Hello everyone! 🙂
Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!
Here we are on the last ‘Myth Makers’ DVD that I had for my birthday this year! I’ve seen ‘The Doctors: The Sylvester McCoy Years’! This is an intriguing DVD. Unlike the William Hartnell, Patrick Troughton and Tom Baker ‘Myth Makers’ DVDs where it featured Doctors and companion interviews; this DVD has interviews with the Seventh Doctor, companions and certain guest stars. 😀
Like before though, ‘The Sylvester McCoy Years’ DVD contains six features as well as an introduction at the beginning that covers the Sylvester McCoy era of ‘Doctor Who’ in general. There are interviews with Sylvester McCoy himself, Sophie Aldred, Lisa Bowerman, Angela Bruce, Jessica Martin and script editor Andrew Cartmell. Wish there were interviews with the Big Finish companions.
The introduction is given by producer Keith Barnfather and…Sophie Aldred! It was nice to see Sophie providing the introduction along with Keith Barnfather and she happens to have an active part in this ‘Myth Makers’ DVD for the Sylvester McCoy era. As well as having her own ‘Myth Makers’ interview, Sophie conducts two other ‘Myth Makers’ interviews and she’s also the production assistant on one.
First up on the DVD, we have a feature with Sylvester McCoy where he’s interviewed by Nicholas Briggs (voice of the Daleks) and the production assistant happens to be Sophie Aldred. It was fun to watch Sylvester’s ‘Myth Makers’ interview with Nick Briggs as they were walking on the locations of ‘Battlefield’ and it was mostly filmed in one shot. 😀 Nicholas Courtney guest stars at the end too. 😀
I’ve met Sylvester at a number of conventions over the years and have enjoyed meeting him. It’s amazing to think that Sylvester has done so much since he recorded his ‘Myth Makers’ interview in the 1990s. As well as doing Big Finish audios of ‘Doctor Who’, Sylvester has played Radagast the Brown in ‘The Hobbit’ film trilogy. I liked it when Sophie showed the end credits on some cardboard.
Next is a feature with Sophie Aldred where she’s interviewed by Nick Briggs. I’m very fond of Sophie and she’s great to meet at conventions. Like Sarah Sutton, I’ve become good friends with Sophie and she’s even done a 4th anniversary sketch of ‘Bradley’s Basement’ for my ‘A Life of Crime’ review. I like how her interview was conducted in her ‘Myth Makers’. She drove Nick around in a convertible.
It was also nice to see Sophie sharing her early life with Nick as they drove around visiting places in London such as her early home and the school she went to. This interview was of course recorded not long after her time in ‘Doctor Who’ during the 1990s. It was fun to see Sophie being so energetic and enthusiastic in her interview and she even brought along her cuddly childhood friend Big Ted. 😀
After that is a feature with Lisa Bowerman, who played Karra in the ‘Doctor Who’ story ‘Survival’ and Bernice Summerfield in the Big Finish audios. For her ‘Myth Makers’, Lisa is interviewed by Robert Dick, who I’ve seen at conventions. I’ve had the pleasure of meeting Lisa Bowerman at conventions and she’s easy to talk to and get along with. She even remembered me in Birmingham! 😀
I like how Lisa’s ‘Myth Makers’ was conducted as we first go through the history of Bernice Summerfield in the ‘Doctor Who’ books and how she became involved in the audios. As well as talking about Lisa playing Benny, there’s also talk on Lisa’s work as a director in the Big Finish audios. There’s also a look into her theatre life as well as her TV work in ‘Casualty’ and of course ‘Survival’. 🙂
Going back to what I said about me wishing there were interviews with the Big Finish companions, these include people like Philip Olivier who played Hex, Beth Chalmers who played Raine, Travis Oliver who played Chris and Yasmin Bannerman who played Roz. It would’ve been nice to stretch out Sylvester’s ‘Myth Makers’ DVD by having interviews with those people. But then, this is a focus on the TV show.
After the Disc 1 interviews of the Sylvester McCoy DVD, we move to Disc 2 where we have a feature on Angela Bruce, who played Brigadier Bambera in ‘Battlefield’ as well as the audio story ‘Animal’. Angela gets interviewed by Sophie Aldred and they get to go about the locations of ‘Battlefield’. I enjoyed Sophie and Angela reuniting with each other here and they clearly get on well in real-life. 😀
I like how Angela’s ‘Myth Makers’ explores her early life, especially in terms of how she started getting into acting and being involved in a musical. It was fun to hear Angela share her memories of working on ‘Battlefield’; how she enjoyed doing the convention circuit and getting involved with Brigadier Bambera again in the Big Finish story ‘Animal’. I think there should be more Bambera tales.
Next up is a feature with Jessica Martin, who played Mags in ‘The Greatest Show In The Galaxy’ and recently with Sylvester McCoy in some Big Finish audios. Jessica Martin gets interviewed by Sophie Aldred at ‘The Capitol’ convention at the Arora Hotel in Gatwick, May 2016, I believe. Oh I miss going to conventions like ‘The Capitol’, which I attended back in May 2017. It was nice to see that in this. 🙂
I enjoyed Jessica Martin’s ‘Myth Makers’. Not knowing much about her, it was intriguing to hear her fascination with classic movies and how she did art drawings when she was a young girl. It was also intriguing to hear her voice impressionist skills, her singing and her memories of doing ‘The Greatest Show In The Galaxy’. It was also really amazing to hear that Jessica had recently done a graphic novel.
And the final feature of the Sylvester McCoy ‘Myth Makers’ DVD is with script editor Andrew Cartmel, who gets interviewed by Nick Briggs. I enjoyed Andrew’s ‘Myth Makers’ which was made in 2002. I’ve met Andrew twice at conventions including the ‘Time Warp’ event in Weston-super-Mare, July 2014 and ‘Pandorica 2014’ in Bristol, September 2014. I’ve found him a rather great guy to meet.
It was interesting to hear Andrew share his insights on being a script editor in ‘Doctor Who’ during Sylvester’s era and how challenging the role was. He also shares his other writing credits, which include things outside of ‘Doctor Who’ as well as inside. Andrew’s ‘Virgin New Adventures’ novels get touched upon as well as his comic stories and the Big Finish audio called ‘Winter For The Adept’.
‘The Doctors: The Sylvester McCoy Years’ DVD has been great to watch as well as the other ‘Myth Makers’ DVDs I’ve seen and reviewed recently. I’m sad that I’ve finished watching all the ‘Myth Makers’ compilation DVDs I’ve had for my birthday, but they’ve been great in getting to know the ‘Doctor Who’ stars that I’ve met and haven’t met more. I hope I’ll get to see more of these DVDs. 🙂
I’m looking forward to checking out ‘The Doctors: The Peter Davison Years’ when it comes out on DVD next!
Thanks for reading!
Bye for now!
Tim. 🙂
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