Spinning Plates with Sophie Ellis-Bextor - Episode 90: Hannah Chambers

Episode Date: March 13, 2023

Hannah Chambers has spent 25 years in the comedy management business looking after many famous comedians including Jimmy Carr, Sarah Millican, Joe Lycett and Aisling Bea. As she explains, she has given up her Monday to Friday fully for her job, and in fact it's not unusual for her to work 14 hour days, often spending evenings watching stand up shows or TV recordings that her clients are appearing in. She loves her job and says she's a bit like a Jewish mother to her clients: pushy, but wanting them to eat properly too! We met at The Garden Cinema near Holborn - which houses her offices but is also a newly-opened cinema, designed and built just before lockdown by her Dad.  We recorded our chat in Screen 1, with plush red velvet seats in front of us and a lovely heavy cinema curtain behind us.Hannah has been on my radar for a long time as my best friend Maria worked with her husband Jeremy, and I have always admired their decision for Hannah to carry on her more-than-full-time job when she became a mum, while Jeremy took on the role of primary carer.Hannah is always quick to tell people about this and is refreshingly unapologetic about it - as she is about everything!I loved Hannah’s sense of humour and her resilience - two things she wants to pass on to her daughters.She told me about a photo she keeps on her phone, of her doing a deal for Jimmy Carr, from her hospital bed, 30 minutes after her first daughter Rosie was born. That probably sums her up: incredibly hard-working but with a great self-deprecating sense of humour. Her daughters recently made her laugh, predicting her tombstone would read ‘Jimmy, I’ll call you back!’Spinning Plates is presented by Sophie Ellis-Bextor, produced by Claire Jones and post-production by Richard Jones Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Hello, I'm Sophia Lispector and welcome to Spinning Plates, the podcast where I speak to busy working women who also happen to be mothers about how they make it work. I'm a singer and I've released seven albums in between having my five sons aged 16 months to 16 years, so I spin a few plates myself. Being a mother can be the most amazing thing It can also be hard to find time for yourself and your own ambitions I want to be a bit nosy and see how other people balance everything. Welcome to spinning plates Good day to you. I speak to you from Sunday morning and Listen to how much clearer my voice is now that I've finished the tour typical but and listen to how much clearer my voice is now that I've finished the tour. Typical.

But I did get through it. So I'm speaking to you now. It's Sunday morning. What time is it? It's getting quite late, actually. It's nearly 10 o'clock. And I came home on Friday lunchtime after being away for, I think it was 11 nights in the end.

Quite long, but really very satisfying, because I've been touring for the first time in Europe like that for 20 years. And there are some countries I didn't go to on this run, but hopefully will go to next run. But there were some places that, yeah, I hadn't done a headline show for Yonks, like Germany. So we did Berlin and Cologne and Hamburg. We were in Paris.

We were in Brussels. Amsterdam. And Warsaw. In the background, you can hear Jesse. It sounds like he's talking at a gobbledygook. He is playing a guerrilla game online with lots of people. And he's very enthusiastic and he keeps trying to make friends. It's very sweet.

Mickey's chilling, having been the first one up. Ray's next door playing. And then my two teenage sons and my husband are all still in bed. How nice. But I'm pretty happy. I'm actually really happy. I'm glad to be home. It was time to be home.

I was missing home a lot. And I like being back in my own place. And the nice thing is I haven't got any work, which takes me away for a few weeks now. And then it's only for a night. So I'm really happy just to have a bit of time here just chilling at home again for a little while I'm in that mood where I really want to sort everything out I feel like this year I've already been very into my sorting out so I keep opening

drawers and cupboards and spaces that haven't opened for ages and just going through everything. It's very satisfying. I love it. How are you? I'm sorry about last weekend when I spoke to you and I was really croaky. That cold was nasty. But I did get through all the gigs, so that's good. But the thing about cold is it's just got to run its course. There's literally nothing you can do to get along. I was trying to rest my voice and I was doing lots of steaming

and drinking so many mugs of hot herbal tea, which really helps for the singing, but doesn't really get the cold on any faster. It's very boring. But the gigs themselves were really, I really enjoyed them despite all that. So that's great. And we've now found ourselves, this is the last podcast of the series, series nine. So I've actually got as my guest this week, someone I had in mind to speak to from the very moment that Spinning Plates came into the world, which is a friend of mine called Hannah. So Hannah Chambers, I know the reason we first met is because Hannah's husband, Jeremy, used to work at the stage paper,

the theatre industry paper, with my friend, Maria. So I first met, yeah, Jeremy through Maria and then his wife, Hannah. And I always really got on with her and she's a very impressive person because she has her own independent comedy management agency but it's really her attitude that always really impressed me and naturally you know what it's like when you speak to someone and you meet up with them every once in a while and you have the chat how are the kids how's the family and uh i was always really impressed with hannah's approach to to work and also to the fact that she was quite she always seemed very unapologetic about the fact

