A Chat with Clever Dick

Richard Carrier - "The Chase," The Who Shop, Time Fracture & More!

We often talk about Clever Dick Films, the data (and humor) packed Doctor Who YouTube channel that analyzes the different eras of the program. It's past time to spend time with the face behind the channel - Richard Carrier. Richard recently went from behind the camera to in front of it with his recent appearance on "The Chase." He talks about his experience as a contestant with Who alum host Bradley Walsh, his visit to the London-based "The Who Shop," and his visit to the immersive experience "Doctor Who: Time Fracture." His adventures keep us in the spirit of time & space as we await the next series of new Who!

Episode Transcript

(00:03):
Welcome to the nerd party. Welcometo Time and Space, a Doctor Who

(00:30):
podcast. I'm Jessica Nunn and I'mher husband and co host Philip Gilphis.
Well, another week of no knewWho to talk about? Of course,
yes, yeah, it does makefor a very quiet evening. We're still
slowly going through the Fourth Doctor.We just finished Althority. Can I remember
the name of the story that wejust watched? Oh, I know,

(00:52):
Um, the Brain of Morbus iswhat we just watched, all right,
and I just remembered the Sisterhood,yes, yes, um, snap.
And I believe don't quote me,that we have one more story and left
in this series, um, Seedsof Doom. Don't quote me, um.
And then I think that will bein our second series with the Fourth
Doctor. So of course, oncewe're done, we'll report on what we

(01:14):
thought of the Fourth Doctor's second outingand everything that's gone on. So,
but now we have to think ofwhat ten gentle Doctor Who topic we're going
to talk about. But we're notgoing to do another movie or another TV
show instant. We're going to breakye for this sea. Yeah, but
we're gon we're gonna bring in ourperson and that's going to be our friend
of the show, Richard Richard,welcome back, Thank you, thank you

(01:36):
for having me. It's always lovelyto speak to you. Guys. Sure
so better known perhaps as Clever Dickfilms Um Richard. I know it's been
a second since your latest release,but how has sort of the response been
to the the large and hard workingI know tenth doctor video that you did,
Whoa It's good has been very well. It's been it's it's been appreciated

(01:57):
quite a lot. It seems it'sbrought I think quite a few younger eyes
to my channel. I suppose asI thought it might do. You know,
people are obviously going to search forDavid Tennant and doctor who more.
It's going to gain a bit moretraction in that sense. And yeah,
I've yeah, I had a bitof an influx of subscribers, as I

(02:20):
tend to experience when I do oneof these big, big videos. So
yeah, it's gone down quite wellgenerally speaking. I tried to be as
usual. I tried to maintain akind of a I mean, it is
a review, so there's a certainamount of my opinion in there, but
it's also a retrospective and I've triedto try and be balanced with things,
because it's I wouldn't say I loveI love all of Doctor Who, and

(02:46):
I love that era as well.However I don't I wouldn't say I love
it as much as some of theother eras So I tried to sort of
point that out in the in thein the review as fairly as possible,
to try and take into account differentviewpoints and also try and encompass I think,
I think getting to this point,a lot of the arguments, for

(03:08):
want of a better word, orthe different viewpoints are perhaps a little bit
fresher and a little bit more stillkind of vociferously argued. So I tried
to encompass some of those things andencourage a broader perspective, and that seems
to have been appreciated quite well.It's difficult sometimes, you know, seeing

(03:29):
it just myself being able to kindof critically evaluate how this is going to
come across. I did watch itwith my wife before I published it,
just to make sure that, becausethat's kind of the era that she really
got into Doctor Who as well.So and for a female perspective as all
well, I wanted to see ifI'd been fair certainly with some of the

(03:51):
comments I'd made about how there wasan influx of female fans appreciating the show,
not just female, but but notablyfemale fans, um appreciating the show
in perhaps a different way than Ihad been before. I was worried that
I might be I don't know,a little bit dismissive or something like that,
or not really take into account.But she liked it, so I

(04:13):
went ahead. Yes, yes,always important, important to have that sounding
board. I for one, amvery look looking forward to your Class retrospective
video, which I'm becoming. SoI must admit I have never seen Class.
Oh well, well, you know, I don't know what to say,
um, because we listen to theyou know, it's it's like any

(04:36):
doctor who thing. We're gonna say, like, well, in Big Finish,
you know, cures all right,um, But I think not the
Big Finish. I mean they we'dlike the Big Finish. Class. Everyone
hasn't been a lot, but Ithink they did two volumes but it was
good. But I think we sortof looked like we could have done another
season or another series, you know, like there's problems, but at least

(04:57):
an American And maybe that's the differenceof course, you know, we always
you're I didn't have once your firstseason. You're working things out, you
know, Okay, let's see whatthe second one does, and then we'll
go from there. And said,for this one, it's sort of like
they got the first season. We'relike, well, we see the issues,
we see the possibilities, we seethe potential. There's no Yeah.
I thought the characters were interesting andthe actors were interesting, and so to

(05:19):
me it would have been worth anotherAnd of course from the teacher perspective of
you know, the high school based, yeah, that's what it was.
I mean, it wasn't that Iwasn't interested in it at all. I
think it just kind of I musthave bit. When it comes to watching
television, certainly when it goes out, I'm pretty bad at doing that.

