Arnold Vosloo Resource Page:
On May 8th 2001 Arnold Vosloo was interviewed on the Big Breakfast which is British TV channel Channel 4's breakfast television offering made by Planet 24 Television. Amazingly, the day before we were invited to attend as the researcher Natalie Fox (who contacted us via an E-group) could not find anyone in the UK who had even heard of any of Mr V's work other than The Mummy. We were supposed to get interviewed, back up in case Arnold couldn't make it I presume, but thankfully by the time the day wore on that idea was dropped. Our day was quite interesting though.
We had to be out of bed at 3.30 a.m. to shower and have breakfast, then at 4.30 a.m. the taxi arrived that would take us from my flat in Windsor to Slough to catch the train to London Paddington at 5.00a.m. By 5.40 a.m. we were travelling on the London Underground to Stratford changing at Mile End on the way
At6.15 a.m. we required another taxi from Stratford Tube Station. The taxi driver didn't know where the studio was so we drove about for forty minutes until a tanker driver parked in the industrial estate where the production company was based showed us a back entrance to the Lock Keeper's Cottages which is The Big Breakfast's film studios. This involved crossing a canal and then running across the back of the set to get round to the other side where the entrance and offices were.
We were definitely late and when we arrived panting at the studios Natalie was waiting for us wondering if we are ever going to turn up. Without more ado we were escorted onto the set during a commercial break, took place behind a sofa and began to watch the madness that is the Big Breakfast being made.
By 8.00 a.m. we were totally non-plussed - these people definitely live on a different planet. So far we have had the Family of the Week, a Vicar reading Biblical limericks and the sort of suicidal camera work that makes for a very dangerous job for both crew and guests. Then they cut to yet another commercial break and the news. Guess who walks in escorted by his own researcher? Now things were starting to get interesting!
Arnold looked as confused as we were to start with and we had been there for an hour so we had experienced this for a while and had had time to adjust to it. He also looked a little disoriented but then as he had presumably been running about London doing interviews here there and everywhere I think we could understand. He had some hair growing into his bald head, not much, and seemed very bothered by it; he kept running his hand over his head for some reason. He also seems to have the jitters, but then I didn't blame him, so had we. He sits there and starting with his right hand pulls each finger on the hand backwards to stretch it, you could hear an occasional click too! Lindsey and I were wondering what he had been doing to his hands to make them crack like that.
8.03 a.m. After more news Arnold is finally introduced on camera. He had just had to move seats and is wearing a blue shirt and thick black trousers (jeans?) to be interviewed. Lindsey says she recognises the shirt from other interviews she has seen, when I was viewing the tape to prepare these I was suprised to see it looked grey! That I think was my television's fault on my dad's where I am writing the finishing bits of this essay I can assure you that it was blue.
In the first interview Arnold handled the interrogation very well I was curling up at the questions they asked him, and wondering if he could grasp the British sense of humour and that of this programme which I myself (who was born and bred here) was having problems with anyway. They were a bit cruel about Diary of A Serial Killer but I did like Richard Bacon's comment about The Progeny being a metaphor for fear of the responsibilities of fatherhood.
During another commercial break we were hustled upstairs Lindsey said that Arnold was just behind him and that she was amazed by his height once she was standing next to him. He did however look quite a less wide that in The Mummy Returns, but I think that some of the robes he was wearing had an effect on this. The Big Breakfast studio is two converted cottages as I said, and for the next bit, as we were upstairs, our hero was to be interviewed on "the bed". This was a round padded item which he was to sit (lie?) on propped up against the headboard next to the female presenter. I noticed him pull on his belt and make sure his trousers were well anchored before he did so! This interview was better than the first he had probably had time to acclimatise himself to the way the interviewers worked and of course he was talking about something which they wanted to hear positive things about.
Finally we got escorted back downstairs and it was time for Arnold to dash off to his next appointment. Lindsey and I stayed until the end of the programme, thanked Natalie and headed off, Lindsey to get back to Kent, myself to head off into London to flat hunt.