that jeremy does the child care when she's working and their dynamic seemed very seems and is i'm not saying behind behind the, no, there is no illusion. It just, I just really was always impressed with them because it seemed like they really had it sorted. But also I could see that Hannah has to work incredibly hard and hold her own. And I think she's got that drive where she wants to really prove herself. She's very, very driven. And I think it's people like her,'s women like her where when I'm feeling wobbly about the choices I've made and the work I do and how it impacts on my ability to parent I think of people like her and think look it's okay to do your own thing and to push

yourself and to be ambitious because there's lots and lots of ways to be a mum that doesn't have to mean you're around 24-7 because you know that is the sacrifice I've made really and I've always said to the kids the worst thing about my work is that it takes me away from them sometimes and you know I've struggled with that but I also know that I would wouldn't be the person I am and I wouldn't be able to be their mum in the way that I am if I didn't have my work so you know I think all these conversations the whole 90 90 conversations I've been having they all help me just contextualize and I don't know be a bit more forgiving of myself I suppose and my my wants and what's what matters to me and it's really always nice to speak to people who have different ways of doing things. And I suppose with Hannah and Jeremy,

Jeremy doing the childcare while Hannah works, obviously we have spoken to a few other working mums where that's the dynamic, but it is still more unusual. It's not the typical. And it certainly isn't the dynamic in my house. So I'd like to thank Hannah and Jeremy for being open and Jeremy for letting her chat about that dynamic too.

And it was a joy to talk to Hannah. She's very funny, and she looks after a lot of really impressive comedy acts from Flight of the Concorde to Ashley and Bea and Joe Lycett and Jimmy Carr. And it's worth mentioning as well that we talked a lot about a certain chocolate that she was eating I can't remember if we speak about at the beginning but basically Hannah from when she gets up through to about midday eats this 100% cocoa chocolate it is disgusting it's only chocolate by name like for me it takes all the fun out of chocolate but then I know I'm not much of a grown-up because I have like sugar in my coffee and that kind of

thing so yeah she says it's like rocket fuel and she eats like a packet of it by lunchtime and then she has to stop otherwise I'll keep her up at night I'm not surprised it's very intense what else do you need to know I think that's kind of it for now. It's, yeah, it was a lovely thing to talk to her and we spoke in a beautiful cinema that her dad has renovated in Holborn called, oh, what is it called? I know the answer to this. My head has gone blank because I keep thinking it's called the secret garden party cinema and obviously that is not it hang on a minute I'm actually gonna look it up for you because that's ridiculous cinema Holborn let's see what my little google can do for me the The garden cinema. There you go. This is not my finest moment in terms of my intros.

Googling a fact about a guest. Brilliant. It's Sunday. I'm tired. I just come back from tour. You're lucky I'm talking to you at all. I'm joking. I just know some musicians who need to decompress. Not I. I was up at 5.30 with my four-year-old yesterday. Hoopla. All right, see you on the other side. Bye. Oh, this is so nice. I'm so pleased to be here. Nice to see you, Hannah. How are you?

Yeah, I'm all right. Yeah, I'm all right now. Actually, do you know why I postponed our chat from, it was meant to be on Monday. It's because I had the most awful surgery go wrong with my mouth. Oh, no. And I couldn't speak. And so we had to move all these meetings to accommodate. I had a wisdom tooth out.

Yeah. Two weeks ago today. Yeah. Which was fine. Did it on a Friday. Thought I'm going to recover on the Saturday, Sunday, and then I'll be back at work on Monday. And I sort of planned the whole thing

to fit in with my schedule. I took the sedative. I had the Friday afternoon off. I thought, perfect timing. Turn my phone off for a few hours. Saturday, Sunday, lovely. Did all the right things. Monday, came into the office,

did my usual way too much caffeine, way too much stimulants, way too much walking around and shouting at people being busy uh got to 6 30 had a meeting and I started hemorrhaging seriously hemorrhaging and it was the most gore I won't don't want to go into too much detail because people might be eating but it was it was basically it's three hours of hell and I called the And effectively, he opened up his central London surgery at 10 p.m. on Monday night, spent an hour and a quarter stopping the bleeding. And then I had to effectively, for four days,

lie horizontal so that it didn't start again. And so I was doing all my meetings. When you finish recording, can you tell me a bit more about the gory aspect? I quite like hearing those stories. I will absolutely tell you about it, because it was like being in a horror film and I still have a bit of PTSD. I'm not surprised.

Anxiety dreams don't take it that far. And I saw him yesterday. I've seen him three times since. And he's been giving me his mobile number and his plans regularly so that I can call him. So my dentist and I have become very close. It's never happened to him in 30 years. So... Where were you when it started? What?

I was in this building. It was an evening meeting. That makes me feel a bit faint. Yeah, I'm really sorry. And then my husband was incredible. Like he was driving me at sort of breakneck speed into central London with it just pouring. No. Who knew there was an artery in your mouth? It's not a major artery, but there is an artery. Yeah, he basically sewn through the artery.

