revealing to us that he would love Viola Davis to appear on the show one day, the Oscar-winning star of the likes of The Woman King and Suicide Squad. For the showrunner, Davis would be a perfect fit should the Doctor Who team “be so lucky” that the Hollywood star would say yes.
As Davies tells us: “I simply worship Viola Davis, one of the greatest actors in the world, we should be so lucky we should have that money. She just brings quality, depth, and surprise. Every time I see her she does something surprising, which is a very Doctor Who quality. She’d get it. I say this hoping that you print it, then her agent will read it and say ‘yes, you can have Viola for absolutely no money, she will come to Cardiff for free.'” Well – here’s hoping!
If Davies’ manifestation comes true, he doesn’t want to waste Viola Davis agreeing to do Doctor Who. Instead, he would love her to play the next iteration of one of the Doctor’s greatest foes: “I think she’d probably be the next Master. You’re not going to waste Viola Davis being nice in the corner. You’re going to have her standing there saying ‘Doctor, you are dead’. Please, make it happen, we have put that into the universe.”
Whilst Viola Davis is showrunner Davies’ pick for a dream guest star, the show’s cast have other ideas. Also putting the question to Ncuti Gatwa, who returns for more timey-wimey adventures as the Fifteenth Doctor, he would love his Barbie co-star Ryan Gosling to appear in Doctor Who one day. As Gatwa reminds us, Gosling is indeed “the number one Whovian”, as proven by the actor regularly wearing a Doctor Who t-shirt to the Barbie set.
Meanwhile Gatwa’s co-star Varada Sethu, who joins this season as new companion Belinda, is setting her sights high, revealing to GamesRadar+ her pick for a dream guest star is “the one and only Beyoncé”. Could the Single Ladies singer ever come on board the TARDIS for an adventure? Well, stranger things have happened…
The new season of Doctor Who arrives on April 12 via Disney Plus internationally and BBC iPlayer in the UK. For more that should be on your watch list, check out our guide to the new TV shows to look out for.
