Simon Guerrier tells some Home Truths

(10/12/2008)
House Proud
How long does it take to write a Doctor Who audio? Simon Guerrier, author of the Companion Chronicle Home Truths, checks his diaries…

Tuesday 11 December 2007, about 09.00
I’m wending my way through Notting Hill on the 52 bus, off to a freelance job writing a sticker book, when I bump into Nigel Fairs. He’s off to Big Finish’s usual studios and we gossip about what we’re both up to. The Wake is finished so my duties on Benny are over. I’ve got to type up my notes on How The Doctor Changed My Life, but otherwise I’m not doing much. Ever tactful, Nigel says we should work on something again soon.

Wednesday 12 December, 15.36
An email from David Richardson. Nigel has suggested me for something they’re planning, “a 5th Doctor mini-series that is a sequel to the Key to Time series, for release in 2009”. Can I come along to “a preliminary writers’ meeting for either the morning of Wednesday 19 or the afternoon of Wednesday 20,” at Jason Haigh-Ellery’s swanky club in London? No, I can’t – I’m still writing a sticker book. “You’re fired,” says David.

Thursday 13 December, 20:20
“How busy are you in the early months of 2008?” asks David Richardson. “Besides the Key 2 Time... I'm gonna be producing the third series of Companion Chronicles, and wondered if you'd be interested in writing one...”.

Tuesday 18 December, after 18.30
The preliminary writers’ meeting. We drink posh drinks in posh surroundings and discuss the bare bones of Key 2 Time. I meet David Richardson in the flesh for the first time and beg to be allowed to write for Sara Kingdom. I’ve got this wheeze for the framing sequence, of an older Sara recalling her adventures with the Doctor even though she died as a young woman. David says he’d like a historical story – or at least something very different from the sci-fi adventures Sara enjoyed onscreen.

Wednesday 19 December, 13.55
I send round my first outline for what will one day be The Judgment of Isskar. Some things survive to the final version – the fifth Doctor, the Key to Time, the last scene of part four. Everything else – new companions called Mary and Angie, the return of an old friend of the Doctor’s, a fake London of 2009 – gets binned over the next few weeks.

Wednesday 24 December, some time in the afternoon
I make my first notes on the Sara Kingdom story, in which the TARDIS visits a spooky family home at Christmas. The gist of the final story is there in the outline. I’m stealing the second character – who I’ll later name after my friend Robert Dick – from the Superman comic strip “For Tomorrow”.

Sunday 30 December, 18.21
I send David a rough 500-word outline for “The House of Pleasure”, “a science-fiction twist on a haunted house story, perhaps with a Christmas flavour like the BBC’s old MR James adaptations.” David is pleased, wants it “to drip with that black and white TV feeling” but worries the title sounds rude. I suggest “Home Comforts” and “House Proud” while he contacts Jean Marsh’s agent.

Thursday 3 January 2008, 12.17
“HOOOOOOOOOOORAY!” says David’s email. Jean Marsh has agreed to reprise Sara Kingdom. I resend my outline to David for passing to Big Finish script editor Alan Barnes. I explain that “I've changed it from House of Pleasure to House of Judgment, which is also the name of a prose poem by Oscar Wilde. Which, of course, I knew beforehand.”

Friday 4 January, 18.42
“Cute,” says Alan, and points out that “Stephen” should be spelled with a “v”. Whoops. He also says: “It's a spooky house at Christmas. The Chimes of Midnight is probably the single most highly regarded BF production. It's kind of cornered the market in spooky houses at Christmas. I think it'd be more interesting to make it a crazy space house, in an abandoned futuristic Ideal Home exhibition or something.”

Sunday 6 January, 11.50
I send Alan and David a 1,200-word outline for “The House of Judgment”, this time detailing the progression of events in the story. Alan suggests we call it “Dream Home”. He also feels that once Sara knows what’s happening it ends too quickly. “My instinct would be to go for a realisation-ordeal-resolution sort of thing, where Sara realises what's going on but something gets in the way.”