(05:39):
I miss so many programs. Andthe only thing I really make sure to
watch on the night that it goesout is Doctor Who. Unless there's a
particular drama that I'm interested in.I tend to catch up with shows more
on on streaming these days, orjust miss them entirely because I haven't got
time or think I haven't got timefor it. And it is something I

(06:00):
meant to catch up with. Butthen it's the sort of accessibility I suppose
really an ease of doing it,because I'm one of those people that I
like to I can't really give upon something, but it takes me forever
to get through some series of thing. So I kind of I've got like
a stack of things that I'm halfwaythrough and I'm just sort of trying to
and there's more and more. Ialmost I kind of miss the days whether

(06:25):
they'd be like one or two showsa year that were like really good that
you had to catch on DVD orsomething. Now there's just so many,
like really high quality programs on allthe streaming platforms and everything that it's really
hard to just keep keep up withthings and be committed to it. You
know, yes, absolutely, ifI did, I wouldn't have time to
do any videos or anything, justbe watching those things all the time.

(06:48):
Well, we wanted to talk toyou. I just want to talk to
you, Yes, But I wasjust thinking that this discussion is a lovely
segue talking about Richard, what youwatch television on a regular basis and things
like that. I thought it wasa lovely segue to Richard's branching out from
behind the camera watching yourself on television. Yeah, so, yes, you

(07:12):
are experienced. Not to speak foryou, but you were a recent contestant,
if that's the right word, ona British show with the Doctor Who
Alum, which has already aired,so it's as spoiler free here or if
you haven't seen it yet, we'regonna spoil it. But can you can
you so tell us about your appearanceon the Chase. Well, yeah,

(07:36):
having said that about television, whenit comes to like quiz shows or game
shows or something, I do tendto have those on quite frequently normally because
we'll be probably having our dinner aroundthe time that they're on, so we'll
sit down put them on. That'shalf an hour, so it takes the
time that we have to eat.So that University Challenge and all these different

(07:57):
quiz shows, and me being aclever dick, I'd like to sit there
and shout out the answers and thensomewhat brate the people who are who get
them wrong. You to some extent. So so I think it was partly
aspired by our friend, a friendfrom work, George. He was on

(08:18):
another quis show called Tipping Point afew years back before we knew him and
that experience. I saw that anecdote, so to speak. I think kind
of for my wife, kind ofgave her the concept of well, you
know, it's not something impossible todo, you know, you're just applying
it on. So she behind myback signed me up to go on the

(08:41):
chase, applied for me and yeah, and then I got an email in
my in my email box saying,oh, thank you for applying to be
on the chase, and I chat, I said, what's this. She's
like, well, you got toput your money where your mouth is.
I don't think she entirely expected meto go through with it, but I
did, so I thought, yeah, why not. You know, so

(09:05):
it's not no harm done kind ofthing, apart from if I went on
there and I was so bad andthen every child in the school humiliating for
the rest of my career. Butthe chase is not it's not a it's
not a really difficult quiz. It'snot like universe. It's just general general
knowledge, and you know, there'sthe odd thing that can be throw you

(09:28):
a little bit, but you cangenerally recover from it. So yeah,
it was a bit of a longprocess. Because when she applied that was
just before the whole pandemic and everything. And then I got a response back.
They called me and gave me likea little quiz over the phone and
then said at some point we'll we'llbe doing an audition in your sort of

(09:50):
region and we'll contact you. Andthen of course there was lockdown and everything,
so everything just sort of got draggedout. But yeah, no aventure.
I had of like a virtual auditionand they said, yeah, well
done, you've been You've been putthrough, and they don't put you through
necessarily because you're a fantastic quizzer.They've got to think, I suppose about

(10:11):
the anecdote and about the about yourpresence on camera or whatever, and I
suppose I think my story of thefact that I have a YouTube channel about
doctor who they thought might make forsome interesting banter with Bradley Walsh, who
of course has been the host forso many years. So yeah, in
the end, I didn't have towait that that long. After that audition

(10:33):
where they contacted me and said,ken you come down, it was just
before Christmas and I was at ealingstudios where they filmed the original Star Wars.
I was quite excited, but Ididn't get a chance to wander about,
and it was a very serial experience. Went down the night before.
It was on a Thursday, Ithink, and I went down the night
before, stayed over in a littlehotel, and then it was really early

(10:56):
in the morning for me anyway,I hate mornings. I had to get
about half five six o'clock and getacross to the studios just around the corner,
and it was all a bit ofa whirlwind, really it was,
which on reflection, I think wasprobably a good thing, because I didn't
really get chance to really wonder orget nervous of the situation I was in,

(11:18):
you know. So they were.It was somewhat Awkward's not the right
word, but slightly strange because ofall the COVID policies and restrictions and everything,
and all the social distancing that wasnecessary. I imagine it might have
been a more relaxed affair had therestrictions not been in place. But they

(11:41):
took us through all the all theall the ins and outs of the game
show and what they what we shoulddo as contestants, and how we should
try and emote as much as possible. That so I think I took that
quite literally because then when I watchedthe episode back, it get cutting to
me all the time doing these subsurdfacial expressions. Yeah, and then we

(12:03):
went out and then and then yeah, we had to we had to take
five changes of outfits, which itwas a bit difficult for me because I
don't I'm a little bit like,you open up my wardrobe and it's just
all the same black shirt. Butyeah, I'd brought by a few shirts.
But part of that is so youdon't you don't clash with any of
the other contestants, and you don'thave any patterns that ll strobe and all

(12:26):
that kind of thing on the cameras. So yeah, and then and then
we didn't have any makeup or anythingbecause of covid um. And then we
would wide up with the microphe.We had wire selves up with the microphones,
and then we were ushered onto theonto the set, which was just
a bizarre experience and we didn't reallyget lots of opportunities sort of have big

(12:50):
chat. It was apparently they dothree episodes a day, and they filmed
for weeks and weeks, so theymust do a couple of years worth of
episodes. In in a space ofa couple of months. And yeah,
I mean, obviously there were therewere breaks. There were spots where we
had to get to a new positionand they set us up and all that
kind of thing. And funnily enough, it was actually a lot more I

(13:13):
don't know about about other shows,but it was a lot more relaxed than
I think it appears on the televisionbecause it doesn't have any of the music
or any of the ticking or anythinglike that. So you just sort of
as long as you can, kindof divorce yourself a little bit from the
situation that you're in a studio withcameras on you, and you just relax.