Oh, my gosh. Yeah, it was a big mess up. Anyway, so that was why I delayed it. And basically on the Monday I was meant to speak to you, we had all these meetings that we'd reschedule. And I was just about, I was like, I was a bit like that like that and I thought I can't speak to Sophie you're so eloquent I was like I can't speak to her so I said we have to move it well um thank you for delaying taking that all in um I'm so sorry what a what a horrible experience was it painful as well it was quite

painful weirdly the pain wasn't the issue for me it was the visuals and it was also the fact and you'll probably get to see this in the next hour I have such a tight schedule that if if I'm suddenly in a position where I can't function yeah in a kind of in a in a in a in a sort of very um efficient way for work or kids or, you know, my exercise, it's very, very stressful. And so in a way that was much more stressful than me having to deal with clients. And after a while, I stopped telling clients what was wrong. So they just thought I just sounded a bit weird.

And I just stopped telling them. And I was lying on my back doing the calls and doing the emails. Wow. Because you just get exhausted by telling people after a while, don't you, with these things. Yeah, and having the emails wow because you just get exhausted by telling people after a while don't you with these things having the same conversation you just think I'm just on repeat so but the pain wasn't so and I took loads of painkillers that was fine and as women we have a very high pain threshold yeah I'm just taking it all in there because I was thinking about your your schedule and you mentioned about being efficient and I do think of you as a very I can see you have that um in you that desire to be very on it and keeping on things so for people

that don't know why don't you tell us a little bit about what your working week looks like what do you when I know you look after comedians I look after comedians so I've done that all of my adult life um since I was since I graduated so I'm 47 on Monday and I started doing that 22 so gosh it's been 25 years um so I don't know how much information you want on that but effect yeah basically I've managed I've been managing comedians since I graduated and I've got a great team of eight people so I've got really good support but effectively I give up my Monday to Friday fully for that you know yeah from the moment I wake up I mean I have a pretty pretty strict sort of morning routine of exercise and breathing exercises and I get into the work into work between

nine and ten and I'm often there till any time up until midnight I suppose but often nine oh wow and then I get back or I go out to a gig or a tv record of course a lot of it's so nocturnal and quite nocturnal and pre-pandemic I would probably be out five nights a week maybe even six now I'm much much better I've had some health issues just nothing major but just things where stress can get ahead of me and I try and have three nights in a week maybe even four you know so I do try much harder to get the balance and I try and get home for nine so that I can see the kids yeah sit on the sofa watch something keep an eye on emails yeah and how old are your two girls now? So Rosie is 12.

Abby is 10. Lola, my dog, is my third child. Is almost three. And I say it with a smile, but I totally see her as my third child. Yes. And I love her so much. And I know I haven't said I love my children. I love my children too.

But I love my dog so much. And I know I haven't said I love my children. I love my children too, but I love my dog so much. I should tell you one thing about her before I forget. We got her in lockdown and she was picked up from Exeter by Jeremy, my husband, who sends his love. And he drove all the way to Exeter. He picked up this lovely eight-week-old puppy.

She's a Cavapoo. And he drove all the way back with her. He picked up this lovely eight-week-old puppy. She's a Cavapoo. And he drove all the way back with her weeing on the seat next to him. And he came back, and I was on the sofa later that evening with the dressing gown, and he put the dog on me, and she found my nipple. And basically, this puppy started breastfeeding. Wow. And it was the most incredible feeling of love and warmth and

oxytocin I would say I mean someone's gonna listen to this and go absolutely rubbish but I honestly felt this rush of oxytocin the hormones just releasing the hormones and obviously there was no milk fuzzy feeling but and then he tried to wrestle her off my nipple and eventually he got her off but he was laughing eventually he got her off. But he was laughing so much that it took him a good two minutes or so before she came off. But we have a bond, yeah. Are you still feeding her now? No.

I would if I could. That'd be another tie, wouldn't it, with your work and your day? That would be, yeah. I can schedule that in. Recovering from the wisdom tooth yeah dog lies across you um and I suppose there's a lot of we mentioned Jeremy so yeah you're I think one of the few people I've spoken to I actually know you outside of chatting to you which is really lovely and I have actually wanted to speak to you since I started the podcast I had

you in my head from the inception of this whole thing because you've always been someone that, firstly, wittingly or not, you've actually influenced me in my approach to my work because I remember us having conversations when we were getting to know one another. And I always loved, well, firstly, you've got that kind of real drive and clarity when it comes to your work and obviously very successful. And I always find it quite a lovely feeling to be around people

who are so sort of engaged with what they're up to and energised by it. But also when it came to speaking about your girls, so Jeremy, who I know through my best friend, who Jeremy and Marie used to work together, in your home he's the primary carer for your girls, which obviously shouldn't be a big deal, but it is definitely still a conversation. And I've always loved the fact that you were so unapologetic and proud about it together.

