Bad Wolf 2007 con report
Jul. 26th, 2007 11:13 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
beccaelizabeth*waves hello to readers*
In case there’s people reading this who don’t usually read me: I go to a bunch of conventions. I often write up con reports. I find if I don’t the cons sort of smoosh together in my head. But usually the reports are more of a me report, since I’m the one that was doing stuff. So mixed in with interesting stuff about the guests there will be less interesting stuff about my clothes and hair and insomnia. I only post these in my own LJ anyway.
I am disabled, diagnosed autistic spectrum / asperger’s, with anxiety and depression. I don’t get out the house much and it’s rather challenging when I do. So I am basically proud of me for turning up at things, and everything after that is bonus.
But I also always feel like I should start these things with a general apology. I’m not so good at the whole interaction thing, and sometimes it shows, and the rest of the time I worry it will. So: if I managed to irritate, ignore, or in general leave you wondering what planet I’m from, sorry. Doing my best. And getting better.
Also, disclaimer: All this is from memory. I didn’t take notes or get a video or a tape or anything. I always hate relying on memory alone because it’s always possible things only happened that way in my head and not in the actual world per se. This is a generalised anxiety based on the way witness reports always vary and knowing how the human brain works. We remember the constantly rewritten story of the event, not the event. It bugs me sometimes. So, anyways, all this? May or may not be accurate and/or true. But it’s how it is in my head.
My first convention was in 1998 and I’ve gone to a few every year since then. Highlander, Buffy & Angel, Stargate, and one Galactica con. Plus Decalogy, which had all sorts. What I have learned: Every fandom is different. Every organiser is different. Some are more different than others. Wolf & Starfury conventions are at the Thistle and have three parties and you can get dressed up shiny and not be the only one. But they’re still different from each other because one has the door bleepers and a paper fight on the Sunday and the other doesn’t. Highlander conventions weren’t quite like that, not always got parties, not always got dressing up. This year I seem to have run out of conventions in the fandoms I’m interested in, especially if I try not to go to cons on college weekends. I mean if I’d have been willing to go to a con the weekend before an exam I could have gone places, but I have this plan to pass and stuff, so no. I never worried about it on Access but then there were more teaching weeks for that.
All this is the very long way of saying: I’d never been to a Doctor Who convention before. Or been in the fandom, really. I am a fan, I buy the DVDs and some of them are replacing the videos and I used to get up early when I still had UK Gold and I own, er, a small collection of sonic screwdrivers… and indeed will admit this in public. So: fan. But not much interacting with other fans, unless they happen to be on my LJ f-list for other reason (and several are).
Torchwood is a whole other deal. I’m a Torchwood fan, in the fandom, reading fanfic, interacting with other fans. All on Livejournal still, but, fandom.
So: I find a convention with Torchwood guests advertised. I start thinking about it.
Then people were reporting on how they met GDL at a signing event and I realised from my degree of envy that I really, really wanted to do that.
Bad Wolf 2007 it was then.
He wasn’t the only person there I wanted to see. I do know better than that. Going to a convention for just the one guest is not embracing the convention experience. And also, sometimes they don’t turn up. Sometimes they don’t turn up for a bunch of conventions in a row and you’re left with a small collection of photographs and no signatures. I know this. So I figured, two Romanas, Leela, and Blake from Blakes 7. Sounds good.
I guessed my velvet and sparkles would be a bit out of place so I ordered a bunch of new t-shirts. These were successful, both in the people-liked-them sense and in the people-talked-to-me sense. Also I got random compliments on my jacket. Weekend therefore made of win from a wardrobe point of view. Did not manage to distribute random smiley face stickers. Nobody wanted those. Did show some people my poem. Not because I thought random people would feel a pressing need to read my poem, but because by that point I was wearing it on my chest in the form of a t-shirt and becoming ever less confident this was amusing. But people laughed at the right line, so that worked out.
And then some of them turned around and didn’t talk to me again, but that happens to me a lot.
Friday: travel and talking.
I started the day seeing the severe weather warnings with Birmingham specifically mentioned. Possibly at that point the sensible person would have decided that a science fiction convention did not really count as necessary travel. But sensible has never really been my strong point. So, off I went. The travel worked pretty well – the train before mine got cancelled and I spent an hour waiting on the station because I… arrived really early and not two minutes late at all, obviously. But the station staff were all helpful on the way there and got me on my right trains. (I have in the past attempted train travel without telling staff I’m disabled and getting help. Sometimes it has worked. One time it resulted in several hours and a bunch of missed trains and a panic attack in the waiting room and a no good very bad day, and I try and learn from my mistakes. Stations: confusing. Ask someone who knows what they’re doing for help.) Got to Birmingham and it was raining really hard. Got a taxi, for what turned out to be a very short journey to the Holiday Inn. I suspect if navigation and crossing roads were skills I was solid on I could have walked it in a couple minutes. At the Holiday Inn there was a problem finding my room. Of course. Even though I had a booking number and I’d paid for it and stuff. So then there was hanging around waiting for quite a long time while it was sorted out. But on the good side it was indeed sorted out and I had a room and finally could go hide in there.
By that point I needed to hide quite a lot.
So, couple hours later reg desk opened, and I went and got my badge and things. Met someone in the elevator on the way down who was wearing a “Are you my mummy?” t-shirt. Started talking to them, continued talking off and on all weekend. Cool.
Quite a lot of guest cancellations. Less cool. But still many guests attending.
Gareth Thomas one of the people who cancelled, for health reasons. Uncool – hope for health soon.
Then I wandered around talking to people.
Yes, really.
For a while I wandered around looking vague instead, but some people said “You look lost” so I said hi to those people, and then they were eating so I said hi to some different people, and I managed to not really learn names of any of them because names fall out of my head quite unhelpfully. But walking up to random people and saying hello kind of sort of works at conventions, so that’s okay.
Then there was a quiz. In teams. I made no contribution to team I was on. I learned I don’t know a whole lot about TV. I especially don’t know a whole lot about TV that was on before I was born. Which, you know, I consider reasonable, really. But I got half of one answer right, which was a Doctor Who question, and I only knew that one because I’d been looking for photos of 6 coat.
Gave up on the evening around 2230, due to extreme lack of sleeping. Unfortunately extreme lack of sleeping continued, so I might as well have sat around attempting talk.
Saturday: Stuff happens
Got up in the morning. Blah. Attempted breakfast. Double blah. Pocketed a box of rice krispies for later. Later discovered they’d fallen out all over my bag. Rest of weekend spent attempting to make sure am not pulling out rice krispies along with things to get signed. *facepalm*
Go get coffee lounge ticket for Yasmin Bannerman, who was Jabe and Swanson and I think is rather cool. Also got a photo ticket I’d booked online in advance, with GDL.
Hung around with vague recollection some people from LJ were planning to meet before the events started.
Then the fire alarm went off. Joy!
So, that was a whole bunch of standing around outside attempting to not get rained on. And also there was a fire engine.
I think mostly I learned that in the event of a fire everyone will head for the exit they know about. I think maybe following fire exit signs should work better.
Stairs were weird – there were no regular stairs down from the bedrooms that I could find, and the fire exits led into the bar and stuff. That was odd, popping out in the bar just because the lift didn’t work. Sometimes the doors didn’t close and sometimes the thing just didn’t change floors. Unhelpful.
So there was a bit of lateness and disorganisation to kick off the day. Always fun.
I was impressed though, by lunchtime they were back on time. Neat.
Something I liked about this con that I haven’t seen at others: interviewers. People on stage to ask questions so that thing where nobody in the hall can think of any never happens. Useful.
This was my first DW con so all the stories are new to me. Given how long DW cons have been going that’s surely not true for people who’ve been before. But it was pretty cool for me. Much amusement, no waiting.
Eric Roberts was on stage first. Played the Master in the TV movie. I… have never considered that my favourite version of the Master. But he was interesting on stage. Talked about a bunch of stuff, like how he used to do his own stunts until one time he nearly fell off a train and decided that plan was no fun. Also, has a titanium hip now, because of doing martial arts for a film. He took the role in the TV movie because it was two people, so he could play the contrast and show how different they were, and be really camp evil for the Master. And then his wife played his character’s wife and he got to kill her.
Next talk was Carole Ann Ford. Played Susan, right at the start. I’ve only ever seen her in The Aztecs and The Five Doctors, yet I had unexpected degrees of oooh-cool to see her. It’s just nifty, meeting people connected to that much TV history. I could do that some more.
She talked about how she originally played Susan much more alien, because she was meant to be thousands of years old and a Time Lady and so she’d be quite different. But then she was told she was really meant to be just a typical teenager. She also said to start with the character was meant to be more like Rose, with the action and being strong and stuff, but that kind of wore off and then she was twisting her ankle a lot.
She’d twisted her ankle that day. For real. She told us to create amusement so it was funny.
