Doctor Who season 11: Sherlock actor talks those casting rumors

Prior to the news of Jodie Whittaker being cast as the new star of Doctor Who, there were, of course, many other names in the running. Sacha Dhawan happened to be one of those names rumored. There was some logic in it given that he has some connections to the franchise — or at least outgoing showrunner Steven Moffat. He appeared in an arc on Sherlock and obviously has a great deal of familiarity with this science fiction franchise to go along with it.

What may be a surprise now is hearing that Dhawan didn’t actually end up auditioning for the new season. While speaking recently at London Film and Comic-Con (per the Radio Times), Dhawan had the following message to pass along:

“I never auditioned for Doctor Who … I think because I’m associated with Sherlock and the Doctor Who world someone must have thrown my name in the hat. It was really nice, Mark Gatiss messaged me ‘I’ve just seen this on Twitter’, to the point where I was calling my agent saying ‘have I got an audition for this?’ No.”

Dhawan did state that he’d be happy to be considered for the Fourteenth Doctor whenever Whittaker is done with the role, though we’re looking really far in the future at this point. Typically most doctors of the modern era tend to run in the role for a few years, and there are often long hiatuses between seasons, especially ones that have some enormous creative changes within them. If Dhawan does want the role, we could totally see him being rather great in it.

It’s still not clear just how different new showrunner Chris Chibnall’s going to be making things with the story, or how far along in production he is on some of these new episodes. The only thing that we can say is that it makes sense that Chibnall probably wouldn’t spend a great time of time writing scripts without knowing who the new Doctor is in advance. That would be a dodgy proposition for him since you want to write for some of the people you’ve already got on board.

When will the new Doctor Who season start filming?

Our feeling is that next year we’ll start to see Whittaker and the rest of the new team in action. After all, there’s still a lot of work to be done! There is no word on the next Companion, and to go along with that, no word on which villains are going to be when they turn up on the show. We do of course expect some Daleks or Cybermen here and there, but there will probably be a few assorted new faces to go along with it.

When do you think you’ll start thinking about the Fourteenth Doctor, and how early is too early? Share in the comments!

Meanwhile, click here to get some other insight when it comes to the series. (Photo: BBC.)