The two of you are such a complete team about all of it. And I wonder when, we'll get onto your working day a little bit more in a minute but when people are talking to you and they are and for your girls as well and they realize that's the dynamic is there what's the most sort of common response well it's funny how so like for example school events or school parties they will always text the mother initially less so now because I think our dynamic is much more known amongst our peer group but the number of times that the school or parents will just assume always assume that the mother is the one that holds the diary will hold all the decision making for the child and it's

not to say that I have no part in that of course I do and I don't want to completely remove myself from that certainly I I you know we certainly discuss things about the kids in the evening or maybe during the day but more in the evening or weekend but it was the assumptions that Jeremy wasn't involved that he's had to fight against and I think when the kids were younger he would so for example um know, I went back to work after a few weeks after both births. And Jeremy was there doing all the sort of normal things you'd get mothers doing and all this sort of the singing groups and, you know, all the, I'm trying to think what they, rhyme times and various different classes. And he'd be the only man there often. the classes and he'd be the only man there often and there's a lovely thing that mothers do when they're kind of going to these groups that they will sort of go off for coffees afterwards and I don't think he was particularly asked and I don't think he was necessarily particularly involved and

I think that's very hard for him because mentally he's still going through those massive changes from not having kids to having kids I hope he doesn't mind me saying but I think he had and I think he was quite saying, but I think he had, and I think he was quite open about this. I think he had postnatal depression. I had a different version of the trauma of it. My trauma sort of took a different shape, but he had that whole sort of trauma

that new mums have, but no one thinks that a man's going to have it. And he's getting used to the fact that he's given up his job and he's having to structure a day with a newborn that isn't really party to that structure. And he is someone that finds that quite difficult. And he's also trying to help me get back into my work routine, because he knows that if I don't sleep, I can't work. And that is what the whole family's reliant on, is me working. So it was all very, very difficult. And it's not helped by the fact that people just don't give men that respect and support. What he found was a lot of people going, oh, we're so jealous of you, we'd love to do that. But I don't think that's necessarily the most genuine response I don't think a lot of men would like to do it I think a lot of men think they

would but I think it's tougher than you think and I think that what Jeremy found was it took him by surprise how tough it was to to to be in these sort of new baby groups with all these mothers yeah yeah it's isolating enough when you're a new parent. And when the kids got a little bit older, he would want him to do playdates. But then if the mother was maybe a little bit more old-fashioned, they would feel uncomfortable meeting Jeremy in the park with the kids. And so he found there was a little bit of prejudice there as well.

So it wasn't always easy. Yeah, that's a lot. And actually, funnily enough, what you're telling me reminds me of uh when we spoke to a while back called Rosa Bloom uh she has a like festival clothing really fantastic sequined um outfits and when she was right in the midst of setting her company when she had a baby so her partner was the primary carer and he got a postnatal depression that the doctors worked at was more similar to the classic maternal one than the it can be maternal or paternal but because

the primary carer's um neurology shifts whoever is the main carer will have these neurological shifts and he was his was the same as what you commonly see in mothers. So interesting. Well, I'm really pleased you said that because I witnessed it, but I didn't know any of the scientific backgrounds. And that's really interesting. It is interesting.

It's really interesting. All this stuff is, I think some of it is relatively new things. I think for a long time, what was happening with people after childbirth and with the early years and stuff was probably just a bit like left as a sort of new science, you know.

So, no, it's really interesting. And I feel for Jeremy with all that, actually. I can totally picture all of that happening and not being invited to the... And also your loss of identity if it's not working anymore and suddenly... Well, this is it because he had like a 20-year career writing, and then he started developing TV shows. And to be fair, he carried on doing bits and pieces, part-time and freelance and stuff.

So he sort of kept up his creativity. But I think he also, I think men more than women like to sort of compare their jobs. And actually, you know, and this is one of the reasons I love Jeremy so much is that he's not he's not a big alpha male like he don't he doesn't need to walk into a dinner party and sit there and go hey I I'm earning six figures doing this he doesn't care he doesn't care about money he doesn't really care about status he doesn't care about what someone does he's very

much do I like you as a person but but and this is a massive generalization but a lot of men that he would meet in some of our circles I think found it quite hard to get their head around the fact that he didn't really care about jobs and status and all that so that was a really good thing and I was really pleased because I think some men would have struggled on that front yeah that their that their wife was the breadwinner and their wife was the one that when you know when we book a holiday my surname being Chambers he would always be known as Mr Chambers and that's quite hard for some men as well we're like wait where's my identity gone yeah but I was very aware and the kids have got his surname actually even though we I haven't taken his yeah so you know you've got

to think about someone's ego and you've got to think about how they feel in that new dynamic because you're focused on the children, but if you completely ignore the new roles as parents, I think you're really missing something that could fester in the relationship. And suddenly you get to sort of, you know, five, ten years later and suddenly your relationship is a bit fragile. Absolutely. Well, that's the ongoing, you know, dynamic between any time two people are raising a child and yeah working all those things out because

children take a lot of work there's a lot of admin there's the practicality of the bedtimes in the morning getting them it's it's full on it's so full I mean you're the best I mean just you know and I know you're interviewing me but I mean Sophie I just don't know how you cope with five children it It's unbelievable. And I've been listening to your podcast, You Got Me Through Lockdown, because I would go out for a walk or a run to try and get away from the solitary existence in my home study.

