Brian Blessed explains why he loves Peter Pan as much as Flash Gordon

12:49pm Wednesday 3rd December 2008

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Big-voiced actor Brian Blessed tells Kerry Ann Eustice why panto is as good as Shakespeare and recalls his first boyhood panto with life-long friend Patrick Stewart

He may be best known for that booming “Gordon’s alive” voice, but Brian Blessed has endless other talents, as he’s keen to tell me during our interview. In fact he’s got so much going on and so many anecdotes he can hardly share them fast enough.

Brian talks (loudly) about his expeditions — the next adventure taking him to the Inca Cities, Peru — for which daily training includes covering 10 miles and a couple of hours weights. “I train like hell, so I’m always ready,” he says.

As an explorer always open to the next adventure - “I think the greatest danger in life is not taking the adventure” - Brian will soon be adding space exploration to the list too.

“I’ve done 300 hours training at Space City in Moscow,” he said.” It’s going very well.”

“I’ve been training with Catherine Destivelle, the French climber, with a view of going up into space next year.

“I’ll be observing. I’m going to be a spokesman. I can say things the scientific-types love, I can relate to the man in the street – the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker. It’s not just for astronauts and the elite, it’s for everybody.

Brian launches into a bit of a rant (there’s no stopping him once he gets going on something) about what a shame it is Britain fell behind as a forerunner for space travel and exploration, after Harrie Massey, who was appointed to head a British space research, decided the British effort would be directed at the design and construction of instruments for satellites, rather than either complete satellites or complete launchers.

“We were ahead of the world. In the late 1960s, we were going to put the first satellites into space but the minster at the time cancelled it all. He said there was no future in satellites. I think they need to build a statue to him, don’t they?

“We are the children of stardust, we need to get out there. The Moon is the answer to all our energy needs. There’s helium 3 on the moon, a tonne of it. We don’t have it on the Earth and a tonne of it will give Britain pollution-free fuel for 25 years.”

“We’ve got to get out there so the Earth can rest. We’re incredibly over-populated; we’ve got to get out there.”

The challenges don’t end there, either. He’s been competing in the celebrity dog training TV programme The Underdog Show, with his canine companion Dougal, who, he tells me, will be moving into the Blessed residence once the show ends.

“I thought I’d be knocked out straight away and get to take him home,” said Brian, who already has lots of pets. In fact he’s almost being drowned out by seven dogs as he tells me this.

“He had kennel cough and was very ill. I had to carry him round the course at one point and got the sympathy vote for that. He got stronger and stronger and, luck would have it, we’re in for a wonderful final.”

While Dougal has indeed done incredibly well, especially fighting off his kennel cough, there’s little doubt Brian’s charm and eccentricity have played a part in the duo’s success on the show. Afterall, his affable nature also went down a storm when he presented panel show, Have I Got News For You a few months ago - an appearance which surely must be in the running one of 2008’s best TV moments.

We want you to go back, I tell him, on behalf of the News Shopper newsroom.

“I’ve never had such an audience reaction,” he cackles. “I’ve had millions of fan mail. So I shall go do a couple more. I’m going to put them all through it again,” he says roaring with infectious laughter.

For Leisure, it was his frank and hilarious accounts of his Mount Everest expeditions which made the uncut version of the show such a hoot. Particularly the one about a fellow climber having to do a, ahem, Number Two over a ravine and, due to the air pressure, it flying up and landing on his shoulder, to his ignorance, only to be discovered when he returned to the tent.

“I’ve got more Everest stories, which I won’t tell you now, but I shall be telling more on the show,” he says, clearly delighted we enjoyed his anecdotes so much. “One, I’ll just give you a smell of it, I had to tape up a man’s piles on his arse. I had to tape his arse up every five hours. He had terrible piles.

“On Mount Everest of course, the lack of atmospheric pressure, means your piles fall out. And he had gigantic piles. He was in a terrible state. That was my job to look after him, shave his arse put Vaseline on his piles, wash his piles and then stick them up with tape.”

And to keep us all entertained while we eagerly await his next presenting stint on Have I got News For You, he’s returning to his post as one of our best-loved panto stars in Peter Pan at Fairfield, a theatre he loves, in a role he takes very seriously, too.

“This pantomime was voted the best of all time and, of course, as there’s no end to my talents, I was voted the best Captain Hook ever,” he booms in his trademark style.

“What I feel strongly about is that there are lots of very cheap pantomimes that are vulgar and horrible. A true pantomime embraces ballet, opera, legitimate theatre, musicals, everything.

“I can’t stand it when so-called celebrities walk on the stage as Captain Hook and go ‘hee, hee, hee’ get their applause because they’re a celebrity. You can’t just do that.

“They come in and some how you can’t rely on them. I can’t bear the vulgarity. So ours isn’t vulgar – it’s witty, tremendous fun, has acrobatics and a giant crocodile in it.”

“To play Captain Hook requires the expertise of King Lear, to do it well,” he added. “I make the audience absolutely adore to hate me. They just love hating me. The kids, for about two hours, you get them away from the television and away from the computer.

Brian is a living testament to the power of a great panto. Although he insists he has nothing against children enjoying video games and TV shows, he’s keen for them to discover other pursuits too. Especially as his own first experience of the form, shared with childhood friend and fellow thesp Patrick Stewart, had a huge influence on them both.

“I have nothing against all that,” he said. “But I saw Jack and the Beanstalk when I was 12, along with my little friend Patrick Stewart - Jean Luc Pickard of Star Trek - who lived in the next village. We went to see a pantomime together when we were little boys and it changed our lives.

“The giant was 25ft high, the production was marvellous and it completely changed my life. With this Peter Pan that we’re doing, the kids go away and every centre of their being has changed. That’s our future, our children.

“Of course, the parents come along and they love it because it brings out the child in them. One must never lose the Peter Pan within one’s self.

He added: “I enjoy doing this Peter Pan as much as doing Flash Gordon or any of the great Shakespeare films. Just as much.”

Brian stars in Peter Pan at Fairfield, Croydon from Dec 6 to Jan 4. 020 8688 9291.

• Brian faces burning questions from the newsroom:

Brian, what are your tips for growing a good, manly beard?

A good manly beard? A lot of vitamin B, a lot of yeast. It thickens the beard, love. Yeast thickens your hair.

Can you whisper, or is your whisper as loud as your every day voice?

Tell him to get a copy of Kenneth Branagh’s latest film As You Like It (he says slowly and more subdued to the rest of our chat). I play Shakespeare’s most evolved human being the Duke Senior who is usurped by his evil brother, driven into the forest and he takes his people into the forest and teaches them how to live in the forest. He is incredibly quiet and philosophical. I’m also playing his evil brother Duke Frederick. One white haired and beard and the other black beard, greasy black hair and a Kagemusha outfit, like Darth Vader. And I’m even quieter than the sinister, frightened Duke Frederick. Tell him that’s Branagh’s latest film and Branagh said ‘you’ve only played five films where you’re larger than life, in your career you have done so many quiet performances. Your quiet qualities are what I want in this film’. So tell him to get As You Like It.

Do you have to keep quiet on trips to Mount Everest in case you start an avalanche?

I have to say, on the mountains I’m always the guy who is jolly and who keeps their spirits up. Tell him the atmosphere is so thin on Everest, your voice only carries 7ft. So your voice won’t carry. You can’t start avalanches up there because, ha, ha, ha, even with my powerful voice the air is so thin. That’s why you have to sign to people.