Perfect Day with Jessica Knappett - EP7: Emerald Fennell

Episode Date: September 5, 2024

Actor, filmmaker and writer, Emerald Fennell joins Jessica Knappett to describe her perfect day. The pair discuss a good goss, getting ready for a night out, being a hun, the wild way in Emerald writes scripts, the fashion in Saltburn, Jess’ new fitness idea and a stunning revelation about parties. Like and subscribe for brand-new episodes every Thursday. Follow us on Instagram @perfectdaycast A 'Keep It Light Media' Production Sales and general enquiries: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

E-R-A-P-E-C-T E-R-A-P-E-C-T Alright then. And the butterfly would like swing tantalisingly, or so I thought, above my Miss 60 lace-up low-slung jeans. Hello, I'm Jessica Knappett and welcome to Perfect Day, the podcast which finds out your favourite people's perfect day by asking their fantasy morning, afternoon and night. Our guest today is award-winning writer, film director and actress Emerald Fennell. Her sensational films include Promising Your Woman, Barbie and Salt Burn.

And if you don't know her through her films, you may know her as The Crown's hot young Camilla Parker Bowles. Is there anything she can't do? Well, we'll find out, won't we? Coming up in this brilliant episode, we hear the absolutely deranged way Emerald drafts her screenplays. I have a devastating realisation about the first time Emerald and I met. We talk about our love of a good goss. We make a stunning revelation about parties. And we discuss the myriad of horrors that keep us awake at night.

Plus I try to launch a new fitness fab. My God, it's a good one. Welcome first-time listeners and returning friends to the Perfect Day Club. This is Emerald Fennell's Perfect Day. There'll be a parade of madness, both psychological and physical. How are you, Ems? I'm really good, thank you this is very exciting it's very exciting I think it's gonna have to just be said from the off that we are friends because otherwise it's gonna be weird isn't it

it would be very good if we pretended not to pretend that we never met I mean it's not like this is a particularly professional you know it's not Frost Nixon anyway we don't know well we don't know actually i don't know what i don't know what you've got going on i think let it be known emerald and i are good pals we've been friends for many years we met at a wedding and we hit it off i think it's fair to say well you felt we'd hit it off right um okay so this this is where i find out that we're not friends at all and this is an entirely

parasocial relationship of my own imagination um no and then we met we met and you were the best person I'd ever met. And I wanted to be your friend. But I actually think, so we actually met because I auditioned for you. The first time we ever met, I auditioned for Drifters. That's so true. I've erased that because of embarrassment, I think. What do you mean? Well, because it's awful, isn't it?

I suppose it's difficult to talk about because you were so good and we so, I mean, God, it would have been so different. But then we went another way. So you went another direction, which was fine, which was totally fine. Just goes to show how different it was back then, wasn't it? That you were auditioning for Drifters and now you're an Oscar winning movie director, which is insane. Still, no, look, you're absolutely right. It is insane. And I still feel very bewildered and shy about that.

bewildered and shy about that I remember I remember auditioning for Drifters so specifically because I think it was the first comedy script I'd been sent that was funny that made me laugh that properly made me laugh I even remember like to date it I was wearing top shop hot denim hot pants over opaque black tights oh my with a shoe boot did tights and denim shorts make it into salt burn because it's that's the era isn't it they did they did i think sadie silverall wore wore um in fact i believe footless tights i believe it's footless tights a ballet pump yes a short and a going out top with approximately 80 necklaces and a hair bump little bumpy quiff yes bumpy quiff actually to be fair I sometimes still try a bumpy quiff do you I don't have the face for it people talk a lot about the sort of bath plugs the graves in all of that and salt but for me it was I was I was really there for the cozies for the charity wristbands it really captured an

amazing kind of nostalgia which I I sort of loved and really enjoyed reliving those years can you talk a bit about that why you set it in that period so um it's set in 2007 mostly summer of 2007 and that was exactly 15 years before the summer that we filmed it and I think it's because exactly 15 years ago is just incredibly uncool because it's not, it's not quite trendy yet and ironic. It's not like Y2K cool. It's just still in your wardrobe, but not really cool anymore. And so actually even, you know, even Sophie, the amazing costume designer, even trying to find stuff, costumes was really difficult because so much of it's still in people's wardrobes and you know I would find what would happen is Sophie'd be like look at this awful t-shirt that we found you're not going to believe it and I'd be like