(13:35):
It wasn't a harrowing experience at all. Really, it was a little
bit towards the end. I mean, I didn't go in expecting I'm I'm
not a gambler. I don't playthe lottery or anything like that because of
the infantesimal odds of ever winning anything, so I don't really ever expect,
you know, things like that.So towards the end, I don't know

(13:58):
if you see or listeners have seenthe chase at all, but the principle
is that there's four contestants, andthen you you have a cash build around
where you answer questions. You havea I think it's a minute to answer
questions in and the number you getright multiplies your potential winnings to buy a
thousand a question. So I gotwhat I get seven questions right. And

(14:24):
then the next stage is they havea chaser who is a you know,
a renowned quizzer. They have adifferent revolving group of them, and you
don't know who you're going to get. And I got the one guy that
I didn't want to have when quiteintimidating, but I think that's probably why
I got him because I said thaton my application. So yeah, so

(14:48):
he and yeah, he came out. And then the idea is you were
asked questions which are multiple choice andyou have to get a certain amount right,
and if you get one wrong,but the chaser gets that same question
right, he takes a step towardsyou on a kind of virtual board.

(15:09):
And the idea is is that ifyou get several wrong, he's going to
catch up with you and then you'reout of the game. Now, when
you go out, you get youget an offer. You get a lower
offer than what you want, oryou get the money that you want,
or you get a much greater higheroffer, and there's a commence either you're

(15:30):
you're closer to him, if youtake the higher offer, you're a further
or if you take the lower offerkind of thing. So so I settled
on I should have gone for thehigher offer, but I was perturbed by
because I was sort of when Iwas on it, I was kind of
doing what you do at home,which is, you know, you listen
to the other questions and you keepyour mind going, and I was sort
of answering in my head. Iwas the third contestant in our team to

(15:52):
go forward, so I had alittle bit of a build up to it
kind of thing, which actually wasbeneficial because I wasn't on the spot.
I didn't feel on the spot,and so then the first guy went out,
in my head, I got allhis answers correct. But then the
lady who went the second time,I would have been stumped. I would
have got knocked out. So Ikind of got cold feet when I went

(16:14):
up and said no, I'll takethe middle offer, because I wasn't entirely
confident because I do have sport ismy achilles heel at the end of the
day. So yeah, I gotback. Three of us got back,
and then all our money gets putinto a pot and then if we win,
it'll get divided between us. Andthen we have two minutes to answer
as many questions as we can asa team, and we get a three

(16:37):
because there was three of us,we got a three point head start.
And then the chaser comes out andhe has the same amount of time to
answer the same number of questions.Wrong, what was your part or whatever
the term would be. It cameto well, I, I and the
other guy got seven each, andthen the lady who went second got sick,
so it came to twenty overall,twenty thousand pounds that is, sorry,

(17:03):
and so so that would be Idon't know, probably about thirty five
forty thousand dollars, I think somethinglike that. I'm not sure the exchange
rates. And yeah, so sowe did it, and you know,
we got twenty questions, so wehad twenty steps that he had to then
catch, which is that's kind oflike the zone that you want to be

(17:26):
in. Having watched the show alot, you know you want to get
higher that you want to get Ifhe gets one wrong, we then get
the opportunity to answer his question andwe can push him back one. So
we got that opportunity five times,and every time we got the question wrong.
And it was so frustrating because youknow, you watch it back and

(17:47):
you go, well, of coursethat's the arm, even though I was
somewhat somewhat unfazed, somewhat when you'rein that situation, you're not at home,
you're not on the sofa relaxing.Yeah, so you just you know.
But the one that really stumped,just actually was quite annoying, was
the fact that it was the nineteenthquestion and he needed one question to do

(18:08):
it, and he got it wrong. And the question was which which a
ball in a sport? I can'tremember the exact wording, but which ball
and a sport has five rows oflasers? And I couldn't for life and
may think, well that was andI thought, as I say sports as
my achilles heel, and I thoughtfive rows of lasers. And the only

(18:30):
thing I could remember was ace VenturaPet Detective and the fact that in that
there's a character who the ball haslasers in it, and it says about
lacers being out or lasers in aslacers and the thing, and I thought,
well, maybe it's rugby, becauseI also had in my mind I'm
sure rugby ball has lasers in it, and they don't anymore, but they

(18:53):
did, they used to. Ilooked it up afterwards, just to prove
I'm not insane. Looked up andthey did used to have rows of five
rows or six rows of lasers inthem, but the wording was sorry,
it wasn't lasers that he said,it was stitches sch and I was saying
five rows and the other guy onthe team said, well, I think

(19:14):
as a cricket ball, and Ithought, but with a cricket ball,
I thought, well, you've gottwo kind of like cs that are put
together to let us c shapes andthen they're stitched or wren. I thought,
where's the five rows coming from?So unfortunately they had nominated me as
the spokesperson to make the decision,and she had changed The woman on the

(19:37):
team had changed her mind to becauseshe'd start with cricket ball as well.
I didn't hear her, but shesaid, oh, I think rugby,
and he said cricket ball, andI'd thought rugby to begin with, so
I said, oh, rugby andit was cricket ball. And I was
so annoyed with myself because I thennoticed that, you know, he only

(19:59):
had one question and he could getObviously, Bradley Walsh has to ask the
question, he has to answer inthe time that he had left. But
what I hadn't noticed until this momentwas the time he had left to do
it, and he had two secondsleft on the cloth really slowly, Bradley.
So yeah, So Bradley Walsh said, I think it was which which

