Brian Blessed Fern Britton Meets...

After 100 yards, turn right. Go around the roundabout. 4th exit.

Which exit? 4th Exeter. At the end of the road, turn left... I must

have interviewed hundreds of people in my time and very often you are

going to their house or a film set or a TV studio and they send you

detailed directions so you don't get lost. But this has to be a

first. Turn left. Turn right. it is rather surreal. How far to

the next exit? 700 yards!. You have reached your destination. Here we

are, outside the house of my guest today whose voice is as distinctive

as his figure, and whose career has spanned uneventful 50 years.

# Don't stop me now, I'm having such a good time...

Brian Blessed is a man with a greater sense of adventure. He has

been a pioneer of Live TV drama. He has climbed Everest. He has

presented wish shows. I am Brian Blessed. He has flown with Flash

Gordon and paid cats and emperors. -- played. And throughout it all,

Brian has had a fascination with religion. He has met the Dalai Lama,

played Saint Peter and called on divine help when needed. 1 Everest

when an avalanche is coming down in this place and that place, 200 mph

and it is heading for the, I called for God. He is, of course famously

loud. "Gordon's alive!". Brian is a force of nature, if you want

something extreme and mad and poetical, Brian is your man.

will fill any room. But there is a side to him that few know about, a

more reflective Brian Blessed. is a national asset. There should

be railings but around him. We are going to sail to the top this time.

Brian Blessed is one of our best- loved actors and he is a man with a

taste for adventure. We now he has climbed mountains but he is also on

a spiritual quest. -- we know. I have no idea what Turner this

conversation will take. -- what turn.

So, Brian, this is your temple. it is. To your work and you're

doing so. Yes. I have always wanted to have a shared and my wife was

not always that happy about it -- shed, that I didn't want to be in

the house, but quite a lot of men, they want to have that kind of

cubbyhole. I love peace. I love silence. The Boer War is very thick

in his wooden shed -- the Boer War. I can come here and be meditate and

pray and I can read and learn. It is here that I create my projects

and the things I want to do. Brian was born in 1936 and grew up in a

village in South Yorkshire the son of a miner. He was a boy with a

vivid imagination. As a child, I wept at the thought that there were

no dinosaurs. I missed the dinosaurs. And I used to create

them and scare the whole street. I said they lived under my house in

great caves and caverns leading down to South America. And they

believed me. A petition was drawn up by the parents, a long line of

parents to our house, to complain that my imagination was too much to

the children and I had to tell them there were no such thing as

dinosaurs and I refused. When I discovered at the age of six that

the planet Mars existed and there were other worlds beside mind... We

are the children of stardust, as old as the universe, we are part of

it. All of that was in me as a child. I arrived happy. I feel as

if I am trying to tether a hot-air balloon. You don't spend your life

with us mortals, do you? I do, I do. He is a one-off, it is a terrible

cliche, but he is. Like no one else. He is not constricted by class, he

is never showing off, he is authentic and eccentric, yes, but

not in a self-conscious way. If a true eccentric doesn't know perhaps

why he is funny. Sunday Driver! am not sure whether Brian knows

about reining himself in. I admire that. There are lots of us who

would love to think that we could just let ourselves go in any

society. The most important thing in life is to love yourself. Oscar

Wilde said "To love oneself is to have a lifelong romance", and so I

do love my company and I like myself, and therefore, I like

people. He has this extraordinary vitality and sometimes it is

completely off the wall, but there is always an absolute truth and

honesty about what he says and what he believes. When he comes round,

my children adore him, and they see the truth very instant the, kids,

whether people are interested in them, what they like a don't like -

- instantly. They think Brian is the funniest person on the planet.

