Brian Blessed has explained, for the first time, why he grabbed a heckler at a VIP dinner last year and then stormed out.

The actor, speaking to Sky Arts, said he walked out of the event at London’s Savoy after one of the diners called the 198os film Flash Gordon, in which he starred as Prince Vultan, as “c**p”.

The 75-year-old was said to have grabbed the heckler by the throat, and shouted: “I’m not standing for this,” before storming out.

Now, 18 months later, the larger-than-life thespian has revealed the full details of the outburst.

He said: “Because one of the men was kind of horrified that I did things like Flash Gordon, I used that as a pretext to leave. I acted on it and I got out. I didn’t get paid for it and got home with my wife and dogs and got on with my life.”

He continued: “I was fine sitting quietly. Unfortunately people go to these occasions and some start drinking at 6pm and the function doesn’t start until 8.30pm or 9pm and there are several phases where drink takes effect.

“They are cheerful for a while, they are bombastic for a while and then they become slightly moronic. After another few hours it becomes rather vindictive. So the whole table were a bit p***ed and a bit vindictive.

“They were fine people but they were drunk and they were being a bit insulting.

“Well I didn’t mind that, but I found it tedious and boring. At my age I haven’t got time to waste and I worked it out that in 45 minutes I could be with all my dogs and I could have a good time digging into two or three rather wonderful books.”

Well, far be it from us to criticise anybody’s taste, but we at FTN absolutely LOVE Flash Gordon, and as such we’re putting the word out there for anyone who knows Mr Blessed to send him our way. We’ll happily chat to him about his acting career and will only ask him once to boom “GORDON’S ALIVE”…..honestly!