The day starts early if you’re a member of the crew for Bedford Who. I was picked up with Andrew, the genial, motivational stage manager, from our hotel by our very own Philip Bates – a fellow crew member – at 6.40 in the morning from The Swan Hotel in Bedford. A short drive to The King’s House, a complex of meeting rooms and halls owned by a local church, where we unloaded hundreds of Candy Jar books out of Philip’s car, and went to meet the dealers. My first task: to get the dealers coffee and croissants. I was determined not to fail this one.
Daleks, Cybermen, TARDIS consoles, and a police box started to arrive from 7.30.
From 9.00am, we manned front of house and welcomed some 280 people, many of them cosplayers. Over half had attended previous Bedford Whos and were back because they knew it was a friendly convention where the prime motivation of the organisers was for people to have a good day. Bedford Who is run by fans, for fans, under the direction of that cheerful Guardian of the Solar System, Simon Danes, who also chaired the panels. What’s more, this was Bedford Who’s 10th anniversary. It’s a convention which raises money for charity: this year, as last, the charity was SMART, which supports Bedford’s homeless population (500 or so at the last count).
Guests arrived: Louise Jameson (Leela); Katy Manning (Jo); Sophie Aldred (Ace); Neve McIntosh (Madame Vastra); Jacqueline King (Sylvia Noble); Jill Curzon (Louise in Daleks Invasion Earth 2150 AD); Virginia Wetherell (Dyoni in The Daleks); Peter Roy (a supporting artist – he was the policeman in Logopolis Part One and 006 in Thunderball!). Daleks patrolled. Cybermen alternately stalked the corridors and listened to the panels.
In the democratic spirit of Bedford Who, many of the questions came from the audience. Sample questions:
Had the actors been worried about typecasting after being in Doctor Who?
Louise Jameson: “Not really – I mean, how many warriors of the Sevateem are there in other series?”
What was the most uncomfortable thing you had to do on the show?
Neve McIntosh said it was her Silurian make up. This took about three and a half hours; sometimes, she was so hot that the sweat collected in her back head piece and then cascaded down her back in a rush. She wasn’t able to eat anything greasy, so had to pass on pasta at meals. The make-up team instructed her, when eating, to pop a morsel into her mouth, close her mouth, chew and swallow: nothing could go on the lips or the make up would be damaged. Katy Manning said it wasn’t always comfortable or much fun running around quarries in high heels and mini-skirts. Her skirts were, she said, sometimes so short that she had to have matching knickers – especially when climbing onto motorbikes. And she hated her false eyelashes, which kept coming adrift and sticking to her cheeks.
Jill Curzon revealed that Tom and Louise’s fall from the Dalek spacecraft in Daleks: Invasion Earth 2150 A.D. was genuine: they had performed it themselves and it had been a very big drop. Virginia Wetherell said she was the occasion of a retake in The Daleks: her headpiece got caught in another actor’s costume and she laughed. William Hartnell was very cross about this, as retakes were an expensive business in the show’s early days, when the expectation was that taping could be stopped once in a 25 minute episode. Virginia also revealed that the actors playing the Daleks in rehearsals, scooted about on orange boxes (wooden crates for transporting oranges, about 18 inches x 12 inches x 12 inches) before the Daleks themselves turned up in the studio. And of course, no one in the cast had any idea that the Daleks would catch on, let alone still be around 60 years later.
Sophie Aldred said that she had indeed known, the last time she attended a Bedford Who, that she was coming back as Ace, but had kept schtum – even as she was asked if she would ever return to the show. Well, there were the NDAs to consider…
Louise and Sophie appeared in an excellent sketch, with Sophie, as a Doctor Who fan, answering fiendish questions from Louise as the interviewer:
Louise: Who played Leela?
Sophie: Um… er… oooh, I know this one, it’s on the tip of my tongue. Bonnie Langford!
Attendees spent the afternoon eating lunch in glorious spring sunshine, visiting the dealers’ rooms and displays, and getting autographs from the guests. Simon chaired the final panel, asking, as is a tradition at Bedford Who, questions to the guests from the TARDIS tin.
Sample question: What advice would you have given your younger self when she was in Doctor Who?
Louise Jameson: I would have told her; don’t worry, it’s all going to be all right.
One of the most cheerful happenings of the day was the final photocall with guests. Some 200 people made their way to the stage to be snapped next to Leela, Ace, Jo, Louise, the TARDIS, and all, making a donation to SMART on their way. And the crew’s final task was to make sure everyone left safely. Every one, but every one, of the attendees I spoke to said how much they had enjoyed the day, would come back again next year, and were beaming.
In short, Bedford Who is one of the happiest days of my year. And this year, it raised £16,145 for SMART.