She said she didn’t like The Five Doctors. She’d just rewatched it to do video interviews for a special edition. She was wearing so many jumpers under the coat, and then she watched it on her widescreen TV, and she looks huuuuuuge. I always quite like it when I old TV looks huge, makes me feel skinny, but I can see how it wouldn’t have quite that effect for people as were in it.
She said she got the script and she was supposed to not call the Doctor Grandfather, and she thought that was wrong. So she asked and they said that if he was her Grandfather that implied at some point there was a Mrs Who and they’d done stuff.
Which wasn’t allowed.
It was mentioned again how 5 wasn’t allowed to touch girls.
But since they’re aliens it doesn’t actually imply that, she pointed out. She had a joke that Peter Sellers used to tell. About watching Martians make babies, in test tubes of course, and then Martians wanting to watch humans. I could type it up but the funny is in the telling.
There was also funny about saying lines wrong, and stuff said about filming DW, and I don’t remember it enough to type it.
Pattern maybe with the former companions: said they’d started their character and been told that she’d be a strong character, she’d be doing action stuff, or she’d be the Doctor’s equal in Romana’s case. But then because DW involves so much set up every episode, so many things needed explaining, and somebody has to be in danger to need rescuing, guess what started to happen? There’s screaming, there’s running, there’s a gradual slip into a… less strong version. Like Leela ending up being all “What is it Doctor?” – there’s only so many ways you can say that line, so eventually it’s not fun to do. That was interesting. I guess I think of the stories… well I mostly didn’t watch them in order, to start with, so my impression of the characters isn’t a chronological one. So I’d not thought of it as a slide before. Even though I am familiar with the concept of character development.
I’m sure there’s ways to do the companion thing and not slip. Asking questions is necessary, but they can be the kind of question with half the answer in them. Like Ace, I guess.
Next up, Linda Clark, Amanda Lawrence, Gareth Roberts. And an interviewer. If the interviewers were on the timetable I could write their names down.
That’s the writer of the episode The Shakespeare Code, and Doomfinger and Bloodtide.
Tell the truth I don’t remember much of this talk. Bits were said that matched bits from the Confidentials, iirc. Maybe it all got filed in with that stuff in my head…
Much was mentioned about the makeup, how it was hot and uncomfortable. One time they were in makeup all day and the camera never pointed at them! And they got water collecting under their ears.
… the glamourous life of the actress.
Filming at the Globe you can’t use fire. It’s the only thatched building in London for a reason. No more fires.
GR said more detail about where the lost play was mentioned. And where he’d got the being on the ceiling bit from. If I could remember that could be interesting.
He said the mood patches from Gridlock were nicked (with acknowledgement) from his DW book.
Mentioned RTD had no interest in bringing back the Master until he realised he was insane. That was the key for him. Actually insane.
There was one thing he said about a plot bunny for a multi-Doctor story. These days you couldn’t just pretend you don’t see the ageing, so there would have to be an explanation for that. Like alternate universe Doctor who didn’t regenerate yet. He reckoned it would be good if, at the end of Doomsday with Rose on the beach, the TARDIS materialises and the Doctor gets out… and it’s Colin Baker.
I think that would be interesting as well as amusing. I mean Rose coped with him regenerating from pretty to prettier, but there’s a wider range he could end up looking like. Would she still be all “never leave” if he got outside her range of preference?
After that there were Hyde Fundraisers on stage, but I had to go back to my room and unstress. Also for lunch. I ate a whole teacake. My total food consumption for the weekend was 4 teacakes, 2 slices of bread, half a packet of rice krispies, and a whole ton of lucozade. It’s amazing I survive these things.
Saturday afternoon
Owen Teale
Also known as that cannibal from Countrycide.
He has also been in a classic series story, Vengeance on Varos, as Maldak. I remember the scenes he was describing, but not well enough to have a visual of him. I’ve got it on DVD, shall probably rewatch from pure curiousity.
At the moment, DW and TW are bookends to his career. (Until he gets more work.) DW was right at the start and then TW was right recent.
On DW he had one bit of a speech as Maldak, and he wanted to do it without wearing his helmet. The uniforms were very shiny, fit the theme and all, but the helmet would make it a bit hard to act. So he asked if he could take the helmet off and the person in charge of the costumes said no. And they had the authority to say that. So he figured he was stuck with it.
Actor (I’m bad at names, I should look it up) that was playing the governor, who would also be in that scene, had a Cunning Plan. He knew a bit more about TV and how it worked, experienced actor, so he was passing on the knowledge. There was a scene they were filming first where OT’s character was just in the background, nobody paying much attention to him. But it was immediately before the bit with the talking, so it set up that shot. So the guy told him about this thing called continuity. If he walks in and takes his helmet off in the background, he has to have his helmet off at the start of the next scene, because no time passes in between. Plan!
So indeed he tries it. And it works, nobody notices. And then they get to the next scene and the person who told him wear-helmet goes a bit ballistic, but they’re stuck with it now.
So that was some good bit of advice.
He talked a bit about mentoring, about how now he’s the experienced guy with the knowledge and how he tries to pass it on when it seems appropriate.
There was a story he told about being in a stage play, Shakespeare, I really ought to remember which one. But he had this big death scene, as you do. And the famous actor guy who was also in the play had watched him do the death scene in rehearsals a bunch and then told him it shouldn’t be about dying, it should be about trying to live, so the actual death moment is a shock to the audience.
I type it up like that and it’s a nothing much, but when he told it there was a Story. With drama and intensity and stuff. Falls out if you try and write it down. That’s what acting brings to it, the life.
About Countrycide:
He got all dirtied up to play the cannibal. Got on set and JB says “I like a bit of rough. But not the teeth!”
To get into the character he tried to think, not happy thoughts about eating people per se, but to connect to the man’s state of mind he was thinking how this was his culture, his tradition, how it was important to him and made him happy. He could connect with the culture part. Then they were chasing around in the woods and he was bringing that to it. The (er, brain blip, director? Tells actors what to do.) had said they weren’t going to go and make it really gothic, they were going to keep it down a bit. But then after the first take he kept telling him to give it more, do more of that. Because he’d found something that made it really work.
That bit at the end where he’s talking to Gwen, the tear in his eye, that just happened that way, that just came out of getting into the character.
There was mention of how gruesome it was. And how the point was to be about the human monsters, to make the audience be waiting and wondering what alien it was and just have it be humans being really bad.
Y’all who read my LJ much know I had Very Definite Opinions about them doing that. If I wanted to see human monsters I’d be watching any other crime show.
So the interviewer guy asked who in the audience thought it was the best episode, and a bunch of people put their hand up.
OT asked who thought it went too far.
One people put her hand up. One people looked around and pulled her hand down and, er, held a finger up. The guy with the roving microphone pointed at me so still I was noticed.
*hides*
But I did think it was too much. It scared and upset me, and not in a good way. I thought it was cheating. I was there to watch a science fiction sort of a show and they stuck in an episode from a different genre. Sure, it was still horror, but I don’t choose to watch that sort. If I’d known they were going to do that I wouldn’t have watched.
That was my first reaction. Having rewatched it slowly and with an eye to how and why they did it, I rather like the craft of it. I’m gradually separating out the emotional reaction, and I know which bits not to look at. And the acting was good and the writing was good and the gruesome FX were good. I just… I really didn’t like it when I first watched it. At all.
… which y’all need to know in the middle of a con report.
I think maybe only one person who turned up at the talk from the guy from Countrycide didn’t like Countrycide. I’m sure there’s more than one person in the world who didn’t like it.
… I live happy in my little bubble world, okay? Okay.
ANYways
He asked audience what they thought about Countrycide and one guy said “Never going back to Wales again.”
OT says something like “I work for the welsh tourist board.”
He mentioned Belonging, the show he was in that Eve Myles was also in. He says it’s a great show. He reckons if it was made anywhere else, Scotland or Ireland or England, it would be a cornerstone of British TV, everywhere would show it, it would be really well known.
So seeing Torchwood, seeing Cardiff in Torchwood, that was extra cool. Seeing Cardiff portrayed as a modern, vibrant, European city. That was important to him.
He had a lot of interesting to say. Everyone did, actually. I got lots of useful data about being an actor from all the stories. (Not useful as in ‘I shall ever be able to do that’, useful more like ‘this is one side of the discipline I’m spending the next 5 years studying’. In an English & Cultural Studies degree, which covers plays and TV as well as poems and books. So everything I look at lately I look at through that prism, connect everything to my degree.)
Next guest
Yasmin Bannerman
She played Jabe the tree lady on Doctor Who and also Swanson on Torchwood. Which I thought was neat so I got one of those coffee lounge tickets with her. That was last thing in the day though. The talk was first. I might smoosh data together in my telling of it, if she said it all.
She said she’s very shy. It’s different being an actor, you go up and it’s someone else on screen, but just being herself she’s shy.
