• Joseph Marcell
(Geoffrey from “The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air”)
• Jeremy Bulloch (Boba
Fett from “Star Wars”)
• Joe Altin (Pypar
from “Game Of Thrones”)
• Ross O’Hennessy
(Lord of Bones from “Game Of Thrones” & Locke from “The Bastard
Executioner”)
• Staz Nair (Qhono
from “Game Of Thrones”)
• Wilf Scolding
(Rhaegar Targaryen from “Game Of Thrones”)
• Dean S. Jagger
(Smalljon Umber from “Game Of Thrones”)
• John Leeson (The
Voice Of K-9 from “Doctor Who”)
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before we get started...
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With
that being said, let’s dive in...
Before we get started, a big thank you to Anthony Lovesey for allowing me to use his pictures from the Joseph Marcell and Game Of Thrones panels. Much appreciated!
Ladies
and gentlemen, welcome back to another convention review by your friendly
neighbourhood Shangel. This time around, I shall be dipping my toe back into
the Showmasters regional circuit for my 5th “Film & Comic Con
Cardiff” – my 3rd straight, but 5th overall. Ordinarily,
I like to get a convention review finished and uploaded within 2-5 days of the
convention concluding, but on this occasion it has taken two weeks! My recent review of “Gloucester Comic Con” and my
imminent review of “Coventry Comic Con” have also been delayed due to a change
in career for me, which has involved new training, a new environment, and a new
lifestyle. No matter, dear readers. Moving forwards, things will be back on
track! Not only that, but I should find myself having more free time than ever
from this moment onwards, so you may very well find that the long-outstanding
“Buffy The Vampire Slayer” and “Angel” episode reviews make a triumphant return
before the end of the year as well.
“Film
& Comic Con Cardiff” took place over the weekend of the 23rd and
24th of September at the Motorpoint Arena. Giving away the “final
score” already, you will find that I ranked this event as an impressively
average ‘6.5/10’, which is the same score I’ve given the last two F&CCC’s
as well. If I had but one word to describe Showmasters’ bi-annual event at
Cardiff’s Motorpoint, it would be “samey”, as every event there seems to feel
identical now. It’s very much like time stands still in the months between
events and I return to the exact same layout, the exact same shitty lighting,
the exact same stalls, and the same level of guests. This isn’t a problem
created by using the same venue as year upon year other events that keep the
venue consistent feel different. They feel as though they’re evolving. Events
like “London Film & Comic Con” (which is also a Showmasters presentation),
“Wales Comic Con” and “Em-Con: Nottingham” seem to grow and expand, and evolve,
and experiment, and transform, whereas the “Film & Comic Con Cardiff”
outing is feeling increasingly stale. Stale to the point where I wish that
nobody will be announced that I wish to meet so that I can skip the event
entirely. On an increasingly busy convention calendar in the UK, I tend to get
more joy from the indies than I do from Cardiff by the conclusion of 2017, which
is a real shame as once upon a time the “Film & Comic Con Cardiff” show was
an up-and-coming powerhouse for Showmasters, boasting guests such as Anthony
Head, Brian Blessed, Robert Englund, Bernard Cribbins and Alfie Allen. Over the
past three years, I feel as though less and less effort has been put in.
There’s been little change or evolution, which is a feeling that is shared by
many people I know in regards to Showmasters’ regional events. It feels as
though Showmasters’ focus is on LFCC, Collectormania, and their co-hosting
German events. Don’t get me wrong, their focus should be on these events as they are much larger, but
significantly more effort and love could be inserted into the regionals too,
otherwise what’s the point in running them in the first place? This can be
reflected in the slowly dwindling attendance numbers when compared to the 2013
edition I attended. I look at the indies in the UK right now – let alone the
big events – and I see no effort being put in here in comparison.
In
preparation for this review, I re-read my review of the last “Film & Comic
Con Cardiff” and the following paragraph struck me :-
“Entirely
average in every sense of the word. For every positive aspect (such as the
guests, the talk hall, and the crew), there was a counteracting negative aspect
(the venue lighting, some of the Motorpoint Arena staff being rude, the
lighting, a lack of guests compared to the previous events, the lighting...).