He never forget she wore what he cares about and his generosity of

spirit and generosity of soul will never be diminished -- he never

forgets you or what he cares about. Perhaps that the generosity of soul

first sprang from his interest even as a child in religion. But that

interest was even quashed before it began. We had a wonderful school

and wonderful teachers. Three or four times a week, you had the BBC

Rep company doing religious stories. You would hear the same actors

doing it. "I am Jesus!" And they were lacking. But Mr RB, he was at

gardening teacher and a priest on the weekends, he had one eye -- Mr

Paul Daly. He totally entranced me about Jesus as we turned over the

compost heap. We talked about the distances Jesus walked. He worked

it out in mileage, he was incredibly fit, and what kind of

language he had used. Brian lived in the village of Goldthorpe in

South Yorkshire. Most families they relied on the Colman's for

employment. -- coal mines. It was a hard life with little scope for

ambition. Most of the kits would follow their fathers down the mines

and marry pretty younger and that is how they imagined it would

always be. A difficult life with soot in your lungs and it collapses.

Not exactly the highest paid job and one of the most dangerous and

unpleasant. So Brian, although his childhood was tough, then it an

inspiring time. The coal mines, they were wonderful days. I am not

knocking the days I had. The war years were wonderful and fed meat,

my imagination, because we had to cinemas in the village -- fed me.

We could see Flash Gordon in black and white, we had a wooden radios,

no television, programmes on the BBC, and Mike father was a cold

cure and he came through at home with their gas lights -- my father

was a cold cure. He came through like Hector, with his light on. "I

am reading about the amazing Mr X, Dad!". And I had uncles with

enormous power he would go to the opera in Sheffield, Orpheus in the

underworld, and they would describe it and acted and we had heroes

around us. With such inspiration, it is hardly surprising that Brian

felt drawn to perform himself. He discovered that he had a talent for

acting and there were plenty of opportunities close at hand for

young person keen to take the stage. There was a man in South Yorkshire

called Harry Dobson. I have never met the director to recall him, as

a mentor, a big man with sausage fingers, great big ball of a man,

and I beg him to take me on. He said, "My God, lad, you're a rough

diamond. It's going to be an lot of hard work". And he worked on May.

Harry Dobson worked on another people who would become a famous

actor. The future captain of the USS Enterprise, Patrick Stewart.

is strange to think that these two, one of them unbelievably hairy and

I think Patrick Stewart was bowled when he was 17, so a wonderful

mixture, -- bald. I think God was soon an amusing mood when he was

sending babies down the chimney that particular day, he thought

there would be fun to have been that part of Yorkshire with two

extraordinary people, both of them extraordinary actors. Patrick has

that extraordinary tenor voice. Brian like this... The most

extraordinary couple. Let's ask about this voice. As a South

Yorkshire boy, you obviously had a good Yorkshire accent, and now...

Yes, it was a problem. Patrick Stewart was the same. He was my

buddy, Patrick, though he was much more refined. I have to say, the

people in South Yorkshire found it very hard to understand what I was

saying. I told him very much a Yorkshire accent, even Shakespeare,

everything. I could hold on to the Val also be there could reasonably

understand, but by Haddad incredibly thick Yorkshire accent,

more than anybody ass -- I had. Harry encouraged him to moderate

his accent but not lose the expression. The result is one of

the most distinctive voices. He has resonance, power. I will never

bring him back, he can stay there and rot. Brian was always quite

allowed young man. He wasn't quiet. He has a kind of Henry VIII sort of

voice. It is like an instrument, his voice. At first blush, he

appears to be allowed, and they actor. -- a loud. And then you

realise he is very good. Goldthorpe in the early 1950s,

Brian's new way of speaking and his love of acting lead from criticism

from some who felt he was getting above himself -- led to criticism.

For his bravado, he was a sensitive lad. I think he is more complicated

than he seems and growing up in Yorkshire, this mixture of

sensitivity and intelligence, with a big, boisterous energy and

strength, it is an odd combination. I don't think, if you're an actor,

it's very easy to be part of the group who grew up with and there

she grew up with in a bohemian sort of atmosphere, because most people

regard actors as a bit weird, and I can't imagine what a lot of his

contemporaries, the other boys at school, would have thought, that

saw him on stage, speaking in Shakespearean verse or whatever.

harsh review in the local paper of one of his amateur performances had

a terrible effect on Brian. It led to dramatic break them. The paper

claims that he had over acted his part. Everywhere I went, people

said, I will try to this part. It was a chink of light armour, and I

didn't take any notice, or so I thought. I ignored them and ignored

them and then suddenly I found, gradually, that I was becoming

morose. And my mother was frightened. I would come home in

the evenings and look at the fire, with big staring eyes. "You're

frightening me, Brian, what's the matter?" "I'm fine!" I thought my

thoughts were speeding up, "You have got a gift, you have got a

gift" and I was doing it all day. I couldn't cope. And then I called

for God. Help may! I'm drowning! I need help! -- help me. And I called.