And I'd go out and I'd listen to your podcast. And it'd fill me with joy. And I'd think, how does Sophie do it? How does she stay so happy? And also, you know what? You've given complete focus to your career when you're doing it. You give focus and then you give focus to your kids

when it's time for them. And I think you get that balance so incredibly brilliantly. And, you know, I don't want to blow smoke up your ass, but I have such respect for you. Well, thank you. There's probably some dots joined there as well because there are definitely bits where the wheels fall off and it's all chaos and yeah um and like anyone where you're trying to do both things you get to the end of some weeks and think

that was that felt pretty good and other weeks you think oh maybe a bit too much work or other weeks a bit too much time where I you know yeah I was not really focused enough on what I was doing so it's about that getting that thing and I think if you work in creative and if you're your own boss it's quite tricky because you're basically weighing up those decisions all the time yes um but I think uh I think conversations like this are really important because it's basically the conversation I have 90% of the time when I meet someone else who's also a parent it's like just it turns to that because it takes up so much of your headspace but and I'd love to be a fly on the wall with most people I know you know you want to see how do they how do they transition from work to parent that's what I'm so interested in because those two sides to your personality

how's that happening yes and it's like last night I had that thing where um my kids weren't going to sleep I've got three in one room so they were keeping normally it works quite well when the the primary school to fall asleep by the time the teenager goes in but last night that doesn't the case and so I was I was also trying to do um an edit of some pictures for um some new album artwork so I had to get it down from 300 photos to 12 oh gosh I didn't quite manage actually it was really anyway so I went up at about 11 when they were still chatting and I was like, you have to stop talking. You know, I was being all strict.

And then I came out and shut the door and felt a bit sad because it's like, you want to be nice, you know, reasonable, but then sometimes you've just got to put on that hat where you're just being really, like, strict. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Well, and me, anyway, just being a bit hardcore. I get told, can you not be fun, mum? And I'm like, nope. I've had a long day in the office my clients have had fun mum oh well that's the thing I was thinking about that so can I what led you to want to look after comedians so so I

was um I don't know how long a version to give you on this so I I I was always going down a very sort of maths and science route at school and university. I did all my sort of maths, double maths, physics, chemistry, A-levels, and I did a science degree at Cambridge. So I was very much going down to once. I did natural sciences, which is a course that covers sort of several sciences, and I specialised eventually in experimental psychology.

But I was always going down a sort of science route because that's where my brain was going down a sort of science route because that's where my brain was naturally best at sort of coping but but from an age from age 16 I was absolutely obsessed by stand-up comedy I was obsessed by um watching it on VHS and I'd go to gigs and then come 18 I had a gap year and I was um waitressing at a comedy club, and I just loved it. And I would collect the numbers of all the comedians that I would be chatting to in all the intervals. So I basically got a notebook full of, you know, whatever, 50-odd comedians. You're 16?

I'm 18. 18. I was a waitress. This is my year off. How are you managing to get phone numbers from all the comedians? I'd be chatting to them and saying, I'm going to go to university and I want to book you for my university. Amazing. Yeah. So I was sort of collecting, you know.

This was before you were even at uni, so you just imagined. Well, I had a place at Cambridge, so I knew I was going. So I was like, I want to book comedians when I'm there. Fantastic. So I was thinking about it. So I collected some numbers. Anyway, went there for three years and I did a science degree. I got through it, but I can't say I was particularly good um but I got involved initially with sort

of producing things with footlights and then I started booking these comedy nights and these balls and I started bringing up these London based comedians and I effectively sort of set the business up in my room my my dad checked the contract. He was a lawyer. I got headed notepaper. I don't think a lot of them realised that I was only 19, 20 years old. I think that there was probably, I never pretended, but I think they probably thought I was quite a few years older. And so when I graduated, it was a natural thing for me to go and set up as an agent and the club that I was working as a waitress for gave me a fantastic opportunity and they said come in as a partner you set up the agency you've got a training ground in the basement which is effectively the comedy club

and I signed within about a week I signed a comedian called Daniel Kitson which I'm sure Claire yeah I know that name um and we worked together for we went on to work together for nine years and then six months later give or take a few months six months I signed Jimmy Carr so I was only 22 when I signed Jimmy wow I didn't realize your relationship goes back that far it goes back to 1999 that's amazing yeah so and and I think we recognizing each other a work ethic and I think what Cambridge had given me was this incredible focus of if you want something to be done you've got to do it so much better than anyone else you basically got to just work incredibly hard.