oh I'm wearing it as to my jumper stop it I still have it I'm still wearing it I'm gonna burn it when I get home but you know it was that thing of because it's exactly what is so funny is the wedding singer which we think of as being the most 80s film in the world the wedding singer was set 15 years before it came out it was set in 1985 it came out in 1997 and that when we were teenagers felt like it might have been it might as well as been world war one it might have you know it might as well have been the trenches. It was so old fashioned. Is it a way of making it funnier then? I think it certainly has this like humanising effect.

Because the thing is, is when you're dealing with a Jacob A. Laudy, like he's a timelessly, classically kind of beautiful person. And so therefore, what you're kind of trying to do is is make him seem of a time make these people make rosamund you know seem like not only is she the most glamorous person in the world not only could she as as a character have existed in a nancy mitford novel or even in like jane austen novel but that they are actually fixed in this very specific time of Nuts magazine and Britney Spears and all of, and, you know, Paracelsus, The Simple Life. And so what it does is it makes these timeless places, a stately home and Oxford University who are just unchanged these unchanged places it makes them specific and it makes them

seem kind of tawdry somehow it just reminds you that the people are kind of the people aren't as they're impermanent unlike the sort of systems that are behind them I suppose in a really kind of incredibly wanky way but also it was just you know it was just a way of recreating my youth and finally bringing back the eyebrow piercing which none of us were immune to no actually I was I didn't have an eyebrow piercing but I did pretend I had an eyebrow piercing sorry how did you the thing is about an eyebrow piercing is it's actually quite hard to pretend. But you could get, do you not remember those?

Oh my God, the magnets. Yeah. Oh God, do you know what, when you said that I had like a Proustian. Yeah. I got my carat on back. I think I had, I think I had a magnetic piercing. Yeah, I think we all did. And the thing is that you sort of live through that, don't you? And now I look, because how many earring piercings have you got? I've got two, baby. Just two?

Clean and serene, yeah. Yeah, and I look at everyone with their, you know, five ear holes. Because sometimes I think, am I sad? I've only got one ear piercing in one ear and you know what happened to me the other day Ems what I ordered earrings off the internet and only one arrived no no no it wasn't it wasn't a mistake they've started selling earrings in singles because so many people just have one you know they'll have an extra hole up here won't they I mean they should tell you they should tell you well Dan's my husband's got both both his ears does he yeah I can see that why doesn't he wear

why doesn't he wear a lovely pair of pearls I know know, I'm sure he would like to. But every now and again, I'll just catch sight of the hole in his ear and I'll think, oh, it makes me feel very, I don't know what it is, like fond of him. Yeah, because it's so lovely. It's like whenever I see my belly button piercing R.I.P. Oh my gosh. so lovely it's like whenever I see my belly button piercing R.I.P. oh my god because what is great about getting your belly button pierced in Great Bedwin the small Wiltshire village is it will be done by a drunk woman who doesn't professionally do it who's doing it more of a hobby but mine is like askew but now obviously I've had to retire it due to multiple children and every time I look at it it it tickles me oh yeah the idea of me having a belly button piercing that especially one my original one had a so it was a belly button stud but it had a little chain with a butterfly attached to it. That's gorgie. Oh my God, thank you, babe.

It was gorge. And the butterfly would like swing tantalizingly, also I thought, above my Miss 60 lace up low slung jeans. Of course. And often would get caught. Of course they would get. Oops. Well, less oops oops more like oozing oozing infection because it's constantly being sort of like tugged at I mean look it's bad it's

hard time I think I might have mentioned this to you before that my new like my health thing is not about losing weight it's not about you know having a having a six pack or whatever certainly not I since having a child having children and having two cesarean sections it does give you like a little bit of an extra sort of paunch which it has for me I'm sure some other people have figured out a way to get rid of it by I don't know doing more than 10 minutes of exercise but I cannot I cannot see and this is gross but I'm gonna say it my new health thing is I want to be able to look down and be able to see my pubes i can't see my pubes anymore because i look down and i just can see my tummy and i didn't used to i used to be able to see my i used to but chess there's such