As you can probably guess, my biggest gripe of the event is the atrocious arena
lighting. Half of the arena has white lights, the other half (where the guests
sit) has yellow lights, both of which are dull, making the arena seem really
dark and depressing. The Motorpoint Arena has, without a doubt, the worst
lighting of any convention I regularly attend. It’s the only event where I have
to play around with the lighting on my pictures with guests at their respective
autograph tables after the event because they’re always so gloomy-looking.”
Word-for-word,
I could write the exact same review of
this event too. The reason why the event has scored a 6.5 is because of the
guests, the talks, and the crew. The negatives of the event are exactly the
same as well – for the love of God, will someone change the fucking arena lights
or put the guests in the brightly lit end of the main hall?!
Now
that my mini-rant is over, let’s dive into the play-by-play of the weekend,
shall we?
Like
the previous two events, I attended “Film & Comic Con Cardiff” as press.
Due to the lack of guests that interested me (either I didn’t know them, they
didn’t represent fandoms I was interested in, or I’d met them before), myself
and my best friend, Hannah (#TeamBesties), didn’t need to be at the Motorpoint
Arena until 2pm on the Saturday, which is so abnormal for me that it didn’t
feel like a convention day whatsoever.
The traffic coming into Cardiff was atrocious
and it took 45 minutes to drive 300 metres down the road, so myself and Hannah
hopped out of the car at the traffic lights, while Scott and Dom found a place
to park. My main reasons for attending F&CCC were Joseph Marcell (a
Saturday only guest) and the three smaller Game Of Thrones guests – Staz Nair,
Dean Jagger and Wilf Scolding (the latter two of which were only attending on
Sunday, which meant I had to travel from Gloucester to Cardiff and back on both
days!). As I was going to be at the event anyway, I’d also decided that I was
going to get John Leeson’s autograph, as well as go and say “hi” to my
muscled-mate, Ross O’Hennessy.
The first
scheduled activity on the agenda was Joseph Marcell’s Q&A panel. Over the
past decade, I’ve attended hundreds and hundreds of panels like this at
conventions....literally. I’ve been to panels where I couldn’t stop laughing,
I’ve been to panels that were informative and captivating, and I’ve been to
some real snoozefests that make you check your watch every 30 seconds, begging
for the sweet release of death. Joseph’s panel lay somewhere in between those
two extremes. It was a very interesting panel, which was a great comfort to me
considering I basically travelled to Cardiff in order to meet Joseph Marcell.
Before attending the event, while on “garden leave” from my old job (I’d handed
my notice in, but they told me I didn’t have to come back and work it, they’d
pay me to sit at home for it instead), I re-watched all six seasons of the
“Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air” for the first time in many years. Like many people
from my generation, the Fresh Prince was part of my BBC2 evening entertainment
from 6pm-7:30pm every week day, with a line-up that consisted of greats such as
“The Simpsons”, “Robot Wars”, “Buffy The Vampire Slayer”, and “Malcolm In The
Middle”. Since buying the DVDs about a decade ago, I don’t recall seeing a
single episode of the Fresh Prince ever since, so re-watching the entire series
was like a trip down memory lane. Suffice to say, I was thoroughly excited to
meet Joseph at this year’s “London Film & Comic Con” and I was devastated
when Joseph had to cancel at the last minute. Thankfully, Joseph’s appearance
was re-scheduled for Cardiff instead and my first time seeing the legend that
is Mr. Joseph Marcell in the flesh was when he came on stage for his panel.
Highlights! :-
·
Joseph made reference to the fact that “The
Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air” is one of the top syndicated shows of the past 20
years and is still shown on television pretty much everywhere in the world on
some channel or another to this day.
·
Joseph’s favourite episodes of “The Fresh
Prince” are “Did The Earth Move For You?” (the earthquake episode), “The Baby
Comes Out” (where Nicky is born), and “Def Poet’s Society” (“caaaaaaannon to
the right of them, caaaaaaannon to the left of them, caaaaaaannon in front of
them!”)
·
Joseph mentioned that he met Will Smith before
he met the rest of the cast and the two hit it off immediately.
·
Someone in the audience asked Joseph who his
favourite and least favourite cast members were and Joseph refused to answer –
rightfully so, really. If the question were simply, “who were you closest to on
the cast?”, I imagine that Joseph would have answered, but adding the “least
favourite” part was a bad idea because it was basically asking Joseph to throw
a former colleague under the bus. I don’t blame Joseph for not answering that!
