Geek Syndicate Issue 7 | Page 88

Geek Syndicate
Image © BBC Worldwide With Colin Baker for The Two Doctors in 1985. Jamie worked well with the Sixth Doctor and Big Finish returned to this idea for several audio adventures.

“Frazer, you sounded like Patrick Troughton then!” and I said “well when I do conventions I always talk about Patrick...” “Just do that first scene again but do it as Patrick with Jamie”. So I did and they asked me to carry on like that. I only get paid as Jamie for Big Finish but I do Patrick for love because that’s my little homage, that’s keeping his memory alive for the fans, rather than just say “now come along Jamie, let’s do this” I’d go: *adopts Patrick voice* “now come along Jamie, let’s do this” with the sort of stuttering. The last one I did was with Michael Troughton and I thought “God it’s like doing an impersonation of your father in front you, and he’s gonna go “that’s nothing like him” but god bless him we did a long scene together, I was in my booth, he was in his booth and he said “Frazer there were a couple of lines you said, I got goose
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bumps all down my neck because it just sounded like my Dad” so that was great, lovely for me to hear from Michael Troughton. GS: In terms of you mentioned before about the different types of reactions or the different types of conventions and you were saying about the British ones seem a bit more relaxed. You’ve obviously been travelling around the world with Doctor Who. Tell us about some of the experiences you’ve had. FH: Through the programme I did forty years ago, I’ve seen most of Australia; Perth, Darwin, Melbourne, Sydney, Hobart. I’ve seen most of America as well, and the American conventions, particularly Gallifrey which is in Los Angeles with about three and a half thousand people, all walking around in costumes, they tend to leave you alone. You can walk through “Hello Frazer!” and then they’ll all come and see your panel and come for autographs but they’re all friendly.

In America there’s probably bigger fandom, but then again America is a bigger place. The fans here are lovely people, you walk through, you’re not going to be pounced on, they know you’re there having a ten minute break “he’s having a glass of wine, leave him alone”. They’re lovely. GS: Why do you think the Who fans are so passionate about a show that’s been going for so many years? FH: People keep asking what is it about Doctor Who, and it’s the fans, the fans have kept it alive, when it took off the fans kept it going, and then Big Finish kept it going with all their stuff. The BBC saw Big Finish were doing rather well and thought let’s bring it back. But I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s the Britishness of the show. People used to say the sets were wobbly and no our sets were never wobbly, what our set designers