a simple answer just grow your pubes grow your pubes out grow your pubes out why didn't I think of that well done I mean that's just there's two ways to solve this problem I would love you to do a fitness video a VHS of you getting to the point where you can see your pubes see my pubes I know like the Kylie hot pants workout but yeah Jess's I've thought about I've thought about doing it like I'd have to be wearing like um I'd have to be wearing what what are those cameras that you wear on your head you're a film director sorry I actually do a gopro a gopro oh yeah okay fine sorry no we don't have those in Saltburn. No, it was more, I was just terrified that I was going to have to answer

some kind of technical question. The Sony SG-1. I think that's it. I don't know what a Sony SG-1 is, but I'll be told, I'm sure. Anyway, oh God, I would love to just keep talking to you about pubes and piercings and gopros but we've got to get on with the format let's have it all right then let's go

I'm Rod Fennell what's your perfect morning oh my lord now I'm okay so I would say the thing that has started happening now that I have children is that occasionally my children will bring me breakfast in bed and it is the most basic thing in the world but truly it is the best thing that's ever happened to me and what happens is they they do lots of testing of the breakfast on the stairs on the way up. So by the time it appears, it has been fingered into oblivion. It is, it's got lots of little bite marks in it. And I just think it's the best way to wake up by such a margin that I don't even think like Marlon Brando in his prime waking you up you know with some with some sort of saucy bedtime talk I just like like simply can't imagine anything could

be better than your children bringing you quite frankly a really disgusting breakfast in bed oh I love it what what are we talking? Pancakes? We're talking. Oh, well, they're quite little, so pancakes would be a bit of a health and safety issue. Obviously, my husband is there. They're not working in an industrial kitchen making food. They are very young to be making you breakfast. They're very young.

The last time they freshly squeezed orange juice, but with their hands so it was a glass with lots of filthy filthy pulp and i think one segment of orange still in there so delicious and then um it's usually a bit of toast with two or three bites taken out of it maybe it will be an m&S pan of chocolate, cold, and it will usually be some kind of flour that has been popped on there, you know, and it's just perfect.

The thing I like about that as well is that the kids have been taken care of and someone else has been playing with them. There's nothing quite like another parent taking the kids off your hands, even for an hour, to relieve you of all of the guilt. You know that you can lie there because they're being taken care of. It's not like they're just watching telly and you should really go downstairs I don't know about you Jess but we don't have any screens in our house no course no we don't um we don't we haven't watched six to eight hours no it's just an abacus it's just an abacus and um actually my children just play with everything,

anything that's available to them. A wooden spoon. Yes. Yes. Toddlers actually just really enjoy playing with the water in the tap. Well, and you really can't, you know, do better than just a bit of outside play, a bit of imaginative outside play.

You know, I know that's what my children are mostly doing. So, yeah. So they're not watching. Good for you. No, no, they've not watched every single series of Bluey. 5,000 times. I mean, it's great. It is great, but it does make us all look bad.

And I think, I mean, although it's better than Cocoa Melon, which gives me kind kind of I have a sort of psychotic break every time I watch it and I just everything about it I keep reading between the lines there are never people on the streets everything's always empty the world is always half complete I don't know it's just all wrong does feel very sinister although we would do make the Cocoa Melon film, of course. Oh yeah, if it landed on my lap. To be honest, I pitched for that for free for about six months

and then not get paid to write it. What else happens in your perfect morning, please? Okay, so perfect morning is I was asleep and my children woke me up. So I didn't even have the guilt of like, I'm awake. Who's going to take one for the team? It's like, I've been asleep. I think that's the thing for me. My perfect day starts with having actually slept for my dream amount of time, which is 12 and a half hours.

Whoa. If I could, if I could have my, if I could live my dream life, half of my time would be asleep. And as it is now, I have four to five hours sleep. And it is an absolute misery. Why do you only have four to five hours sleep? Well, it's a combination of factors. It is children don't sleep, intrusive thoughts,

nightmares, night sweats, the horror, the existential horror of death, things that might happen to the children, things that might happen to me. It's just the night time, it used to be for fun and snogging and dancing and watching sexy late night films. And now it's just for the cold hand of terror around my neck.

