Peter Capaldi has a dream... for the Doctor to meet Martin Luther King

But when asked which famous face he'd like to see the Time Lord come into contact with, current Doctor Peter Capaldi had one name on the top of his list.

"Martin Luther King," revealed the Doctor Who star at An Afternoon with Mark Gatiss and Friends – a fundraising event organised by the London Lesbian and Gay Switchboard.

When Gatiss – who has written seven episodes of the BBC1 sci-fi drama – asked him to elaborate, Capaldi explained: "I don't see why the Doctor shouldn't be involved in the civil rights struggle. Those Ku Klux Klan guys – what's going on there?"

Luther King – who pioneered the US civil rights movement, winning the Nobel Peace Prize for his campaigning before he was assassinated in 1968 – has previously appeared in Sylvester McCoy-starring episode Remembrance of the Daleks when audio of one of his speeches was played during the title sequence.

But a man who could help make Capaldi's dream of an episode focused on the activist a reality is Gatiss, who added: "What Russell [T Davies, showrunner from 2005-2010] did by introducing the idea of a celebrity historical was a new thing for Doctor Who – it's not just kings and queens.

"I think it would be really interesting but it would be a big challenge because you'd have to work out exactly the tone of the adventure."

Capaldi also mentioned he'd like to see an appearance from Robert Johnson, "the great blues guitarist who legend had it sold his soul to the devil on the crossroads at Mississippi at midnight."

The 56-year-old actor – who has just appeared alongside Jenna Coleman in his first full series of Doctor Who – was also asked what is on his bucket list, to which he replied: "If I did have an ambition it would be not to regenerate for a while."

Doctor Who returns this December for a Christmas special starring Nick Frost, Natalie Gumede, Michael Troughton and Faye Marsay