(20:21):
religion has a as a temple that'scalled a zigger rout in it, And
the chaser sort of sat back andkind of grown because he thought I've run
out of time. He went,oh like that, and then he went
Islam. And the problem was,now you won't see this if you ever
catch the episode. I know it'sdifficult to see overseas, but you won't
see this because it was edited.But in that moment, see the rules

(20:44):
state that if you start to answera question and the buzzer goes for time
out, if you'd started before thebuzzer rang and you get it right,
technically you get it and his wasthe correct answer. So then everything stopped
and as a bit of a surrealexperience because you can't we use the cadescence,
can't hear of the charter. They'reall up in a gallery and Bradley

(21:04):
Walsh's got an earpiece in so he'stalking back and forth to them, and
he turned around and go, rightnow, we need to check whether he
started to say the word before afterbecause it'd groaned. They had to then
work out I was saying and exactly. So they then literally fifteen minutes we

(21:25):
stood around on the set while theywent through frame by frame to work out
whether he'd start to say it,And then they said, we're not going
to tell you when we know.Okay, we're just going to pick up
from where we left off, andyou've either one or you haven't, so
your reaction will be gender. Soso they so we were standing around and
all of a sudden they went rightand they all got into positions again.

(21:47):
During this like fifteen minutes, theguys like cricket bars sounding really good now,
isn't it? Yeah? That wasthe thing. It was quite um.
I was because I thought if welost it, I'm going to be
not only are they going to hateme? I knew everyone who's watched because
The Chase is a really popular showin the UK. It gets for the
time slot of the Dison a weekday, sort of five o'clock six o'clock time.

(22:10):
It gets like the largest audience ofany program. And this only really
sunk into me after I've been onit. But millions of people are going
to be watching me and analyzing meand mocking me, and so yeah,
so they set up, they reset, and I said, right, let's
go, and then all the lightschanged and they went, yeah, You've
won, and I just couldn't believeit. I was like, oh my

(22:33):
god. And I still couldn't quitebelieve it later and I just thought it
was so close. Yeah, soyeah, we got We got a third
of twenty thousand pounds, which iswell they rounded it up to six thousand
and six hundred and sixty seven poundseach. I plan, our plan for
the vast majority of it is togo to Lapland to see the northern lights,
which is a bit of a cliche, but it's it's what my wife's

(22:56):
been wanting to do for years ina little log cabin. And she put
her name, She's the one whoput me up, So yeah, gets
she gets to that of nice excellenceof what was Bradley wash like? Did
you get to have your banter?Yeah? Yeah, it was lovely.
I mean they shoot more obviously thanthey put in the show. They cut
bits out and stuff, and there'sa little bit like all game shows,

(23:18):
there's a little bit of a chatwhere you say who you are and what
you do and all that kind ofthing. Um. So he you know,
he asked me about my job,but then he also said, I
said my other thing. Because theykind of it's not scripted as such,
but you've gone through a process wherethey'll say this is the kind of this
is what you need to talk aboutkind of thing from what you've told them.
You have to fill in a bigbio of who you are and what

(23:41):
you do and everything. And ofcourse they latched onto the fact that I
have this YouTube channel um so soyeah, so I got onto that bit
and said I have this channel aboutdoctor who. Um And it was quite
funny because he said he says,I don't know, I don't get it.
I don't he says, I'll minuteand I don't understand it. And
then the chaser Mark Labette. Thechaser came out and when he said,

(24:03):
look, I know about doctor Who. You know a lot about doctor Who.
The only one who doesn't here isBradley Well it so yeah, it
was good fun. It was goodfun. And he I mean, he's
a pro and he's been doing entertainment, not only acting but but you know,
hosting and television personality for years.So he just wanders about like he

(24:26):
owns the place, which I supposehe kind of does. I mean,
he's one of the producers, Ibelieve on the show, but not in
a kind of proprietorial I'm the boss, where's my where's my coke kind of
way. It will be more likehe's just just so relaxed and he knows
he's the star, and he justhe really made us feel ease. He
didn't make us feel uncomfortable at all. He'd have a chat with you.

(24:47):
And it's very weird because there isn'ta sense of, you know, having
done some amateur dramatics in my time, you know the ydrig, you go
on stage and you're that character andeverything is about the performance, whereas he
I mean, he's not really playinga character obviously when he's hosting a program.
But at the same time, there'sthere wasn't a sense of he came
out and he got into the zoneand he was like, you know,

(25:08):
don't look me in the eyes.I'm I'm performing now. He just talked,
and he knew because he's been doingso yere that long, that they'll
cut bits out that you know,aren't relevant or whatever. He said a
few off color things as well.Isn't making it mainly down to mainly to

(25:29):
do with the fact that he waslaughing at how how thick in his words
he thought he was at not beinggetting an answer correct. It was something
to do with anthropology or something he'sthinking about insects or something like that.
So yeah, but you know,he's just so just so relaxed. It
was. We were done by lunchtime. When I was at half twelve.