Yeah. I mean, I can relate to that. I can relate to that. What time do you go to bed? 10.30. And what time are you waking up for all of this cold horror? 12, 2, 3, and then up at 5, usually. Yeah, up at 5 with the kids. Yeah, it's kind of that there'll be a parade of madness, both psychological and physical, in our house.

So it's a kind of constant you know somebody will be like running in needing to sing a song two in the morning um and then it and then it will be a kind of um yeah so so basically just my perfect day is that I've had some sleep and so I wake up my children have brought me some delicious pastries. I look in the mirror and I'm not a sort of haggard witch, but in fact, I'm a sort of blossoming milf in her prime. So every day, basically. That's this one morning. So I will have a bath. Also, for the purposes of the rest of this day, basically. That's this one morning. So I will have a bath.

Also, for the purposes of the rest of this day, my children, I don't want to say they don't exist, but they've been taken to Legoland by their grandparents and they're having a whale of a time. Exactly. So they're in good hands, but they're not my hands in good hands but they're not my hands crucially they're not my hands it's important to know that they are having a great time as well oh a great time they don't miss you i mean and for example what we're what i'm not doing on

my perfect day was what we did this weekend which was which was go to the cushy sock actually it was lovely and also look it was more that i told one of our children that that he was about the age that in the olden days you would go to sea and so i think he thought he was about to be conscripted so he screamed in terror that he so he thought he was sort of showing him around a bit like you show them around the school yes right so we're we're crucially on the parrot lego land and i am going to get some santa maria de novella bath salts so specific they're the most amazing they make any bath an experience an event oh my god why are they so incredible i They're so incredible.

I don't know. I don't know. They're very soothing on the muscles. No, it's none of that. It's not like an Epsom salt. It's the smell. The smell is like the best smell you've ever smelled in your life.

I'll be honest. I can feel a host read coming on, actually. Santa Maria de what? I'm going to have to learn how to say it. De novella. De novella. Oh, wow. I'm going to get bath salts. And say it. De novella. De novella. Oh, wow. I'm going to get bath salts.

And you have to do this. You have to go, ah, I'm getting into the bath. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Oh, my God. So you're having a lovely bath. So having a bath. I'm going to read something in the bath. Genre?

And the bath's going to be two hours. Is it a mag? Is it a mag? Is it a book? Oh, is it a mag? I hadn't even thought, is it a mag? Yes. If it's a mag, it's going to be House and Garden.

Because I just want to just have a little look at what everyone's doing. I need to know what Beata Herman's doing in terms of upholstery. I just need to know the moment it hits the newsstands. Love a bit of Beata Herman. Oh my God, an absolute dream. my god an absolute dream so it will be that but most likely it will be a mid-century novel by a female novelist in which a woman usually a woman in her early 30s therefore unfortunately a miserable spinster possibly with a drinking problem will be going to seed in a boarding house in London oh wow okay I've only recently started reading again though because because of children it's because children and also it's just one of

those things you have to actually remember to do right can you talk about your little break that you're on I'm I'm on a little break. Yeah, well, I cannot talk, but it sounds like I've been institutionalised. I wish I had. Basically in the last five years, well, nearly six years actually, I did, so really from the start, the start of Killing Eve season two

to a month ago or six weeks ago, I've been working non-stop um and as well as having two children and not really having even a moment of maternity leave or anything like that and you were you were nine months pregnant or something when you were directing promising a woman yeah I was nine months pregnant at the end of it I was nine I gave birth three weeks later three weeks after principal photography and then straight into the edit and then straight to the edit I was like it's fine let's just let's just keep going but you know but that's look that's all fine yeah it's that's the it is what it is because what happens in anyone's life, but particularly in a woman's life, is that, you know, the two things tend to come at the same time, don't they?