Unfortunately, after Joseph refused to answer, the audience member tried to
push the point by following up with, “we all really want to know!”, at which
point Joseph replied with, “well you’ll have to keep wanting to know then!”, so
it all became rather awkward for a second.
·
Evidently, the late, great James Avery (Uncle
Phil) originally auditioned for Geoffrey. As interesting as that dynamic would
have been, I’m overwhelmingly pleased that James was cast as Uncle Phil and
Joseph was cast as Geoffrey, as James’ fatherly relationship with Will and
Joseph’s one-liners are of key importance to the show.
·
Joseph recently lived in Oregon for a while in
order to perform in a theatre production there. Apparently, the people of
Oregon are obsessed with “Mrs. Brown’s Boys” at the moment.
·
Joseph talked about the differences between
working on television in the United States vs. the United Kingdom. In the U.K.,
he doesn’t ask for an assistant or a car to pick him up, etc., as there’s often
not the budget to do that, plus it’s not considered to be the ‘norm’. In the
United States, if you don’t ask for an assistant and a car to pick you up,
you’re considered a fool!
·
Joseph Marcell’s initial contract for “The Fresh
Prince” was for six seasons, which is exactly how long the show ran for in the
end.
·
Joseph toured the world a few years back for a
production of “King Lear”, where he portrayed the titular character. He
ultimately portrayed the character for two years.
·
Joseph came across very well during the Q&A.
He seemed very appreciative to the audience that turned up to see him talk. He
said that it’s a common expression that one audience member at an event like
this represents a thousand fans, so he was grateful for all the people that
came. Joseph wasn’t afraid to give an opinion, he talked about what the acting
world is really like, and he didn’t sugarcoat things. It was fascinating.
Joseph
Marcell: Soon after leaving Joseph’s panel, myself and Hannah headed
back downstairs to the main hall, where we perused the merchandise stalls for a
little while before heading over to Joseph’s autograph queue, which was only a
handful of people long by this point in the day (2:45pm). I’ve mentioned before
that guests who have never been to a convention or have rarely been (this was
Joseph’s second UK convention to my knowledge) tend to fall into two categories
– either they have no barrier and will talk and talk because they’re so excited
to be there and don’t know any better or they will have the deer-in-headlights
look and won’t give you much to work with because they don’t know what the
protocol is. I’d put Joseph more into the latter category. He didn’t seem shy
or reserved whatsoever, but nor was he particularly talkative. He replied to my
comments, smiled, gave great eye-contact and laughed enthusiastically, but he
didn’t push the conversation onwards. He was the very definition of a
‘responder’, which is pretty much what I expect from a guest experience.
Wonderful guy and was offering table pictures – even better, guests can’t
charge for table pictures at Showmasters’ events, which is a huge help for the
attendees that are on a tight budget! If only that arena lighting wasn’t so
shit...Guest Type = Responder.
(Regular readers, you
can skip this section)
“Shangel, what’s a ‘Responder’?”
I’m glad you asked.
Many years ago, after attending numerous conventions, I devised a system
whereby to categorise my experiences with guests and their level of interaction
in order to compare the quality of my experiences across conventions and time.
I have O.C.D., shut up. The following three types were found :-
·
The Responder:
This type of guest is often polite and friendly. If you ask them a question,
they’ll happily answer. If you comment on something, they’ll respond or smile
gratefully. However, they won’t carry the conversation forward, you have to.
These are the most common type of guest, and this is what you expect when
meeting someone at a convention. This is a great category to be a part of.
· The
Groucho/Big Guest: There are two aspects to this category. Firstly, you
have the groucho. The groucho is there for monetary purposes or is generally
just having a bad day, or is a bit of an ass. If you meet enough people, one of
them is bound to be an ass! The grouchos aren’t interested in conversations
above a few words. They’ll say ‘hi’ (sometimes they don’t bother with that),
sign, say ‘bye’ (sometimes), and you’re on your merry way. Of course, in
certain situations this is relevant and expected, which brings me to the second
part of this category, the ‘big guest’. Some guests are going to be insanely
popular. Such as Stan Lee at LFCC ‘14, who had an entire building to himself
basically. When you get a huge queue like that, the guest can’t take a lot of
time with everyone. If they did, many people would go home disappointed at not
getting to meet them at all. Therefore, the convention company and the guest
want to get through as many people as possible. You cannot have a huge guest
and expect to get above a minute with them, which is perfectly fair.
