A walk on the wild side
As wildlife photographer Doug Allan heads to Wales to host a stage show, James Rampton asks what audiences can expect
Q: How would you describe your new live show, Wild Images, Wild Life?
A: I want to persuade people to come on an emotional journey with me, a journey with a message but which is also infused with humour and raw adventure.
In the show, I’ll be looking back at the highlights of my 35-year career, and chart my feelings during that time.
It started with pure excitement, but over the years it has evolved into a greater appreciation of all the experiences I’ve had.
When you work with animals like polar bears, it’s a wonderful privilege.
Q: What else will you be discussing?
A: My quiet appreciation has now given way to deep concern.
I’ve spent a disproportionate amount of time at both poles, and over the years I’ve seen many changes.
Being a scientist before I was a film maker has allowed me to understand the full implications of climate change, and it’s seriously worrying.
It’s more accurate to describe it as climate “breakdown” rather than climate “change”.
Q: When did you start to notice the difference?
A: When I was working in the Antarctic in 1976, there were a few murmurs about climate change, but not much concern.
Then when I went to the Arctic for the first time in 1988, that’s when Jim Hansen, the renowned American climate scientist who at the time worked for NASA, first said, “Hold on, I think we have an issue here with a warming planet.”
Things were slowly starting to change. Back then, for example, it was a case of snow in spring in the high Arctic, but by the 2000s that snow in May was now falling as rain.
The melt on land and the break-up of the sea ice was happening earlier every year.
I’ve watched those changes in the Arctic with my own eyes.
Q: What other changes have you observed?
A: I worked on the BBC’s Life in the Freezer in 1992.
One of the big sequences in that series involved filming penguins on Dream Island in Antarctica.
At that time, there were about 18,000 pairs of penguins there, but when we returned to Dream Island for another series in 2008, the numbers had reduced to only 3,000 pairs.
That’s a precipitous decline. Talking to scientists, they’re concerned because the fastest warming places on the planet are the poles. Temperatures in winter on the Antarctic Peninsula are now 5-6° warmer than they were in mid 1950s. That’s caused some radical changes.
Increased melting of the glaciers and ice shelves is already beginning to increase global sea level.
Q: What do you hope people will take away from Wild Images, Wild Life?
A: I’d like my audience to feel they’ve been entertained, and that I’ve offered some fresh insights into how and why we film wildlife.
If you like those 10-minute “diaries”at the end of the big shows, then think of this as an extended version.
But I hope also people take away a fresh sense of connection to our planet, an empathy with it so they see the urgency about tackling climate change.
The decisions we have to take will be difficult, but there are solutions and I’ll be looking at them too.
Q: You have worked with Sir David Attenborough on such landmark series as The Blue Planet, Planet Earth, Life and Frozen Planet. How did you get to know Sir David?
A: In 1981, David was filming for The Living Planet, his follow-up series to Life on Earth, and he with his film crew hitched a ride on the Royal Navy’s HMS Endurance to the Antarctic.
The ship had scheduled a visit to the island where I was working as a scientist and diver.
It fell to me to take the film crew to places where they would get the best views of the wildlife.
Watching David’s cameraman, I thought, “He’s doing all the things I enjoy. That what I want to do next.”
David and the others very generously gave me advice about how the television business operated.
Q: So Sir David took you under his wing?
A: A penguin’s wing, yes you could say that. I remember one night on base he said: “If I want to go to Africa, there are a dozen people I can phone about filming elephants, chimps, whatever.
“But if I come back to film in Antarctica, I’ll have to come to you.”
It left me thinking maybe I did have some kind of unique selling point.
I had the chance to go back to the Antarctic the following winter, a different base, no diving but a colony of emperor penguins that were accessible through the winter.
So I decided to take a movie camera with me.
I contacted Jeffery Boswall, a producer at the BBC who was just beginning a series all about birds, and I filmed the emperors for him.
Q: You have an astonishing CV, which includes eight Emmys, five BAFTAs, two Polar Medals and the Fuchs Medal. How would you sum up your career?
A: It’s been wonderful to spend so much time in the natural world’s true wildernesses, in the company of some amazing animals.
It’s been a huge privilege, and I hope now, by talking about my experiences, I’m contributing to the growing awareness of the issues the planet and its oceans are facing, and the solutions we can (and must) embrace.