No point being an armchair philosopher, do you believe in God,

do you not? For God's sake, if you are put in that situation, you call

for help and I needed help, I was There was an answer to Brian's plea

for help in the form of his speech to a chair, Frank Cooper. Brian

went to visit him. I walked in through the door. Forget the speech

election, I am finished! I can't think, I can't speak, I can't do

anything. And I collapsed. I said "I'm no good, everyone says it" And

I wept and wept and groaned Emily and groans and collapsed,

unconscious on the floor -- a million groans. When I woke up, he

was washing my face with at Halle and his wife was saying "It's all

right." And he started singing songs and then he did some poetry

about love and bits of Shakespeare, bits of this, bits of that.

Wonderful, deeper things that penetrated my head. And he stroked

my head and whispered all of these are wonderful Lions from Ulysses by

Tennyson, to strive to yield, you know. Not to Gillian and it all

went in to my head -- give in. And he cured me. It was a miracle. And

I laughed and he said, that better. Nice to see a laugh. You'll be all

right now. And that never looked Brian has certainly never looked

back. After National Service with the RAF, he went to drama school at

the Bristol Old Vic. Brian was different, he was quite different

from all other students. Not that one particularly looked up to buy

up -- to Brian. One just looked at him in amazement and wonder. Brian

used to tell stories, a bit like a fairy stories, and everything he

ever said, one bought 100%, even though one may have thought, he is

having me on. You believe everything and maybe that is the

mark of somebody who is rather a good actor. Brian couldn't be

described as a model student. He had his own ideas. He wouldn't

necessarily do what teachers wanted him to do. Maybe that is the nature

of a drama school. I am not sure that they are much use to you, if

you have already got what Brian He didn't have to wait long for

success. His first big role was in I watched Z Cars as a boy. If I

hear that tuned to this day, I get prickles up the back of my neck.

Cars was a police drama set in the fictional Liverpool suburb of

Newtown. What was startling is that it was an extremely realistic

depiction of police work. He is arguing with the inspector, he

can't win. It used top quality writers, high quality scripts and

realism about police work, and compelling characters. Brian played

a confident bobbly, nicknamed Fancy Smith. I am going to have to take

you in for stealing property from a toy company. I have nothing to say,

I want my scarf. We can let him have a cup of tea before he goes?

We could, I suppose. It was a series that lived dangerously. It

went out alive. It is being with him, I suppose. Live performance

gives you the same as theatre, it gives you an age, and excitement, a

pace. The other side of that is that you can't, by definition, have

retakes. Genuine courage was required. I did not by those

brushes. As far as I know, he opened the door and he went. What

courage was it, to do a live broadcast every week, live

television is exciting, and good fun. But dangerous. Yes. It was all

new on Z Cars. It was 45 minutes live, and five minutes filmed. We

had 24, to 28 million viewers. The first time I was introduced as

Fancy Smith, dancing outside a pub, I a slightly get a word wrong.

you got... One of those cars. managed to grip on and do something

interesting. You wait there.

I almost lost it, I almost lost my nerve. After that, I was fine. I

could do anything on a live show. Ad-lib if things went wrong, hold

up a wall if things went wrong. Even hold up the car if the springs

had gone in the studio. I have said nothing about it to

John. I believe you. You don't! It was a wonderful challenge.

guests used to have terrible times. John Hurt, I had a 10 minutes seen

with him. The light came on, that meant 24 million, or 28 million

viewers, and I was supposed to break him down. I said, I want to

have a word with you. He said, I'm guilty. Steel 10 minutes scene had

gone! The news went out 10 minutes early map - the whole 10 minutes

scene had gone. It was me who got the blame. When the news comes in

early, it is because people are terrified of me! Fancy Smith is

this marvellous character that you grew and loved and created. He was

as big and as famous as The Beatles, they were there at the time as well.