I was very focused and wanted to try and make my mark. And it was seven days a week I'd be out at gigs and I would, I never took any weekends off. I would do that for probably six years. I just worked seven days a week, every minute of the day until I met Jeremy. And then I started to take weekends off. And that was a slight sort of change at that point.

But then after six years at this comedy club, we split. And then I set up on my own in 2004, Chambers Management. And the clients came with me. So, yeah, quite a few of them have been with me since you know sort of turn of the century that's it well that's insane because I would imagine as well anytime you've got art and commerce they're quite uneasy bedfellows and in comedy you might get someone who's amazing making putting a room in the palm of their hand and making them laugh but their business acumen or their ambition might be a little bit less focused yeah and they're probably

quite vulnerable in that regard actually like musicians too yeah so having that symbiosis of someone that has the vision and sort of says you've got this talent how how important is it to you what they see for themselves or is it about you so you is it sometimes like you have this idea of their potential and you're helping them I feel like I need to marry my ambition with their ambition otherwise it won't work and I've not had 100 success rate and that because sometimes I push too hard and the client just wants an easier life I have I don't have that many clients you know I've only got about 14 clients and there's nine of us looking after them so it's the ratio is pretty high but the expectation on us on the expectation on the talent to do their part of it you know to be working hard and it's it's a pressure you know I can't get away from the fact there is that

pressure but there's also pressure on us to work equally hard and we have that yeah relationship whereby we agree that we're all going to work as hard as possible and occasionally it doesn't work out and you have to part ways and that's fine that's life you know sometimes you just sort of as with any relationship you go off in different directions but the the what the relationships that work best are the ones where we have that understanding and I really and I really really enjoy it like I can't say I enjoy every moment of it but then no one enjoys every moment of their job but I really find um the journey of taking someone from unknown to that sort of first level of being known yeah is that turning point

it's so exhilarating when you start to kind of when you start to sort of um you'll go to a non-industry party for example and people will say who their favorite comedians are and they'll mention someone who's just turned the corner and inside you're going yes they've got into the consciousness of people that aren't in the industry yeah and that's really exciting um so i get a real buzz from it still and I guess you do have to manage to get that person that feels the same about that ambitious thing because all these things you know it's not like every day you're up and ready to push the rock again that then there's a momentum on both sides so on yeah they're sometimes phoning you with I've had

this idea I want to do this or how do I get onto that festival or whatever exactly exactly it's often things like I want to get onto that tv show how do we do it that's often or how do I get onto that festival or whatever it might be. Exactly, exactly. It's often things like, I want to get onto that TV show, how do we do it? That's often, or how do I get my own TV show? What's that journey going to be? And so we then carve that career path, which obviously changes because you can never completely plan a pathway, but you try together to stick to the sort of one-year, two-year, five-year plan. And that's exciting because you really do share the excitement

when they get to that next stage. And just for sake of name-dropping, who are some of the people that people would know? So we mentioned Jimmy Carr, Sarah Millican. So Sarah's been with me, I think, 16 years, give or take a year or two. So Jimmy and Sarah are both in Australia right now. And I'm flying out in a week and a half, two weeks to see them both in Sydney and Melbourne. And Joe Lycett.

So that was exciting. Joe and I have been working together, I think, 12 years. And he was someone that was, you know, completely unknown when when we started working together and we have had so much fun recently we've filmed a show that uh we're currently selling on his website but it's something I'm so proud of and uh it's called more more more how do you like it and it's it's it's there's always puns and then we're I love a pun too yeah I love a pun um and then we're about to launch a sort of a big um a big live channel four show which i think will be announced by the time this goes out i think it would have been announced so i don't think i'm saying anything inaccurate but it's a kind of lgbt uh lgbt tfi friday live show oh cool it's gonna be really exciting in Birmingham. Amazing. So those three. Aisling Bea.

Oh, wow. Cool. Who is just an incredible actress and writer and hopefully tour or tour soon. So those are probably the names that you would know most. And then there's Flight of the Conchords that you and I have talked about before, who I've been working with now for 20 years. So since 2003, they don't come over very often, but when they do, that's really exciting.

And they do so well. Gosh, what a lovely roster. So many, and I love the fact that so many long-term relationships, which always speaks volumes. I mean, cause I think in entertainment, you can sort of multiply everything by seven for like, you know, loyalty factor. And I was thinking on the way here, I was trying to work out my mind who would be more needy to manage, musicians or comedians?

