Peter Capaldi
Peter Capaldi
Peter Dougan Capaldiis a Scottish actor, writer and director, best known for being the twelfth and current actor to play the title role in the long-running BBC One sci-fi series Doctor Who. He has played numerous roles in film and television including the role of Malcolm Tucker, a spin doctor in the BBC comedy series The Thick of It and its film spinoff In the Loop, for which he has received four British Academy Television Award nominations, winning Best Male...
NationalityScottish
ProfessionTV Actor
Date of Birth14 April 1958
CityGlasgow, Scotland
I could make the title of my memoirs: 'It's got cinematic disaster written all over it.'
I love these sort of documentaries, which you might turn on late on a Saturday night - like, say, 'The Alma Cogan Story.' But they are ripe for spoofing, because the presenters are always so serious and anxious to make themselves look like rather attractive and interesting people.
I think the truth is always interesting, but with politicians, you don't get to see much of that.
The thing that runs through the British film industry even today is a lot of unsung movies are financially the bigger ones. Even though they weren't always the greatest of movies, something in them was very potent which people loved.
Personally, I have as little to do with politicians as possible. The ones that I've met I've found very boring. They're extremely egotistical, incredibly self-important. If I can help it, I try to stay as far away from them as possible.
The big reason that 'Doctor Who' is still with us is that every single viewer who ever turned in to watch this show, at any age, at any time in its history, took it into their heart - because 'Doctor Who' belongs to all of us. Everyone made 'Doctor Who.'
The British film industry has always tried to sell itself as something rather sophisticated. It's almost as if it thinks it is by royal command. It has always tried to claim the high ground, not only over Hollywood but over the whole of humanity!
I'm not saying that all politicians are awful. I don't know any of them well enough to say whether they're awful or not. But almost every day, you find out something about them that's appalling. Maybe we shouldn't be surprised any longer.
The Americans just have a great sort of wit about them.
I always thought it was funny that my grandparents had bought a ticket to New York and ended up in Glasgow.
Even if I hadn't been cast as Doctor Who, my acting would probably have been influenced by William Hartnell or Patrick Troughton, Jon Pertwee, Tom Baker, and all of the other guys. Because those were the actors that I really watched every moment of, as opposed to Laurence Olivier.
I lived through a golden period where society felt that it was good to help people who didn't have a great deal of money fulfil their potential.
A year after winning the Oscar, almost to the day, I was directing a dog food commercial.
I've lost count of the times I've been asked to 'be' Malcolm Tucker: to go on a political program on television, presumably in order to be the character and give opinions as him.