Yes, I couldn't walk down the street. I lived in Richmond, Surrey.

I had to wait until about 515, and rushed to Woolworths and get some

food quick. I went to Derby to do a book signing, I had never done a

book signing. James Bond was on, Sean Connery, From Russia With Love,

thousands of people were going to see this film. I said, can you tell

me the way to this book... He's here! I spent nine hours in this

book shop, signing autographs with the police looking after me. That

was the effect of Z Cars. It was phenomenal. How do you stop that

making you too big for your boots? Or did it affect you? You are young

man, it is going to have an effect on you. It was a shock that one

could be so well known. And yet not known? I wasn't resentful, but I

realised I had lost a lot of freedom. That I couldn't get around,

I couldn't go into my parks. I was already thinking of Adventures and

things, it curtailed a lot of that. I slightly became a prisoner. I

think it would be fair to say, I was known as the big head of the

company. In that I tended... I find it difficult, being a somewhat

classical actor. I had to do a little bit off the set as well,

which I think people found a bit Brian had run-ins with one member

of the cast in particular, Stratford Johns, who played

Inspector Barlow. I said you are a cheeky young fellow. I was always

answerable to him, as the inspector in Z Cars, Stratford Johns. In I

Claudius, I was Augustus Caesar. Suddenly, he was a senator in my

court. There was a long scene, I walk down and I put it in and I say

about moderation. Don't I know you? No, Caesar. He suddenly dropped it

After leaving Z Cars, Brian took on roles very different from Fancy

Smith. He played St Peter in its Dennis Potter's controversial TV

drama, Son Of Man. Brian hadn't lost his childhood fascination with

the figure of Jesus. Colin Blakely played the title role. I wanted to

come with me. Where to? All over this land, I have to preach to the

people. I have to tell them things kept secret since the world began.

There had not been many depictions of Christ, or Christ's story in

broadcasting, because for many decades they were not allowed.

What Dennis Potter did, and the cast did fantastically well in Son

Of Man, was to try to give a more naturalistic, realistic portrayal

of that story. And so the key thing in the acting and the writing was

realism. When it came to doing the film, when they started the first

scene, Colin could not come out of his dressing room. I can't be

choosers, I can't do it. He was a terrific actor. -- I can't be Jesus.

They couldn't get him out. I went in there. I had him doing the

Lord's Prayer. I said, that's it, that's it, mechanical. Like every

time people do the Lord's Prayer, it is generally mechanical. So

there is a kind of boredom element about it. I had him doing things,

for thine is the kingdom! Thine is the kingdom! The Power And the

Glory! For ever! And ever! And it shook him. And I said. Get on and

play it! And he was tremendous. He sailed through it and it came to

the Crucifixion. It is the Crucifixion... You find out, you

ask, before you do the scene. You find out what it means. And he went

on the cross, and he went, my God, my God, why has thou forsaken me?

Colin went, my God! My God! Swire Everybody went, God... It was

amazing. It was so amazing that there were live debates after it on

television. And all sorts of things. Yes. What do you feel about this?

He was a real man, he had hairs on his chest, he had failings. He said,

is it me? One word from the cross, only. Why have you forsaken me. The

one that expresses doubt. This sums up quite validly, dramatically from

Dennis Potter's point of view, that this in no doubt is in Jesus. He

doesn't say that the final words of Christ are, it is completed, a cry

of triumph. More than 40 years on from Dennis Potter's drama, the

importance and power of the Crucifixion is undiminished for

Brian. The creator, God, loves his son. Who he is proud of. It's but

he allows his sons to be stretched on a cross, and nails put through,

and why? It is Jesus' mission, why he came. They would take all the

sins of the world on his shoulder. All the sins, Hitler, everything,

everybody, Saddam Hussein, whatever, all this, murderous killers, he

takes it all on his shoulders. And what loneliness must he feel, as he

allows himself to become a man? I am being over-dramatic on his

interview, aren't I? When are you not have a dramatic? There is

nothing I can do about it. I have a three-litre engine, there is hugger

all I can do about it. Brian is an extraordinary person to interview.