It's a good question. It's a good question. And we're probably going down a very, very dangerous hole here. You don't have to name any names. I just think, I mean, you know. I tell you one thing I was thinking on the way here, I was thinking, because I have quite a loose tongue, and I said this morning to my,

I sort of saw my kids and husband for about, I don't know, 10 minutes, and I said, what do I need to be most careful of not to say to Sophie? And they said, well, you're absolutely conditioned not to say stuff about your clients. Like I have, I've never messed up on that front, but I mess up all the time. I say things completely inappropriately about the kids. So they said, the kids sort of listed all the things

not to say about them. But I'm good. I've sort of trained my brain with the clients because you kind of have to. You're given so much confidential information. And so, yes, there's probably pillow talk with me and Jeremy about things that have upset me, but it would never go beyond the bedroom.

Because as soon as your clients think they can't trust you, you're finished. And you with your agent as well. You would have to know that you could say something that was so personal and it would go no further. Oh, yeah, no, definitely not. They're like a therapist in some ways. But I do think that both sets, musicians and comedians,

I know from my manager, it's very important that I feel like I'm the most important thing to him. Yeah, yeah. So when you've got 14 people who need to feel like that, how do you balance that? It's not always easy. And most of the time it's fine because certain clients

need need need that nurture and time at different times so I can balance it and it's you generally shouldn't talk about other clients yeah that's a I would say that's a very good rule it's a very very good rule occasionally we mess up because sometimes you have to but it's not it's not great no I don't like that either Derek if, if you're listening, I really don't like it. Yeah, it's the golden rule. Don't compare clients. It's only about me, please. It's all about the person you're speaking to.

Absolutely. I don't want to know how well someone else is doing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I don't care. No, occasionally I go, listen, they're doing really badly. That's okay. That's okay. If you say like, don't worry,

their tour didn't sell either. Totally fine. Then you're like, oh, that, their tour didn't sell either. Totally fine. Then you're like, oh, that's fine then. Yeah, exactly. But if it's, that's so strange. It worked so well with so-and-so. You're like, if you listen to what you've just said. Can I just repeat that back?

Should we just repeat that back? And you should then say, you know, the other agent's doing even better. Yeah, do right. Throw it back at them. So yeah, it is sometimes difficult and I suppose what's sometimes hard is when on the same night there's you know there's two shows that are equally important and I've obviously got a good team and thank god I do so we can sort of share things out but there is always that thing of there's always that worry that I have which is does that client think because

I'm not there that I don't care and And sometimes logistically, you just can't be everywhere, you know, and it is, I, I suppose I have this inner perfectionism, whereby I do regularly worry that me not being there sends the message that I don't care. And I, yeah, I go to bed sometimes going, Oh, no, I do really care. But you just can't you just there's a limit to how much you can do absolutely and I think there's lots of ways to be there without having to physically be there even a little message remembering whether what they're up to but then when what happens so obviously it's these long long-term relationships that have really you know well nurtured and maintained but then when the babies came along how obviously you said you know

it was quite an obvious thing that you would maintain your work and it was really important to the family but what about for you how easy was it for you to sort of structure that in your head I I found it really hard I found it really hard I wanted to control everything I so initially when I got pregnant um the day I found out that I got pregnant was the day we moved into this building. It was a very, very memorable, it was March 2010. And it took me a while to get my head around the fact that I was expecting a child because it wasn't something that I'd planned. I think that Jeremy was probably the one that was pushing it more than me, if I'm honest. I wasn't,

I hadn't, I wasn't one of those girls that had sort of grown up going, I want, you know, I want loads of children. It took me a while. So I tried to plan it and I tried to plan it in terms of initially getting a private midwife. So the private midwife could then see me out of hours at home and that worked that worked quite well um I then had physical difficulties with I have physical difficulties with both pregnancies so and I've listened to quite a lot of your podcasts it's amazing how many have um sickness how many people you've you've spoken to have I had zero sickness. I had the thing where you can't walk, where your pelvis opens. Yeah. So I was strapped up.

Very painful. It's incredibly, to the point, I mean, I was on crutches. I could just about get in and out of the car and drive to the office. But going up and down stairs, it was just awful. And that was the first pregnancy. The second one was I was hospitalized because the baby at nine weeks was sitting on my urethra and I couldn't pee. So I had to be catheterized for a few weeks.

Wow, I've never even heard of that one. No, you just literally can't pee. It's the weirdest thing. So I had these two sort of physical things going on. So the first pregnancy, I got this private midwife. And she, after a few months, I think she could see that I wasn't really coming to terms with having a baby. She could see psychologically I was still running my life at the same speed. I was still very stressed.

There's a lot of stress hormones that were going through me. And she tried quite hard, I think, to slightly sort of calm me down. My mother as well. My mother's a child psychiatrist, which comes with its own as a whole other podcast, being the daughter of a child psychiatrist, where she means very well, but the comments, because they're coming from incredibly good

scientific backing have quite a sharp meaning you know like when she says things you kind of go you're not just saying that as a mother with an opinion you're saying that someone that's been properly sort of trained up and so I feel even worse yes I can imagine that yeah so so I um I as we got closer and closer to the date, I was really struggling mentally with it. And then I thought, right, I'm going to try and have a home birth. And we set up the pool. And then I think, was it 24 hours beforehand?