Monday 7 January, 10.38
I send David a revised outline, now called “Home Truths”. David reminds me it needs to be in two episodes, so I add a cliffhanger. We get back to discussing my Key 2 Time outline: whether I can use the Ice Warriors and whether new companions Eve and Janus should both travel with the Doctor in part one.

That script becomes the priority for the next few months. Then David wants me writing a completely different Companion Chronicle linking to the Key 2 Time. Zara (formerly Janus) will share a cell with Ace in The Prisoners’ Dilemma.

17 April, 12.32
The synopsis for Home Truths has been approved by the estate of Terry Nation – who created Sara Kingdom. The BBC approves it too, with a couple of minor changes.
A week later, we record all three Key 2 Time plays. In May, I’m busy writing – and rewriting – The Prisoners’ Dilemma and then the first draft of Home Truths.

Monday 2 June, 10.24
I send David the first draft of Home Truths. I check Lisa Bowerman is directing the story because I’ve an idea for part two…

Thursday 5 June, 14.50
Jacqueline Rayner provides some additional comments on the script – “structurally it seems fine, they're mainly small niggles”. I make these changes that afternoon and also suggest that, as per Doctor Who of the time, the story should have individual episode titles. I suggest “The Dream House” for part one followed by “Home Truths”. David stares at me strangely.

Wednesday 11 June, 10.55
The BBC approves the script. David has to book it into studio and we need to cast someone to play Robert.

Monday 16 June, all day
Recording of The Prisoners’ Dilemma. I go along, get in the way and talk to Lisa Bowerman about the feel of Home Truths. She listens with heroic patience.

Thursday 19 June, 10.25
I answer David’s questions about my two Companion Chronicles for a forthcoming feature in Doctor Who Magazine.

Tuesday 3 July, 11.54
I provide David with blurbs and liner notes for both Companion Chronicles. I mention that, with Home Truths, Sara has been in more Doctor Who episodes than Captain Jack Harkness. David cuts that bit.

Monday 7 July, 14.59
David tells me Home Truths will be recorded on 8 September, since Jean Marsh is in a play until then. I check my diary. Drat! I’ll be in Seville.

Friday 18 July, 18.33
I enthuse to David and Simon Holub about the cover for Home Truths, which has been put up on the Big Finish website. Simon sends me a large version of the artwork. Hooray!

Monday 8 September, 12.44 (local time)
I text David to see how the recording is going, while stood in front of the cathedral glimpsed in The Two Doctors. Then I have an ice cream.

Saturday 18 October, 15.43
Paul Wilson, who runs the Big Finish website, kindly provides me with a download of Home Truths, which has gone off to be pressed. I’m meant to be doing my tax return. Instead I am grinning and giggling. Cor, it’s so much better than I’d hoped. I send an email to David Darlington thanking him for the impressive sound design. Only it wasn’t him who did it.

Wednesday 12 November
The huddled masses are able to download Home Truths from the Big Finish website and the CDs are posted out.

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Dark Shadows Reborn

(15/08/2008)

By Stuart Manning

April 17:

It’s a Big Finish strategy meeting.  MD Jason Haigh-Ellery announces he has a plan – he always has a plan.  With the logistics of gathering the Dark Shadows cast for our second series of releases proving especially complicated this summer, we’re now unlikely to record until the end of the year.  So, what do I think about us recording some more straightforward dramatic readings to bridge the gap? 

It’s a good idea, and coincidence is on our side, as LA-based actress Kathryn Leigh Scott (Maggie Evans) is going to be in London for a month in May.  Taking a leaf from the Doctor Who Companion Chronicles, I suggest we use a second reader.  Any ideas?  Well, actually...

“What about Alec Newman?” I suggest innocently, pretending to sound casual.  I’m not, of course.  My brain’s whirring away – it has to be Alec Newman!  For the uninitiated, Alec played vampire Barnabas Collins in the 2004 Dark Shadows pilot produced by Warner Bros, and gave a fantastic performance.  Ever since seeing it, I’ve been trying to think of a way we could involve him in the Big Finish range, and as we’ll be recording in London, maybe this could be it.