· The
Conversationalist: This is easily my favourite type of guest. They’ll
answer your questions with a smile, ask you questions in return, and are happy
to chat for an extended period of time (extended = above 2-3 minutes),
regardless of where the conversation leads or how long you’ve been talking.
Obviously, there has to be some cut-off point if there is a queue behind you,
but you leave the experience feeling euphoric and like you gained a lot more
than just the autograph you queued for.
Feel free to let me
know your experiences with guests in the comments below or on social media!
Soon after leaving
Joseph’s autograph table, it was time to head up to the first floor for my
studio photo with, you guessed it, Joseph Marcell! It was Marcell-fest 2017! My
day had thus far consisted of a Joseph Marcell talk, a Joseph Marcell
autograph, and now a Joseph Marcell studio photo...are you sensing a theme?
While walking down the corridor to the back of Joseph’s studio photo queue, I
heard my name being called. I had a quick scan and couldn’t see where the call
had initiated, so I shrugged it off and kept on walking. A few seconds later, I
spotted where it had come from – Mr. Josef Altin, who amongst many other roles
portrayed Pypar of the Night’s Watch in “Game Of Thrones”. Josef was at “Film
& Comic Con Cardiff” as a regular attendee with his fantastic young
daughter. For those keeping score, I’m 2/2 for bumping into Joe randomly at the
past two F&CCC’s! Joe and his daughter were queuing up to get a studio
photo with Joseph Marcell just like everyone else. I told Joe that based on how
his career is going lately, very soon he won’t be able to do that as too many
people will recognise him! I exchanged pleasantries with Joe and we caught up
on each other’s lives for the past couple of months since I’d seen Joe last
before I headed to the back of the queue and my photo with Joseph Marcell was
taken. It’s always a privilege to see Joe Altin and he’s someone that has
become something of a friend and mentor over the past couple of years. I’m
looking forward to seeing Joe again at “Reading Comic Con” next month! The
studio photo with Joseph Marcell went very smoothly and came out great. With
Marcell-fest 2017 now at an end, it was time to tick off the remaining two
things on the itinerary – go and say “hi” to Ross O’Hennessy, plus get an
autograph from John Leeson.
Ross
O’Hennessy:
Having only seen Ross a fortnight earlier at “Gloucester Comic Con”, it felt
more like going over to chat to a mate than to meet a celebrity at an autograph
table. As this was Ross’ first Showmasters event, we largely chatted about how
the experience was going for him and the prospect of him branching out into
doing international conventions too. Ross is a stand-up guy and doesn’t like to
commit to conventions unless there’s a very strong chance he’ll be free to
honour his commitment, which has limited Ross’ international appearances thus
far because even though Ross has had opportunities to go abroad, the timing hasn’t
worked out yet. I won’t go into more detail than that about my time with Ross
because it’s more high-end, behind-the-scenes convention stuff, such as
contracts, money, and agents, which would be very unprofessional to share
publicly. It’s always wonderful to bump into Ross. Not only is he a great
conversationalist, but he’s also so
down-to-Earth and humble. I intended to grab a picture with Ross at the
autograph table, as I haven’t taken a picture with Ross since our first time
meeting, which happened to be Ross’ first ever convention, “Wales Comic Con
2015 Part II”. Due to the arena lighting being so shitty, I decided to skip it
and get a picture with Ross the following weekend at “Coventry Comic
Con”...could have saved myself £10 if someone sorted out that shitty arena
lighting! *grumble, grumble*....Guest
Type = Conversationalist.
