Tom Hanks For ‘Doctor Who’? BBC Target Oscar Winner, Even Ask Peter Capaldi To Persuade Him To Star

Is there a chance that Tom Hanks could find himself riding the TARDIS through space and time as the new star of Doctor Who? It doesn’t seem likely even though the incarnation of the beloved Time Lord actually asked him to star in the show.

Peter Capaldi, who has starred in the hit BBC show since 2013, admitted to ITV’s Good Morning Britain, via the Radio Times, that he’d been asked to try and convince the Oscar-winning actor to appear on Doctor Who, with Capaldi insisting that it is “a great venue for any kind of actor.”

Capaldi then admitted, “Funnily enough they were trying to persuade me to… I was working with Tom Hanks last night and the producer was on to me saying, ‘Try and persuade Tom to come and be in the show.’ I did have a word with him but he is very busy at the moment.”

Unfortunately for Peter Capaldi, his request to Tom Hanks couldn’t have come at a worse time. Hanks, who won his Best Actor Oscars for his work on 1993’s Philadelphia and 1994’s Forrest Gump and is widely regarded as one of the best actors of his generation, is still in the midst of promotional work for Steven Spielberg’s Bridge of Spies and currently has five acting roles in the pipeline.

Hanks recently concluded a supporting role in the Meg Ryan-directed Ithaca, while he’s taken the leading role in A Hologram for the King, Ron Howard’s Inferno, James Ponsoldt’s The Circle, and Clint Eastwood’s Sully, which is the biographical drama based on Chelsey “Sully” Sullenberger, the pilot who heroically landed a stricken airplane on the Hudson River.

Clearly, he’s got quite a full schedule on his hands, which is why it will be pretty hard for him to find the room to film a supporting role on Doctor Who, let alone taking over the TARDIS. Even though that would be something that every Whovian around the world would fully endorse.

Peter Capaldi didn’t just have Tom Hanks in his casting purview, though. That’s because the current Doctor also believes that the show could benefit from an extra dose of rock-stardom, and he’s admitted that there are two specific rock icons that he believes would make the perfect guest stars for the show.

“I think it would be good to have some rock stars: I’d like to see Keith Richards or David Bowie,” Peter Capaldi declared.

There’s an outside chance that both of these rockers could pop up on the show.

David Bowie’s son, Duncan Jones, is currently putting the finishing touches to Warcraft, the $200 million blockbuster and adaptation of the hugely popular video game, while he previously found critical acclaim with both Moon and Source Code.

Plus, David Bowie recently starred in a short film to promote his upcoming new album Blackstar, which is due out on January 8. If Peter Capaldi’s lucky, he’ll have caught the acting bug once again.

Meanwhile, Keith Richards most recently made an appearance as an actor in Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End and Pirates Of The Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. This rather surprising casting choice was made after Johnny Depp confirmed that the Rolling Stones guitarist was his inspiration for the role of Captain Jack Sparrow.

[Photo by Getty/David McNew & BBC]