She says usually she’s looking after her kid, but sometimes she goes and does acting. One off roles that take a couple of weeks and then are all done. When she heard about Jabe she heard she was like a princess so she thought she would get to be pretty and wear a pretty dress and have like a holiday for a couple of weeks.
So she gets in and they do the makeup for the first time. And she didn’t know what prosthetics were, but then she had a whole cast of her head done and they put the big tree crown on and put pieces on her face and hands to alter the texture. And the first time they finished the makeup they were like “Tada!” and she was like “Ack!” and, er, it wasn’t so much pretty. She got them to change it just a little bit. But the makeup took like 5 hours to do and was not easy.
The dress was pretty. Very structured, and with big tall high heels.
She then had to wear it for two weeks solid. She said by the end of filming it *reeked*. She was just trying to keep her arms tucked in tight and make sure if she went in a car the windows were open.
(Ah, the glamour of acting!)
She got to keep the cast of her head. She said it’s weird because she’d expect herself to be bigger.
She’s very short, so she’s always in the high heels and then they call for a box. Says she should just get some stilts.
Had never figured that after drama school she’d ever play a tree. But she could connect to other aspects of the character.
She said before the filming she got called in to talk over the scenes and see if she had the right idea about them. So when she’s with the Doctor and she knows what happened to his people she was thinking this was like she’d just found out he was an Auschwitz survivor.
She never expected all this stuff that surrounds Doctor Who. She never thought she’d be doing signings. She says after the first fifty times you sign your name you start to forget what it is.
She was really surprised that she got to be on the covers of stuff.
She mentioned Torchwood and how it looked gruesome and how in the police station bit they had photos up of the ‘corpses’ and there was all that blood and it looked really real.
The coffee lounge bit had talking in it and was cool. It didn’t have me talking in it, which could possibly have been considered the point. I’m sure I had thoughts that morning. Things I could say and could ask and that. But by the evening? The trouble with me when I get tired is everything gets equally interesting. The person I’m going to get one chance to talk to is then competing for attention with the pattern from the carpet and the shiny off the arms of the chairs and every random thought that crosses my mind. I had to drag my train of thought back on track and pin my attention to the outside world about once a minute. Very frustrating. But I was there and I was paying attention with as much brain as I had left and it was indeed cool.
I just… couldn’t make words. When there was signing autographs at the end I got as far as “Nice meet you.” And then I *facepalm* and mutter “English.”
I’m sure nobody minds but me. But… she just got through saying how intelligent fan letters can be. They really pay attention and mention specifics of a performance. It’s like getting letters from other actors, she said.
I’m… not sounding like one of them smart fans.
And it’s really unfair cause I actually study DW & TW for college and have big thinking about it. Just… not today.
*sigh*
There were only like half a dozen people in the room for the coffee bit. It was pretty cool. I don’t know why more people don’t want to do that.
Possibly for the same reason whenever I tell people I met the lady that played the tree in DW and I sound all enthusiastic people look at me funny.
*sigh some more*
So, anyway, that was the end of Saturday. For me. There were other things going on, there was a dinner and a cabaret and stuff, but I just couldn’t track the world by then. I needed some serious sitting in the dark with the duvet over my head. I was hoping for sleep but there wasn’t a whole lot of that this weekend. Too wound up. Very annoying.
So then it got to be time for the auction and then the disco.
I went to the auction. I meant to skip it and save testing my willpower, but then I was all awake and dressed and stuff, so.
Signed script for like £1800. Woah.
But I found myself thankfully mostly untempted. There’s a whole lot of DW related Stuff in the world. But there’s not a whole lot of room in my house for said Stuff, so I didn’t attempt the raffle for the standees or to buy the Really Big Dalek Poster or to acquire second signed copies of books or anything.
The disco was… well, I had fun. I went in there with a having-fun mind and fun was had. I was the first one on the dance floor if you don’t count the guy with the invisible wheelchair. They played the songs from the last eps of DW season 3. I like the drums one. They also played the YMCA – I think three times – and the Timewarp – the godawful dance version you can’t actually dance to. And Cliff Richards’ Summer Holiday. That one cleared the dancefloor instantly. But there had been quite a bunch of people on there. Specially when “Dancing Queen” was on, floor was packed.
… I probably shouldn’t admit some of the stuff I danced to if I want to keep any cool points.
… I was at a Doctor Who convention. I think cool points are somewhat irrelevant.
I had fun though. Even though the dancefloor was tiny and there was lots of bumping into people and some guy sort of grabbed me but not in any bad places just I always have to consciously avoid hitting people when they do that. And I did dancing with, in that there was a circle of people including me. And there was the “I get knocked down, I get up again” song so I retain my unbroken record of dancing it at every con I’ve been to. (I used to faint and stuff, and at one point it was the only song I managed to dance to. These days, doing much better.)
So, aside from the thing where I could have run better music off my laptop, that was fun.
Then it was two in the morning and they were in the middle of Bohemian Rhapsody and they just stopped the music.
Middle of song!
Just getting to the hair flying bit!
So naturally by that point there’s a bunch of guys on the dancefloor doing air guitar and singing along, and they didn’t feel the need to stop just because the music did.
I think somebody somewhere has video of most of this.
… if I end up on YouTube… *shudders*
Mind you, I think there were points where I was both youngest and thinnest person dancing, so that part is good for the ego.
I like dancing. There’s shiny lights and lots of music and if you can’t string a thought together it’s completely irrelevant. And also by then everyone else is too drunk to think either, so that works out.
Then there was sleep. Because Sunday was the day of GDL, and coffee lounge tickets were likely to sell quite fast.
I got up at 0730.
I got to the breakfast room.
I picked up a potato based breakfast product, managed one bite, and decided breakfast just wasn’t going to happen.
Wrapped some bread, grabbed another box of cereal, and went to stand in a line.
I was not the first one there, despite the fact the desk didn’t open until 0800. I think I was the 12th or something.
*waves hello to other GDL fans*
And yes, we were all there for the same tickets.
0800 and the 15 of us in the q sold out the GDL coffee lounge. Thought so. So it was cool, I got up early and got the ticket I wanted.
… y’all know the punchline to this one already.
The rest of the morning was supposed to be GDL: photo, coffee, on stage talk.
Instead it was the saga of Waiting for GDL to not turn up. Which involved a line for the photo, actually having the coffee without him, and in my case skipping the video that replaced the on stage talk.
I could have been annoyed about that. But I wasn’t. I don’t know why. I was just having a fun weekend and quite happy to sort of bounce along having things not work out. Well, I say happy, I always get in a bit of a flap about Things Changing, and it’s annoying when the only data available is Maybe Later, because you can’t just say sod it and wander off. Well, you can, I did, but there’s always the vague possibility of Things Changing Again when you’re not looking.
When I got home and told my mum about it she was all “Grr, false advertising, not on!” But I totally don’t blame the organisers. I don’t actually blame GDL, though a phone call at some point might have been nice. It’s not like anyone actually planned for half of Britain to be flooded and traffic to be a nightmare and all that. And yeah, I know about those photos and the JM thing. Even so. Stuff happens, sometimes at the last minute, and things don’t work out.
… okay, I could totally be less zen and more grrr, but where’s the fun? Less stress. I let it go.
The way the morning actually worked out was made of win, from my perspective.
Matt Rippy.
And, on stage, Murray Melvin, who played Bilis and had interesting things to say, but from where I was sitting?
Matt Rippy. Captain Jack Harkness, original 1941 version. Incredibly cute guy.
Coffee lounge. Seat on my right.
:-D
So, the part where he was talking on stage I was only sort of there for. To start with I was standing in a line waiting for GDL, and then I was popping back down to see where the line went. So I saw bits and not other bits.
He was asked what it was like kissing JB. He said he could see why you’d want to know, but he doesn’t kiss and tell.
They didn’t discuss or practice the kiss in advance. They could have talked about it, asked which way they go, that kind of thing, but they wanted it to be fresh. So they didn’t talk or practice, they just went for the kiss.
And after the first time they did that, big silence. All the extra people and everyone, all big silence.
MM said something like, that was because they were in awe. That moment worked just so well, everyone was silent because it worked.
They both had stuff to say about the clothes, how they were more structured and stuff, and the hair, all slicked back. Which is how MM has always worn his.
… I’m sure they said more and I don’t remember it. I maybe remember it bundled with the coffee thing? I don’t know.
I do remember after that talk going back down and finding GDL was Still Not There. So everyone with a coffee club ticket was hanging around in various stages of Not Amused. Said we should have the coffee anyway. So we did. Well, not me, because I don’t eat and I only drink lucozade, but I sat in a room full of people and thought sociable thoughts.
More usefully, I also nipped out for a photo with Matt Rippy. Who is cute. He asked my name and I said “Becca” and didn’t even stutter.