You've spent 10 years, 15 years working to get to the stage. And that's also the time when you kind of, you know, if you want to have children, it's sort of the time when you kind of need to start thinking about that. So it's inevitable. I actually think what was really great for me in lots of ways is it's important to say it can be done. It can be done. I spent a lot of my like 20s, I'm anxious that it's not possible to do this stuff. And it's hard. It's like grueling. It's physically hard and emotionally. It's not wonderful, but it is possible possible this is the first time i've had some time off in yeah in five or six years and it is i gotta say absolutely amazing yeah um okay any

more to add to the morning the bath in a bath okay yes reading mags reading mags reading depressing mid-century literature also if i can if there's time i'd love to get somebody on the phone and have a chat on the phone yes i love a chat on the phone obviously phoning a good old phone pal phone friend yeah perfect so then i'll get out the bath i'm going to go get coffee from a coffee shop, which to this day, I love. I love doing more than anything in the world. Because really at heart, I'm a hun. I'm live, laugh, love.

I'm a center candle. I'm just, I'm a goss. I'm Heat Magazine. Have you got a special coffee that you like to order? I have a special coffee. I'm Heat Magazine. Have you got a special coffee that you like to order? I have a special coffee. Well, now it's summer. It's a white Americano. Oh, I thought you were going to go iced.

No, yeah, yeah, yeah. Sorry, iced. Yeah, yeah. Iced Americanos. Yeah, iced white Americano. But the ice, the way the ice like plaques around in the plastic, sorry, Earth, sorry uh sorry planet earth you know just the way that it clicks around and I'm gonna walk down the street and I'm like just that just

that single use plastic that I just toss and then I just toss it away I toss it into the earth every day I do try actually can I say I do have a cup that I do that I do mostly remember to bring because I'm not a complete monster but um uh you're just tottering down the high street with your yeah just tottering just tottering away with your eyes first sunny's on oh yeah of course hands loosey-goosey of course because it's a sunny day it has to be a sunny day on this what you're iced you're iced white americano yeah and you've had a bath you smell amazing amazing and then I'm gonna go I'm just gonna go for a shop at my happiest I just want to go and look at some t-shirts I want a coffee I want to just like I just want to just like I don't do you love a shop don't you I love a shop I love commerce

you probably don't know that I know this about you if I want you to come somewhere I'll tell you that I'm in a shop a really nice shop and you'll you'll be there in like five minutes but also it doesn't have to be a nice shop even like it's no can be going to the SO station like I love going to the SO station they've got magazines they've got different types of sweets they've got sometimes it's an M&S version or sometimes it's a co-op and sometimes you've got a Ginsters if you want one you've got Pepperami if you want one and you can have anything you want and you know in the same way that like there's not it doesn't matter what the shop is like sometimes I could go into a shop that's just for knitting

but I don't knit I just be like oh if I knit if I could knit imagine how much I'd love this shop I don't feel the same about all shops but I do feel this way about all gift shops in sort of museums and places like that oh my god totally I just love the gift shop and even we went to like um one of those kids farms like a you know sort of like a petting zoo the other day where like you walk when you first walk in there's like loads of guinea pigs and you can pet the guinea pigs and then you can feed the lambs and all of that and even that place had a gift shop and and when I saw it Dan was like go on then I've been letting all the kids go off into the pens and then and then I saw the gift shop and I was like oh my god but it's true but it's just thing is and it's not even it's not even getting

anything it's just I don't know it's the possibility it's the possibility of something I've always felt like this about clothes but also it's why I'm obsessed with house and garden and all of that stuff it's like if i have this lamp i might be this person if i wear this dress i might be that person it's just like that when you go into a shop you could be anyone you could you you could even if it's just like which chocolate bar are you going to choose what does like the difference between a kit kat chunky or a boost i mean those are two completely different days. Yeah, one of them's disgusting.

One of them's disgusting. Which one? Sorry, hang on. The Boost? The Boost, obviously. Why would you ever choose that? Unless you want to have a bad day. Like, yeah, I'll choose the Boost.

The Boost? Because I hate myself, I suppose. The Boost is the best jess what do you mean it's got taurine in it it's got caffeine in it it literally it's like the monster energy drink of chocolates yeah it's something there's something really almost creepy about a booze to me. Like it's not really a chocolate bar. It's just like a chewy, isn't it like, it's a bit like cereal. Sorry, you don't like texture? You don't like your, you don't like feeling like you've had a heart attack?