April 18:

David Richardson, Big Finish’s line producer emails.  Alec’s interested, subject to seeing some script pages.  Yikes!  David’s not one to waste time.  Unfortunately, I am, so I spend the weekend fretting as I fail to come up with a story.  Do we have him play Barnabas?  Do we go with a completely new character?  Eventually, I decide we’ll do both – what we need is something that has all the essential qualities of Barnabas, but is a unique personality linked closely with Maggie Evans.  Listeners will get a taste of what Alec’s Barnabas might have been, within the context of a new story.  So no tall order there, then.


April 21:

So, how will this become a story?  Well, if we’re using a two-person format, it’s a spooky voice talking to Maggie, I reason... A voice whispering away inside her head, trying to scare her.  And one that might adopt any number of guises.  Of course, that’s not really a story, but it’s enough for me to write a few pages of dialogue and email them off. 

I also want to explore Maggie’s time at the Windcliff asylum.  There’s a pivotal period on the original show, where Maggie’s trying to recover from her ordeal with Barnabas Collins, and I think there’s some mileage to be had there.  We can really explore the psychology of being a vampire’s victim, and discover what happened to Maggie in that month or so she spent off-screen.  All we need now is for Alec to say yes.


April 23:

And he does!  For a moment I’m in total shock, before it sinks in that I need to have two scripts ready within the next two weeks.  So, half-enthused, half-panicking, I set to work writing.  It’s the usual mixture of inspiration, dead ends and frustration, but I’m generally pleased with how it’s going.  After a few late nights spent with the phantom voice in Maggie’s head, I begin to think I’m the one being haunted by it. 

I’m currently partway through my work on the second series of Dark Shadows, and I have a problem that’s stumped me for a while.  And one lonely evening, whilst fretting over the resolution of The Ghost Watcher, I realize it’s staring me in the face...  The bit of series two that’s clogging up the story and doesn’t really work – it’s the ending I’m looking for.  Right ending, wrong story.  Problem solved!  It moves from one script to the other and fixes both of them in the process. 


May 1:

It’s all gone wrong.  I’m 10 pages into writing the second script and I’ve hit a wall.  My plan from the first meeting was to have Alec play the same character, but set the stories years apart, around Maggie’s two trips to the Windcliff Asylum in 1966 and 1970.  We’ll explore Maggie’s changing character, and her reaction to a seemingly unchanging supernatural figure stalking her, I think.   On paper, it seems fine, but I soon realize we’re just telling the same story twice.  I try moving bits around and throwing myself curveballs, but it’s hopeless.  So, reluctantly I admit defeat and go back to the drawing board.  The transposed bit of series two is still good, though.  That can stay.

So, new story.  The asylum stay remains as a plot point, but I decide to relocate the action to Maggie’s offscreen return afterwards, and set it largely in the town of Collinsport.  In the series, the action was generally restricted to the Collinwood estate, but here’s a chance to get under the residents’ collective skin and find out what makes a remote fishing village plagued by the supernatural tick.  Fear, mostly, but the resilience and fortitude of the denizens seems well worth exploring. 

But where will Alec fit in?  It makes sense to have him play a new arrival, to give us an outsider’s view of Collinsport, and I remember Kathryn telling me a while back that she’d like to do a more romantic story, which gives me a starting point.  And then I get a flash of an image – all movie poster style – a man in a long coat, walking through a misty night, holding out a hand with a glowing orb in it.  I have no idea who he is or what he’s holding, but I suddenly have enough to start writing again.


