Seasons of John Hurt

My earliest memory of John Hurt was actually of his voice, as the heroic rabbit Hazel in the animated version of one of my favorite books, Watership Down. Next came The Elephant Man, Jim Henson's The Storyteller and of course, Alien. However, my mother (who was born on the exact same day as Sir John— 22 January 1940) is very partial to his infamous scene in Spaceballs, which is her favorite Hurt performance.

Isn't little Captain Grumpy and 
his Gallifrey-destroying
superweapon cute? 

        

(This is a somewhat long post, so please bear with me.)    

    In 2014, I was still working on my sketchbook drawings of each incarnation of the Doctor in order. Each sketch (which would eventually become a finished illustration) had a little fob-watch in the corner to indicate each Doctor's "number." So what "time" on the clock should the War Doctor have? 

    This was a little bit of a quandary  because he was the hidden incarnation between the Eighth and Ninth Doctors. I decided his designation would be 8:30— half past eight.

    When I finished my sketch of War as he appeared in "Day of the Doctor," I celebrated by getting a little War Doctor action figure.    

    Around the same time, my friend Sandra Franklin had attended a talk that John Hurt gave in her hometown of Norwich, Norfolk, and she surprised me by showing him a copy of my sketch of the War Doctor.  She had asked if he could sign it for me!              

    He then asked her if she had another copy of it for him to keep—and luckily, she did! She told him that I was drawing all the Doctors in order, and so he wrote,

    "For Raine. All best wishes. Keep going!" 

    You can imagine how absolutely over the moon I was by this. Thanks must be given again to my dear friend Sandra. And to John Hurt (the legend!) himself for the encouragement.

    Needless to say, I kept going. 

Here's the very messy beginnings of the sketchbook drawing. You can see that I'm all over
the place in my book. On the opposite page, you can see my scribbled notes and
my trying to work out the position of his hands. 

Beginning rough stages: I made a large photocopy of the working sketch and traced it 
onto some vellum bristol paper. I also tidied up the fob-watch in the corner. 

        

And starting my first layers of acrylic gouache. There would just be a touch of subtle
color with the red of his sonic screwdriver and his brown eyes.

And the finished version!

Next up, I had wanted to do a Young War Doctor as he had appeared very briefly at the end of "Night of the Doctor".

    The image of young John Hurt that has been used in that short episode, which had finally shown the Eighth Doctor's regenerating, had been from a production of Crime and Punishment, which I had watched on YouTube.

    I had then made some reference drawings in my sketchbook as I watched the program. 

    I had decided that Young War needed to dramatically hold some sort of prop. At first. I toyed with the idea of his holding a gun (very un-Doctor-like, but probably more in line with the un-Doctorly War Doctor).

    Eventually, I had settled on his taking a trophy: an eyestalk from one of his archenemies, the Daleks.

    Little did I know synchronicity was at work because at the same time the iconic image of the young War Doctor holding a Dalek eyestalk was being used in the superb charity short film  Seasons of War. 

    (You can watch it here!)

    The eyestalk in this case had been used as a telescope, which I thought was an absolutely genius idea. It was the concept of director/writer Andy Robinson and writer Declan May.

The transferred sketch, with some tidying up of the fob-watch. War looks very grumpy,
like he wants to hit someone over the head with that Dalek eyestalk. 

Most of the painting done here; I decided I wanted to put some splatter on the
fob-watch in the corner to show that Young War gets down and
dirty with his business. 

The finished version, which the same small hints of color and
added splatter on the fob-watch. 

    I was contacted by some of the filmmakers about the happy coincidence of the Dalek eyestalk—and I ended making some new friends!

    Seasons of War became an excellent, limited run charity book full of brilliant stories and art, published by Chinbeard Books  and edited by Declan May for Cauldwell Children, all telling unknown tales of this previously secret incarnation of the Doctor. 

    I had ordered a copy right away. When I had received it and saw what a beautiful book it was, I had wished I had been able to contribute to it in some way. It had received many amazing reviews and there was even one in Doctor Who Magazine.

                       There would eventually be another printing of it...


    While the second edition (with added, all-new content: brand new stories, art and commentary) was being readied, something very sad occurred: we lost John Hurt, only a week after his 77th birthday.   

    This came as a great shock to me. I had been at my job at the bookstore when my co-worker gave me the news and I had to leave the sales floor to process it. 

    That evening, I was contacted by the publisher of Chinbeard Books, Barnaby Eaton-Jones, who had seen my two finished War Doctor illustrations. He told me that there would be a special new tribute to John Hurt included with this latest and perhaps last edition of Seasons of War—and he asked if my two illustrations could be included in it.

    I immediately said YES (of course!!) — and I was honored to finally be able to contribute in some way to this wonderful book. 

    When I received my copy of Seasons of War, I was nervous about seeing my illustrations in print. Would they fit in there with all the beautiful content I had seen in the previous edition?

Here are some photos (below) of my contributions. My two War Doctor illustrations sort of "bookend" a touching new tribute to John Hurt written by editor Declan May. 

 

    The book is absolutely gorgeously put together, and like the first version:  hefty! Which is great because there's so much more brilliant content in this next edition, a whole missing Doctor Who era starring John Hurt at different ages. So many fantastic stories, commentary and beautiful illustrations.

 

    Everyone involved did a wonderful job and all the love shows. And I want to thank the publishers once more for letting me be a part of it.

    All proceeds went to support Caudwell Children.

    Next, I was commissioned by Declan May to do a alternate cover for yet another (and last) reprint of the book.

    In 2017, North America had a solar eclipse. During this, I was working at a bookstore and trying to come up with an idea for the new illustration. 

    I had been drawing little doodles of War standing in front of an eclipse on post-it notes at work (don't laugh, that's how these things always start) and I finally settled on this idea and began scribbling in my sketchbook. 

    I had wanted some cosmic event in the sky as a good, dramatic backdrop for the War Doctor, and this is where the very timely eclipse came in. My thinking was that there might be symbolism in darkness temporarily covering a sun, showing his despair at having to make a terrible choice. 

   
    My sister Victoria told me that I didn't have any pictures of me actually at my easel or at my drawing table, and that people might want to see how I work. So here I am!

Also, on the easel, you'll notice the 12th Doctor's sonic screwdriver. No, it doesn't help me draw, but I used it to see the position of the War Doctor's hand while holding his own sonic.

(Oh, who am I kidding?  It's a seriously awesome sonic screwdriver and it's just fun to play with it because it lights up three different ways and makes cool noises.) 

    There's been a few photos of my hand holding my pencil or paintbrush, but it's hard to get a photo of yourself working when you live alone and your laptop's self-timer produces some dreadful photos. (Also, my dog and cats had no thumbs to operate a digital camera.)

    Luckily, Victoria happened to be visiting my (then) new apartment to help me put some drapes up over my many bookcases (it helps keep the dust off them and makes the room look less chaotic)—and she snapped a few pictures of me drawing.

    In the above picture, I'm making adjustments. It's easier to see your composition when it's vertical (on the easel) because you're able to step back and look at it from a distance. Before I had the easel, I used to just tape the work-in-progress to a wall in order to look at it.

The finished Seasons of War limited edition cover.

    What were your favorite John Hurt performances? Did you enjoy his fantastic Big Finish audios? (There's also a brand new series of Young War Doctor adventures as well, starring Jonathon Carley, which I'm eager to listen to.)  

    And once again, I would like to thank John Hurt for his inspiration.

                                                                    I kept going.