John
Leeson:
I love John Leeson. I’ve seen John at conventions quite a few times over the
years, including twice on stage for a Q&A, the most recent of which being
earlier in 2017. However, for some bizarre reason, I’d always decided to leave
his autograph until the next time. This is something that I did for years with
certain convention regulars. Then, last year, out of nowhere, I just started
ticking them off the list. I don’t even know why! I think because a few people
I’d met over the years started to pass away, I didn’t want to miss the
opportunity to meet some of the elder statesmen, so, in 2016, I ticked Dave
Prowse, Jeremy Bulloch, and the late, great Kenny Baker off the list. On this
occasion, as my day was so quiet anyway, I went over to meet John face-to-face
for the first time and he couldn’t have been nicer! We chatted about the
auditioning process for voicing K-9 in “Doctor Who” – a role in which he is
celebrating his 40th
anniversary this year! John said that his agent called him one day and
ecstatically informed him that he’d been offered not one, but two roles in “Doctor Who”! John was so
excited that he couldn’t talk for a few seconds. He could see his career
blossoming before his eyes! At the point John was fantasising about receiving
awards and gaining national fame, his agent informed him thus, “well...with one
of the roles you’ll be voicing a monster (the Nucleus)...and with the other
you’ll be voicing a robot dog...” John could instantly picture his career
nose-diving into the ground. Amusingly, John has made a living off of that
robot dog for 40 years – travelling to conventions around the world, continuing
to voice K-9 for “Big Finish” audio books, and it is easily his most
recognisable role. So the amusing story has a very happy ending at least. We
also discussed John being a wine educator as a secondary form of employment and
what led him down this unusual path. John’s autograph was just £10 and because
it was Showmasters the table picture with John was free too, so I snagged one
of those. Great price, a wonderful gentleman to meet, and a thoroughly pleasant
experience! Guest Type =
Conversationalist.
With everything on
the day’s agenda completed, it was time for myself, Hannah, Dom, and Scott to
head back to Gloucestershire – not before stopping off at Yo! Sushi for dinner
– and for myself and John to brave the journey back to Cardiff the following
morning.
Unlike the previous
day, the journey getting into Cardiff was positively easy. No traffic, no
drama. The journey home would be a much different story, but more on that
later. The day’s itinerary was equally undemanding as Saturday’s, with just
three autographs to get, three studio photos, and two panels to attend. The
autographs that needed to be collected were from Wilf Scolding, Dean Jagger,
and Staz Nair, who also happened to be the same three people that I had studio
photos booked with later in the day. The first thing to do for the day was
attend the “Game Of Thrones” panel, which consisted of, you guessed it, Wilf
Scolding, Dean Jagger, and Staz Nair, whom all had natural chemistry together.
Highlights from the panel! :-
·
The
very first thing I noticed was that Staz is a ball of energy. Like, crazy hyperactive and excitable, which
made for a very memorable and enjoyable panel experience. Out of the three
panels I attended over “Film & Comic Con Cardiff” weekend, this was easily
the highlight.
·
All
three actors expressed their gratitude in being cast for “Game Of Thrones” and
they all referenced that just having the show on your acting résumé opens doors
for you that would otherwise be closed.
·
Wilf
mentioned that he’d never seen the show before being cast. After getting the
part, he binge-watched the first six seasons. This meant that upon originally
being cast, Wilf had no idea how important Rhaegar was to the story. In my
opinion, by the season seven finale, Rhaegar was the most important character that had never been seen in the show.
·
Staz
mentioned that having himself, Dean, and Wilf on stage started to feel like “Blind
Date”, so he started talking in a camp voice and expressing his love of taking
long, romantic walks on the beach. That guy is frickin’ hilarious.
·
Staz’
favourite scene to film was during the season six premiere, “The Red Woman”,
where he gets to whip Emilia Clarke – or, I should say, Qhono gets to whip
Daenerys. Everyone laughed at this choice because it sounds kinky as Hell, but
Staz’s reasoning was really sound. Having the whip in his hand made him feel
more comfortable in the role and less nervous about being a part of the biggest
show in the world right now.
·
Dean’s
favourite scenes that he was involved in were all from “The Battle Of The
Bastards”. The main fighting scene(s) in the BotB took 2.5 months to film in
total. Dean was on set for one month filming his sections. One month of
fighting, mud, slipping, choreographing, and braving the cold of Northern
Ireland. Dean mentioned that when he was filming his battle with Kristofer
Hivju (Tormund), after one particular take, Dean started laughing to himself
and couldn’t stop. When Kristofer asked what was so funny, Dean mentioned that
all of the extras surrounding them, while acting weary from battle, were swaying
like an army of zombies from “The Walking Dead”. This job Kristofer laughing as
well and they couldn’t stop for a few minutes.
·
Wilf’s
favourite scene that he was a part of was easy as he’s only been in one scene
on the show thus far. At least it’s a good scene!
·
Staz
talked about his fake beard on the show. Staz said that he can’t grow a beard
like that in real life as he’s “not a real man” and the beard he’s wearing on
the show is made out of yak’s hair. He said that somewhere out there in the
wilderness is an angry yak with a bald patch on its fur. The process of putting
the yak hair around Staz’s face was a three-hour process in total!