May 10:

The scripts are nearly finished, and with bleary eyes, they go off to David to distribute to the cast.  They’re not the two stories I set out to write, but I’m pleased with them.  Clothes of Sand is an abstract, dreamlike tale – later in the studio, Alec describes it as a “waking consciousness” – whereas The Ghost Watcher is a much more linear story, with a wistful edge.  The Ghost Watcher is a very late title change – the scripts go out called The Day of the Dead, which I put in without really thinking, based on one line of dialogue in the pre-titles.  Good title, but there’s no day!  There are some dead, but they’re out only at night.  And Night of the Dead has more than a hint of George A. Romero about it.  So, The Ghost Watcher it is.  Done.


May 15:

Alec calls me to check the arrangements for tomorrow’s recording.  He immediately seems a nice guy, and very enthusiastic, telling me how much he’s looking forward to tomorrow.  “I know a bit about Dark Shadows,” he says conspiratorially.  “Yeah?” I reply.  “I was in a pilot of it,” he confides.  I wonder where this is going.  “I played Barnabas,” he reveals modestly, and I detect more than a little pride.


May 16:

Studio days are always over so quickly.  Pages pile up on the floor as the takes are called and all the things you wished you’d thought to put in the script swim before your eyes with devastating clarity.  But, for once, I’m enjoying the ride.  Both Alec and Kathryn are fantastic, and it’s there, whispering to us in the control room, through the speakers - exactly the voice I heard in my head when I was writing. 

No wonder Maggie’s scared.

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THE HAUNTING OF THOMAS BREWSTER - DIRECTOR'S NOTES

(30/04/2008)
By Barnaby Edwards

Audio directors are often asked what exactly we do: surely it's just a question of assembling the cast in a studio, giving them the script and pressing record? Well, by way of illustration, I thought I'd show you what my duties were on The Haunting of Thomas Brewster:

STORYLINE AND FIRST DRAFT: AUGUST-OCTOBER 2007
Jonathan Morris is asked by Alan Barnes and Nicholas Briggs to suggest a storyline for a Fifth Doctor and Nyssa adventure. He sends in a brief synopsis for a story set in Victorian London. It's at this point that I become involved. Along with Alan and Nick, I read the synopsis and give notes. It's returned to Jonny, who refines the synopsis accordingly. Alan sends the revised storyline to the Doctor Who production office in Cardiff for approval.

The first draft of episode one comes in at the end of September and it's clear we're going to need a good young actor to play the title role. On 26th September I suggest two actors for the role: John Pickard and Sid Mitchell. When the finished script is delivered on 16th October, it becomes apparent that the fresher-voiced John would be perfect for Brewster and the slightly more knowing Sid would be better suited to Pickens. But we also need someone to play the Doctor's new assistant. I ponder this.

Alan, Nick and I give our notes on Draft One and Jonny goes off to write a second draft.

CD COVER: OCTOBER 2007
While Jonny is busy rewriting, I start discussing the cover with our designer Alex Mallinson. We both want something suitably gothic. I send him some picture ideas, including artwork from the films An American Haunting, The Haunted House, The Wolf-Man and The Haunting. Alex reads through Draft One of the script and starts formulating ideas. Alan and I write the blurb for the back cover. Alex sends me a sketch of the pose he wants the actor playing Thomas Brewster to adopt. I file it away for when I'm at the studio.

SECOND DRAFT: NOVEMBER 2007
Jonny's second draft is superb. We have a number of tiny amendments, mainly to do with making some characters more sympathetic and others less so. My main contribution is rather nerdish: the story features Tower Bridge, which I point out wasn't built until 1894. Jonny happily moves it to another London bridge. The retweaked script goes off to Cardiff for approval.

BUDGETING AND SCHEDULING: NOVEMBER 2007
As ever, I won't be able to afford all the actors on both recording days, so I need to work out whom I'll need when. I break the script down into individual scenes and part scenes, so I can arrange which bits I'll be recording on which days. In an ideal world, you'd start with Scene One at the beginning of the first day of recording and work through to the final scene at the close of the second day. Sadly, that's rarely possible on a tight budget, so you have to be more inventive in your scheduling.