… This to me is an achievement worth recording. I stutter my name more often than anything. Is most frustrating.
So, anyways, had photo! Have photo now. Pretty photo. I’m actually smiling so it shows on the outside. Clearly I was having a good day.
Then I stayed for the coffee lounge.
He said a bunch of things. I’m sure. However as I recounted the important bits to mum it was more “He took his jumper off. And rolled up his sleeves. And had a button undone on his shirt.”
… I’m a visual sort of person.
*shuffles a bit and changes the subject swiftly*
He had much to say about work he’s been in. He was in the Reduced Shakespeare Company. He explained what they’re about, how they started out doing quick versions of Shakespeare at Ren Faires in the US and then came over to the UK and realized they had way more time to fill than show to do so they decided to do all Shakespeare plays in like ninety minutes. He said he usually played the women. He does the website for them now, I think he said. (Yup, I just looked it up. Found a page for him as a website developer.)
He talked about when he tried doing tap dance and he turned out to not be good at it, but the teacher said that what the audience notices is what’s going on with *does a little mime with face and hands* (so, expression and gesture and stuff), and he really took that to heart because he could do that bit. So everyone else was technically better than him, but people from the audience were saying how good he was because he was being all *does the hands again*.
He’s just been in Day of the Dead, zombie movie remake. I forgot who he said he plays, but he said it’s very different casting him than the person in the original. I know little about zombie movies so most of what he had to say fell out my head due to lack of context to stick it to. He says they’re fast zombies, filmed with the film going slow so they’re all sped up, like 28 Days Later. He said they had a guy in to do movement coaching, the guy who did the apes in Planet of the Apes? So they’re fast zombies that move weird, and there’re lots of them, and they’re very scary.
He did a lot of research for Captain Jack Harkness, lots of looking up old photos and finding little things about how they held themselves and how they moved. He noticed the way they held a cigarette, so it was cupped in their hand, which makes sense on an airfield or somewhere windy, to keep it alight. I liked watching him explain this bit because he was serious about it and demonstrated with his hands. I just liked how he had thought about it and picked up little things and seemed really interested in it. I mean, that would be why he’s an actor, but it’s neat watching people talk about the stuff they’re into.
… I explain poorly and move on.
He mentioned the director for CJH would give notes in a way that never added up to “that was wrong” but was more “okay, now we’ve got that, let’s try something different.” He was a very calm guy, never got flustered, which sets the tone for everyone else to stay calm to. When he was giving notes he’d tell them quietly, so only the actor he was talking to knew what he’d said. That way the other actor had to watch for the changes, and they’d stay involved, engaged in the scene.
He said that any time he’s not sure what to do in a scene he’ll look in the other actor’s eyes. Usually the answer is there, in what the other actor is doing. And if it isn’t the audience will still be all “huh, what’s going on with those two?” Because they’ve got Eyes going on.
Then there were autographs (I only got the two from the coffee things, I didn’t do all that getting up and standing in lines for the others. It was cool enough seeing people do talks.)
And then my morning was all done.
Again with the hiding in my room, but in a happy way now.
(I am vaguely amused that I was hiding instead of watching the Hyde Fundraisers.) (I’m easily amused.)
Sunday afternoon, started with Romana. Not Romanas though because of the weather. Mary Tamm.
Is my second favourite Romana, but since Romana is among my very favourite characters that works out.
She said how she’s started out being told that Romana would be the Doctor’s equal, but by the end of the season she’d gone back to screaming and falling and needing things explained and such. She said there didn’t seem to be anywhere much for the character to go after that. So she left. But they wouldn’t believe she was leaving, so they didn’t write a regeneration scene. Right up until she left they reckoned they could get her back. (She said particular person name but I don’t recall it.) They were sitting at lunch one day and the someone said again that she’d be back and she had really had enough of being told that and Lalla was also there at lunch so MT said “Lalla could do it.” And then she could see the think wheels turning as the idea took.
There were also interesting funny stories. I can remember being amused. Possibly it was the story with the flashing, and the one with the wrong bedroom. If I could remember them better I could amuse the internets.
Then I had another break in my room.
(Yes, this many breaks are a necessary part of my day. It’s really rather annoying.)
Then it was Louise Jameson and Clare Clifford.
Leela. :-D
The interviewer said he’d had a poster on his wall of her with the knife in that costume.
She said she’d never expected the whole ‘sex symbol’ thing. She just thought she was going on a kids TV show and the costume was perfectly logical for a savage. But of course it was on right after the football results and people kept watching.
She was asked what it was like replacing a popular companion (a bit like Martha replaced Rose). She said she got such nice fanmail she was really pleased. But then there was a mixup with the mail and she got fanmail meant for Sarah Jane and it was all “come back, the new girl’s useless!” And that was a bit of an eye opener.
Like reviews for plays. One time she got the best comments any actor could hope for, and the worst most horrible comments ever, and it was for the exact same performance of the exact same play.
She demonstrated how there’s only so many ways you can say “Doctor, what is it?” This was a factor in leaving.
Her favourite story was one where she got away from the Doctor for a bit and got to actually do stuff.
They were both asked to describe their Doctor in one word. CC was with 5 and she said “Charming”. LJ (4, obviously) said several words sprang to mind, but she ended up with “Challenging.”
One of the words was ‘eccentric’. She said he’s very smart, very well read, very… I forget her phrasing, but I think he talked about a lot of different things a lot. And that can be hard to be around all the time. But they get on very well now.
I know CC talked as well. I guess my attention was a bit rationed :-/
I think she said that when they go in the TARDIS in Earthshock is the first time someone says “bigger on the inside” about it.
There were more stories about work that was not Doctor Who. And about playing darts. And stuff.
Memory is tricksy.
At the end they were asked to describe fans and conventions in one word.
LJ thinks and says “Challenging” :-)
So of course CC says “Charming”
… *has paranoia I’ve got the words wrong and hence squished the funny* …
So anyways, that was the end of that talk, and that was the end of Sunday. There was saying thankyous, and then it was all done.
Some more talking in the bar after, but mostly people were going home.
My going home took all of Monday, 9-5. And that was with using my shiny new mobile phone to have a taxi waiting at the station when the train got in. Well, actually in the station car park in a minor traffic jam attempting to reach the taxi rank, but basically as a plan it worked. The get on the train plan only kind of worked. I asked for help at stations but did not in fact get any. I’m irritated about that. They assigned someone but he didn’t turn up when he said he would. And then there was a train and it said Norwich and it was supposed to go to Norwich but by the time it got to Ely it decided to just stop there instead. Ely was not having a good day. You could hear it in the announcer’s voice. He was all “Would passengers for Norwich please stay on platform three.” People were standing around and it was a whole train’s worth of people and, well, we were Not Amused. Except the plural people who were reading Harry Potter, who I got the general impression may not have minded much where they were. But then there was getting the train and being squished into seats with our luggage because the racks were full and, well, big annoyance. But I got home eventually, which is better going than much of the country. And I had a nice chat with the taxi driver on the way home. He was one of the guys that drove me to college for a couple of years so he was wondering how I’d been. I like using the same taxi company, I don’t have to explain how to get to my house and they know it’s me when I phone up.
… that last paragraph I’m sure fascinated you all.
Okay, impressions of Bad Wolf: Different. Smaller. Less parties. I’d definitely take my laptop again because there’s a lot of time in my room I could be watching episodes. Though I’m sure if I could have been awake and gone to the Saturday evening entertainment it would have been entertaining. For me to get there, quite far away. But, despite the extra challenges and the guest cancellations, I had fun. I’d happily go again if there were Torchwood guests again. Especially if they turn up next time.
… now I want to go to a Wolf or Starfury con to see all them people and have a big party again. Meeting new people is *difficult*.
But still, definitely fun.
Anyone that was also at the con and has anything to add or correct or point and laugh at, feel free to do so in comments.
Also, anyone that has photos and/or video of me… er, hopefully the video will never hit the net, but if you think there’s me in a photo that would be cool to see. I lack camera these days and have no such record. I’m in the black and red hair and matching jacket, usually with a Torchwood t-shirt.
*waves bye-bye to theoretical this-item-only readers*
/ con report
In case there’s people reading this who don’t usually read me: I go to a bunch of conventions. I often write up con reports. I find if I don’t the cons sort of smoosh together in my head. But usually the reports are more of a me report, since I’m the one that was doing stuff. So mixed in with interesting stuff about the guests there will be less interesting stuff about my clothes and hair and insomnia. I only post these in my own LJ anyway.
I am disabled, diagnosed autistic spectrum / asperger’s, with anxiety and depression. I don’t get out the house much and it’s rather challenging when I do. So I am basically proud of me for turning up at things, and everything after that is bonus.
But I also always feel like I should start these things with a general apology. I’m not so good at the whole interaction thing, and sometimes it shows, and the rest of the time I worry it will. So: if I managed to irritate, ignore, or in general leave you wondering what planet I’m from, sorry. Doing my best. And getting better.
