They Might Have Been the Doctor (but weren't)
Over the years there have been a number of "near misses", with various actors nearly regenerating into the Doctor and not quite making it. For completeness' sake, here's a run down on as many of them as I can:
Other Candidates For The Existing Incarnations - to come...
Cinematic visions - The Last of the Time Lords
For several
years Greenlight Productions tried to get a Doctor Who cinematic movie off
the ground. They got to the point of having a script all ready to go, and
even (allegedly) their leading man had been cast and agreed to do the role.
This leading man? Renowned thespian, Alan Rickman. Then problems arose, the
license expired, and this intriguing bit of casting fell by the wayside.
See here for a profile of this Apocryphal
Doctor.
To be or Not to be - a Stage Doctor
The Inheritors of Time was a Doctor Who stage play written by American writer John Ostrander. It got as far as casting it's leading man, before funding problems arose, preventing it from having it from happening. See here for more on this apocryphal incarnation.
Novel Ideas - Virgin's Choice
During Virgin's
time as the publishers of the Doctor's adventures, they came to consider
that Sylvester McCoy had occupied the role too long - worrying that they
might begin to run out of ideas for his version of the Doctor, they hit upon
the idea of having the Doctor regenerate in the books. Looking for a model
to base their new "eighth" Doctor on, they picked David Troughton, son of
the late second Doctor, Patrick.
It's an understandable choice. David's love of the show has been demonstrated a number of times. He turned up in the TV version three times, and since the show's departure from our screens, he has made a name for himself amongst the fans for his work on the various spin-offs, notably as Egan in The Stranger Chronicles. He has a strong screen personality and an excellent CV of acting roles behind him. He would not be a bad choice for a TV Doctor, and in fact placed highly in the fan polls for a replacement Doctor.
Virgin asked David if he would pose for a photo shoot as the new Doctor, to give their artists and authors a model to work from, and he agreed. The photo shoot was carried out shortly afterwards, and things looked set for McCoy to bow out and D.Troughton to step in. Then the BBC got wind of the idea, and vetoed it. Perhaps it was just as well - while David would have made an interesting Doctor, introducing him would have blown all the books' chances for being considered part of the official story a year or two later when McCoy was seen to become McGann.
Doctor Who Magazine - Season 27 and beyond
Doctor
Who Magazine speculated as to what might have happened if Doctor Who had
not left our screens with Survival. They postulated a twenty-seventh season
of the show, which saw the departure of Ace and introduced a new companion,
before climaxing with the regeneration of the Doctor (see
Apocryphal Seventh Doctor). They speculated
that the new Doctor might have been Richard Griffiths.
Doctor Who magazine has also carried out a few polls over the years to see who the fans would like to see in the role of the Doctor. The first time the magazine ran a poll, the top choices were:
Brian Blessed.
Richard O'Brien
Jeremy Brett
Alan Rickman
Several years later, in 2000, they ran another survey, this time asking for people to choose whom they would like to see as either a cinematic Doctor, or the lead in a new television production. This time the results were:
For the Movies
10. Jeff Goldblum
9. Robin Williams
8. Liam Neeson
7. Anthony Stewart Head
6. Patrick Stewart
5. Johnny Depp
4. Richard E. Grant
3. Anthony Hopkins
2. Hugh Grant
1. Paul McGann
For TV
8= Mark Gatiss
8= Stephen Fry
8= Robert Powell
7. Sylvester McCoy
6. George Irving
5. Richard E. Grant
4. Alan Davies
3. Rowan Atkinson
2. Ian Richardson
1. Paul McGann
More to follow.
Any Additions/Corrections? Please let me know.
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