LI Who: 60

Just reading that above post back and knowing that I will be interviewing Gary Russell AND Tim Treloar! Ha!

I've been asked to write a description of Big Finish: The Gary Russell years. Just 2 or 3 lines. This is what I wrote:

Big Finish, the Gary Russell years

Synonymous with innovation and experimentation. The early days of Big Finish were known for exciting stories that expanded what both Doctor Who and the audio medium could be. We were introduced to the new adventures of Bernice Summerfield without The Doctor and solidified Lisa Bowerman as the iconic archeologist for the next two decades and more. We were blessed with the return of Paul McGann as the 8th Doctor, new and exciting Big Finish companions, as well as new stories with Doctors we loved and missed. After years in the wilderness, with Gary Russell as the creative director, Big Finish gave us some masterpieces, and some stories that were questionable at best, but rarely were any of the early stories mediocre or boring.

Yep, found out yesterday. So very excited!!!

I don't yet know the answer to your question, but I'm going with "anything goes". I have a lot of homework to do, but I've already come up with some questions for Gary. I need to listen to all the Third Doctor audios again, read more about the early BF days, etc. And I'm looking forward to it!

So it seems that I jumped the gun. Tim Treloar has not yet been officially announced. So keep it quiet everyone.

Sacha Dhawan was just announced! Great news!

And still no Tim Treloar announcement. I know that he's coming, but yeah, Sacha does take precedence of Tim. I get it.

Just bought my photo ops!

Paul McGann (in his Night of the Doctor costume!)
Sacha Dhawan
Jan Chappell and Brian Croucher
Katy Manning
Frazer Hines and Michael Troughton

Woo!

Regards

mark687

Ok, folks. Time for my LI Who debrief. I don't know if I can do justice to how great the weekend was, but I'll do my best. I also have no idea how to upload a photo. Sorry.

FRIDAY: I got there early in the afternoon on Friday. I left home early so I didn't hit too much traffic. If any of you have ever driven in the greater NYC Metro area, the ride from NJ to LI can be brutal. I pulled up to the front door of the hotel to unload my bags and there was Katy Manning and Gary Russell walking up to the hotel from a walk it seems like they were on. I unloaded my bags and went to park the car and they were now sitting on a bench in front of the hotel chatting. I walked up to them and said hello and introduced myself to them both, letting Gary know that I was going to be his interviewer for the Big Finish interview. (He did a number of interviews this weekend.) They both seemed really pleased to meet me. Katy let me know how much I was in for a treat and Gary told me to make sure he didn't run on too long. It was a short but great conversation.

After checking in and going to my room for a bit, I went downstairs and picked up our (Me and Harper) name tags at registration. They were passing out these free electronic Daleks to the first 100 people. It was neat! They had games on it to play, and allowed to to connect with others throughout the con that also had them. It was a nice addition, and I felt bad for those that didn't get one. 

That evening was the first Gary Russell interview, which focused on his overall experience in different areas of Doctor Who and the extended universe. The new animations coming out are not being done by his team, but by the team that did The Macra Terror. He spoke a bit about Audio Visuals as well as the creation of BF, but those topics were going to have their own interviews. He did speak about his lovely relationship with Liz Sladen and his time on the Sarah Jane Adventures and Torchwood.  It was a nice panel. 

Later in the evening I attended the "LGTBQ+ and Doctor Who" panel with Harper, who had made it out by then. It was a lovely panel and PACKED. Which I thought was great.  Then it was time to just hang out with friends. And we played a mean game of Cards Against Humanity with 12 people and the biggest deck I've ever seen! All in all, a successful first day.

Yes, I promise I'll get to Saturday and Sunday. And a whole post just about the interview.

Saturday, Day 2:
I started the day moderating the "Intro to Big Finish" fan panel. It went very well and we got some good questions from the audience. It was a great panel of fans, each one of us coming to Big Finish at a different time, and in a different way. In fact, there was a 17 year old kid on the panel who began listening to BF 2 years ago after coming to one of my panels. So that was pretty cool.

There were some great panels. Brian Croucher was fun. He's very funny and seemed to enjoy his interview. He did let us know the terrible news that Michael Keating will no longer record anything for Big Finish due to his health. It seems he has advanced dementia. So sad. But he's been enjoying his work with BF, and was especially happy that he was able to record a story with Steven Grief before his death. Went to the Michael Troughton interview and the the Paul McGann interview, which was standing room only. He is so comfortable and at ease at these things, and really loves doing them. He led the entire room in a round of Happy Birthday to Sylvester McCoy, which was recorded and sent to him, since his birthday was the next day. No new Big Finish news from him, but it really was a delightful interview. 

I gave up my seat in the main hall to go to the Gary Russell Audio Visuals interview, which was a treat. The interviewer, who I had met the night before, found some wonderful treats in her research leading up to the interview. She found an online copy a fanzine that Gary had edited back in the 80's as well as multiple clips from Audio Visual stories and the original cassette covers and cast lists. I loved hearing how they worked back in the day, and that He, Nick and Bill Baggs used multiple aliases for themselves in each story so it didn't seem like they were doing everything. LOL. 

Because I gave up my seat in the main hall, I was out of luck for the Sacha Dhawan interview. The room was so packed that I couldn't even get in the door. So I chatted with some folks (including Roxy Troughton, who is a hoot!) and ended up at the "DW and the Art of the Cold Open" panel. They benefitted from the fact that the main hall couldn't hold everyone at the con. It was a good panel. 

There were a few more panels and interviews, including Jan Chappel, and went for some great photo ops. Had a great hug from Kay Manning, and got a photo with Harper and Paul McGann in his Night of the Doctor costume, which was awesome! He looked great!

We did find time to eat during all of this, and then at 9 PM is was time for "FrazerCon 4!" This is a tradition at LI Who. 2 hours of fun, adult oriented entertainment. Mostly audience participation games, like "What would Frazer Do?". This year they also did some improve games with Frazer, Michael Troughton and volunteers from the audience. It was very funny. Then it was just time to have some drinks and hang out with guests and fans who were sticking around for the evening. They opened up a patio in the back of the hotel and we were able to all hang out and chat until the wee hours of the night. I sat next to Michael T for a while and had a lovely chat. It seems that he left acting for quite a while when his first wife was ill, and he was a physics teacher. He's an interesting guy. I went to bed around 2 AM, and there were still people up, chatting in the lobby. It was a great night.