I don't, I don't get it. I don't get it at all. It's not for me. But I'll take a Kit Kat Chunky. Okay, you can have a KitKat Chunky and that's great and that's great so this so the morning is got a coffee go to shop could be any shop could be any shop could be any shop emerald finnell what's your perfect afternoon please okay okay okay okay it is a goss ah do you know what i mean and you could could be there. You absolutely can be there. I hope I am. It is a cup of tea at home and a goss. And the thing is, I once read an article which was like about the things that make people happiest. I'm sure I bored you about this before.

Number one, when you feel happiest is having just completed a boring task. Number two, talking through small problems with friends and if that is not a little goss i don't know what is so the dream scenario is one of our mutual friends has slightly let themselves down it is not a prop it's not, it's not going to ruin their life. It's not going to, it's not going to ruin their marriage. It's just, they've done something that we, the goodies, innocently having a cup of tea, might not have done ourselves. You know, we might not have done it ourselves. And we will be needing to go through this for two to three hours. We're going to have to comb. We're going to have to comb we're going to have to do a

little bit of combing through it we're going to be combing and or even better somebody's ex-boyfriend slash husband slash girlfriend has done something embarrassing they posted something cringe so then we can just go through every minute of the past that's a really good one an ex an ex someone who's not if this isn't directly affecting us it's not it's not like trauma anecdote that one has to sort of make something out of something awful it's a bit of a whoopsie yes a little more yeah and so that's the thing so then so everyone will come over we'll have some tea we'll have some cake we'll talk it over and then and then leading into dream scenario for later we're all going to get ready together because getting ready to go out out is the best thing that anyone can do on any day

borrow other people's makeup look at other people's makeup see what they've got in there oh because it's always better try on six to eight outfits yeah try on other people's clothes also just chat just the chats you're kind of in this space where you fit you're everyone's the funniest they've ever been everyone's the most interesting because you're not like it's just a natural yeah kind of sisterly joy and it's like a safe space with your best friends. I mean, the sort of friends that you're going to get ready with are going to be the best ones anyway, because they're going to see it all as well, aren't they? Yeah, big time, big time.

They'll see your pubes, even if you can't. But no, so that's the dream, is that getting ready for a party, for a party, for a proper, messy, fun, getting glad rags on party. Yes. But not like, are we talking black tie? Are we talking or are we just talking like, no? I guess in my mind, I'm imagining, well, a little bit like your birthday party, if we can mention such a personal private event. But your dress code was a bit much. It was.

Sorry. Your dress code was, in inverted commas, a bit much. Not, it was a bit much. Yes, it was a bit much. The opportunity to get, I feel a bit self-conscious now about getting like dressed up to go and see my friends or whatever. Why? Because they know what I look like. because I look like a piece of shit you're quite a flamboyant dresser what's happened that's made you self-conscious not self-conscious I

suppose um flamboyant dress I was just imagining myself no I just was imagining myself coming out of um stars stars in their eyes with my eyes just like neil diamond yeah that is what it's like when you enter a restaurant that is literally what it's like oh emerald's here dry eyes so this is it have you got anything else in um to add to your perfect afternoon or have we we've reached the evening by this point we've reached it yeah yeah so um just before we move on very uh briefly if this was a working day yeah how would your working day look? Like how do you, do you sort of set a timer and lock yourself in an office? Definitely not. You know, it's probably what everyone says. It's like a week of procrastination and then two days of absolute panic.

And it will be, it's the same for you know for everything but but the thing is about my right my writing the kind of my writing process that I have if it even is a process it's um it's sort of thinking it's walking around and thinking and so a writing day will usually be me listening to music and kind of stirring into space. Cutty sock. Cutty sock. Cutty sock. Do you take yourself off to places or do you just stay at home and wander around?

I will go to places. So I'll kind of walk somewhere. So if I'm meeting someone or I have to do anything I'll try and like walk there because I find I do better thinking when I'm actually doing I'm not like just walking to I'm not like Wordsworth going for a walk to think about a poem I'm actually on my way to the shops thanks William I'm actually going to get an adapter for a plug or whatever it is. You're going to buy some daffodils. I'm going to buy some daffs, actually. Thank you very much.