The Haunting of Thomas Brewster is without doubt the most technically complex script I've yet directed. Any single scene may need to be recorded up to six times (not counting retakes):

1. Main action: Doctor, Nyssa, Brewster, Lilian and Meg, say.
2. Narration: Brewster narrating what's happening.
3. Ghost: an ethereal voice speaking inside the head of one of the characters.
4. Flashback: a scene from the past we only see in flashback within this scene.
5. Doubling up: one of the actors playing two roles in the same scene, meaning we have to record the whole scene twice (for example, Leslie Ash playing both Lilian and Meg).
6. Background voices: street sellers, hawkers and so on.

Working all this out and fitting it into a two-day recording schedule takes me nearly two weeks.

CASTING: NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2007
Having worked out which characters I need on which day(s), I prepare a shortlist of actors I'd like to play each part (perhaps ten actors per role). Peter, Sarah and the studio have been booked for 13th and 14th December, so the rest of the cast will have to be available for one or other or both of those days. Then begins the lengthy process of phoning agents, making offers, sending out scripts, negotiating fees and so on. I start casting on 26th November, sending Jonny, Alan, Nick and David Richardson regular updates on my progress.

The first actor to confirm is Christian Coulson (Tom Riddle from Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets) as the Doctor's new assistant, Robert McIntosh. I've stayed in touch with Christian since I cast him in The Bride of Peladon. He's such a talented actor and I knew I wanted to work with him again, so this is a great start. Next to confirm is John Pickard (from 2point4children and Hollyoaks) as Thomas Brewster - and the rest fall into place after that until finally the whole thing is cast.

RECORDING: 13-14 DECEMBER 2007
We record in our usual studios from 10am until 6pm, with a break for lunch during which I have to take all the publicity photographs of the actors (these pictures will be used on the cover and in the booklet of the CD, as well as being sent to Doctor Who Magazine and other periodicals). The cast are uniformly excellent and a good time is had by all. Jonathan Morris comes in to hear what we're doing with the script and is able to offer some useful pointers to the actors as to the meaning of words like "kinchin" and "libbege".

CD BOOKLET: JANUARY 2008
Alex Mallinson's superb cover comes in, although we have to replace his moody shot of Tower Bridge with another, more period bridge. My fault entirely: I forgot to mention my historical nicety to him! I write my director's notes for the interior of the booklet and send David Richardson a selection of photographs, together with a cast list. I'm amazed at how many roles Trevor Cooper plays - we must get him again.

POST PRODUCTION: JANUARY-APRIL 2008
Sound designer Simon Robinson and I discuss the feel of the music. I suggest Saint-Saens's Carnival of the Animals, Mussorgsky's Pictures At An Exhibition, Stravinsky's Isle of the Dead, the soundtrack to The Name of the Rose, Philip Glass's music for Dracula and some of John Harle's pieces for A History of Britain. I don't want Simon to copy any of these works, but they're useful as a sort of musical shorthand for the atmosphere I'd like to establish for the story. This is the third story I've done with Simon and I absolutely adore his music, so I'm already excited thinking about what he'll come up with.

On 14th January, Simon sends me the dialogue edit for my approval. This is an assemblage of all the correct takes in the correct order and will be the first time I can listen for real to what I had hitherto only heard in my head. Usually this sounds a bit disappointing because there aren't any effects or music and the voices all sound like they're in a studio booth rather than in a railway tunnel or on a riverbank or wherever. However, this time I'm pleasantly surprised: the story comes across well and the performances are wonderful (Barry McCarthy's Creek is a particular joy). I type up some sound design notes, decide to use a handful of alternative takes on certain lines, make some trims and send it back to Simon to have the effects put on. We talk a lot about pitch bending some of the characters: Leslie Ash's two aunts, Lilian and Meg, are tweaked up and down respectively to make them sound more distinct from each other; Creek is pitched up a teensy bit as well.

On 10th February, Simon starts sending me a version with the sound effects on it. He's done the most spectacular job. Over the next three weeks we tweak and adjust and refine the effects edit. We're in relatively good shape before I have to go away for the whole of March to work on something or other. While I'm away, Simon sets about composing the musical score and e-mails me each episode as it comes out. Simon's music gives the story a wonderful sense of drama and emotional depth and my only note to him is: more!

