Interview with Virginia Hey
Feb 12, 2014 16:27:27 GMT -5
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Post by 🐍 cahusserole 🐍 on Feb 12, 2014 16:27:27 GMT -5
I mentioned to Douay-Rheims-Challoner that Virginia Hey was going to guest star in one of Big Finish's Fourth Doctor Adventures. Here is an interview with her from Big Finish's monthly emag, Vortex:
HEY ON WHY
VIRGINIA HEY, GUEST STAR OF THIS MONTH’S FOURTH DOCTOR ADVENTURE WHITE GHOSTS, REVEALS TO PAUL SPRAGG WHY DOCTOR WHO MEANS SO MUCH TO HER
Hello Virginia. How does it feel to be in Doctor Who?
I’m so flabbergasted I can’t tell you, because I’m a great Doctor Who fan. In fact, Doctor Who was the only show I was allowed to watch on TV for many, many years, I think until I was about fourteen. Then I went back to Australia. Oh, that and The Avengers, I was allowed to watch The Avengers towards the end. So it’s a huge thrill and what an honour. And [Tom Baker, The Doctor]’s the most fascinating gentleman. When I met him I immediately called him sir. No, really! Because he’s a majestic actor and I really respect him a great deal. And I’ve just moved to the UK; I got here six weeks ago now. So I land in England and the very first job I have as an actor in the UK is with Tom Baker; it doesn’t get better than that.
Who was ‘your’ Doctor?
Tom. It was Tom. And then after that I didn’t watch Doctor Who for many, many years. And that’s the era that my mind is locked into. Eras after that I was growing up very fast and I was moving in lots of different directions and there was school and college and so forth, so I didn’t really get back into Doctor Who until fairly recently. But for me it’s him. He’s the one and only for me.
How did you get involved with Big Finish?
I met [producer] David Richardson at a Doctor Who convention. I think I approached him because someone said, ‘Oh, you see over there, that’s David Richardson from Big Finish and they do lots of audiobooks. You should talk to him and see if they have any characters for you, because that would be amazing for you to do when you settle in to the UK.’ So I approached him because I don’t have an acting agent yet, and I just said, ‘Oh my God, I would love to do some audiobooks and voiceovers,’ and he said, ‘Okay, I’ll keep you in mind’. He approached me a few weeks ago and said, ‘Right, we’ve got a character for you’. And here I am. I’m really chuffed! It’s my first job in England!
What can you tell us about your character?
Let’s just say she’s a withered academic. I would say she’s probably late sixties, maybe early seventies, and she’s seen it all, and she’s a teacher on another world. And she has her favourite students and she most obviously is irritated by other students, which I’m sure is natural for a teacher, but I think she’s at the end of her life as a teacher. She’s very driven and she’s a very powerful character, and quite irritable as some elderly ladies can be. So she’s a joy to play! It’s so nice to me because I haven’t played an elderly lady before. However, my character in Farscape was four hundred years old. But she was an alien.
What made you decide to return to the UK?
I was here when I was little, hence watching Doctor Who in black and white. Dad was a dentist; he decided to come over to England and set up a practice over here. Mum was a very creative woman; artist, journalist part time and classical music composer. Not famous, but that’s just what she loved to do apart from raise her children. Part of raising us was showing us the beauty of Europe so she definitely wanted us to come over here for a few years so that she could take us through Europe and introduce us to the most famous and extraordinary art galleries and the cathedrals and the architecture and the creative energy. Then I stayed from [age] twenty, off and on, until thirty-eight. But all of those years here in England made me really feel like I was home. This is where I’m happiest in the world.
You mentioned Farscape, in which you played Zhaan. Do you miss the show?
There’s aspects of it that I do miss a lot. I miss the character because when you give birth to a character as complex as Zhaan, a lot of you goes into the character and you really do feel as though you’ve given birth to a child and raised that child to adult and then released the child. But the love and the attachment are still there. I don’t know if other actors feel that way about some of the roles they’ve played, but I certainly do. It was really nice to play that role because she wasn’t human and I could just really let myself go. I didn’t feel self-conscious in any way. Not that I was aware of being self-conscious before, but when you have a mask – it wasn’t literally a mask, but figuratively – you can somehow relax behind it. So I do miss her. I put so much of myself into her that I miss her with all my heart and soul. But we always say that Zhaan is out there in the ether somewhere. Well, she’s in here, isn’t she? Really, she’s in my heart.