Yeah. I'm not going to sleep with my sister like some romantic poets we know. In brackets. Byron. All of them. Lord Byron. Oh, I thought you were talking about Byron. And Wordsworth.

And Byron, of course. Byron, half- of course half sister so so it's fine tell me about um Wordsworth your Wordsworth process is walking around going to the shops and then I think you've said before that a scene might just come to you like it comes to you in images is that right it is more like and I've said it I've said it before and I always feel a bit kind of cringed saying it but it's a bit like a doll's house it's a bit like having it starts with it starts with nothing and then you'll build the shape of it and then you'll start decorating the rooms and then you start you know and not necessarily in this order but then you have the dolls and then you move them

around and then some of them fall off the top of the doll's house and never come back and some of them stay there and some of them become smaller and more malevolent and some of them I mean it's just it's it's just that until I really feel like it's done I can't really write it down the moment I start working on paper everything tends to because I'm quite kind of pretentious and baroque in my like nature it tends to get a bit overwrought and a bit so I try as best as I can not to put it down until I feel like it's ready to just transcribe it. I mean, that's not always possible. And of course, when you're like in, you know,

when you're actually in prep and when you're shooting, you end up, you know, you end up reworking things, of course. But for the first draft, I really like to hold off really until the last minute. Just hold it in your head then. Yes. Do you? But that's over years. That's years and years though. really until the last minute. Just hold it in your head then. Yes. Do. But that's over years. That's years and years though. And it's not,

but it's just years and years of like, it's just years and years of thinking about it. The place that I go to feels completely real to me. And it has to feel, it has to feel completely real when then for me to write it down if it's just a kind of vague idea I feel very lost I know I know what you mean but I think it is remarkable to keep a whole world and characters and dialogue in your head without putting pen to paper but I think it's amazing I always think of like

the fights we never have with people the fights I've always wanted to have there are fights that you know how they go yeah pretty much now back to front the things you wish you'd said the what they might have said what did they what if they said this what if they said this and then there comes a point where it's the same you can almost put it to bed because you can've had it you've done it you know it and it's the same sort of thing it doesn't it's not necessarily verbatim every time but it but the sense of it is this is the way it goes this is always the way it goes now I know this is the way it goes it can't go any other way because I've tried every other way Emerald what's your perfect night please it is a party it is a 21st birthday party or an 18th

birthday party but now but are you 21 no I'm it's now it's all of my friends now because I really truly think everyone I know has just gotten like more beautiful and interesting and cool um that's not to say that like all of my friends who are younger aren't as cool it's just like I actually am really delighted by everyone I'm just delighted with everything now but what I mean is that it is a party where somebody will end up in a ditch somebody is going to lose a shoe somebody's going to like snog somebody's uncle like I don't mind if they're spin the bottle I don't mind if I'm crying having a kebab at the end like that kind of the kind of night that you can only really have when you're young because the

kind of stakes are relatively low where everyone gets absolutely off their face not me I'm sober but you know I'm absolutely like high on life and everyone's really putting their best foot forward in order to slip up colossally and then feel absolutely like die laughing just want to have like a mark like is it a marquee in a garden leaky marquee in a garden could be oh my god is it even a lock-in in a pub like any of these things like just something debauched and outrageous yes and I think one of the crucial elements for me is that like a good number of people you don't know because I think the thing about our age is that you end up it's it's you know you just because your life is already very full and lovely making new friends is something that is like such a treasure because it's very rare and going to a party where you

don't know lots of people is quite unusual still unless it's like a work event whatever it is so the idea of that thing when you're that age when you're like 18 and you go to like somebody's birthday party or house party the chances are you'll know 20% of the people which means 80% of people are all possibility but who are and who are they yeah and who are they they're funny they're sexy some of them are boring and dull and you give them the wide berth but some of them are like tantalizing and french and some of them have a ciggy that you can scab, you know, and all of that stuff. Like, it's just the stuff of like,

everyone could be your next best friend. Do you know what? It's possibility again, isn't it? It's the shop. It's the shop of the night. It's the shop of the night. I do really, I just love having a chat. I just love, there's everything.

