London, May 2022. The announcement caused a stir in the world of small screen across the Channel. The BBC, after debating who will be the next David Tennant, the lead doctor in the "Dr. Who" sci-fi series, decided to give the role to Ncuti Gatwa. The production team was made of stars like Hugh Grant and Kris Marshall who fell in love with his charm.

"I was told that I had been chosen a few weeks before, but I had to keep it a secret, and I won’t lie: for my chatty self, it was not easy!", he recalled, laughing. "But I’m so happy to have been chosen in this legendary series of British television!" he told InfoMigrants.

From Central Africa to Scotland and then to London, the journey to the spotlight for the 30-year-old actor has not been easy.

Born in Nyarugenge, a district of Kigali, in 1992, Gatwa did not really have time to discover life in his native land. Two years after his birth, the genocide tore the country apart. The family left Rwanda, via Congo, and obtained refugee status in the United Kingdom.

"The genocide changed the course of our lives. We arrived in Scotland, and my father was accepted at the University of Edinburgh to pursue studies in philosophy. We moved into housing for migrant families. It was very green, with wide open spaces, like in Rwanda," said Ncuti.

There, the young Rwandan read and studied the Bible a lot during his free time. Outside the family home, he experienced racism, he explains. In middle school, students bullied him, creating a Facebook page to post racist messages about him.

But he stood up to the bullying. "I knew I was different from my classmates," he recalls. "But I kept being myself, telling myself that they would change, and in the end that's what happened! I explained to them that it was horrible to pick on someone for his skin color. I realized that they were completely ignorant. They apologized, and we even became friends afterwards".

First steps in theater

Another event disrupted his life: his father leaving Scotland for lack of professional opportunities, for Cameroon. "It was a huge sacrifice, and I have enormous respect for what he did. He made this choice to help us, despite the distance, and it was very brave," he said.

The young Rwandan finally obtained his British passport. His adolescence remained rocky. "He was rebellious, an artist!" one of his childhood friends, Josh Stewart, said, smiling. “He went out, drank when he was offered alcohol and he escaped from his home at night, for places that were quite dodgy!”, he added.

Gatwa used to dance, but at 16, one of his teachers told him about theater, sensing his talent. "She came one day and said to me: 'You are very comfortable playing, you have something, maybe you should get into this business!'", he said. “So I decided to interview to go to theater school. It changed my life." At 17, he joined the Royal Conservatory of Scotland, and then earned a degree in arts and comedy.

Living homeless, on the brink of giving up

His professional acting career got off to a rocky start, and in 2013 he joined the Dundee Rep Theater, where he played supporting roles. He decided the following year to leave Scotland, heading to London, to try to move up into the industry. He met there fierce competition and faced the high cost of living. Gatwa lined up a string of small roles, including one on the Bob Servant series, but struggled to make ends meet.

He eventually landed a minor role in Shakespeare's play "A Midsummer Night's Dream", and held on to his dream of becoming a star actor despite the precariousness of his situation. He also played a policeman in the Scottish film "Stonemouth."

"There were very difficult times, when I was hungry, when I struggled to find roles. It weighed on me a lot, especially for a young man like me in a city as competitive as London. I doubted myself a lot during these years," he added.

But his situation did not get better and he eventually found himself on the street, penniless, at the beginning of 2018. "I couch-surfed at friends’ places. I was lent money to stay in a room in an apartment but the host decided the day of my arrival not to house me anymore. I lived for some time homeless, not knowing where I was going to sleep the next evening, and I only ate once a day. I lost a lot of weight, I was depressed, I was thinking about quitting everything," he recalls.

The success of Sex Education

The same year, however, he landed the first major role of his young career, that of Eric Effiong, a British-Nigerian teenager in the Netflix series Sex Education. It was an instant hit.

"And to remember that a few months before landing this role I was in the most absolute limbo, it's crazy!", he said.

In 2019, he returned to Rwanda for the first time in more than 10 years. "It was a very interesting experience, I felt a lot of support, a lot of love. I am happy to make my people proud, and I am proud to be Rwandan and Scottish. I will never forget where I come from, I am African, and very proud to be," he said.

He splashed magazine covers, one after another. In 2020, he was one of the lead figures in the BBC documentary "Black and Scottish," about being black in the Highlands. After his first season in Sex Education, he won the award for best British Breakthrough at the Broadcasting Press Guild Awards, then lined up nominations for the BAFTAs, where his name has appeared every year since 2019 in categories such as "Best Male Comedy Performance" and "Best Actor in Television".

His career has been skyrocketing. "I'm not surprised by his trajectory," says Stuart Ranji, who grew up and spent his high school years with Ncuti. "He always had something special, a crazy talent on stage, a very developed artistic touch, he was born an artist."

He moved up again in April 2022, when he was chosen to become the new Dr. Who, the famous English series. He became the first African actor to obtain this legendary role. At 30, he will be starring in the Barbie movie coming out next month, alongside Ryan Gosling, Margot Robbie and Will Ferrell.

"I have dreams, and I'm going to do everything to make them come true! I'm fulfilled, and I don't set myself a limit. Why not play in a James Bond one day? It would be huge!," he told InfoMigrants.