Would you play her again on audio?
Oh, God yeah! If I don’t have to paint myself blue in the studio! Why don’t you do a spin-off, Zhaan’s World? There you go. Good idea?
HEY ON WHY
VIRGINIA HEY, GUEST STAR OF THIS MONTH’S FOURTH DOCTOR ADVENTURE WHITE GHOSTS, REVEALS TO PAUL SPRAGG WHY DOCTOR WHO MEANS SO MUCH TO HER
Hello Virginia. How does it feel to be in Doctor Who?
I’m so flabbergasted I can’t tell you, because I’m a great Doctor Who fan. In fact, Doctor Who was the only show I was allowed to watch on TV for many, many years, I think until I was about fourteen. Then I went back to Australia. Oh, that and The Avengers, I was allowed to watch The Avengers towards the end. So it’s a huge thrill and what an honour. And [Tom Baker, The Doctor]’s the most fascinating gentleman. When I met him I immediately called him sir. No, really! Because he’s a majestic actor and I really respect him a great deal. And I’ve just moved to the UK; I got here six weeks ago now. So I land in England and the very first job I have as an actor in the UK is with Tom Baker; it doesn’t get better than that.
Who was ‘your’ Doctor?
Tom. It was Tom. And then after that I didn’t watch Doctor Who for many, many years. And that’s the era that my mind is locked into. Eras after that I was growing up very fast and I was moving in lots of different directions and there was school and college and so forth, so I didn’t really get back into Doctor Who until fairly recently. But for me it’s him. He’s the one and only for me.
How did you get involved with Big Finish?
I met [producer] David Richardson at a Doctor Who convention. I think I approached him because someone said, ‘Oh, you see over there, that’s David Richardson from Big Finish and they do lots of audiobooks. You should talk to him and see if they have any characters for you, because that would be amazing for you to do when you settle in to the UK.’ So I approached him because I don’t have an acting agent yet, and I just said, ‘Oh my God, I would love to do some audiobooks and voiceovers,’ and he said, ‘Okay, I’ll keep you in mind’. He approached me a few weeks ago and said, ‘Right, we’ve got a character for you’. And here I am. I’m really chuffed! It’s my first job in England!
What can you tell us about your character?
Let’s just say she’s a withered academic. I would say she’s probably late sixties, maybe early seventies, and she’s seen it all, and she’s a teacher on another world. And she has her favourite students and she most obviously is irritated by other students, which I’m sure is natural for a teacher, but I think she’s at the end of her life as a teacher. She’s very driven and she’s a very powerful character, and quite irritable as some elderly ladies can be. So she’s a joy to play! It’s so nice to me because I haven’t played an elderly lady before. However, my character in Farscape was four hundred years old. But she was an alien.
What made you decide to return to the UK?
I was here when I was little, hence watching Doctor Who in black and white. Dad was a dentist; he decided to come over to England and set up a practice over here. Mum was a very creative woman; artist, journalist part time and classical music composer. Not famous, but that’s just what she loved to do apart from raise her children. Part of raising us was showing us the beauty of Europe so she definitely wanted us to come over here for a few years so that she could take us through Europe and introduce us to the most famous and extraordinary art galleries and the cathedrals and the architecture and the creative energy. Then I stayed from [age] twenty, off and on, until thirty-eight. But all of those years here in England made me really feel like I was home. This is where I’m happiest in the world.
You mentioned Farscape, in which you played Zhaan. Do you miss the show?
There’s aspects of it that I do miss a lot. I miss the character because when you give birth to a character as complex as Zhaan, a lot of you goes into the character and you really do feel as though you’ve given birth to a child and raised that child to adult and then released the child. But the love and the attachment are still there. I don’t know if other actors feel that way about some of the roles they’ve played, but I certainly do. It was really nice to play that role because she wasn’t human and I could just really let myself go. I didn’t feel self-conscious in any way. Not that I was aware of being self-conscious before, but when you have a mask – it wasn’t literally a mask, but figuratively – you can somehow relax behind it. So I do miss her. I put so much of myself into her that I miss her with all my heart and soul. But we always say that Zhaan is out there in the ether somewhere. Well, she’s in here, isn’t she? Really, she’s in my heart.
Would you play her again on audio?
Oh, God yeah! If I don’t have to paint myself blue in the studio! Why don’t you do a spin-off, Zhaan’s World? There you go. Good idea?