·
One
of Emilia Clarke’s “Daenerys’ wigs” costs £7,000 to make! Staz questioned who
gets the money for the wig and then did an impression of an angry yak not
getting paid for his body hair being removed. Totally hilarious.
·
Getting
Wilf into full Rhaegar costume and wig was also a three-hour process.
·
Dean
loved filming “The Battle Of The Bastards”, but was a little disheartened to
see that Smalljon Umber (his character) never got to trade blows with Jon Snow
during the battle – particularly as it was because of Smalljon that Ramsay had
Rickon in the first place, which is what ultimately led to Rickon’s death.
·
Saddest
character deaths :- Wun Wun’s death broke Wilf, Ygritte’s death crippled Staz,
and Oberyn’s head-go-boom was the most memorable for Dean. Dean did a fantastic
impression of the Mountain exploding Oberyn’s head. The “boom” he did into the
microphone made everyone jump.
·
Staz
had little experience riding horses before being cast on “Game Of Thrones”. He
said that the constant up-and-down motion of being on the horse really hurt his
coccyx.
·
Staz
questioned how well Qhono would fair on 21st century Earth and
labelled the movie, “A Dothraki In New York”. He then did impressions of a
Dothraki having to buy an iPhone or take a female out on a date. Man, that dude
just lights up the stage.
·
Dean
said that a few weeks after auditioning for “Game Of Thrones”, he received a
call from his agent at 6:37pm. His agent told him, “You’ll find out tomorrow
whether or not you got the part on the biggest show on television.” Dean said
it was the longest night of his life! If you were the agent, why not wait until
the following day to call Dean? Seems cruel. The following day, Dean’s agent
called him to let him know that he did not
get the part. After Dean was crushed, his agent said, “only joking!” – Monstrous!
·
Staz
said that two years ago, not long before being cast in “Game Of Thrones”, he
was living on a single bed in his friend’s corridor. What a success story he
is! Same for Dean too, but more on that later in the autograph table section.
·
Wilf
still works as a chef to this day, even alongside his acting career. Not only
does this make him smart as he’s earning money while getting a foothold in the
industry, but it also means he’s grounded enough to not think he’s “above”
doing a regular job while appearing on the biggest television show in the
world. While Wilf was telling this story, it struck me just how much he sounds
like Harry Lloyd, who portrays his younger brother, Viserys, in “Game Of
Thrones”. Wilf is actually English,
not Welsh. When all the news was breaking about him appearing in “Game Of
Thrones”, he was erroneously portrayed as a Welsh actor. He’s not. He’s
English. He’s English and sounds just like Harry Lloyd.
·
All-in-all,
it was a terrific panel! The perfect blend of fun, funny, informative, and
real. There were personal stories, stories from the set of “Game Of Thrones”...and
some jokes thrown in along the way too. One of the better panels I’ve attended
this year for sure.
After the “Game
Of Thrones” panel concluded, rather spur-of-the-moment, myself and John decided
to stay and watch the Jeremy Bulloch panel too. Highlights! :-
·
I’ve
got to point out that the Showmasters gentleman hosting the panels throughout
the weekend was terrific. Great job!
·
Jeremy’s
panel was unique in that he stood up for the entire duration. It was also
unique because the first half of the panel involved bringing up volunteers from
the crowd in order to speak lines and act out impromptu scenes, while the
second half was reserved for the Q&A section.
·
Jeremy
mentioned that he used to play rugby in Cardiff during his youth.
·
Jeremy
said that he almost didn’t take the role of Boba Fett. At the time, Jeremy was
part of a theatre performance and didn’t want to take time away from it in
order to say a few lines in a sci-fi film. If it was a bigger part or more
lines, he’d have jumped at the chance, but as it was a minor part (or so he
thought at the time), he needed a little convincing. Ultimately, he was able to
get four days off in order to film for “The Empire Strikes Back”, which is,
amusingly, still his most recognisable role almost 40 years later!
·
When
Jeremy first put Boba’s jetpack on, it made him topple over backwards because
of the weight of it!
·
Jeremy
also appeared in three separate James Bond films and he stated that Sir Roger
Moore is “possibly the nicest man I’ve ever met.”