And he is right about the three- litre engine, he has an agent

energy for a man of 75. -- amazing energy. It has field some

remarkable acting. To be, or not to be. -- it has fuelled some

remarkable acting. This is my patch. It is something inside him. It

transmits through the camera, you don't have to stand next to him,

sit round the dinner table with him, be in his physical presence, I

think you can feel it. Sort of imagine it, imagine being hugged by

him and how it could turn into a rib cracking experience. I think he

is quite an instinctive actor, actually. I am not sure he goes

home at night and looks at the lines and thinks, if I go up at the

end of this line or down, that will do that. He was back - it was

always an adventure, and excitement, on stage to work with him. Some

people might say Brian is not subtle. But why should he be?

Quiches is a performer. He is an over a go. -- he is a performer. He

perhaps does more than is necessary, I sometimes have a longing to be a

private citizen again. One of Brian's most famous roles was

Caesar Augustus and the BBC series I Claudius. It showed he could play

not only policemen and fisherman, but emperors as well. I watch it at

least once a year, it is so magnificent. It is the last great

studio made drama in British television history. It is the

acting that people remember and they were really on a tightrope,

because they were using theatre actors predominantly and they bring

a power and a weight and a sort of Shakespearian Association. Is it

too late to lay down the burdens of office? You are just like your

father. Always wanting the Republic. He was my enemy to at one time. --

also. He was the bullying but rather put upon emperor, Augustus,

the first emperor. Under around him, his family and his loved ones were

being poisoned by his wife, whom he trusted and that the very end, he

himself is poisoned. It is very embarrassing. People might think we

were trying to poison you. death of August this is one of the

series's most famous moments. death scene is magnificent, if you

watch it, he keeps completely still with his eyes are open for, I think

it must be, 90 seconds. You actually watch him die, you see the

RA's the Delays slightly. They don't blink and he doesn't move. --

you see the IRA's blaze. It is one of the great death scenes in

television history. -- eyes glaze. The extraordinary adventure of

Brian Blessed's life took another turn in the early 80s and it had a

lot to do with a set of poems around cats and one of Britain's

most successful composers of musical theatre. When Andrew Lloyd

Webber said his next musical was based on TS Eliot's Old Possum's

Book of Practical Cats, the common feeling was that he was completely

mad and it would be a disaster, so the claws were red, as it were, for

Cats. -- out. It was as far away from the mainstream as you can get.

A group of people saying, "We are going to turn ourselves into

pussycats and we are going to seeing children's songs." it was an

extraordinary experiment. And the fact that it ran for 23, 24 years,

those of us involved could never quite believe it. Brian played the

role of the wise cat Old Deuteronomy.

# The cat who has led many lives... A Old Deuteronomy was gentle, why

is, ultimately ecstatic and priest like -- why is. And scarcely ever

moves, the traffic stops for him. Hatchback you've heard there are

several kinds of cat... I had no idea that Brian could sing,

but he was very game. He was very up for it. He was an adventurer in

every sense. The first time I saw my dad acting on a stage that I can

remember properly really was when he was in Cats. That was this

amazing voice. It was overwhelming, so exciting. The first six months,

it was like no other show. It was transcendental, wherever you went.

You could touch the air. The audience and the cast became one.

Old Deuteronomy stayed on stage during the interval, and children

were encouraged to cuddle and talk to him. It became a big thing. Boys

and girls dressed as cats and they would come and sit with me.

stage? They would have ice-creams and talk to me. It is lovely to see

your dad like that, everyone loving him and him being the safe, warm

place. When I was that age, I was five, that is what he was for me.

Then up on stage, he was that for everybody else, which was lovely.

At one performance, something remarkable happened. There was a

man and woman to bear and a little girl and I said "Are you enjoying

it?" and she said "... Yes" And her parents started to cry and I

thought I had said the wrong thing. And they said, "Know, quite the

contrary. That is the first time at child has ever spoken -- no.". And

she came after that quite regularly and her speech got better and

better. What you think it was in Old Deuteronomy that did something

to that little girl that she could respond? She totally and utterly

believed that as Old Deuteronomy... She forgot her ailment and

responded with great heart. She just believe did me. A child's

belief is astonishing, isn't it, occasionally? Occasionally, you get

feedback from audience, a letter, a postcard, a telephone call, and the

sort of incident that Brown has described, where somebody will say

that as a result of the show, something like changing has gone on

-- Brian has described. You definitely can't ever set out to

bring that about and if you hear of such a thing, it is only humbling

and just make you go a bit quiet. There is one place that appealed to

Brian's sense of adventure far more than being on stage in the West End.

