Thursday, March 7, 2013

Peter Davison

My next celebrity autograph blog is English actor, Peter Davison.

Born in 1951, Peter Moffatt decided to use the stage name Peter Davison to avoid confusion with a well known director of the 1970's. Davison first came to prominence in the late 1970's playing the role of veterinarian Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great And Small.

Then, from 1981 - 1984 Davison was cast in his best known role as the Fifth Doctor in the British sci-fi series Doctor Who, replacing the extremely popular Tom Baker's Fourth Doctor, who had played the role for the previous 8 years.  At the time being the youngest actor to assume the lead role, Davison's Fifth Doctor was an unashamed fanatic of cricket, dressed in his trademark whites and a stick of celery, and a aptly stored cricket ball in his jacket pocket helped save his life on one occassion (Four To Doomsday).

Having battled the Cybermen, the Master, and Omega, The Fifth Doctor departed the series saving the life of his new companion Peri in the greatest episode of all-time, The Caves Of Adrozani.


After his days on Doctor Who, Davison appeared in numerous tv shows both in America and the UK, including A Very Peculiar Practice, All Creatures Great And Small (again), Magnum P.I., At Home With The Braithwaites, Heatbeat, and The Last Detective to name but a few.

When the new series of Doctor Who was revived, Davison donned the whites and celery again for a mini-episode Time Crash opposite his future son-in-law David Tennant's Tenth Doctor.  With the show gearing up for it's 50th anniversary on 23rd November 2013 there's constant rumours of another return to the show for the Fifth Doctor, but we'll have to wait and see!


Now, onto the autograph... As a member of the Doctor Who Club of Victoria, I drew a fancomic for the club magazine which featured the Fourth and Fifth Doctor up against the Master.  When Davison visited Melbourne in the late 2000's he was given a copy, and mentioned that he didn't remember ever being that skinny (a bit of a jibe about my artistic skills I think).  Anyway, some time later I wrote a fan letter to him in the UK, and shortly after received this delightfully inscribed colour 8x10:


Score!