I Am What I Am, John Barrowman [smart ebook reader .txt] 📗

coming at all. We all hugged each other and by the time we had separated, we were all crying. It helped a little that Binny and Coco12 added that they were okay with their characters’ deaths. Since the whole Owen-of-the-living-dead arc had happened with Burn, he didn’t think his character could go any further, while Naoko agreed that she too was ready to move on and try some other avenues.

When Burn, Naoko, Eve, Gareth and I had all finished our work for the day, we gathered in my trailer to talk about this turn of events. We cracked open a bottle of champagne and we drank and laughed and cried and cracked open another bottle of champagne. The impromptu gathering wasn’t so much a party as it was a wake for Owen and Tosh.

Not long after these developments, word came down from the Producers on the Mount that Torchwood was moving to BBC1 for series three. Hurrah! How cool was that? Eve, Gareth and I were ecstatic. Who wouldn’t be? We each felt as if all our hard work was finally being recognized and rewarded. Then came the caveat, the ‘but’ – the ‘we loved your audition, but you’re just not right for the part’ moment. The producers informed us that the third series would be running on BBC1, but it would only be five episodes instead of thirteen.

Before I go any further, let me make it really clear that this cut from thirteen episodes to five was a decision made at the production level. The fact that it was one more thing changing at Torchwood, and that this worried me as I’ve already suggested, doesn’t diminish the truth that the decrease in the number of episodes was necessary for sound creative and programming reasons. The reduction had nothing to do with my schedule, or Russell’s, or Eve’s, or Gareth’s – or anyone else’s, for that matter.

When a television show moves to BBC1, it’s important to make a dramatic impact: after all, this is the flagship of the BBC and Torchwood needed to perform there with a big bang. In order to achieve this, the producers, including Russell, decided to create a television event over five consecutive nights that would be so exciting and so suspenseful that it would be a not-to-be-missed viewing event around the country. The BBC wanted the kind of mini-series dramatic event that would give people something to talk about at the water cooler in their offices the next morning.

When I asked Russell about the episode cut, he revealed that there was also a powerful artistic motivation behind the move. Russell admitted to me that from the moment Captain Jack had first emerged on the page, he had had his secrets. Russell had been keeping a few pivotal details from Jack’s back story under wraps ever since the character’s inception, including the stunning family revelations in ‘Children of Earth’, which I think make Jack’s character more layered and more complicated, his psyche darker, and his anguish for and about humanity more transparent. Russell felt that these disclosures needed to be framed in an epic narrative like ‘Children of Earth’ – one that, even in its thrilling aspects and its brutal, heart-wrenching moments, was really a story about what one person is willing to sacrifice for their own or their family’s survival.

I got all of that, but – still – I have to admit I had mixed feelings about the decision. That, coupled with the loss of Burn and Naoko from the Torchwood team, sent me home to Scott on many a night during filming to ask him if he thought I was being paranoid and silly by reading something into this series of events. His response was always supportive and comforting, and then he’d make me some toasted cheese and a vodka tonic and rub my feet and I’d forget about what was bothering me for a while.

The problem with ‘[b]eing slightly paranoid is like being slightly pregnant – it tends to get worse’.13 The second area that contributed to my fretfulness had to do with some scheduling issues on Torchwood.

Scheduling has always been a source of a little conflict between the Torchwood producers and me. When I’m filming Torchwood, it’s my main gig. No ifs, ands or buts with that statement. However, unlike a lot of other actors, I want to keep my work diversified, my jobs balanced, and my plate full. It’s how I roll – a little music, some theatre, a children’s show, a concert tour, judging. I’m very good at multi-tasking in my professional life14 and I like to plan my schedule in such a way that I get maximum entertainment value out of my time.

Life is short and it’s not a rehearsal. I want to make the most of my talents and the opportunities they are now affording me. That’s one of the reasons why my manager, business partner and friend, Gavin Barker, and I formed Barrowman Barker Productions (BBP) in 2008. This production company will give me the chance to broaden my entertainment interests even more.

Even while I was filming Torchwood series one, I could never get a hard-and-fast weekly schedule from the producers on a regular basis. Sometimes the schedule would get delivered the night before a shoot. I remember during series two, an AD dashed to my Cardiff flat close to midnight with a schedule for the following day that stated I was not needed until later in the afternoon. What annoyed me about this short notice was that I had cancelled a guest appearance on another show in London in order to return to Cardiff that night because I’d thought I had an early pick-up the next morning.

I want to work because I love to work. This means I need a precise schedule to follow every week. Gav maps it out down to the second, and I check it every night to see what I have to do and where I have to be the next day.