Michael Jackson not that one, the BBC Two controller wanted to be more like Channel 4, so decided to commission a cool drama for young people about trainee lawyers. When I told [executive producer] Tony Garnett that I'd briefly been a lawyer, his eyes lit up. But I didn't want to write a show about lawyers! Fuck, so boring. That's why I'd left to become a writer.
Rebecca Lucy Taylor, known as Self Esteem, channels a lot of personal stuff into the role of Maggie Frisby, a minor rock singer, angry, amused and very drunk as her band disintegrates at a 1969 Oxford student ball.
Each series explores technology that feels just one step ahead of reality. In the era of AI, it feels more and more timely. Ben does a lot of research and we have advisers who inform us about the latest developments. Not just from the Met and counter-terror but military consultants as well. They're banks of information and a lot more open than you'd expect because it's all off the record.
Among the bold choices in Luca Guadagnino's feverish film of William S Burroughs' novel are the late 20th-century pop and alternative soundtrack (Nirvana, Prince, New Order) for a 1950s story, and the casting of an unrecognisable, orc-like Manville in a trumped-up cameo as the shaman Dr Cotter, who was male in the original book.
Katherine Ryan's podcast is called Telling Everybody Everything, and she does. The comedian is honest to a fault: her comments are regularly reported out of context to create clickbait news stories that give people the wrong idea of what she meant and of her as a human, but she doesn't stop. Her commitment to truth, especially in the celebrity world she inhabits, is as unusual as it is admirable.
Welcome to the latest issue of Stream On, the weekly newsletter from Consequence that answers the eternally confounding question: What films and TV shows should you be watching? (Subscribe here!) We're looking at all the new and recent releases from Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, Prime Video, Paramount+, Peacock, HBO Max, and more for ideas - not to mention a Blast From the Past and streaming suggestions from this week's special guest: Midwinter Break star Ciarán Hinds!
The best actress I've ever worked with is Judi Dench, who's such a mischief maker. She's so delightful. She's so, so good. If you ever just want to just hear something short, listen to Judi Dench read a Shakespeare sonnet, just find one on YouTube, and it will move you to tears - you'll just think that is how English should be spoken.
The Castle Cinema, which opened on Chatsworth Road in 2015 after a crowdfunding campaign, has become one of the best places to catch a film in the whole of London, so there's no better team to revitalise Catford Mews. Reopening at The Castle Catford some time in 2026, the venue will boast three screens, a community space, a bar and a cafe.
We were doing a job in Belgium where I met them (her roommates in Clapham), and they would tell me about the infamous Infernos, this place is so fun, you can't get kicked out of there, you can do anything in Infernos, and you can't get kicked out'.