‘Doctor Who’ Showrunner and Two Doctors Almost Crossed Paths at a Book Signing in the 70s

Doctor Who alum David Tennant, who portrayed the Tenth Doctor between 2005 and 2010, appeared at Wizard World Comic Con in New Orleans this weekend for a Q&A, where he told audiences about a near-encounter between himself, the Fourth Doctor (Tom Baker), the Twelfth Doctor (Peter Capaldi), and series 5—10 showrunner Steven Moffat, who were all at the same Glasgow, Scotland bookshop in the 1970s.

“I had a poster of Tom Baker on my wall, signed on the bottom. He came to John Menzies, which is a bookshop in Glasgow. He came to John Menzies, in 1970-I’m-not-quite-sure-what, I went along and got the Doctor Who Monster Book, which had a poster in the middle, and Tom Baker signed it,” Tennant said, as captured by RadioTimes.

“Also in the queue that day, I have since found out, was Steven Moffat, would you believe? Also getting something signed,” Tennant said of the man who would in the future oversee his time as Doctor Who.

Another future Doctor, Capaldi, made it to the same shop — but he didn’t get a signature.

“I only recently found out that there was somebody who missed it, who came too late with his book and didn’t get it signed that day,” Tennant said. “Peter Capaldi turned up late. So yeah, it’s quite weird that three of us, for whom Doctor Who has ended up being quite a large part of our life, were nearly in the same queue in John Menzies that day.”

Tennant explained the feeling behind going on to star in a television show he grew up admiring, calling the experience “surreal.”

“It’s odd that something that you loved, and that inspired me, and certainly Steven, Peter and myself, I think it’s fair to say that to a greater or lesser extent that television programme inspired us to go into the career that we’ve gone into and we’ve all ended up being in it and it’s been a huge part of our life,” Tennant shared.

“It’s odd, it’s weird, because you move from it being something you loved and indulged a passion for and bought books on and put posters on your wall for, to something that you then have a responsibility for in some sense,” he said. “And it’s quite surreal and it keeps being quite surreal. Even now it’s quite surreal.”

“Then once you start doing it, you spend a few days going ‘this is weird, that’s the Tardis, I get to go in it’ and then you just have to get on with it,” the Scottish actor explained.

“It doesn’t mean you stop loving it, it doesn’t make it any less special, it just makes it a special in a very different way. I think all of us who were in the queue at John Menzies feel the same way.”

Tennant recently praised actress Jodie Whittaker, who will portray the first female incarnation of Doctor Who in series 11 this fall, calling her “unpredictable and glorious and funny.”