(25:51):
I was back in my car tryingto kind of process the whole thing
really. But it's a fantastic experience, and it was interesting as well to
see, you know, a studioset up and a film company and all
that kind of thing, especially underthe situations that we've been. You know,

(26:11):
we had a sort of a briefwindow there where lockdown had been lifted,
but then it was going to itcame back literally, I think a
couple of days after I was onit, so Bud, Yeah, it
was. It was interesting to geta bit of a perspective about how people
are working, because as trivial asit might seem, I think, you
know it, certainly we need thosetelevision programs and those things that make us

(26:34):
feel relaxed and somewhat calm. Soyou know, it's like there was some
criticism from some quarters as always towardsDoctor Who when it was refilming begun filming
obviously with COVID restrictions and everything inplace, and I'm thinking, well,
what did you want to just watchreruns of Dad's Army For the rest of

(26:56):
these people actually work. I mean, for one point of view, the
fact is that, having briefly workedin that industry, I know how kind
of tooth and nail, how difficultit is to actually earn money and pay
the bills because everything is generally kindof freelance now anyway, It's not like

(27:17):
like back in the seventies when youwork for the BBC made Doctor Who and
you would just put where you weren't. You just put on any program.
It might be doctor it might beanything, and you had a salary nowadays,
you know, it's difficult. Butthen even beyond that, I think
that it's kind of admirable that thesepeople are working in those conditions to provide
a, you know, a service, just like like many other industries and

(27:38):
things like that have over this wholeperiod. How was the reception or did
you get any curious? Then therewas the very, very long wait began
because I was not allowed to tellanyone. Obviously I told my wife and
my immediate family, but I wasn'tallowed They knew, everyone knew I'd been

(27:59):
on Chase or you know, myemployers and colleagues and stuff had known um.
And then I just had to waitand wait and wait, and they
said, you know, it mightnot be for months. We'll contact you
two weeks before it's due to beaired. They said, though that they
expected it to be a bit soonerbecause obviously for this show that they did,
this series they filmed, they hadglass screens dividing us and things like

(28:22):
that, and they said, we'llprobably want to transmit those ones earlier later
in the year. Yeah, exactly, so, so I was kind of
expecting it, and yeah, theythey they kind of I don't know if
this is true or official in anyway, but they don't give you the
money for ages and ages and ages, and I think it's part of the
reason is though, if you don'tif you tell anyone or contractual contract you

(28:47):
see. Ye. So yeah,there was there was a long delay in
getting the money, which I didn'texpect, and spent a little bit of
money and then I was like,oh, no, where's the money.
But then yeah, actually I gotthe notice through and I said, everyone
had been asking me constantly at work, you know, when when are you
on? When's on the chase on? I said, I'll tell you when

(29:07):
I know, I'll tell you inthe ch and and then eventually they said,
right, it's coming out. Ithink it was March mid March um
and I said, I went andtold my my boss, and she was
like, oh, this is great, this is great for the school,
you know. So I was onthe school the school social media facebook page.

(29:30):
All the kids were talking about it, and I thought, and they
kept asking me, you know,because they knew it was coming up,
did you win? And I said, we'll have to tune in and find
out because I couldn't even up tothe last I can't tell anyone like I'm
still working here days. Well yeah, that was the conclusion that some of
them and so yeah, so thenm yeah. Then it went out and

(29:57):
it was just a surreal experience.Really. I got some really lovely comments
from kids and things I've done reallywell and parents. I did make one
mistake though, which I got ataste of what it's like, perhaps to
be a minor celebrity, was thatI looked up the chase on Twitter while

(30:18):
it was on. So there's acommunity, shall we say, people that
like to watch and tweet along andthey don't pull any punchers. So there
were a lot of a lot ofincredibly mean and upsetting things, but you
know, you take it with apinch of salt. I was a bit
annoyed at her first, but Ithink it's because I think it's partly because

(30:45):
in that last bit, because theya lot of people don't realize how it
works. And of course they'd nominatedme. The other two had nominated me
as the spokesperson for the team,so if the chaser got an answer wrong,
it came to us. I wasthe one who had the final say.
Basic and the cricket ball one,all these sports fans were yelling cricket
at the screen, but in themoment, I was thrown completely by these

(31:07):
five rows business. And we debatedit for much longer than what was in
the show. Obviously jed trim bitsdown, but we talked about it for
a little while and the woman inthe middle, as I say, came
around and she said, actually,I think we should go for rugby ball,
but they cut that bit out.So what it looked like was they
both turned around and said cricket ball, and then I went rugby ball,

(31:30):
as if I was just ignoring them. And so I suppose I must have
come across as quite you know,self important or something. But you know,
it's all It's all television. It'sall nonsense, isn't it. They
do say to be fair the chase, they say, you know, stay
off social media for a couple ofweeks during the show, which is a

(31:51):
bit difficult for me because obviously withmy channel and my Twitter and things like
that, it's kind of noticeable.But you know, take all this sort
of pinch of side. You know, at the end of the day,
I won, so absolutely I couldsay, with my life, enjoy your
Twitter stream, guys. I've beencounting my pound notes. All right,
Well, every sound like because Iwas worried, you know, with COVID,

(32:14):
Like well, maybe it was kindof like you know, the experiences,
like, well, we didn't doanything, but it sound like it's
more of it was the experience thatyou wanted, or at least you know,
yeah, absolutely. I think actuallyif it had been more of a
thing, if they've been more wanderingabout talking to people, and more crew
sort of visible and moving about,I think I might have the reality of
the situation might have got to bea bit more and I might have been

(32:36):
more nervous in my answer. Sobecause we were almost you know, you
had a team of like chaperones,it was like three people. And then
the studio is all dark. Youknow, it's a bit like being on
stage at theater. You know,you can't actually see you can see camera
lights, but you can't see allthese crew members in the thing. And
that was the weird coincidence actually,because when I finished and everything, and
I'm kind of, you know,still bewildered at the fact that we won

(33:00):
this money. Somehow I stepped offthe stage to go through to the green
room and out of the shadows emergeas a guy that I went to university
with because I studied film and mediaa university. And he's a I think
he's a crane or a jib operator. And he came out of the shadows
and said to you, all right, how you doing. I haven't seen
him in twenty years. I think, oh, that's a most So yeah,

(33:21):
it's a small world and it's sucha bizarre kind of thing. And
then yeah, and then I justdrove home. It was all very surreal.
I'm glad I did it, notnot just for the money, but
I'm glad it's good because now nowI did put my money where my mouth
is, and now I can havea go at the television again, immunity

