Brian Blessed

Brian Blessed, Oliver Reed, Peter O Toole – they don’t make modern actors like this anymore! This fab story tells us:

The Blackadder actor stunned guests on the BBC’s Midweek show as he recounted the incident in graphic detail during a discussion about what women experience during childbirth.

A male midwife, an artist and a environmental activist all gave their own opinions on how hospital surroundings can affect a woman during labour, before Blessed piped up with what he claimed was his own experience of childbirth.

“Years ago, in about 1963, I was running over Richmond Park and a woman was having a baby in a tree and there was no one around. Because I’d been brought up with babies, kind of [in a] working class background and helping with babies, I rushed across to her,” he told his host, Libby Purves.

“Gradually I got the baby out. Yes, I delivered in Richmond Park. The afterbirth came out and I got rid of the clots, then I bit it loose, then I tied it into a knot and then I just called for help and eventually an ambulance came. I was covered in blood, my shirt was covered in blood, I was wrapping and wiping her [and saying] ‘It’s alright darling!’.”

Now there’s a neighbor in a deep rural community someone a long way from a maternity ward would want!!