Jacqueline looks fragile but still very recognisable as Servalan. Her voice is now very husky; she explained that after a severe throat infection, she lost her entire upper register and had to lower her speaking voice. Stephen also looks good and I think he could still play an older Travis.
What are their hobbies? Jacqueline's are reading and gardening. Stephen said he's very hyperactive and always has to be doing something. Self-promotion is needed these days and he has his own website. Unlike Michael, he thoroughly enjoys promoting himself. (Aside: someone told me afterwards that Stephen was lucky to get his URL: www.actor.co.uk)
Jacqueline admitted to being a soap fan. She religiously watched them until about a year ago, then her TV died, she picked up a book, and hasn't watched it again. She now thinks soaps are dreadful; "the people are so attractive and their lives so appalling." Would she do it? Far too much work: makeup at 6am, you work till 8, then go home and learn your lines for the next day. She was addicted to Emmerdale Farm as it was so bad she couldn't believe these people were actors. She said that people are now untrained, they can only do one performance, and she feels nothing but contempt for them. Nowadays there are no rehearsals, no work is done on delivery, and rehearsals are now only for major films.
They both said that often the dialogue for Servalan and Travis was not quite right so they changed it themselves.
Someone asked Stephen: You scared the life out of me as Travis; was that your intention? If Stephen played him now, he might give him more humour. However, to show a dedicated killer at work was his only intention. "If you're kitted up in black leather and an eye-patch, your parameters are fairly limited."
Jacqueline said that in Blake's 7 there were always five or six video cameras to edit from; now everything was done on film with only one or two cameras.
Paul Darrow wanted Avon to be more evil. Did they want Servalan or Travis to be? Jacqueline: No. She didn't like the violence on the show. She was very upset with the torture of Dayna in Animals, especially as she was the token black, so they cut a lot of that. Servalan, she said, was into femininity, not violence.
Stephen: No, Travis was evil enough.
Should there have been more sex? Jacqueline says you never saw the crew use the bathroom or have sex when they must have done so on a daily basis. [laughter]
Why did Stephen leave? The character was going nowhere and was too predictable. There are only so many episodes one can end with "I'm going to get you, Blake!" He was offered some input into the character, so he said yes, but then got offered a film which took first precedence.
Someone mentioned the Sheelagh Wells blooper reel. Jacqueline said it was so funny, better than Blake's 7. When she saw it, she said to Paul, "Why don't we play it for comedy?" and Paul said, "Darling, you do!"
Stephen said that Blake's 7 worked because the characters were so good. People liked that; it's more important than staging and SFX.
Do you think you played Travis better than Brian Croucher? No. Just differently. Moriarty was not in all the Sherlock Holmes books; perhaps Travis was in too many episodes in season 2.
Stephen then mentioned the scene where he had hurt his foot and a stand-in was used so that all one saw was Travis's boots. He was puzzled that they used someone who was short with turned-out feet, and whose only credentials were that he'd worked with Stephen on something else. "Why? Why not get a six-foot bloke who could walk straight?"
Why wasn't Jacqueline in the last episode? There was a personal reason why they didn't want her. She doesn't know what she would have liked to have happened to Servalan.