Editor’s Note

I stumbled upon Big Finish Productions quite accidentally, when following a mysterious path of links I’m not quite sure I could recreate, searching out the post-Stargate career of Michael Shanks. Delighted but not a little trepidatious (what was this, spoken word fanfic?), I downloaded the first audio drama in their Stargate line, Gift of the Gods, starring Shanks as my beloved Daniel Jackson. Less than one track in, I was completely hooked. This audio drama thing was the best idea ever!

I have since purchased all twelve of their Stargate dramas -- the SG-1 kind, featuring Janet Fraiser, Vala, Teal’c, even Walter; and the Atlantis kind, featuring Drs. Weir, Beckett and Zelenka, plus Major Lorne -- and can honestly say I have loved each one. There is just something so... right about hearing these stories told in the voices of the original actors (yep, even Zelenka's), not to mention the fact that we are getting new, and excellent, tales from these characters' lives. I have yet to delve into Big Finish's Doctor Who, Highlander, Dark Shadows or other branches, but I have no doubt they are as well-written, well-produced, well-acted and well-crafted as their Stargate equivalents.

But how, I wondered, had such glorious, mission-continuing productions come about? And how could I make sure that other fans of various discontinued series got the chance to experience the joy of this discovery? So I contacted Big Finish to get the inside scoop, and below is the result.

My advice? Get to know Big Finish. I think you’ll be glad you did.

  -- Rachel Hyland

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Hello! I’m Paul Spragg, and I’m an alcoholic. No, hang on. I work for Big Finish Productions. That’s the one. Now, you’re probably asking yourself ‘Who is this person’? Well, I just said. I’m Paul Spragg. You may also be wondering what on earth Big Finish Productions is. I can help you there too: Big Finish is a UK-based production company that makes audio dramas. So far, so average, right? The difference with us is that we don’t just get someone in to read a book. Our audio dramas are (in the main) entirely original pieces, commissioned by us, and performed rather than read.

It might not sound like a big difference, but it really is. We record in two different styles. Firstly there’s the enhanced reading, where one actor does the bulk of the story narration while a second pops up from time to time as a second character, enabling the story to be broken up a bit with dialogue scenes. The second style is the full cast drama, where the entire story is performed by a group of actors. Oh, and did I mention? We make audio dramas based on classic TV shows, as much as possible using the original actors to voice the roles. Those TV shows include Stargate SG-1 and Atlantis, Highlander, Dark Shadows, cult British hits Sapphire & Steel and Robin Hood and, of course, the world's longest running sci-fi TV series, Doctor Who.

A quick history lesson: in the 90's, while Doctor Who was off the air, Virgin Publishing created a series of novels exploring what happened to the Seventh Doctor and Ace after their last televised adventure. Soon, a new companion was created to venture forth with the Doctor, Professor Bernice Summerfield, an archaeology professor, created by modern Who mover and shaker Paul Cornell. Once Bernice had been well established and become popular, Big Finish founder Jason Haigh-Ellery saw an opportunity and licensed a range of full (albeit small) cast audio plays starring Lisa Bowerman as Bernice, adapting book stories before electing to produce original stories for the second series. Meanwhile, Jason’s partner in Big Finish, Gary Russell, suggested that instead of making Doctor Who spin-offs, they could make Doctor Who. Approaching the BBC, the pair were delighted to get a ‘yes’, and the audio adventures of Doctor Who began a year after Benny first appeared, in 1999, the first release uniting Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Doctors Peter Davison, Colin Baker and Sylvester McCoy for the first time. Since then, the Doctors have alternated throughout the main title, with Eighth Doctor Paul McGann joining the ranks a year or so after the project began.

Today, Big Finish is still a small company but has expanded its catalogue considerably. On top of the ongoing Doctor Who range (over 130 2-CD stories have now been released), there have been Dalek, Cybermen and Sarah Jane (before the BBC made any) spin-offs, an entire series dedicated to the further adventures of the Eighth Doctor, and a host of other programmes getting the Big Finish treatment, as mentioned earlier. On top of that, the company has created new Tomorrow People adventures and has recently turned its hand to Sherlock Holmes. Further Victorian values have also been explored in Jago & Litefoot, a Who spin-off mooted way back in the 70’s and starring the investigative odd couple from TV story “The Talons of Weng-Chiang”.

Where do I fit in? Well, many moons ago there lived a magazine production company called Visual Imagination. Near the beginning, its small team of writers and editors included one Nicholas Briggs. A friend of both Jason and Gary, Nick was tapped to be part of the Big Finish team from the start, and has since risen to the role of executive producer of the company’s output. A few years later, David Richardson was plucked from Visual Imagination where he was editing Ultimate DVD and The Works and asked by Nick if he’d like to join Big Finish. A couple of years on, David, who’d worked with me at Visual Imagination, where I edited Cult Times, asked me if I’d be interested in joining the team. With much of the fun gone from the job due to budget cuts, the recession and other difficulties, I jumped ship too.

These days, I like to think of the three of us as a team where each person crosses somewhat into the job of the others. Nick handles much of the creative side of things, certainly in the main Doctor Who brand, and often writes and directs stories. He even sometimes does the sound design and music. David, the most organized man in the entire universe, takes care of a lot of the administrative work, sending out scripts, contacting actors and agents and making sure every production is at the correct stage of progression at any given time. Somehow he also makes time to produce, overseeing every one of the Companion Chronicles range, goes to the studio every day we record, and is generally indispensable in every conceivable way.