(33:43):
from any criticism. Now no onecan say, well, if you can
do it, better go and doit. I did. Also an interesting
addition to your CV winner, Well, yes, no one else has that
on there, well, I meanvery few. Um, we'll congratulations again.
So speaking a little lower stakes here, but speaking of maybe expectations and
whether they're it met or not.You got to do a little bit of

(34:07):
you know, despite the lockdown,you get to do some traveling and some
I'm going to characterize it this way, some Doctor Who traveling and you went
to a place that, bizarrely we'veactually been that you had not been,
which is the weirdest thing. Butyou got to finally get visited the Who
Shop in London and yes, yes, well many many moons ago, several

(34:30):
centuries ago, it feels like beforeall the recent events. My wife bought
me for I can't even remember whatit was for. Maybe it was just
for love, but she bought metickets, well us tickets to go to
the Time Fracture Immersive theater Doctor Whoproduction that's on in London. And so
as part of that, she said, well, what else would you like

(34:51):
to do while we're there, becausewe were going down to stay in the
night, and I said, well, Philip and Jessica mentioned the Who Shop
and I've never been there and wereally should go there. Now. I
know why I've never been there becauseit's out in Barking or somewhere. It's
quite far out, isn't it.So unless you actually tend to go there,
you're not going to find it.But yeah, no, I had.
We had a lovely little time there. We went went out, Lisa

(35:13):
loved it. My wife Lisa lovedit because they've got a little um.
I think he's a little he's alittle dog. I'm trying to think of
what the breed is now. It'sit's not a pug, it's something some
of a French bulldog, something likethat. And he came out and yeah,
she sat on the floor plane withhim for about half an hour,
like I'm going to be in themuseum for like forty minutes. So yeah,
well, unfortunately that was that thatwas a problem that the museum wasn't

(35:35):
open. So I'm going to goback. When things lifted a little bit,
I did look longingly at the tardestdoors. Yeah, but yeah,
go back definitely. And but yeah, no, I I spent a good
amount of time looking around thinking whatam I going to get? Because I
wanted something A lot of books andDVDs and all that kind of thing I've

(35:55):
either got or you know, Iwanted something that I wouldn't how to get
necessarily in or out. So Iwent how to look in their little glass
cabinet they have by the doors,which have actual props and things, and
I thought, well, I can'tgo too crazy on this, but they
had three little carved maquette things ofYetty sort of replicas of the Yetty playing

(36:20):
pieces that were from The Abominable Snowmenand The Web of Fear, and I
thought, I'll get one of those. So he's now proudly in my cabinet
with my other figures downstairs. Butyeah, oh and I gotta, we
gotta. Bizarrely, we got alittle tardis like a doormat thing because we
need a new dormat. We think, oh, I'll do fantastic little things

(36:44):
like that. But we had agood chat with the with the people who
work there. Yeah, it wasnice talking about things, and we were
talking about the items and things thatcome up for auction and how Peter Jackson,
we believe, had recently acquired oneof the power of the Daleks sort
of toy models that we used forthe original conveyor belt scene that was recently

(37:05):
reconstructed on DVD, but the originalbecause they were toy Daleks that were produced
and the production team got hold ofthem and kind of repainted them and use
them and it went. It soldfor some absurd amount of money. I
think it was something like eighty thousandpounds or something, and it was on
the phones and there was a NewZealand buyer, so she suspected it was
Peter Jackson. And I think she'sprobably right because I've seen on DVDs and

(37:30):
stuff his warehouse of collectible Um,so yeah, that's very funny. Well,
now, how was the time fractureexperience? Obviously? Yeah, I
mean, I don't know how I'mgonna be on probably I don't know anyway,
but it was kind of was itIs it just in that one spot,
or isn't one or two? It'sit's in a building. I'm not

(37:51):
sure what it used to be,the building that they've kind of converted it
and changed it. It's all verybizarre because it's not like a theater where
you go and there's an auditorium andall that kind of thing. It is
literally like the side of like anold I don't know what the building was
now, I'm sure I knew,but they've got you sort of go down
and there's a street. It's incentral London, but there's a street and

(38:15):
the walls of all the walls arethe outside of all been painted black and
they have the unit signs on.So I said to my I think we're
in the right place. And youjust sort of queue up there and they
let you in em Batcher's kind ofthing, and then you go through and
there's all these areas and zones andit was a surreal experience. I mean,
despite my documentaries and videos and goingon the chase, I wouldn't just

(38:37):
got myself as a very extrovert personand kind of slightly awkward in those events.
So you know, and they say, you know, it's fine if
you don't want to take part,if you just want to observe and kind
of thing. You know, it'sit's all kind of very it's very kind
of like not improvised, but there'skind of a sense of how do what
you call it? It's kind ofa little bit like whose line is it

(39:01):
anyway in a sense that everyone's kindof almost kind of like improvising in the
moment and incorporating things into scenes.There's a general sort of storyline, and
there's lots of little easter eggs shouldyou look for them. All the all
the people, the actors, allthe unit people all have like easter egg

(39:21):
name, so like one of themwas called Harry Sullivan, and well they
have like different names of characters.They're not necessarily supposed to be those characters
where they've just got these names,you know, um, and it's it's
it was just it was kind ofsurreal but really really different and interesting and
exciting. I don't think it's necessarilyeveryone's cup of tea, because you're sort

(39:45):
of wondering about and I think Ithink the thing with it is is there's
so many you get the sense,or I got the sense afterwards, although
I really enjoyed it, that Ifelt like I'd missed important things and that
might just be the completest in me. Like, for example, if I
play like an RPG computer game,I will play every single side mission in
every place until one hundred percent completedit, because if not, I get

