Portrait of the Tardis by a very young man...
HE will bound onto our screens this autumn as the latest incarnation of Doctor Who.
But while playing the role on TV may be a new experience for Peter Capaldi, his interest in the Time Lord stretches back a long way.
When the 55-year-old Scots actor was still a teenager, he established his sci-fi credentials by publishing an article and a drawing in a Doctor Who fanzine.
And a copy of his contribution to the Doctor Who International Fan Club Magazine has now come to light after being spotted by another fan leafing through yellowing back issues.
The pen and ink artwork bearing Capaldi’s name shows the blue police-box Tardis materialising in an alien landscape.
And in an accompanying article the young Capaldi writes of the excitement shared by viewers on watching the cult show’s opening sequence, before going on to analyse some of the special effects.
Capaldi’s contribution dates from 1976, when he was a pupil at St Ninian’s High School in Kirkintilloch, East Dunbartonshire.
It was spotted recently by historian and Doctor Who Appreciation Society member Matthew Kilburn, 43, from Oxford, who found it among some Dr Who memorabilia bought on the internet.
He said: ‘I bought a lot on eBay of some very early titles from the mid 70s, and buried in with them were a few issues of the magazine for the Doctor Who International Fan Club – a Scottish-based group, who stopped publishing after a few months. Peter Capaldi was a member and contributor. I thought it was marvellous and showed what an all-round talented person he was at that age.
‘I think he is a good choice to play the Doctor. He is clearly an enthusiast who very much has his own idea about the programme and Doctor Who’s personality, and will bring that to the part.’
In the May 1976 edition of the rare magazine, Capaldi contributed two full pages – including the signed ink drawing showing a simple pen outline of the Tardis in a rugged landscape.
He wrote: ‘Watching the abstracted light forms and patterns which appear in the opening sequence of Dr Who has become a familiar ritual for all of us. The wonder of the opening is that it manages to capture in only a very few moments of screen time the atmosphere of Doctor Who.’