Me? I pick up what’s left to do. I put together the CD booklets for the main title, Companion Chronicles and Eighth Doctor Adventures; I write many of the articles for free-to-all magazine Vortex (downloadable from www.vortexmag.com and sent out with every order placed each month); I do website updates; and I’m one of the two main points of contact for customers as I handle anything that turns up in the Enquiries inbox and try to answer questions or organise fixes for people’s ailing accounts wherever possible. So if you contact Big Finish, chances are you’ll be talking to me. Oh, and I’m producing as well now. I’ve taken on the new series of both Highlander and Stargate, and while Stargate is currently trapped in the approvals process [Darn it! - Ed.], the second series of Highlander has been recorded and is even now being cut together. Featuring the Four Horsemen from Highlander: The Series, it’s clever, exciting and, above all, splendidly violent. I hope it’s going to be as wonderful as it sounded in the studio.

It’s obviously not just the three of us at Big Finish, of course. While we take care of the day-to-day running of things, we’d be lost without the help of invaluable freelancers who write, direct, create artwork, run the website, take care of customer orders, script edit, score, sound design, and perform an array of other jobs vital to the success of each release. What really makes the company tick, though, is devotion.

When I was a kid, my Dad pointed out to me that ‘all that sci-fi nonsense’ I knew about would be no use to me in the job market. So naturally, once I reached my dream of becoming a journalist on a sci-fi magazine, he was forced to eat his words. After years watching him come home from work less than thrilled about his job (though there’s no doubt that in the ‘providing for his family’ stakes he was one of the best), I always swore I’d never do a job I didn’t enjoy, regardless of the financial ramifications. Working on Cult Times was just such an enjoyable job, an opportunity to be a journalist but in an area I adored and with countless opportunities to meet stars of shows I admired and go to screenings and launch parties. But above all, its selling point was the people I worked with. My editorial colleagues were always a delight to be around day after day, and we’d offer support, sweets, biscuits and cups of tea at times of stress.

Few people are lucky enough to experience that a second time, but Big Finish is much the same. While the team of people involved are more scattered (the beauty of a worldwide communications network enabling people to send in work from anywhere), I’ve rarely seen so dedicated a group, working all hours simply to make sure that the end product we put out is as good as it can possibly be. It’s that which can make or break a company: a real desire to succeed from all its employees is an exceedingly good way to make sure of high quality every time, as no one wants to let the side down. And, of course, almost everyone involved with Big Finish is a Doctor Who fan and determined to deliver stories as good as, if not better than, the TV episodes. Especially now there’s a new series to be weighed against…

That’s the real key here. Being a fan of a show really does make you want to do it justice, especially when you’re delving into areas the TV version never did. All the CG in the world can’t compete with a well-designed aural landscape, and with the likelihood of the older Doctors returning in the new show quite slim, there’s very much a desire to let them do things they never would have been able to on TV. While the Fifth and Seventh Doctors are quite similar to how they were on screen, the Sixth Doctor (and Colin Baker, who plays him) have found a new lease of life on audio, where the loud coat isn’t visible and the stories can give Colin a chance to play all the sides to his Doctor that he never was given the chance to do. And as for Paul McGann, while comic strips kept the Eighth Doctor alive after his fleeting TV appearance, it’s not in the same league as an audio drama, where Paul, aided by brilliant companions played by India Fisher and Sheridan Smith, has broadened and deepened his Doctor into a fully 3-D character. And let’s not forget the multitude of returning monsters who’ve caused trouble, with Daleks and Cybermen regularly turning up in audio adventures along with Draconians, Wirrn, Giant Spiders, the Mara and many more to come.

Being a fan has certainly come in handy producing Stargate and Highlander. The scripts for the second Highlander series are absolutely superb, and capture the spirits of the Four Horsemen perfectly. Hearing the original actors bring them to life in studio has been nothing short of a wonderful experience. As for Stargate, once again the scripts for the third series are wonderful creations, beautifully capturing the feel of the shows. I’m proud to be involved in them, and astonished that I get to have a say in which lines from Vala, Daniel Jackson or Methos are right or wrong and insist certain things are removed or rewritten. And people listen! Oh, the power…

But I do love being in the office as well. There are always a ton of fun (and occasionally not so fun) things to do, and I get the chance to be insulted by Nick and David, be part of a podcast, talk to writers about their scripts, go to the studio and meet the most wonderful stars and guest stars, and, most of all, talk to the fans via e-mail and on the Big Finish forums. Rarely less than polite, the fans offer a wealth of helpful advice, opinions, thoughts and genuine love of the things we produce, and it’s always interesting to hear from them -- even the occasional slightly loopy one! They’re very much the lifeblood of the company. It’s their subscription money that enables us to make productions, and it’s their dedication that results in them shopping from us direct more often than not, thus enabling us to get the maximum possible return from their money. They even police the internet for us, helping to seek out those people who pirate our (deliberately DRM-free) audios. Invaluable, every one of them.

So, that’s a beginner’s guide to Big Finish, purveyors of fine quality audio drama.

Why not come visit? 

Geek Speak Magazine would like to thank Special Guest Contributor Paul Spragg for sharing his story with us. Now, go and check out those audio dramas!

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Big Finish Productions' website: www.bigfinish.com

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