·
After
the laughter and hyperactivity of the “Game Of Thrones” panel, Jeremy’s felt
totally different. It was more reserved and more intimate. There’s no denying
that Jeremy is a living-legend of sci-fi and the convention circuit! I’ve been
attending conventions for about a decade now and during that time Jeremy, Dave
Prowse and Kenny Baker have probably been to over 50% with me, and at least one
of them has been at almost every convention I’ve ever attended. With Kenny
sadly no longer with us and with Dave retiring from conventions at the
conclusion of 2017, Jeremy is the last man standing, and the UK convention
scene will have lost something truly special when Jeremy decides to hang up the
helmet as well.
With both
panels now at an end, my schedule for the remainder of the afternoon was a
doddle. Three autographs from the Thrones boys and three studio photos with the
Thrones boys. The first of the studio photos (Dean Jagger) was at 3:30pm, with
the other two being in quite quick succession afterwards. This left me an hour
to collect the three autographs before the studio photos began.
Dean
Jagger:
The elusive Dean Jagger! I was first supposed to meet Dean at “Wales Comic Con”
at the end of 2016, but, sadly, Dean had to cancel. Since meeting Dean in
Cardiff, he’s also had to cancel his appearance at “Wales Comic Con” at the
conclusion of 2017, so I’m really happy I took the opportunity to meet him
here! I must have chatted to Dean for a solid 10 or 15 minutes and the first
thing that struck me about Dean was that he’s so humble. A few years back, Dean was working in a mattress factory
between acting gigs, which is still something he does to this day when he finds
himself having a little free time. He said it helps to keep him grounded, which
is totally admirable. Myself and Dean talked about the process of being cast in
“Game Of Thrones”, we discussed what it was like filming for a couple of months
in Belfast, and what it was like filming such an intricate, detailed fight
scene like the one in “The Battle Of The Bastards”. Dean also mentioned that he’s
just been cast as the lead in a new television show, which will start filming
in South Africa at the end of this year. Obviously, he couldn’t go into too
much detail, but it sounds like it’s going to be a huge deal for him, which is
lovely to see. I grabbed a picture with Dean at the autograph table and the
lighting was inevitably shit. No matter, I still had the studio photo booked
for later in the day. This was merely my back-up. My chat with Dean may have
been my longest of the weekend and it was a pleasure to meet him. In fact, all
three of the Thrones guys I met on Sunday were fantastic. They may not have had
huge roles in the show, but they all
have great stories to tell. I’ve often found that the “smaller” guests tend to
be the best experiences because you get more time with them, they’re cheaper to
meet, and they’ll tell you everything. Guest
Type = Conversationalist.
Wilf
Scolding: Sat
right next to Dean was Wilf. Both convention virgins, both soaking up the
experience for the first time...and both were super cool to meet. It was very
surprising and joyous to see Dean, Wilf, and Staz have a steady stream of
people at their autograph table throughout the day. None of them really seemed
to dry up at all, which is what I’d have expected by a certain point in the
day. Wilf had attended the premiere for his new movie, “Bees Make Honey” at the
Rain Dance Festival in London the previous night, so I asked him how that went,
which he seemed really appreciative of. I don’t think anyone else had spoken to
him about it during the day, so I think he liked the fact that I’d done a
little research into his career and talked about something other than “Game Of
Thrones”. Wilf said that they’re taking it to film festivals for the time being
before hopefully getting it released to the general public in the future.
Inevitably, our conversation – which was also quite long – eventually turned to
“Game Of Thrones”. I asked Wilf how difficult it was to keep his appearance on
the show secret for the 6 months or so before the episode aired, especially
after he was heavily tipped for the role a few months before he showed up on
screen as someone had stalked his Twitter and worked out that he’d started
following other people from the show during the time that the Rhaegar flashback
would have been filmed. Wilf said that it was tough and he told virtually
nobody. Once it got leaked that he was likely portraying Rhaegar, his
management team told him not to respond or acknowledge the people tweeting him
about it whatsoever, which must have been tough when he was being bombarded
with questions.
I
mentioned to Wilf that if “Robert’s Rebellion” ends up being the prequel series
that is chosen to be produced, he may find himself having a much larger role in
the “Game Of Thrones” television world moving forwards. Wilf loved that idea
and requested that I hunt down David and Dan to request this specific prequel
and his involvement in it. Wilf talked about filming in Belfast and how
dedicated the crew were to making Wilf’s Rhaegar look as much like a true
Targaryen as possible. While his involvement in the show thus far has been
limited, Rhaegar is such an iconic character that he’s instantly become
important to the show. I thanked Wilf for his time, grabbed a picture with him
at the autograph table, and headed over to my final autograph table of the
weekend, Mr. Staz Nair. Guest Type =
Conversationalist.