(40:07):
like this itch that I need toscratch. And I think with time fratchure.
There's like something like fifteen or sixteendifferent routes through the story, and
you go to like different environments dependenton the choices that you make. So
when you finish, you think andyou look through you know, the show
program and stuff, and there's soI didn't see that. I didn't see
that, and I know, ofcourse the point is but to go back,

(40:28):
but it's a bit more of atrip and an expense for us to
go back and again, so weended up they're sort of like the beginning
and the ending, I think thesame for everyone, but what happens in
between is different. So we endedup back in you step through this time
fracture portal with your gang of people, and we ended up in Elizabethan,

(40:49):
England with Queen Elizabeth and she's justbeen she says, dumped by the tenth
Doctor and he's just run off tothe day of the Doctor essentially, and
she's very cross. So then yeah, and then there was an ood wandering
about and that was bizarre because Imean, I've obviously seen the costume and
everything, but the way they'd doneit, he had the ball lit up
and the voice was coming out andit didn't obviously have like an internal microphone

(41:12):
or something, because it wasn't allmuffled like a bloke in a suit.
It really was believable as the one. And there was obviously the Dalek show
up at some at one point trundlingabout and then I think probably one of
the most interesting parts, and certainlybecause obviously there were a few children around,
although we went to a sort ofa later evening one. So there
mainly just geeks. There's a fewkids, you know, in the costumes

(41:37):
and scarves and all that kind ofthing. And there's one part where it's
quite interesting because they integrate the intervalas part of the show. So you
go to this bar and you're supposedto be on a spaceship that's traveling to
Gallifrey, I think as where it'sheaded, and so the iydre is while
you're in transit, you're in thisbar, and they had these two ladies.
One was all blue, a bitlike what's his name and a big

(42:00):
blue guy. Yeah, yeah,he becomes a headless monker. They put
his head off, but they hada lady dressed up like that, and
then they had a lady dressed upas a Silurian and they were both on
stage doing live singing and it wasamazing, like really good performance. And
then you've got like random actors wanderingabout playing characters. They sit down at

(42:22):
the table and have a chat withyou about what's going to go next and
what you think is going to happen. Then the ood and a woman had
a fight in the middle of thebar, and they've all got like,
you know, cocktails that are likespace age cocktails and all this kind of
and then when we finally landed onGalliphrey, we left and you go down
this corridor and they did it veryvery well where you're being a company,

(42:42):
you're you're normally chaperone by some anactor that's part of the play the performance,
and you go down this corridor andthen um it's the lights went out
and then it starts strobing, andthen there were people dressed as the angels,
and so every time the strobe flash, they were getting closer. So
it was really well done. Asa complete spoilers, I'm sure I'll probably

(43:05):
get told off of something. No, I think we're just freaking out because
we like, I know, thisis really well done. There was a
there was this lad and he wasabsolutely petrified, and so we got this
kind of vicarious thrill of because youknow, as an adult you go as
someone in the costumes. But itwas really well done because of the strobe
lighting and when it went black andthey came back, you didn't get a

(43:29):
sense of them physically moving. Youdidn't see them move. They just appeared
and got closer and you had torun down the corridor away from them and
everything nice. So yeah, Iknow, unfortunately I read, I think
it was on Twitter the other daythey had an unfortunate a pipe or something
burst and flooded the whole performance area. So they're they're repairing it all and
then they'll be putting the performances onagain. So I think it was real

(43:52):
bad luck along with everything else that'shappened, you know, everything being delayed
and everything. But it was reallywell done and it was I think I
think James Goss had a big inputon the on the plot, so it
was very it was accessible to people, I think outside of the doctor who
to some extent you know that weren'tbig fans. But also there was a
lot of there were a lot ofrewards for fans and people in a lot

(44:15):
of the set dressing, for example, as I say, had lots of
little little Easter eggs and nods tothings, and there were a lot of
props and things. I think alot of fans contributed perhaps a lot of
items and things like that to it. So yeah, it was a fantastic
experience. I think it sounds likedefinitely it reminds me a little bit of

(44:36):
Um the Star Trek experience that wasin Las Vegas for a few years.
I was living in California at thetime, and so when it first started
out it was in the Las VegasHilton. But anyway, it was I
mean, I know, yours soundsvery immersed, like when you think doctor
who don't necessarily think immersive because you'relike the tartists. And then then what
but like obviously they did all thatwith you because but with Startrek, like

(44:58):
you can be on the ship andyou're like, that's sort of the you
know, treky You're just geeking outwalking the quarters of a ship, and
they because they and they had sortof a cool effect when you sort of
walk into the thing, you likeyou're in rows, like you're queued up,
and then like everything turns dark,and I mean, of course what's
really happening is the lights go outand then what you're thinking in front of
lifts up and then you're in thetransporter room when it lights up, so

(45:22):
you're sitting on transporter paths now.And so then you go to the corridor,
you go to the bridge, Imean, and then eventually they added
a second part, the Borger Experience, which is more of a theater experience,
but it's like a forty if you'veever been to anything like that,
so like you know, holographic thingsand like you know, the Borg and
you were like three D glasses.But anyway, so yeah, that was
sort of compares too. But I'mglad there's sort of a Doctor Who version

(45:44):
of that. Yeah, and likePunch Drunk, the theater group Punch Drunk
does that sort of me They kindof really pioneered. Yes, yeah,
yeah, yeah, well this companythey did they did one recently which was
The Great Gatsby, which was Ithink mainly just an excuse for everyone to
get dressed out of a drink cocktails. I suppose, I'm not quite yeah,

(46:13):
but yeah, no, it was. It was good. I think
there was a sense I suppose thatmight appeal to a lot of people in
the sense that you can, ifyou want, you just wander off and
go somewhere. It's not like it'snot like I suppose, like the Doctor
Who experience and museum that used tobe in Wales. I think is more
similar perhaps to the Star Trek onethat you mentioned, in the fact that