Also, disclaimer: All this is from memory. I didn’t take notes or get a video or a tape or anything. I always hate relying on memory alone because it’s always possible things only happened that way in my head and not in the actual world per se. This is a generalised anxiety based on the way witness reports always vary and knowing how the human brain works. We remember the constantly rewritten story of the event, not the event. It bugs me sometimes. So, anyways, all this? May or may not be accurate and/or true. But it’s how it is in my head.
My first convention was in 1998 and I’ve gone to a few every year since then. Highlander, Buffy & Angel, Stargate, and one Galactica con. Plus Decalogy, which had all sorts. What I have learned: Every fandom is different. Every organiser is different. Some are more different than others. Wolf & Starfury conventions are at the Thistle and have three parties and you can get dressed up shiny and not be the only one. But they’re still different from each other because one has the door bleepers and a paper fight on the Sunday and the other doesn’t. Highlander conventions weren’t quite like that, not always got parties, not always got dressing up. This year I seem to have run out of conventions in the fandoms I’m interested in, especially if I try not to go to cons on college weekends. I mean if I’d have been willing to go to a con the weekend before an exam I could have gone places, but I have this plan to pass and stuff, so no. I never worried about it on Access but then there were more teaching weeks for that.
All this is the very long way of saying: I’d never been to a Doctor Who convention before. Or been in the fandom, really. I am a fan, I buy the DVDs and some of them are replacing the videos and I used to get up early when I still had UK Gold and I own, er, a small collection of sonic screwdrivers… and indeed will admit this in public. So: fan. But not much interacting with other fans, unless they happen to be on my LJ f-list for other reason (and several are).
Torchwood is a whole other deal. I’m a Torchwood fan, in the fandom, reading fanfic, interacting with other fans. All on Livejournal still, but, fandom.
So: I find a convention with Torchwood guests advertised. I start thinking about it.
Then people were reporting on how they met GDL at a signing event and I realised from my degree of envy that I really, really wanted to do that.
Bad Wolf 2007 it was then.
He wasn’t the only person there I wanted to see. I do know better than that. Going to a convention for just the one guest is not embracing the convention experience. And also, sometimes they don’t turn up. Sometimes they don’t turn up for a bunch of conventions in a row and you’re left with a small collection of photographs and no signatures. I know this. So I figured, two Romanas, Leela, and Blake from Blakes 7. Sounds good.
I guessed my velvet and sparkles would be a bit out of place so I ordered a bunch of new t-shirts. These were successful, both in the people-liked-them sense and in the people-talked-to-me sense. Also I got random compliments on my jacket. Weekend therefore made of win from a wardrobe point of view. Did not manage to distribute random smiley face stickers. Nobody wanted those. Did show some people my poem. Not because I thought random people would feel a pressing need to read my poem, but because by that point I was wearing it on my chest in the form of a t-shirt and becoming ever less confident this was amusing. But people laughed at the right line, so that worked out.
And then some of them turned around and didn’t talk to me again, but that happens to me a lot.
Friday: travel and talking.
I started the day seeing the severe weather warnings with Birmingham specifically mentioned. Possibly at that point the sensible person would have decided that a science fiction convention did not really count as necessary travel. But sensible has never really been my strong point. So, off I went. The travel worked pretty well – the train before mine got cancelled and I spent an hour waiting on the station because I… arrived really early and not two minutes late at all, obviously. But the station staff were all helpful on the way there and got me on my right trains. (I have in the past attempted train travel without telling staff I’m disabled and getting help. Sometimes it has worked. One time it resulted in several hours and a bunch of missed trains and a panic attack in the waiting room and a no good very bad day, and I try and learn from my mistakes. Stations: confusing. Ask someone who knows what they’re doing for help.) Got to Birmingham and it was raining really hard. Got a taxi, for what turned out to be a very short journey to the Holiday Inn. I suspect if navigation and crossing roads were skills I was solid on I could have walked it in a couple minutes. At the Holiday Inn there was a problem finding my room. Of course. Even though I had a booking number and I’d paid for it and stuff. So then there was hanging around waiting for quite a long time while it was sorted out. But on the good side it was indeed sorted out and I had a room and finally could go hide in there.
By that point I needed to hide quite a lot.
So, couple hours later reg desk opened, and I went and got my badge and things. Met someone in the elevator on the way down who was wearing a “Are you my mummy?” t-shirt. Started talking to them, continued talking off and on all weekend. Cool.
Quite a lot of guest cancellations. Less cool. But still many guests attending.
Gareth Thomas one of the people who cancelled, for health reasons. Uncool – hope for health soon.
Then I wandered around talking to people.
Yes, really.
For a while I wandered around looking vague instead, but some people said “You look lost” so I said hi to those people, and then they were eating so I said hi to some different people, and I managed to not really learn names of any of them because names fall out of my head quite unhelpfully. But walking up to random people and saying hello kind of sort of works at conventions, so that’s okay.
Then there was a quiz. In teams. I made no contribution to team I was on. I learned I don’t know a whole lot about TV. I especially don’t know a whole lot about TV that was on before I was born. Which, you know, I consider reasonable, really. But I got half of one answer right, which was a Doctor Who question, and I only knew that one because I’d been looking for photos of 6 coat.
Gave up on the evening around 2230, due to extreme lack of sleeping. Unfortunately extreme lack of sleeping continued, so I might as well have sat around attempting talk.
Saturday: Stuff happens
Got up in the morning. Blah. Attempted breakfast. Double blah. Pocketed a box of rice krispies for later. Later discovered they’d fallen out all over my bag. Rest of weekend spent attempting to make sure am not pulling out rice krispies along with things to get signed. *facepalm*
Go get coffee lounge ticket for Yasmin Bannerman, who was Jabe and Swanson and I think is rather cool. Also got a photo ticket I’d booked online in advance, with GDL.
Hung around with vague recollection some people from LJ were planning to meet before the events started.
Then the fire alarm went off. Joy!
So, that was a whole bunch of standing around outside attempting to not get rained on. And also there was a fire engine.
I think mostly I learned that in the event of a fire everyone will head for the exit they know about. I think maybe following fire exit signs should work better.
Stairs were weird – there were no regular stairs down from the bedrooms that I could find, and the fire exits led into the bar and stuff. That was odd, popping out in the bar just because the lift didn’t work. Sometimes the doors didn’t close and sometimes the thing just didn’t change floors. Unhelpful.
So there was a bit of lateness and disorganisation to kick off the day. Always fun.
I was impressed though, by lunchtime they were back on time. Neat.
Something I liked about this con that I haven’t seen at others: interviewers. People on stage to ask questions so that thing where nobody in the hall can think of any never happens. Useful.
This was my first DW con so all the stories are new to me. Given how long DW cons have been going that’s surely not true for people who’ve been before. But it was pretty cool for me. Much amusement, no waiting.
Eric Roberts was on stage first. Played the Master in the TV movie. I… have never considered that my favourite version of the Master. But he was interesting on stage. Talked about a bunch of stuff, like how he used to do his own stunts until one time he nearly fell off a train and decided that plan was no fun. Also, has a titanium hip now, because of doing martial arts for a film. He took the role in the TV movie because it was two people, so he could play the contrast and show how different they were, and be really camp evil for the Master. And then his wife played his character’s wife and he got to kill her.
Next talk was Carole Ann Ford. Played Susan, right at the start. I’ve only ever seen her in The Aztecs and The Five Doctors, yet I had unexpected degrees of oooh-cool to see her. It’s just nifty, meeting people connected to that much TV history. I could do that some more.
She talked about how she originally played Susan much more alien, because she was meant to be thousands of years old and a Time Lady and so she’d be quite different. But then she was told she was really meant to be just a typical teenager. She also said to start with the character was meant to be more like Rose, with the action and being strong and stuff, but that kind of wore off and then she was twisting her ankle a lot.
She’d twisted her ankle that day. For real. She told us to create amusement so it was funny.
She said she didn’t like The Five Doctors. She’d just rewatched it to do video interviews for a special edition. She was wearing so many jumpers under the coat, and then she watched it on her widescreen TV, and she looks huuuuuuge. I always quite like it when I old TV looks huge, makes me feel skinny, but I can see how it wouldn’t have quite that effect for people as were in it.
She said she got the script and she was supposed to not call the Doctor Grandfather, and she thought that was wrong. So she asked and they said that if he was her Grandfather that implied at some point there was a Mrs Who and they’d done stuff.
Which wasn’t allowed.
It was mentioned again how 5 wasn’t allowed to touch girls.
But since they’re aliens it doesn’t actually imply that, she pointed out. She had a joke that Peter Sellers used to tell. About watching Martians make babies, in test tubes of course, and then Martians wanting to watch humans. I could type it up but the funny is in the telling.
