The search for a new Time Lord begins.
“Doctor Who has been the most brilliant experience for me as an actor and a bloke,” says Matt Smith, the current Gallifreyan in charge of the TARDIS, but the time has come for Smith to bow out. He’ll be there for the Christmas special and the 50th Anniversary show, but that will be the last we’ll see of Smith, the youngest actor to ever play the Doctor, in the title role. Smith, who’s “incredibly proud” of the show and his time there, says Trenzalore calls. Now the search is on for a new actor to play the Doctor.
“Somewhere out there right now, all unknowing, just going about their business,” says lead writer and executive producer Steven Moffatt, “is someone who’s about to become the Doctor. A life is going to change, and Doctor Who will be born all over again!” Smith, only 27 when he got the part, had previously taken on small TV roles and one uncredited part in modern noir film In Bruges, but nothing quite like the Doctor; a role for which, he admitted at the time, he wasn’t entirely prepared for. “I have to be honest,” he said in a 2009 interview, “I can’t claim to have watched the show in its entirety or have been a follower as avidly as some people are.” In his departure announcement, Smith thanked his fans for welcoming his incarnation of the Doctor.
“It’s been an honor to play this part, to follow the legacy of brilliant actors, and helm the TARDIS for a spell with ‘the ginger, the nose and the impossible one’,” said Smith in farewell. “But when ya gotta go, ya gotta go.”
Source: BBC