Somewhere that as a boy, he often dreamed of. Mount Everest. Brian

was inspired by one climber in particular, George Mallory, who in

1924, died attempting to conquer the peak. I wanted to follow in his

footsteps to pay tribute to this great man, and his great

mountaineer friends, a tribute to their great ideals. Ideals that to

a certain extent we have lost the day. People said it was impossible.

But Bryant didn't want to just conquer Everest, he wanted to make

a film that faithfully recreated Mallory's climb. Murray left his

wife and children, babies basically, for this dream and passion -- and

Mallory. I think that appealed to Brian, because he has the same

desire to do something extraordinary. There is no way that

Brian could play Mallory. He was too old, he was and slim and young.

But what he did do was embody Mallory. He sold it as a one-man

show up Everest. And also not in modern beer. We had gone out and

got tweed jackets and tweed trousers -- Kiev. And hobnail boots,

basically. We were doing it as Mallory would have done it. When

Dad did finally go up Everest to make his film, I think my mother

and I just listened to the silence. It was quite restful, because he

had been so obsessed with it was such a long time, he needed to go

out there and do it, because he could only tell us the story so

many times. And there was only so me times we could hear it. John-

Paul Davidson knew that when Brian Ayres or Everest for the first time,

it would be a moment he had to capture -- saw Everest.

purposely held it back from him and those days, you had to have all the

magazines Loaded, so could week -- so we could record his first sight

of the mountain, when you see it at the head of the ballet. It was

extraordinary, because he just filled up. It looks so beautiful. I

can see the North face... He is not one for weeping and crying, but you

could see the intensity of the experience. He had dreamt about

this moment for so long. I think that is where... That is where

Mallory is. I just can't believe I am there. It is a dream come true.

Just to add to the adventure, despite the dangerously thin air,

Brian was climbing without oxygen. He loves the fact that he has a

pair of lungs on him that are almost unique and therefore have

allowed him to climb up Everest and without using oxygen. Yet when you

speak to him, he is always wheezing and you think "How can he even

climb the stairs" This is hell, I never envisaged this.

I have always thought that my father was indestructible and I

have no doubt that he would come back. He is a force of nature and I

can't imagine anything ever happening to him. I have never

climbed a mountain, so I don't know, but I have a feeling that there

must be a conversation that the mountain is having with you.

there something spiritual, that when you get so high and you can

see the heavens and you are so close, do you feel you are closer

to something else? Absolutely. And the beauty of the place is

staggering. The privilege of being amongst its millions of rainbows

and to look up into the cobalt blue and the ridges that go on, and the

curvature of the Earth. You are closer to the Creator. Your

emotions are rarefied. For me, the sacrifice of being physically

pummelled was made up for by the spiritual ascent that I made and I

have never looked back since. were talking before you went and I

heard you say that you were concerned about hallucinating it,

you were scared of that, yet fellow climbers said they are to be

welcomed. Yes, I welcomed them indeed. Reinhold Messner, the

greatest mountaineer ever, he said, "You hallucinate, that is good and

you will talk to your rucksack, it is good. Hallucinate with the

mountain and she will look at you". So just go with it.

Everest, or when it is you are feeling refined and in love with it,

that is when she is at her most dangerous. And at one point, my

grandfather appeared. This happens many time on Everest Two people.