There was also funny about saying lines wrong, and stuff said about filming DW, and I don’t remember it enough to type it.
Pattern maybe with the former companions: said they’d started their character and been told that she’d be a strong character, she’d be doing action stuff, or she’d be the Doctor’s equal in Romana’s case. But then because DW involves so much set up every episode, so many things needed explaining, and somebody has to be in danger to need rescuing, guess what started to happen? There’s screaming, there’s running, there’s a gradual slip into a… less strong version. Like Leela ending up being all “What is it Doctor?” – there’s only so many ways you can say that line, so eventually it’s not fun to do. That was interesting. I guess I think of the stories… well I mostly didn’t watch them in order, to start with, so my impression of the characters isn’t a chronological one. So I’d not thought of it as a slide before. Even though I am familiar with the concept of character development.
I’m sure there’s ways to do the companion thing and not slip. Asking questions is necessary, but they can be the kind of question with half the answer in them. Like Ace, I guess.
Next up, Linda Clark, Amanda Lawrence, Gareth Roberts. And an interviewer. If the interviewers were on the timetable I could write their names down.
That’s the writer of the episode The Shakespeare Code, and Doomfinger and Bloodtide.
Tell the truth I don’t remember much of this talk. Bits were said that matched bits from the Confidentials, iirc. Maybe it all got filed in with that stuff in my head…
Much was mentioned about the makeup, how it was hot and uncomfortable. One time they were in makeup all day and the camera never pointed at them! And they got water collecting under their ears.
… the glamourous life of the actress.
Filming at the Globe you can’t use fire. It’s the only thatched building in London for a reason. No more fires.
GR said more detail about where the lost play was mentioned. And where he’d got the being on the ceiling bit from. If I could remember that could be interesting.
He said the mood patches from Gridlock were nicked (with acknowledgement) from his DW book.
Mentioned RTD had no interest in bringing back the Master until he realised he was insane. That was the key for him. Actually insane.
There was one thing he said about a plot bunny for a multi-Doctor story. These days you couldn’t just pretend you don’t see the ageing, so there would have to be an explanation for that. Like alternate universe Doctor who didn’t regenerate yet. He reckoned it would be good if, at the end of Doomsday with Rose on the beach, the TARDIS materialises and the Doctor gets out… and it’s Colin Baker.
I think that would be interesting as well as amusing. I mean Rose coped with him regenerating from pretty to prettier, but there’s a wider range he could end up looking like. Would she still be all “never leave” if he got outside her range of preference?
After that there were Hyde Fundraisers on stage, but I had to go back to my room and unstress. Also for lunch. I ate a whole teacake. My total food consumption for the weekend was 4 teacakes, 2 slices of bread, half a packet of rice krispies, and a whole ton of lucozade. It’s amazing I survive these things.
Saturday afternoon
Owen Teale
Also known as that cannibal from Countrycide.
He has also been in a classic series story, Vengeance on Varos, as Maldak. I remember the scenes he was describing, but not well enough to have a visual of him. I’ve got it on DVD, shall probably rewatch from pure curiousity.
At the moment, DW and TW are bookends to his career. (Until he gets more work.) DW was right at the start and then TW was right recent.
On DW he had one bit of a speech as Maldak, and he wanted to do it without wearing his helmet. The uniforms were very shiny, fit the theme and all, but the helmet would make it a bit hard to act. So he asked if he could take the helmet off and the person in charge of the costumes said no. And they had the authority to say that. So he figured he was stuck with it.
Actor (I’m bad at names, I should look it up) that was playing the governor, who would also be in that scene, had a Cunning Plan. He knew a bit more about TV and how it worked, experienced actor, so he was passing on the knowledge. There was a scene they were filming first where OT’s character was just in the background, nobody paying much attention to him. But it was immediately before the bit with the talking, so it set up that shot. So the guy told him about this thing called continuity. If he walks in and takes his helmet off in the background, he has to have his helmet off at the start of the next scene, because no time passes in between. Plan!
So indeed he tries it. And it works, nobody notices. And then they get to the next scene and the person who told him wear-helmet goes a bit ballistic, but they’re stuck with it now.
So that was some good bit of advice.
He talked a bit about mentoring, about how now he’s the experienced guy with the knowledge and how he tries to pass it on when it seems appropriate.
There was a story he told about being in a stage play, Shakespeare, I really ought to remember which one. But he had this big death scene, as you do. And the famous actor guy who was also in the play had watched him do the death scene in rehearsals a bunch and then told him it shouldn’t be about dying, it should be about trying to live, so the actual death moment is a shock to the audience.
I type it up like that and it’s a nothing much, but when he told it there was a Story. With drama and intensity and stuff. Falls out if you try and write it down. That’s what acting brings to it, the life.
About Countrycide:
He got all dirtied up to play the cannibal. Got on set and JB says “I like a bit of rough. But not the teeth!”
To get into the character he tried to think, not happy thoughts about eating people per se, but to connect to the man’s state of mind he was thinking how this was his culture, his tradition, how it was important to him and made him happy. He could connect with the culture part. Then they were chasing around in the woods and he was bringing that to it. The (er, brain blip, director? Tells actors what to do.) had said they weren’t going to go and make it really gothic, they were going to keep it down a bit. But then after the first take he kept telling him to give it more, do more of that. Because he’d found something that made it really work.
That bit at the end where he’s talking to Gwen, the tear in his eye, that just happened that way, that just came out of getting into the character.
There was mention of how gruesome it was. And how the point was to be about the human monsters, to make the audience be waiting and wondering what alien it was and just have it be humans being really bad.
Y’all who read my LJ much know I had Very Definite Opinions about them doing that. If I wanted to see human monsters I’d be watching any other crime show.
So the interviewer guy asked who in the audience thought it was the best episode, and a bunch of people put their hand up.
OT asked who thought it went too far.
One people put her hand up. One people looked around and pulled her hand down and, er, held a finger up. The guy with the roving microphone pointed at me so still I was noticed.
*hides*
But I did think it was too much. It scared and upset me, and not in a good way. I thought it was cheating. I was there to watch a science fiction sort of a show and they stuck in an episode from a different genre. Sure, it was still horror, but I don’t choose to watch that sort. If I’d known they were going to do that I wouldn’t have watched.
That was my first reaction. Having rewatched it slowly and with an eye to how and why they did it, I rather like the craft of it. I’m gradually separating out the emotional reaction, and I know which bits not to look at. And the acting was good and the writing was good and the gruesome FX were good. I just… I really didn’t like it when I first watched it. At all.
… which y’all need to know in the middle of a con report.
I think maybe only one person who turned up at the talk from the guy from Countrycide didn’t like Countrycide. I’m sure there’s more than one person in the world who didn’t like it.
… I live happy in my little bubble world, okay? Okay.
ANYways
He asked audience what they thought about Countrycide and one guy said “Never going back to Wales again.”
OT says something like “I work for the welsh tourist board.”
He mentioned Belonging, the show he was in that Eve Myles was also in. He says it’s a great show. He reckons if it was made anywhere else, Scotland or Ireland or England, it would be a cornerstone of British TV, everywhere would show it, it would be really well known.
So seeing Torchwood, seeing Cardiff in Torchwood, that was extra cool. Seeing Cardiff portrayed as a modern, vibrant, European city. That was important to him.
He had a lot of interesting to say. Everyone did, actually. I got lots of useful data about being an actor from all the stories. (Not useful as in ‘I shall ever be able to do that’, useful more like ‘this is one side of the discipline I’m spending the next 5 years studying’. In an English & Cultural Studies degree, which covers plays and TV as well as poems and books. So everything I look at lately I look at through that prism, connect everything to my degree.)
Next guest
Yasmin Bannerman
She played Jabe the tree lady on Doctor Who and also Swanson on Torchwood. Which I thought was neat so I got one of those coffee lounge tickets with her. That was last thing in the day though. The talk was first. I might smoosh data together in my telling of it, if she said it all.
She said she’s very shy. It’s different being an actor, you go up and it’s someone else on screen, but just being herself she’s shy.
She says usually she’s looking after her kid, but sometimes she goes and does acting. One off roles that take a couple of weeks and then are all done. When she heard about Jabe she heard she was like a princess so she thought she would get to be pretty and wear a pretty dress and have like a holiday for a couple of weeks.
So she gets in and they do the makeup for the first time. And she didn’t know what prosthetics were, but then she had a whole cast of her head done and they put the big tree crown on and put pieces on her face and hands to alter the texture. And the first time they finished the makeup they were like “Tada!” and she was like “Ack!” and, er, it wasn’t so much pretty. She got them to change it just a little bit. But the makeup took like 5 hours to do and was not easy.
The dress was pretty. Very structured, and with big tall high heels.
She then had to wear it for two weeks solid. She said by the end of filming it *reeked*. She was just trying to keep her arms tucked in tight and make sure if she went in a car the windows were open.