(46:34):
there's kind of like a one waydirect through and they have performers and actors
where this one kind of you youcould, I mean some people did,
and maybe I'm just a stickler forrules or something. I'm one of these
sheep that follows key. You know, you could just wander off and they
were like hidden little things, andyou get like this guy took me aside
and gave me a mission, butunfortunately I didn't get a chance to fulfill

(46:54):
it because he got killed by analien shortly afterwards. But yeah, it
must take an incredible amount of organization, and I think there's there's a kind
of a there's a chaos to it. Certainly when it begins. You go
into like this control room and they'reall monitoring, and there's other people and
there's lots of shouting and noise,and it was a little bit kind of

(47:15):
disconcerting at first, but you kindof ease into it, you know,
and and get used to it,and then yeah, I'd like to go
again. I don't think we getthe opportunity to, but yeah, it'd
be a good, good experience to, you know, to get somewhere else,
because I know, I think thething is I opened up the program
guide and I saw that they'd recreatedwhat looked like Totter's Lane, the original

(47:35):
Junkyard, and I thought I didn'tget to see that. I want to
go And yeah, I think alsobecause the Doctor Who Experience has gone,
now that's kind of yeah. Wewent there three three times or so when
there would be new things there.So we went once when it first opened
it was in London, and thenthey moved it permanently to to car Well

(47:59):
not yeah, definitely, and wewent a couple of times there then as
well, you know, and sawlike new things that had come in from
the from the more recent series.So I think this kind of fills that
gap a little bit. But youknow, it's obviously a little bit impermanent
in that sense, but I supposea lot of art is really you know
indeed, indeed, well, wejust wanted to catch up on your many

(48:22):
doings because it are very interesting aboutyou know, especially with not any new
who on, it's about your yourexperiences in and out of who Is certainly
makes it seem like there's still whodo experience. So absolutely before we let
you go, where can folks checkout all your social media and all your
upcoming projects and all your past onesas well well. The main one is

(48:44):
cleverdic films on YouTube and that's mymain channel. And yeah, I'm hoping
too. I've been unfortunately been well. I've had other things. I've had
other priorities recently with school and thingsum, over this last last few months
since I posted the Day a Tenantvideo, but I have been slowly working
on my next Companion episode voted forby patrons, which is on the Brigadier.

(49:07):
So I'm a bit of a suckerfor punishment. I think I missed
him off on the first round.I put him in the second, and
then everyone voted for him, andI thought, oh, why did I
do that? Because you know,it's such in itself, might actually balloon
up to be an equivalent of oneof the main Doctor eras, because I've
got to cover, you know,such a period of time right up to

(49:28):
Capaldi arguably. So yeah, sothat's that's on its way, and then
then I'll be starting properly the MattSmith era, which I know is obviously
aware of the expectations that being thefiftieth anniversary as well, and there's quite
a lot that I'm going to haveto cover with that, and also the

(49:51):
more recent it gets, the hardersometimes it is for me to really research
and get the get the ins andouts. I mean, I don't really
necessarily, I don't tend to delveinto gossip and hear saying all that kind
of thing anyway, even on thethings from thirty forty years ago. But
at the same time, there's alot of there's a lot of energy and

(50:13):
a lot of effort that's been expendedover the years on detailing the most minute
MINUTII of the original series. Andyou know, when you get two thousand
and five onwards, it starts tobecome a lot more difficult to find information
that isn't just the officially sanctioned yetthat's the PR stuff that was just part
of PR and promotion. But Ihave been slowly amassing a load of research

(50:37):
materials for the Matt Smith era,So I'm going to be delving into that
and building on what I already know. Yeah, and obviously I'm I'm on
Twitter and Facebook as well as CleverdicFilms. And also this summer I will
be going to Wales. So wethought we need we need a breakaway,
but we don't want the astor whofilming locations to our Absolutely well, last

(51:00):
year, last year, we wentdown to Cornwall to visit my parents in
law, and I thought while wewere there, I thought, I wonder
if there's any doctor who filmed inCornwall, because I knew that there had
been like Classic who. I knewthere had been some location filming around the
place, and I looked it upand found that we were literally just a
few miles from where they'd filmed alot of the Smugglers. And I thought

(51:21):
this would be an interesting one becausebeing a lost story as well, that
might be intriguing for people. Soit was actually my wife who said,
you know, we'll go to Walesand then you can do some more location
videos. She'll accompany me out andwe'll take the dog for the walk and
so yeah, so we're I don'tknow where we are now. I think
we're about twenty miles or so eastof Cardiff. So there's, you know,

(51:45):
compared to Cornwall, where there wasjust like one or two place,
there's going to be like a hundredlocations to choose from to go to.
So I don't quite know where we'regoing to go yet. But this is
quarry number yep, I know thisis quarry number two. Maybe your your
wife is going to love the quarry. What I thought on that note,

(52:07):
actually I was quite pleased. Iwas watching talking about TV shows, I
was watching low Ki recently, whichI think is the most Doctor Who show
that isn't Doctor Who. Yeah,and there was an episode where they were
so blatantly in a quarry and Ithought, yes, this is just like
oh yes, yes, yes,I mean they even you could see that,

(52:27):
they'd even they thought, we can'tdisguise it, so they'd clearly made
efforts to actually make it a quarry. It was a quarry on an alien
world, but clearly it was justyou know, in real life too.
I thought, this is in thegrand tradition. Ye. Well, thank
you Richard, and we look forwardto everything that's coming next. Thank you
very much. Have a good holiday. Well until next time, enjoy the

(52:53):
Doctor's many adventures throughout time space.This is BBC Television