As the actor Brian Blessed turns 90, a host of stars have shared their memories of working with him, celebrating his energy, exuberance and distinctive voice.
Emma Thompson: 'A mighty wind, a tree of life'
Emma Thompson recalls how Blessed championed cold exposure long before it became fashionable. During the filming of Kenneth Branagh's Henry V at Shepperton, she visited him in his dressing room, where all the windows were open. 'It was bloody freezing,' she says. Blessed told her a story about Everest while she sat getting colder and colder, until he noticed her blue lips. He then bundled her into heated corridors to recover, thundering: 'The cold is good for you!' Thompson took a cold shower every day after that.
'The man is a legend: a force, a mighty wind and a great tree of life,' she adds. 'I will always love him deeply and appreciate his kindness to a young actress, his wit and fun and energy and gaiety, his loudness and his madness.'
Derek Jacobi: 'Get to 100!'
Derek Jacobi first worked with Blessed at Birmingham Rep in 1960, when they would do a different play every month. 'It was my first job and he was the star of the show. I was in awe of him,' Jacobi says. Sharing a dressing room was 'an education in itself' – Blessed was 'not particularly restrained – not when it came to pissing in the sink!'
Jacobi describes him as 'full of bluster and bigness, but underneath it all, he is as sensitive as the rest of us'. His message to Blessed is: 'Get to 100 and we'll all be there applauding! We're all applauding at 90 too!'
Dexter Fletcher: 'Wow, he just says anything!'
Dexter Fletcher worked with Blessed in the 1984 season at the Royal Shakespeare Company in Stratford-upon-Avon, in Henry V and Hamlet. 'He came with this energy, exuberance and lust for life. I'd never seen anybody like him,' Fletcher recalls. Blessed spoke openly about his body, shocking many but not Virginia McKenna, who played Gertrude.
When Fletcher was offered a role in the film Revolution with Al Pacino, Blessed advised him: 'Listen, Dexter, go and do the movie because the movie world is small and when you get into it, if you make a success of it, you're in and it's a great living.' Fletcher says that advice led to many films, and he has 'a great love and affection for him'.
Melody Anderson: 'He pinched my bottom'
Melody Anderson, who played Dale Arden in Flash Gordon, remembers Blessed's 'Shakespearean voice bellow throughout the stages'. She says he was 'as indefatigable off screen as he was as Prince Vultan of the Hawkmen' – 'He is a Hawkman!'
During a scene where he spun her around on a table, he gave her a little bottom pinch. 'As an actor, I loved it because it solicited such an honest response,' she says. The director, Mike Hodges, was thrilled. Anderson adds: 'It's not an ego thing: it's a life force. I don't think I've ever met anyone who has such energy and self-confidence.'
Brian May: 'An extra member of Queen'
Brian May, who made the soundtrack album for Flash Gordon, says Blessed's voice is 'a musical part of what we achieved, like an extra member of Queen'. May recalls Blessed appearing in his badger crusade video, 'doing the Brian Blessed everybody wants, very loud and distinctive, shouting: “Keep the badgers alive!”'
'We saw a side of him that cares deeply and passionately about animals,' May says. 'I see him as a very deep human being.'
Alan Hinkes: 'He never seems to conk out'
Mountaineer Alan Hinkes spent two-and-a-half months with Blessed on Everest 30 years ago, when Blessed reached 7,700m before turning back. At base camp, Blessed would regale them with tales in the mess tent, and Hinkes would roll off his stool laughing. 'He didn't seem to conk out,' Hinkes says. At charity events, Blessed says: 'Alan's saved my life and he's carried me down on his back when I was knackered.' Hinkes admits: 'I couldn't really carry him down on my back, but it's a good story.'
Imogen Stubbs and Adrian Lester
Imogen Stubbs, who worked with Blessed in The Relapse at the National Theatre in 2001, calls him 'a delightfully terrifying figure running around on stage with a blunderbuss and his signature booming voice that creates its own weather system', but with 'the sweetest, kindest personality backstage'.
Adrian Lester says Blessed's performances are 'large and full to the brim with life'. He recalls how Blessed can tell a story about a trip to the Arctic where he punched a polar bear on the nose 'and somehow you know it's true'. Lester adds: 'A rare, brilliant, kind-hearted giant of a man. I wish there were more like him.'