(Ah, the glamour of acting!)
She got to keep the cast of her head. She said it’s weird because she’d expect herself to be bigger.
She’s very short, so she’s always in the high heels and then they call for a box. Says she should just get some stilts.
Had never figured that after drama school she’d ever play a tree. But she could connect to other aspects of the character.
She said before the filming she got called in to talk over the scenes and see if she had the right idea about them. So when she’s with the Doctor and she knows what happened to his people she was thinking this was like she’d just found out he was an Auschwitz survivor.
She never expected all this stuff that surrounds Doctor Who. She never thought she’d be doing signings. She says after the first fifty times you sign your name you start to forget what it is.
She was really surprised that she got to be on the covers of stuff.
She mentioned Torchwood and how it looked gruesome and how in the police station bit they had photos up of the ‘corpses’ and there was all that blood and it looked really real.
The coffee lounge bit had talking in it and was cool. It didn’t have me talking in it, which could possibly have been considered the point. I’m sure I had thoughts that morning. Things I could say and could ask and that. But by the evening? The trouble with me when I get tired is everything gets equally interesting. The person I’m going to get one chance to talk to is then competing for attention with the pattern from the carpet and the shiny off the arms of the chairs and every random thought that crosses my mind. I had to drag my train of thought back on track and pin my attention to the outside world about once a minute. Very frustrating. But I was there and I was paying attention with as much brain as I had left and it was indeed cool.
I just… couldn’t make words. When there was signing autographs at the end I got as far as “Nice meet you.” And then I *facepalm* and mutter “English.”
I’m sure nobody minds but me. But… she just got through saying how intelligent fan letters can be. They really pay attention and mention specifics of a performance. It’s like getting letters from other actors, she said.
I’m… not sounding like one of them smart fans.
And it’s really unfair cause I actually study DW & TW for college and have big thinking about it. Just… not today.
*sigh*
There were only like half a dozen people in the room for the coffee bit. It was pretty cool. I don’t know why more people don’t want to do that.
Possibly for the same reason whenever I tell people I met the lady that played the tree in DW and I sound all enthusiastic people look at me funny.
*sigh some more*
So, anyway, that was the end of Saturday. For me. There were other things going on, there was a dinner and a cabaret and stuff, but I just couldn’t track the world by then. I needed some serious sitting in the dark with the duvet over my head. I was hoping for sleep but there wasn’t a whole lot of that this weekend. Too wound up. Very annoying.
So then it got to be time for the auction and then the disco.
I went to the auction. I meant to skip it and save testing my willpower, but then I was all awake and dressed and stuff, so.
Signed script for like £1800. Woah.
But I found myself thankfully mostly untempted. There’s a whole lot of DW related Stuff in the world. But there’s not a whole lot of room in my house for said Stuff, so I didn’t attempt the raffle for the standees or to buy the Really Big Dalek Poster or to acquire second signed copies of books or anything.
The disco was… well, I had fun. I went in there with a having-fun mind and fun was had. I was the first one on the dance floor if you don’t count the guy with the invisible wheelchair. They played the songs from the last eps of DW season 3. I like the drums one. They also played the YMCA – I think three times – and the Timewarp – the godawful dance version you can’t actually dance to. And Cliff Richards’ Summer Holiday. That one cleared the dancefloor instantly. But there had been quite a bunch of people on there. Specially when “Dancing Queen” was on, floor was packed.
… I probably shouldn’t admit some of the stuff I danced to if I want to keep any cool points.
… I was at a Doctor Who convention. I think cool points are somewhat irrelevant.
I had fun though. Even though the dancefloor was tiny and there was lots of bumping into people and some guy sort of grabbed me but not in any bad places just I always have to consciously avoid hitting people when they do that. And I did dancing with, in that there was a circle of people including me. And there was the “I get knocked down, I get up again” song so I retain my unbroken record of dancing it at every con I’ve been to. (I used to faint and stuff, and at one point it was the only song I managed to dance to. These days, doing much better.)
So, aside from the thing where I could have run better music off my laptop, that was fun.
Then it was two in the morning and they were in the middle of Bohemian Rhapsody and they just stopped the music.
Middle of song!
Just getting to the hair flying bit!
So naturally by that point there’s a bunch of guys on the dancefloor doing air guitar and singing along, and they didn’t feel the need to stop just because the music did.
I think somebody somewhere has video of most of this.
… if I end up on YouTube… *shudders*
Mind you, I think there were points where I was both youngest and thinnest person dancing, so that part is good for the ego.
I like dancing. There’s shiny lights and lots of music and if you can’t string a thought together it’s completely irrelevant. And also by then everyone else is too drunk to think either, so that works out.
Then there was sleep. Because Sunday was the day of GDL, and coffee lounge tickets were likely to sell quite fast.
I got up at 0730.
I got to the breakfast room.
I picked up a potato based breakfast product, managed one bite, and decided breakfast just wasn’t going to happen.
Wrapped some bread, grabbed another box of cereal, and went to stand in a line.
I was not the first one there, despite the fact the desk didn’t open until 0800. I think I was the 12th or something.
*waves hello to other GDL fans*
And yes, we were all there for the same tickets.
0800 and the 15 of us in the q sold out the GDL coffee lounge. Thought so. So it was cool, I got up early and got the ticket I wanted.
… y’all know the punchline to this one already.
The rest of the morning was supposed to be GDL: photo, coffee, on stage talk.
Instead it was the saga of Waiting for GDL to not turn up. Which involved a line for the photo, actually having the coffee without him, and in my case skipping the video that replaced the on stage talk.
I could have been annoyed about that. But I wasn’t. I don’t know why. I was just having a fun weekend and quite happy to sort of bounce along having things not work out. Well, I say happy, I always get in a bit of a flap about Things Changing, and it’s annoying when the only data available is Maybe Later, because you can’t just say sod it and wander off. Well, you can, I did, but there’s always the vague possibility of Things Changing Again when you’re not looking.
When I got home and told my mum about it she was all “Grr, false advertising, not on!” But I totally don’t blame the organisers. I don’t actually blame GDL, though a phone call at some point might have been nice. It’s not like anyone actually planned for half of Britain to be flooded and traffic to be a nightmare and all that. And yeah, I know about those photos and the JM thing. Even so. Stuff happens, sometimes at the last minute, and things don’t work out.
… okay, I could totally be less zen and more grrr, but where’s the fun? Less stress. I let it go.
The way the morning actually worked out was made of win, from my perspective.
Matt Rippy.
And, on stage, Murray Melvin, who played Bilis and had interesting things to say, but from where I was sitting?
Matt Rippy. Captain Jack Harkness, original 1941 version. Incredibly cute guy.
Coffee lounge. Seat on my right.
:-D
So, the part where he was talking on stage I was only sort of there for. To start with I was standing in a line waiting for GDL, and then I was popping back down to see where the line went. So I saw bits and not other bits.
He was asked what it was like kissing JB. He said he could see why you’d want to know, but he doesn’t kiss and tell.
They didn’t discuss or practice the kiss in advance. They could have talked about it, asked which way they go, that kind of thing, but they wanted it to be fresh. So they didn’t talk or practice, they just went for the kiss.
And after the first time they did that, big silence. All the extra people and everyone, all big silence.
MM said something like, that was because they were in awe. That moment worked just so well, everyone was silent because it worked.
They both had stuff to say about the clothes, how they were more structured and stuff, and the hair, all slicked back. Which is how MM has always worn his.
… I’m sure they said more and I don’t remember it. I maybe remember it bundled with the coffee thing? I don’t know.
I do remember after that talk going back down and finding GDL was Still Not There. So everyone with a coffee club ticket was hanging around in various stages of Not Amused. Said we should have the coffee anyway. So we did. Well, not me, because I don’t eat and I only drink lucozade, but I sat in a room full of people and thought sociable thoughts.
More usefully, I also nipped out for a photo with Matt Rippy. Who is cute. He asked my name and I said “Becca” and didn’t even stutter.
… This to me is an achievement worth recording. I stutter my name more often than anything. Is most frustrating.
So, anyways, had photo! Have photo now. Pretty photo. I’m actually smiling so it shows on the outside. Clearly I was having a good day.
Then I stayed for the coffee lounge.
He said a bunch of things. I’m sure. However as I recounted the important bits to mum it was more “He took his jumper off. And rolled up his sleeves. And had a button undone on his shirt.”
… I’m a visual sort of person.
*shuffles a bit and changes the subject swiftly*
He had much to say about work he’s been in. He was in the Reduced Shakespeare Company. He explained what they’re about, how they started out doing quick versions of Shakespeare at Ren Faires in the US and then came over to the UK and realized they had way more time to fill than show to do so they decided to do all Shakespeare plays in like ninety minutes. He said he usually played the women. He does the website for them now, I think he said. (Yup, I just looked it up. Found a page for him as a website developer.)
