Former “Doctor Who” Guest Stars Who Are Now Movie Stars

This is a look at actors who guest starred on “Doctor Who” (2005-present) and have since become movie stars. This does not include actors who were movie stars before guesting on “Doctor Who”, or lead actors who have since gone into movies.

Andrew Garfield
Garfield played Frank in the Season Three episodes “Daleks in Manhattan” and “Evolution of the Daleks”. He broke into movie stardom in “The Social Network” before getting the lead in “The Amazing Spider-Man” movies. He received Academy award nominations for his roles in "Hacksaw Ridge" and "tick, tick...BOOM!"

Carey Mulligan
Mulligan played Sally Sparrow in the fan favorite Season Three episode “Blink”. She later went on to be in movies such as “Wall Street: Money Never Sleeps” with Michael Douglas and Shia LaBeouf, and “The Great Gatsby” with Leonardo DiCaprio. She received Academy award nominations for her roles in "An Education" and "Promising Young Woman".

Gugu Mbatha-Raw
Mbatha-Raw played companion Martha’s sister Tish Jones in the Season Three episodes “Smith and Jones”, “The Lazarus Experiment”, “The Sound of Drums”, “Last of the Time Lords”. She is on the brink of movie stardom. In 2014 she led the smaller movies “Belle” and “Beyond the Lights”. In recent years, she was in the movie “Concussion” with Will Smith, appeared along-side Matthew McConaughey in the Civil War drama “The Free State of Jones”, and in Disney’s live-action “Beauty and the Beast” with Emma Watson and Luke Evans.

Felicity Jones
Jones played Robina Redmond (a.k.a. The Unicorn) in the Season Four episode “The Unicorn and the Wasp”. She had a supporting role in the movie “The Amazing Spider-Man 2”, had the lead female role in “The Theory of Everything”, for which she was nominated for an Academy Award. In 2016 she co-starred with Tom Hanks in "The Da Vinci Code" sequel "Inferno" and had the lead role in “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”.

Daniel Kaluuya
Kaluuya played Barclay in the 2009 special episode "Planet of the Dead". He had the lead role in the 2017 horror movie "Get Out", for which he received an Academy Award nomination, and had a supporting role in Marvel's "Black Panther" as W'Kabi. He won the Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actor in a Supporting Role for the movie "Judas and the Black Messiah".

Gemma Chan

Chan played Mia Bennett in the 2009 special episode "The Waters of Mars". She played the dual roles of Minn-Erva in "Captain Marvel" and Sersi in "Eternals", and appeared in the movies "Crazy Rich Asians" and "Raya and the Last Dragon".

Olivia Colman

Colman played the mother that Prisoner Zero impersonated in "The Eleventh Hour". She won the Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Leading Role for "The Favourite", and was nominated for her roles in the movies "The Father" and "The Lost Daughter".

Letitia Wright
Wright played Anahson in the Season Nine episode "Face the Raven". She has a supporting role in the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies "Black Panther", "Avengers: Infinity War", and "Avengers: Endgame" as Shuri, the princess of Wakanda, which became a leading role in the sequel "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever". She also lent her voice to a character in the animated movie "Sing 2".


Honorable Mentions:

Simon Pegg
Pegg played The Editor in the Season One episode “The Long Game”. He had already led movies before his appearance on the episode, but has since become a supporting actor in the “Mission: Impossible” and “Star Trek” franchises.

James Corden
Corden played Craig in the Season Six episode “The Lodger” and the Season Seven episode “Closing Time”. Afterward he appeared in Disney’s movie of the musical “Into the Woods”. He also replaced Craig Ferguson as the host of the CBS talk show “The Late Late Show”.