Open but you better go down, that, you have done really well, -- "You

better go down, lad, you have done really well." And I turned around

and he was not there. He is not there. Then I turned around and he

was still there. Solid. I have had that experience several times on

Everest. We are going to sail to the top

this time, God willing! All we will stamp to the top. We are taking the

Brian did it turn back. He had climbed to 27,000 feet -- did turn

back. It was a significant achievement. There is just now F. I

have got to stop or I will never get back. -- no the air. I can't

think of many actors that would have the endurance, the fortitude,

the persistence, all the qualities that are needed to climb any

For Brian, life is a spiritual as well as a physical adventure. On

his expedition, he was fascinated by the Buddhist faith of the

Himalayan people he encountered. To Brian's delight, after much

negotiation, he was able to meet the Dalai Lama and get his blessing

for that climb. But any conversation involving Mr Blessed

can take an unusual term. Mallory, when they were first going, they

were going through Tibet and had to get permission from the Dalai Lama

to climb it, because it is a sacred mountain. I was trying to recreate,

in a sense, that meeting. Brian was, of course, thrilled to meet him.

And it his blessing. That was what we were hoping for. He was very

generous and found the meeting with Prayad Hallur areas. Brian is not

intimidated with anyone -- the meeting with Brian hilarious. The

I think a middle-aged man here, dressed in 1920s clothes, very much

needs a lot of blessing. It would be a great privilege and I would be

This is a symbolised blessing. you meet someone like the Dalai

Lama, if you can get some time alone with him, or someone like

that, you become yourself. I was almost rude to him. I am saying,

it's Your Holiness, you make me 6th! You make me really sick! Why

do I make you sick? Because you are so good! It is hard to live with.

So millions turn out to see you, you are so good! Don't you ever get

angry? Yes, if you weeks ago, a doctor came to inject me, to go

abroad, and he had a needle, and he stuck it and it went into my bone

and I was in such pain, I thought, I hate that doctor, he is fatter

than... What? Fatter than me? Is that what you are saying? I am a

human being, you are going to hurt me. I am hurt.

So, please forgive me. On your knees! He goes on his

knees! I said, all right, I am a forgiving man, I forgive you, stand

up. That was my relationship with him all the time. He is a man with

a powerful sense of humour? A huge sense of humour. This extraordinary

conversation took an even more surprising twist. Brian claims that

the Dalai Lama knew that Brian's brother was seriously ill, and told

him that when he died, he would be reincarnated. He said, your brother,

not well. It won't be long now. It's when you pass away. -- when he

passed away. But three, 4 o'clock in the morning, he believed in God.

He will be fine. He will be born in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Yeah. I never

mentioned that before. Good heavens, did that come true? I believe so. I

would rather leave it alone, but yes. That is what he said. My

brother is alive in Nova Scotia, about 12 years old. Go at heavens.

-- good heavens. Can I ask you how you know that? Because I have

visited him. I went to Halifax, I was filming in some lovely studios

there. I went to this area where he was, and that is exactly the guy I

knew, my little brother when I was 12 years of age, with a Canadian

accent. I have to keep asking you this. Did the Dalai Lama to you

precisely the address? He did. went to that address and waited?

didn't tell anybody, I said I was in the area for but I didn't even

say to the boy. The boy like me straight away, we got on very well.

I was looking at Allen. You totally believe that? Totally. I find that

life is a miracle, the whole thing is a complete miracle. I agree that

life is a miracle in itself, but once again, Brian has left me with

For many people, Brian Blessed is not associated with climbing

Everest, starring in Z Cars, or I Claudius. Instead, he is famous for

possibly the two best-known words in cinema history. I am sure when

he goes down the street, everybody shouts, Gordon's a live! Because

that is how they remember him, been good old Flash Gordon. Flash Gordon

was an epic and slightly camp science-fiction film, in which

Brian played Prince Vultan, leader of the Hawkmen. It was a part that

Brian was thrilled to take. Did you think this was going to be a very

defining role for you? This is your Everest, on film, in a way? Yes, I

did. I had seen Flash Gordon as a child in the local cinema, the

Empire Cinema, once a week on Saturday, in black and white,

terrific. I always pretended to be Prince Vultan, pretending to fly

and jumping off the bridge, on to the top of a train and on again.

Anyway, I never dreamt I would play it. During one important day's

filming, Brian got rather carried away. His boyhood self took over.

There is a scene in it, where we attack a rocket ship. It took five

days to get these dynamite ready, the special effects, the lads on

board, the monsters on board. We are flying 2,500 men. We are trying

to get ready, I had a big bazooka, which was made of cardboard. It

took five days to get ready, stand by! Action! Come in, a flash! Dive!

