Were you born with a beard? 
I soloed it with a huge wolf...it slept in my tent, and I gave him a pork pie now and again 
Ha ha ha! No, but the last time I was beardless was when I was in I, Claudius. I was like, 'Can't Augustus have a beard?' And they said, 'No! He was the one that got rid of beards!' Beard means barbarian. He insisted that everyone should be shaved. I love having the beard. It's bloody useful on expeditions. In the Arctic you can get frostbite to the face, so the beard does keep you warm
What's the strangest thing you've ever found lodged in it?
Oh Christ! I've just come back from Kinabulu - a mountain in Borneo - and wound inside the beard was a 14in-long fucking orange leech! I didn't know it was there till I got down the mountain - I had a giant fucking leech in my beard!
You've tried to climb Everest three times. Fourth time lucky?
Yes, I shall be going next year. I'm the oldest man to reach 28,500 feet without oxygen. I would've reached the summit but I had to rescue a Spanish climber who was dying. His oxygen had broken down, he had 5 kids and I got him down the mountain. People say, 'Isn't it dangerous?' climbing Everest and all these mountains. But I say, 'The greatest danger in life is not taking the adventure.' My wife is much more worried about me going on to the M3.
Wow, tell us another trekking story...
About nine months ago I was in Mongolia on an expedition to do the first British ascent on the highest mountain there. I saw desert camels, snow camels, and there were no roads, nothing. We rode for 50 days on horseback with the Mongols. Wolves everywhere! They have them as pets. I soloed it with a huge fucking great black wolf. Twice the size of an Alsatian! It slept in my tent, and I gave him a pork pie now and again.
Flash Gordon was ace. Did you get to keep your costume?
No, they kept that for the museum, didn't they? Everywhere I go it's extraordinary, whether I'm doing voiceovers, on building sites, with lords and ladies, they all want me to say, 'Gordon's Alive!' I did it on Loose Women the other day. Flash Gordon has become the great cult movie of the earth.
What did you think when you saw what you had to wear?
Well, when I was a child I used to go to the cinema to watch it in black and white every weekend. And we ran down the railway playing the parts, and I always played Vultan, but I never thought I'd get to play it in the film. When I went to the studio and saw all these great posters on the wall, I said, 'You've cast me already, you bastard!' and they said, 'No, that's Vultan from the comic strip!' I said, 'It's me!' and they said, 'That's right, Brian, it's you!'
Do you wish you'd been in Blackadder beyond the first series?
I wasn't free. What part do you think I was pencilled in for in the second series? The Queen! Miranda Richardson's part. It would've worked marvellously. With the same voice and great big muscles, saying, 'Blackadder come here!' I'd have been grabbing him, mauling him, and sexually harassing him - he would've come up with black eyes all the time.
How good was it being in Star Wars: Phantom Menace?
Marvellous - and I realised I had the last word in the film! It's where all the Jedis are kneeling in front of me and I went... [adopts weird Donald Duck blubber sound]... and I remember George Lucas saying, 'That sound you just did is going to cost me 0,000 in computer graphics!' And I said, 'I'm sorry, George.' And he said, 'No, I love it Brian!' He let me make noises, burp, fart and God knows what. 'That's great Brian, lovely Brian...' He let me do what I want!
Your voice is legendary. Have you ever failed to talk over someone?
I was recorded on the Richter scale as bigger than Pavarotti. About 15 decibels louder than anybody else. About two years ago I did Stars In Their Eyes and I was Pavarotti. I looked at the screen behind me and I thought Pavarotti was here, but then I realised it was me. The audience stood up and cheered, the shock when I suddenly did the... [erupts into booming version of 'Nessun Dorma']. And it was strange because I sounded just like him. And I got 100 per cent of the vote.
You're a lifelong Newcastle fan. Why?
It's a toss-up between Newcastle and Man United, actually, because in 1948 Man United won the FA Cup 4-2 and they passed through our village to play their last game in Sheffield. We were little kids out on our playground and they stopped off there. We put our school strip on and we played Manchester United in a game and they let us beat them 26-0. So I've always had a warm spot for them.
Finally, can you give us a typical Brian Blessed line to finish...
'Mark, you impetuous boy! Oh, who wants to live forever? DIVE! [Brian hangs up, cackling madly.]
MORE FEATURES
Bookmark this post with: