Born: 28th October 1982 (as Matthew Robert Smith)
Episodes Broadcast: 2010-2014

Matt Smith was born in Northampton, Northamptonshire, and could easily have wound up a star on the football field instead of in Doctor Who. A highly talented player, Smith was eventually made captain of Leicester City's youth team. At age sixteen, however, he suffered a serious back injury which would preclude any meaningful attempt to make a career in football. Smith was devastated, but an interest in drama had already been kindled by one of his teachers. With the support of his family, Smith decided to join the National Youth Theatre. He soon acquired an agent in the form of Wendy Padbury, who had been a Doctor Who companion in the late Sixties.

In 2005, Smith completed studies in drama and creative writing at the University of East Anglia. He then made his television debut at Christmas 2006 opposite another former occupant of the TARDIS, Billie Piper, in the Philip Pullman adaptation The Ruby In The Smoke. In 2007, Smith made his West End debut in Swimming With Sharks starring Christian Slater, where he acted alongside his future Doctor Who companion, Arthur Darvill. The same year, he had a starring role in Party Animals and could be seen in two episodes of The Street. Smith was also reunited with Piper on a pair of projects: the Pullman sequel The Shadow In The North and under more intimate circumstances in an episode of Secret Diary Of A Call Girl. The 2008 crime film In Bruges was meant to be his movie debut, but his material wound up on the cutting room floor.

Smith became the youngest actor ever to play the Doctor, at just 27 years of age

Next, Smith became a regular in Moses Jones, for which the casting director was Andy Pryor. Impressed with Smith's work, Pryor secured him auditions for not one but two shows being overseen by Steven Moffat. He was deemed too similar to series star Benedict Cumberbatch to make an effective John Watson in Sherlock, but the outcome was different where Doctor Who was concerned. Moffat had anticipated leaning towards a more mature lead actor, in contrast to the youthful Tenth Doctor played by David Tennant. After meeting Smith, however, he had a change of heart. On January 3rd, 2009, a special edition of Doctor Who Confidential unveiled Smith to the world as the Eleventh Doctor. When he made his debut in the closing seconds of 2010's The End Of Time, he became the youngest actor ever to play the Time Lord at just twenty-seven years of age.

Smith's first full adventure came three months later in the appropriately-titled The Eleventh Hour. Later that year, his football prowess was on full display in The Lodger. He also made an appearance in the spin-off series The Sarah Jane Adventures, joining a pair of former companions -- not just Elisabeth Sladen as Sarah Jane Smith but also Katy Manning's Jo Grant -- for Death Of The Doctor. Audiences around the world were taken with the potent combination of Moffat's twisty narratives and Smith's interpretation of the Doctor as an old soul in a young body. Doctor Who's profile on the international stage -- and particularly in North America -- reached unprecedented heights.

Smith's era reached its zenith in 2013, during the festivities surrounding Doctor Who's fiftieth anniversary. Not only did he battle Zygons and Daleks alongside two other Doctors -- Tennant's tenth incarnation and a hitherto-unknown Doctor played by John Hurt -- in The Day Of The Doctor, but he also had a surprise cameo appearance in the docu-drama An Adventure In Space And Time. By this stage, however, Smith had already announced that he was following Tennant's lead and leaving Doctor Who after three seasons. The various storylines which Moffat had woven through Smith's tenure climaxed in the 2013 Christmas special, The Time Of The Doctor. Nonetheless, in true Eleventh Doctor fashion, Smith then made a surprise appearance in Deep Breath, the first adventure for his successor, Peter Capaldi.

Smith returned to television to play a young Prince Philip in The Crown

After leaving Doctor Who, Smith focussed on the cinema. He had already made two movies during his time as the Doctor: 2010's Womb with Eva Green and the 2012 biopic Bert & Dickie. Having now attracted interest from Hollywood, Smith collected three more film roles in the span of three years: the Ryan Gosling fantasy Lost River, the science-fiction sequel Terminator Genisys and the horror spoof Pride And Prejudice And Zombies. Smith finally returned to television for the first two seasons of The Crown, for which he played a young Prince Philip. Amongst several further movies to close out the 2010s were Charlie Says, with Smith as mass murderer Charles Manson, and Official Secrets opposite Keira Knightley.

During the early Twenties, Smith's notable roles on the silver screen included the time-bending thriller Last Night In Soho and the super-hero movie Morbius with Jared Leto. Smith's next television project was House Of The Dragon, the prequel to the fantasy epic Game Of Thrones.