'He is a down on his luck dodgy wizard'

Tell me about Mr. Sydney? What is he like?
Nigel: My character's name is Mr. Sydeney. He is a dodgy wizard. He is a student wizard who owes some money because of a spell that went wrong a while ago. He owes quite a lot of money to Ridcully, so he has been hauled into our band to assist Mr. Teatime or rather T-e-a-t-i-m-e with the awful goings on in Tooth Fairies' Castle.

How are you enjoying playing Mr Sydeney?
Nigel: I am enjoying playing Mr Sydeney a lot. I have been looking forward to doing this because I have a long acquaintance with Terry Pratchett from reading the books on audio book. I do the unabridged audio books. So I have done all the characters' voices for years. And this is fun because there is such a brilliant cast in this, its kind of what I would have put on my own cast list, in my head you know.

Hogfather seems to be primarily about belief and the power of belief making the world go round. Is that something you agree with?
Nigel: I don't think that so much you need belief to make the world go round. But you need the belief if you are going to get Christmas presents. I think that is the sort of moral of the tale.

Are you gonna get Christmas presents?
Nigel: I never get Christmas presents. I just wrap Christmas presents and buy Christmas presents

At the moment is your motivation simply that he is desperately down on his luck?
Nigel: Sydeney, is desperately down on his luck, he has lost a lot of money gambling. And so he is having to basically set out and sell the few spells that he can manage to do, to gangs of assassins and thieves, so he is a very unwilling member of the gang...

If you could have Mr. Sydeney's spell for anything, what would your spell be?
Nigel: I wouldn't want Mr. Sydeney's spell for anything, because it is going to go wrong. None of his spells in this go right. He is not the best, the most efficient wizard of all. He is a down with his luck, dodgy wizard

Underlying Terry Pratchett's vision of Discworld, there seems to be a sort of a mythology, a set of rules parallel to our world. Do you agree?
Nigel: Yes, I think I prefer Terry Pratchett to many other fantasy books. Because underlying it he has a very healthy outlook on life, a very good philosophy that he is banging on again and again. It is very wise I think, he has a lot of wisdom. And Ankh Morpork the town is very organic, everything is thrown in there. Everything is very realistic. It is like it is in real life, which is a mess that sort of, just about, gets by. And I think he is very positive on that. Rather like a Monty Python film in a sense. It is very life affirming I think.