Everyone is so surprised. It's why I love reality TV as well. People are so surprising and so wonderful and so remarkable and resilient and sometimes tawdry and creepy and cruel. And, you know, and I think the thing is, is that there's so much to talk about. There's so much to talk about. There's so much to

talk about with everyone. And you never know what you're gonna get. You never know. But the thing is, is that I hope that I hope that I'm, I think, although I am nosy, I hope I'm not kind of prurient. No, you just find people interesting. And now it's like I meet new people in an environment where people don't necessarily want to have a long chat because no one's got any time. And that's the nice thing about a party, isn't it? It's like that's actually all we've got to do, and especially when you're young.

Yeah. Before we go, do you have any evening, evening any nighttime rituals any sort of bedtime rituals or anything as I say it's two to five hours of of worrying it's what I will it's what I like to do it's my bedtime ritual I know I look I do um I do try and take my makeup off and I'm successful 50% of the time which I think is absolutely incredible. That's really, yeah. It is incredible. Very impressive. And so there's that.

And then I'll listen to a podcast to go to sleep. What podcast are you listening to? It's usually like an in our time, something like, yeah, something that is really interesting, but can we say maybe not so interesting? No, it's slow. Slow. Something quite slow and

informative yes and will you hopefully in a dream world nod off to um a slightly dry podcast you know in a dream world i'd be i'd have some kind of tranquilizer somebody would just get me with a dot and i'd go down. I've started taking now because I am a sucker for, I will believe anything anyone says on another podcast, which is the danger of the power of podcasts, isn't it? And somebody said, if you've got insomnia, then you've got a gene mutation and you have to take these three supplements, folic acid, which is fine. Yes. I'm writing it down look at me i'm not a doctor folic acid folic acid something called sam e it's sam dash e

i know okay and the other one is 5htp and i'm just taking party drugs? I'm taking all three of those bad boys. Is it working? It definitely hasn't kicked in yet, but I've only been taking them for a week. And the other thing that I've tried, as recommended by Romesh Ranganathan,

it's got a massive backlash. So if this stays in, I'm going to be in trouble for saying it because i told him that it didn't work but then i have been i've been trying it again is magnesium magnesium butter because magnesium is supposed to be quite good for sleep if you rub magnesium butter into your feet then it gets it absorbs into your body and then the magnesium is supposed to send you to sleep so i'm trying that as well i absolutely will not do that i will not do that i would rather never sleep again or we could all just stay up and listen to some podcasts keep the podcast community thriving how many of these podcasts are just being listened to by people with insomnia. Even this one now, it's very meta.

So let's imagine you are going to die. Oh my God. Your children are going to die. Everyone you love is going to die. Yes. It's not okay. Accept it. You are past your prime.

The worst is going to happen and may already have happened. You did say something offensive at that dinner party. That person does think you are a cunt. You are not as good in bed as you think you are. Do you know what? We should do a tape. We should do an insomnia tape for people with insomnia we could be their worst thoughts you know what though to be honest i think that that is actually

probably the better the best way of tackling it yeah maybe we do just need a podcast like the worst of the worst worst case scenario no because some of the stuff's really bad and i can't i actually know i can't oh god no actually you see and this is why i don't sleep no i've changed my mind actually i don't want to accept it anyway look it's been my perfect day as it always is talking to you emerald thank you so much for being here i love you very much i love you and um come come please come again please come please come again i don't know have a good goodbye have a good night tonight all night and i hope you listen back to this when you can't sleep. There we have it. That's the show. That made you feel terrified and sleepy? No? Well, good. Now's a good time to give us a like, subscribe

and review, please. And why not give us a follow on Instagram, Twitter and TikTok? We're at at Perfect Daycast. Why don't you let me know if you can see your pubes? No? OK then. We release a brand new episode every Thursday and we've got a whole host of fantastic guests lined up for your listening pleasure, including the hilarious Adam Buxton and Nick Muhammad. What more could a gal want?

Right, I'm off to buy some bath salts and a GoPro. That's all from me for now. From Yorkshire we love, I'm Jessica K buy some bath salts and a GoPro. That's all from me for now. From Yorkshire we love, I'm Jessica Knappett, wishing you a perfect day. Thank you. Thank you.