Which I invented, it is from the iron. Squadron 14, died! -- it is

They said, cut, cut, cut. Brian, we put in the special effects. I had

never felt such a twit in all my life. Because I was doing the

special effects with my mouth. bless you! They had to reset the

whole thing, it took two days. Brian! We put in the special

effects! You raced to be there. That is one of those... You'll have

to give us a quick Gordon's I live! I feel good! Wherever I go and I am

walking down the street, on the scaffolding and taxes, people say,

give us -- hears the telephone, please say to my wife, Gordon's

alive. Jukes and Lords and Camilla Parker Bowles! Would you mind

saying Gordon's alive. Everybody asks me to say Gordon's alive.

polls continued to slide for Gordon Brown. Some people are saying he's

dead and buried, but I think the opposite. I say Gordon pars alive!

Yes! Other people know dad would different things. The vast majority

of what defined the idea of Brian Blessed really was Prince Vultan.

Which is fantastic, I just think it's a bit of a shame that some of

his other work gets missed. He is no one-trick pony, but sometimes I

think people see him like that. There is a difficulty being an

actor, many actors go through their careers without ever having a stand

out role. Obviously, that's bad. The flipside is that sometimes, you

get a role that is so remarked on, and so visible, that it actually

overshadows the rest of your career, and the decisions of casting

directors. I think that did happen with Flash Gordon. It was such a

perfect role that I think that after that, when the parodies of

Brian Blessed really became very big. Do you have a copy of All

quiet On the Western Front? quiet on the Western Front! Let me

just check! With his booming voice and Everest sized personality,

there was always a danger that Brian would become an exaggeration

of his younger self. He seems very comfortable, it is just another

part of his big adventure. Bollards! Is see a national

treasure, yes. He is a national asset. There should be railings but

around him. He has done 60, 70 films now. Dad had is still the

high point, physically and I think, metaphorically, of what I have done

I would like to say how really lucky I think I am, to have grown

up with someone who is so it's generous, and extraordinary and

funny. And just inspiring. You know, and a pain, obviously! Brian is

still busy acting, which after 50 years in the profession, is quite

an achievement. Last year, he and Ros perform together for the first

time in the BBC series, Doctors. She played a daughter whose father

is suffering from memory loss and he believes he should go into an

old people's home. How long have you been in the nursing home?

has been an age. South you tried it for one day. It is full of old

people! It was lovely to work with dad, we have never acted face to

face before. It was basically a tussle between a daughter, who

wants to come into her own right as a person, who has grown up with a

famous father. I don't know where they got that idea!

Daddy, are you all right? Yes, I frightened Stirling Moss here.

you only know how much it's worry you have called me. I have aged 20

years in an hour. That's nice, you can catch up with me! It's not

funny! Your youngest daughter is an actress and recently, your paths

crossed and you work together. Was that a deliberate happening? They

cast their before me and then they realised I would be good as an

eccentric who is a bit of a genius. I wish I had been born infertile.

wish I had been brought up by nerves -- by walls. I was very

nervous. She is very mercurial and volatile. The pair of us, having

such gargantuan qualities, would we Daddy, you are wonderful. But if we

carry on like this, we are going to kill each other. And I love you too

much. Our time in Brian's little hut at the end of his garden is

almost over. With Christmas close at hand, I wondered how Brian's

family would be spending it. How important is this Advent time for

you? I find I will not be put off Christmas. Since a child. I find it

my favourite time of the year. I love all the carols. Some of them

There is something about it that centres people, and that I believe,

even the person who despises the commercial side of Christmas, or

quietly on their own somewhere, in their garden, in their sitting room

somewhere, quietly just so's an unheard pref -- quietly just says.

An unheard prayer. Because we are saved. The politicians can't save

us, but we are saved by this single act of colossal bravery, and by the

trust of the maker. Happy Christmas, What an extraordinary man Brian

Blessed is. I know he has conquered so many things in this physical

life, whether climbing mountains or creating Prince Vultan ordering

whatever he does, but it is the spiritual question inside him that

is so fascinating. I don't know what he is going to do next, he

probably will climb Everest, he probably will be on the first space