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Matt Smith may join Star Wars: Episode IX in 'key role'

The Doctor is in. A new report from Hollywood says the former star of Doctor Who and The Crown is going galactic.

Gael Cooper
CNET editor Gael Fashingbauer Cooper, a journalist and pop-culture junkie, is co-author of "Whatever Happened to Pudding Pops? The Lost Toys, Tastes and Trends of the '70s and '80s," as well as "The Totally Sweet '90s." She's been a journalist since 1989, working at Mpls.St.Paul Magazine, Twin Cities Sidewalk, the Minneapolis Star Tribune, and NBC News Digital. She's Gen X in birthdate, word and deed. If Marathon candy bars ever come back, she'll be first in line.
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Gael Cooper
Matt Smith as the Doctor

Matt Smith may be joining Star Wars.

BBC

Matt Smith, who's just off a two-season stint playing Queen Elizabeth II's husband Prince Philip on Netflix series The Crown, may be joining Star Wars: Episode IX in a "key role," Variety reported Tuesday.

Details were sparse, and Disney didn't immediately respond to a request for comment, but the final movie in the nine-film Star Wars saga is currently filming in the UK. (It's still untitled, but here's a recent popular rumor.)

On The Crown, Smith, 35, played Philip from his wedding to then-Princess Elizabeth in 1947 to the birth of their fourth child, Prince Edward, in 1964. He's been nominated for an outstanding supporting actor Emmy Award and will find out Sept. 17 if he wins. Tobias Menzies was just announced as Smith's replacement, playing Philip as he ages into the 1980s and the Princess Diana era.

Before his work on The Crown, Smith was the youngest actor ever to play The Doctor on the long-running BBC series Doctor Who .

It's unknown who Smith might play in the Star Wars universe, and whether he'd be on the side of the rebels or the Empire. Star Wars: Episode IX is set to open worldwide on Dec. 20, 2019.

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