SIGN OFF: 28 MARCH 2008
Happy with the finished result, I sign off on the project. Nick Briggs wants us to tweak a couple of the TARDIS effects, which takes Simon a few more days. Once that's completed, Simon does the CD mastering and sends the discs off to our duplication facility. That's that. The Haunting of Thomas Brewster has kept me - and many other people - busy for eight months. I hope you enjoy it.

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THE DARK HUSBAND - PRODUCERS NOTES

(20/03/2008)
THE DARK HUSBAND - PRODUCER’S NOTES
By David Richardson

It’s the week before Christmas, and most people are out and about buying their presents. As I arrive at The Moat studios, I’m painfully aware that I’m yet to buy my first gift - there’s just been too much to do. And the world is so busy, in fact, just to get this recording to fit with everyone’s schedules, we’ve had to separate the two recording days - we do half of the story on Tuesday 18th, the rest on Friday 21st. Which is bad news for poor Philip Olivier, who has to travel down from Liverpool and back twice in one week. He doesn’t seem to mind at all, but I can’t help feeling rotten about the fact. And it’s not easy for Sylvester either, who’s in the middle of playing The Fool in a run of King Lear; last night he apparently got to bed at some ridiculous hour, and here we have him working early in the morning, saving the world yet again.

Anyway, here we are on one of the moons of the planet Tuin, in a respite from a centuries old war. Listen to the finished story and you’d think that the studio was buzzing with people, but today it’s a small band of actors: apart from Sylvester, Phil and Sophie, there’s Danny Webb. Oh, and Sophie has brought her sons in too, so while she’s busy being Ace I’m the acting child minder. Not having kids of my own, I wonder briefly how to entertain them; I start singing songs and they think I’ve gone bonkers. They sit quietly, happily painting and doing arts and crafts. They are, quite simply, the best-behaved children I’ve met in my life.

Star attraction for the day (aside from my singing turn) is Danny, back again so soon after playing Byron in The Girl Who Never Was, simply on the basis that a) he can play anything brilliantly, and b) he’s one of the nicest actors in town. We won’t say too much about what he has to do in the story, because that would spoil it, but let’s just say he’s a very physical actor, even on audio. We’d all be entranced as he’d wave his fists in the air, or strike a pose. Philip thought it was fantastic. When I pointed out in the green room that Danny had taken on a new stance, clenching and unclenching his fists while delivering a line, Phil leapt out of his seat and was in the gallery to take a look. We all thought Danny was stunning.

Three days later, and we were back to Tuin. Sophie’s children weren’t around today, but we had gained the considerably naughtier Sean Connolly and Katarina Olsson, who were playing dual roles as The Bards and the Ir Computers. They were great fun, and absolutely threw themselves into their odd roles. We also had a lot of visitors that day: Peter Ware dropped in to cover it in Doctor Who Magazine, and had so much fun he stayed around for the pub in the evening. Grant Kempster, who was designing the CD cover, dropped in to see the story in the making; he did a quick sketch of what he thought it should be. In the end, that sketch became pretty much what you see in the CD centrespread instead.

And Toby, the studio engineer and the unsung hero of the Audio Adventures of Doctor Who, catered in the Christmas spirit. There was a fabulous buffet, endless mince pies and crackers - everyone got into the spirit of the occasion, and you’ll see from the photos that it was quite a party.

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Diary of a Big Finish Producer

(12/03/2008)
Five exciting days in the life of Big Finish’s line producer David Richardson

Thursday February 28
The deadline for Big Finish Magazine 11, which is given away free to our cherished subscribers, is rapidly looming. Nick Briggs has recorded the links to my script, David Darlington has completed post production on the interviews, trailers and features, and he’s sending stuff to me to approve in sections. It’s sounding great so far. Meanwhile just the cover to finish…

Lots still to sort for our Top Secret Doctor Who Project which I’m looking after while Nick concentrates on his one zillion other responsibilities at Big Finish. The three stories for 2009 are recording in April, and I’m organizing auditions for actresses for tomorrow. We’ve got 11 reading for parts, so that means a schedule to draw up, scenes to mail out to agents, and final checks that I haven’t messed up and got someone coming in to read of Character X when she should be reading for Character Z.