Staz
Nair: Not
only is Staz a complete ball of energy and an excitable puppy in equal measure
on stage, but he’s also just as crazy one-to-one at his autograph table. He’s
so much fun to talk to! One of the most natural, effortless, enjoyable, crazy
experiences I’ve ever had at an autograph table before – and there have been
over a thousand! As I started chatting to Staz, a small boy in Cosplay walked
past and made Staz melt. Therefore, the first few minutes of our conversation
was dedicated to conventions. This was Staz’s second ever con (both have been
via Showmasters) and Staz talked about how much he’s loving the environment and
atmosphere at the events. Not only does he get to meet fans and have some great
conversations, but he also sees the effort and passion being fuelled into
Cosplay, and he gets to see the friendships that are being created by people
who happen to share some similar interests. I talked about how and why I
started conventions a decade ago and the conversation got pretty deep. The
conversation shifted to “Game Of Thrones” and I asked Staz how fun it was to
film in Spain and Croatia while wearing yak hair and armour – spoiler: not
pleasant. Wearing a full-on beard and moustache, made out of itchy yak hair,
while it’s 35 degrees outside, doesn’t exactly scream “fun”. Staz also laughed
as he told us that at the end of the day, when he’d take the yak hair off, he’d
be left with a white tan-line beard and moustache while the rest of his face
was brown. After about 10 minutes of chatting, I thanked Staz for his time and
told him I’d see him in the studio photo session later in the afternoon. Just
as I was leaving, Wai Ching Ho (Madame Gao from “Marvel”) came over and said to
me, “I wish I had as much energy as this man does! He never stops!” Gotta say I
agree with Wai (whom I met a couple of months earlier at LFCC) there! He’s like
the Energiser Bunny. With everything taken into account, Staz was probably my
favourite guest of the weekend. Crazy, ridiculous, hilarious, over-the-top
friendly, and really approachable. Great guy. Guest Type = Conversationalist.
Soon after
leaving Staz’s autograph table, it was time to head to the first floor for
three studio photos in pretty quick succession. All the photo shoots ran
smoothly and on time, all the guests were interactive and in high spirits, the
crew were great, and the hour just flew by. It was time for myself and John to
brave the 60 minutes back to Gloucester...or it should have been 60 minutes. Just outside of Newport, there were
roadworks on the motorway, which resulted in three lanes merging into one. This
meant that it took us nearly two hours
to get a mile or so down the road! I don’t recall ever being in such bad
traffic before. I was going a little bit crazy and I wasn’t even the driver! I’ve
discovered that I don’t handle bad traffic well. John’s car is only a year or
so old, so it has all the fancy gadgets and statistics that my 2002 Honda Civic
Vision doesn’t have (which, interestingly, I bought from John a few years ago).
Turns out, the 60-minute journey home took three
hours in total and our average speed for the journey was 26mph. Ugh. Shoot
me now.
Rumour has
it that “Film & Comic Con Cardiff” will only be returning once next year
instead of the two separate editions that have historically been the case. If
this means that more effort will be put into the line-up and overall
presentation, I’m all for it. The next F&CCC takes place over the weekend
of the 12th and 13th of May and will once again be at the
Motorpoint Arena. For the love of God,
someone sort out the fucking lighting for May! The tragedy here is that this
event could be something truly special if the effort was once again put in as
it was a really, really strong event
for the first year or two that it took place. Showmasters do such an amazing
job with the bigger shows like Collectormania and LFCC. Some of my favourite
events ever have been Showmasters and it seems as though more effort is being
put into the regionals lately if ‘Film & Comic Con Newcastle’ is anything
to go by. I can only hope that Cardiff follows suit. Whether or not I return to
Cardiff in May will be entirely dependent upon the guest line-up, particularly
as the April/May region of the UK con scene is stacked already.
My review
of “Coventry Comic Con” should be up within a couple of days. Then I’m off to “Loughborough
Comic Con” on October the 22nd, followed by “Reading Comic Con” at
the end of November, and, finally, “Wales Comic Con” during the first weekend
of December to cap off the year in style. Stay strong, stay safe and stay happy!
-
Your
Friendly Neighbourhood Shangel
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