Big Bang’s Kunal Nayyar has revealed his ambitions to play the Doctor in Doctor Who.

The actor, who has starred as Raj Koothrappali in the hit US comedy series The Big Bang Theory since 2007, might need to brush up on a few buzzwords, however.

“That’s the funny thing about all of us on the Big Bang Theory: the people we portray are not the people we are in real life. Once at Comic-Con a fan was asking about the TARDIS. I asked ‘What’s the TARDIS?’ And 10,000 fans just turned on me and starting booing!” he told BA.

It’d be quite the comeback from that if he took on the title role. But he’s eager:

“Wouldn’t that be cool if I played Doctor Who? The first Indian Doctor Who maybe after Big Bang…?”

On the subject of Big Bang, Nayyar reveals that waking his parents up in the early hours of the morning to tell them he got the part didn’t go too smoothly, with everyone thinking something had gone wrong.

“Of course, the first thing your parents do when you call them in a different country is like ‘are you ok? Are you safe – why are you calling us at this time?’ “I was like ‘Ya, ya – I’m great’ and I am just weeping, just crying, because this meant so much to me to be this kid from New Delhi, India, who made it onto the big screen.

“And they really thought something was wrong because I’m crying. I told them I got the role and everyone was crying at the same time. It was very special.”