The cover proofs for two Doctor Who releases arrive - The Haunting of Thomas Brewster and Skull of Sobek. Both look perfect - a quick call to Key Productions, who dupe all our CDs, and both will start rolling. They should be in very good time for the April release.

Friday February 29
I’m only in the office for the morning, and there’s so much to sort that not everything will get done. I’m going to prioritize. Hurray for prioritizing! First up, some extra names for today’s auditions. The more the merrier - get ‘em booked. Nick’s asked for a small revision to the cover of Assassin in the Limelight, so that goes back to artist Grant Kempster for some tweaks, mainly involving lighting. Talking of covers… we need to finish off the cover for our first Stargate SG-1 release today, but there’s a problem accessing our FTP server. It’s not going to happen. The clock ticks to 12… and I’ve got to go. That’ll have to wait until next week now.

Quick train into the centre of London, and I meet up for a coffee with one of our directors and actor Bryan Pilkington, who is going to be reading the Doctor’s lines at our audition (before rumours start: Bryan is NOT auditioning for the Doctor!). A gulp of latte later and we’re in the audition rooms at the Arts Theatre with our executive producer Jason Haigh-Ellery for the next three-and-a-half hours. I record each of the performances onto a digital recorder; it’s going to be impossible to make a decision now, so we’ll take the sound files away to mull over.

Saturday March 1
I leave home in Bromley and head off to Barking for Invasion, a Doctor Who convention organized by the lovely people at Tenth Planet. This is the first convention I’ve been to in almost 20 years, and I’m impressed by the brilliant organization - those attending get to see star panels and even intimate ‘coffee lounges’ with actors. I’m here with our Marketing Manager John Ainsworth and Website man Paul Wilson, and we run the Big Finish table in the merchandise area. It’s just lovely to meet and talk with the people who buy our CDs - some talk to me about my blog, others tell us about their favourite stories, and congratulate us on the new website. And who’s that on the opposite table? It’s Anneke Wills, signing her autobiography. I pop over and say hello, and it’s my first opportunity to tell her about the plot for her upcoming Companion Chronicles. I was reading the script on the tube coming here, and we hope to record it within six weeks or so. As I describe the story, Anneke’s jaw drops. “That is so bizarre,” she says. “That actually happened in my family.” She’s thrilled.

There’s a strong Big Finish presence here today: Paul McGann has shared the stage with Nick, while Sheridan Smith has popped along for the afternoon to sign autographs. It’s her first convention, and she’s perhaps a little overwhelmed. Paul, John and I record a podcast with her, and it’s great fun. When it’s time for Sheridan to leave to begin signing she exclaims, ‘But I’m enjoying this! We’re having a great chinwag!’. She’s just as loveable as Lucie Miller.

Sunday March 2
Day off. I watch 3.10 to Yuma. Great movie, you should see it.

Monday March 3
I’m working at home today. I’ve got five scripts to read, and they’ll never get looked at if I’m in the office. First up I’ve got the second draft versions of two scripts from our Top Secret Project, which will be released in January to March 2009. It’s recording at the end of next month, so these scripts have to go to Cardiff to be approved by next Monday. Which gives us a week for the director and me to make any notes, and for the writers to amend them. I’ve also got the first and sixth scripts from season three of The Companion Chronicles to read. Emails piling up in the Inbox. The master of the Big Finish Magazine to listen to and approve… The last one will get bumped to tomorrow.

Tuesday March 4
Yay! Access to the Big Finish FTP site, so I’m starting to get the Stargate cover done. It’s taking ages to download. So I’m writing this!

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