He talked about when he tried doing tap dance and he turned out to not be good at it, but the teacher said that what the audience notices is what’s going on with *does a little mime with face and hands* (so, expression and gesture and stuff), and he really took that to heart because he could do that bit. So everyone else was technically better than him, but people from the audience were saying how good he was because he was being all *does the hands again*.
He’s just been in Day of the Dead, zombie movie remake. I forgot who he said he plays, but he said it’s very different casting him than the person in the original. I know little about zombie movies so most of what he had to say fell out my head due to lack of context to stick it to. He says they’re fast zombies, filmed with the film going slow so they’re all sped up, like 28 Days Later. He said they had a guy in to do movement coaching, the guy who did the apes in Planet of the Apes? So they’re fast zombies that move weird, and there’re lots of them, and they’re very scary.
He did a lot of research for Captain Jack Harkness, lots of looking up old photos and finding little things about how they held themselves and how they moved. He noticed the way they held a cigarette, so it was cupped in their hand, which makes sense on an airfield or somewhere windy, to keep it alight. I liked watching him explain this bit because he was serious about it and demonstrated with his hands. I just liked how he had thought about it and picked up little things and seemed really interested in it. I mean, that would be why he’s an actor, but it’s neat watching people talk about the stuff they’re into.
… I explain poorly and move on.
He mentioned the director for CJH would give notes in a way that never added up to “that was wrong” but was more “okay, now we’ve got that, let’s try something different.” He was a very calm guy, never got flustered, which sets the tone for everyone else to stay calm to. When he was giving notes he’d tell them quietly, so only the actor he was talking to knew what he’d said. That way the other actor had to watch for the changes, and they’d stay involved, engaged in the scene.
He said that any time he’s not sure what to do in a scene he’ll look in the other actor’s eyes. Usually the answer is there, in what the other actor is doing. And if it isn’t the audience will still be all “huh, what’s going on with those two?” Because they’ve got Eyes going on.
Then there were autographs (I only got the two from the coffee things, I didn’t do all that getting up and standing in lines for the others. It was cool enough seeing people do talks.)
And then my morning was all done.
Again with the hiding in my room, but in a happy way now.
(I am vaguely amused that I was hiding instead of watching the Hyde Fundraisers.) (I’m easily amused.)
Sunday afternoon, started with Romana. Not Romanas though because of the weather. Mary Tamm.
Is my second favourite Romana, but since Romana is among my very favourite characters that works out.
She said how she’s started out being told that Romana would be the Doctor’s equal, but by the end of the season she’d gone back to screaming and falling and needing things explained and such. She said there didn’t seem to be anywhere much for the character to go after that. So she left. But they wouldn’t believe she was leaving, so they didn’t write a regeneration scene. Right up until she left they reckoned they could get her back. (She said particular person name but I don’t recall it.) They were sitting at lunch one day and the someone said again that she’d be back and she had really had enough of being told that and Lalla was also there at lunch so MT said “Lalla could do it.” And then she could see the think wheels turning as the idea took.
There were also interesting funny stories. I can remember being amused. Possibly it was the story with the flashing, and the one with the wrong bedroom. If I could remember them better I could amuse the internets.
Then I had another break in my room.
(Yes, this many breaks are a necessary part of my day. It’s really rather annoying.)
Then it was Louise Jameson and Clare Clifford.
Leela. :-D
The interviewer said he’d had a poster on his wall of her with the knife in that costume.
She said she’d never expected the whole ‘sex symbol’ thing. She just thought she was going on a kids TV show and the costume was perfectly logical for a savage. But of course it was on right after the football results and people kept watching.
She was asked what it was like replacing a popular companion (a bit like Martha replaced Rose). She said she got such nice fanmail she was really pleased. But then there was a mixup with the mail and she got fanmail meant for Sarah Jane and it was all “come back, the new girl’s useless!” And that was a bit of an eye opener.
Like reviews for plays. One time she got the best comments any actor could hope for, and the worst most horrible comments ever, and it was for the exact same performance of the exact same play.
She demonstrated how there’s only so many ways you can say “Doctor, what is it?” This was a factor in leaving.
Her favourite story was one where she got away from the Doctor for a bit and got to actually do stuff.
They were both asked to describe their Doctor in one word. CC was with 5 and she said “Charming”. LJ (4, obviously) said several words sprang to mind, but she ended up with “Challenging.”
One of the words was ‘eccentric’. She said he’s very smart, very well read, very… I forget her phrasing, but I think he talked about a lot of different things a lot. And that can be hard to be around all the time. But they get on very well now.
I know CC talked as well. I guess my attention was a bit rationed :-/
I think she said that when they go in the TARDIS in Earthshock is the first time someone says “bigger on the inside” about it.
There were more stories about work that was not Doctor Who. And about playing darts. And stuff.
Memory is tricksy.
At the end they were asked to describe fans and conventions in one word.
LJ thinks and says “Challenging” :-)
So of course CC says “Charming”
… *has paranoia I’ve got the words wrong and hence squished the funny* …
So anyways, that was the end of that talk, and that was the end of Sunday. There was saying thankyous, and then it was all done.
Some more talking in the bar after, but mostly people were going home.
My going home took all of Monday, 9-5. And that was with using my shiny new mobile phone to have a taxi waiting at the station when the train got in. Well, actually in the station car park in a minor traffic jam attempting to reach the taxi rank, but basically as a plan it worked. The get on the train plan only kind of worked. I asked for help at stations but did not in fact get any. I’m irritated about that. They assigned someone but he didn’t turn up when he said he would. And then there was a train and it said Norwich and it was supposed to go to Norwich but by the time it got to Ely it decided to just stop there instead. Ely was not having a good day. You could hear it in the announcer’s voice. He was all “Would passengers for Norwich please stay on platform three.” People were standing around and it was a whole train’s worth of people and, well, we were Not Amused. Except the plural people who were reading Harry Potter, who I got the general impression may not have minded much where they were. But then there was getting the train and being squished into seats with our luggage because the racks were full and, well, big annoyance. But I got home eventually, which is better going than much of the country. And I had a nice chat with the taxi driver on the way home. He was one of the guys that drove me to college for a couple of years so he was wondering how I’d been. I like using the same taxi company, I don’t have to explain how to get to my house and they know it’s me when I phone up.
… that last paragraph I’m sure fascinated you all.
Okay, impressions of Bad Wolf: Different. Smaller. Less parties. I’d definitely take my laptop again because there’s a lot of time in my room I could be watching episodes. Though I’m sure if I could have been awake and gone to the Saturday evening entertainment it would have been entertaining. For me to get there, quite far away. But, despite the extra challenges and the guest cancellations, I had fun. I’d happily go again if there were Torchwood guests again. Especially if they turn up next time.
… now I want to go to a Wolf or Starfury con to see all them people and have a big party again. Meeting new people is *difficult*.
But still, definitely fun.
Anyone that was also at the con and has anything to add or correct or point and laugh at, feel free to do so in comments.
Also, anyone that has photos and/or video of me… er, hopefully the video will never hit the net, but if you think there’s me in a photo that would be cool to see. I lack camera these days and have no such record. I’m in the black and red hair and matching jacket, usually with a Torchwood t-shirt.
*waves bye-bye to theoretical this-item-only readers*
/ con report
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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Date: 2007-07-26 11:31 pm (UTC)Anne, I so need a sonic screwdriver
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Date: 2007-07-26 11:42 pm (UTC)I have three sonic screwdriver pens of various sorts and one mini torch. I like the torch best.
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Date: 2007-07-27 02:37 am (UTC)Anne, that's my excuse and I'm sticking to it
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Date: 2007-07-27 11:53 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-27 01:03 pm (UTC)I found another version at ThinkGeek - it has a pen, an invisible UV ink pen, and a blacklight. I may have to buy both of them. You can't be too prepared for Daleks, right?
I feel very old - we used tire pressure gauges for our sonic screwdrivers, back in the day...
I still have the maroon corduroy jacket of many pockets in the back of my closet and my Andy Panda overalls in a box someplace. I gave Daria the scarf and hat, back when she was still going to Who-cons. The costumes I made for fandom...
Peter Davison is still my favorite Doctor, though. Not allowed to touch girls, hee.
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Date: 2007-07-27 02:42 pm (UTC)The guy with the invisible wheelchair on the dance floor is a hoot!
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Date: 2007-07-27 02:46 pm (UTC)it's not that it always works, the having fun mind, but when it does it's very useful.
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Date: 2007-07-28 08:03 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-07-28 10:48 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-08-03 04:40 am (UTC)Yep he's a doctor in it, I can't say more as it's spoilery. It's a remake of the old Romero film of the same name. If you love zombies you know who I mean.
http://imdb.com/title/tt0489018/
More info on it. It's currently in post-production...so hopefully coming to theatres soon after that.