It was very clear that it wasn't going to happen. And so within about 24 hours, Bupa triggered a caesarean at the Portlands and it kind of went from one extreme to the other. And I remember just waking, coming round from, not coming round, I was awake, but coming out of the operating theatre, having had my first baby.

And there's a photo of me on my phone that sums it up really. I was doing a deal and I was doing a deal for Jimmy within, I don't know, it was probably about within 30 minutes and you've got this photo of me and I have saved it because I'm trying to laugh at it now,

but there's a photo of newborn six and a half pound Rosie sitting in my legs and me just doing this, just completely ignoring her and I'm mortified. I'm mortified, but also I can laugh about it now because it just summed up the way I just wasn't accepting that things had changed and then the hormones

change don't they after sort of two three four days you must know this how you know you I don't know whether you still the baby blues and all that baby blues and I was in tears and tears and tears and I was like what have I done to my life? I was so upset. It took me, yeah, it took me a while. And then I had to do the whole juggling of trying to get myself fit from the cesarean, try and breastfeed. I wasn't producing enough milk because the, you know, I wasn't, I was stressed as well. I wasn't producing enough.

And that was a big factor in all that. I've had that happen too. Yeah, it was hard. One of my clients at the time, as a present to me, sent me the best breastfeeding expert, Claire Byam Shaw. So she came around to our house on the first day I arrived home to help me breastfeed. So I had all this fantastic help and care. And I also had a night nurse as well after a week. So I did get a lot of support, but I still found it really difficult. Like the shock of going from in control to not was immense. And where's this pressure coming from? Have you always been like that with yourself?

I think I've always been quite a perfectionist. I think my dad, if I'm honest. My mum's never been pressurising. In fact, she's always been, take it easy, calm, look after yourself, look after your children, come home earlier. She's been like that. My dad is one of those, you know,

you get 97% on a test and he says, where's the other 3%? He's incredibly successful. And I think whether he means it or doesn't mean it he absolutely projects this you've got to succeed mentality around the family and that was that was the atmosphere when I was growing up at the dinner table it was all about success it's also quite an addictive thing in your brain I think when you're high if you're a high achiever yeah I say this with not much experience of it myself

but I can see it in people where it's almost a similar thing to being like a thrill seeker or something if you want to keep hitting these targets and probably you get buzz you do and probably this idea that

I've given birth but here I am sealing a deal somewhere and you made complete sense like look at me check me out I haven't lost that side of me I'm just doing this as well yeah and there's no judgment here as well because I think there's no rules about any of this stuff and it's sometimes you know things take a little while to percolate and find their space and it's tricky if you're the one that gives birth because from

the moment you find that you're pregnant things are supposed to change overnight you know and you can see with your when I got pregnant with sonny i could see him richard him he could take months longer if he needed to to accept that there was this new person coming and all the responses or responsibilities that come with it but for me it's like right don't drinking stop that i know that relaxes you and it might feel nice to your friends but that's that's how um you know watch how much you're sleeping watch what you're eating please you can't have that anymore all these things you're like why have i got to just do this overnight and it's immediate the responsibility and also the guilt when you if you even feel like you you know have desires get outside you're not supposed to

feel any of that stuff anymore it's you're so right about that and in fact with my second with abby i feel incredibly guilty she suffers quite badly from asthma and eczema. And I feel that when I was eight and a half months pregnant, we were, I was in the witness stand in the high court because my client at the time, Frankie Boyle, and I were suing the mirror and we won. But I was, I was, I was, I was doing that. And I was there and I was eight and a half months pregnant. And the stress of going to court when you're that pregnant,

I could see the jury were kind of thinking this woman could give birth at any moment. You know, I was ready to pop. And I think that those stress hormones aren't good and I feel incredibly guilty about it. I don't regret it because I made the decision at the time, but I do feel guilty and I think um I think guilt's a wasted bit of energy to have just it's a really annoying emotion isn't it it's a really annoying emotion

to have and I really wish I don't have it I didn't have it but every time I see my daughter with her inhaler and her eczema cream I just think yeah I probably didn't help things there's I'm like look I don't I'm medical backing but I'm pretty sure being a witness in court doesn't lead to your child having eczema but I can totally understand that and in fact um I was talking to a sort of friend of the family who's like family about one of the kids and something they were a few things they're dealing with and she literally I mean I don't take it too much time but she literally went what did you do wrong I know where she's coming from with that, but I don't really want to go down that line because I don't think that's very helpful.

And as a general rule, actually, I'm one of the first people to say to a fellow mother, don't feel guilty. Because I'm totally against that whole sort of, oh, I feel guilty about this and that. But I think I'd be disingenuous not to say that there isn't some guilt there because I did put my work first but I did it I did it knowing that there was a good support for the kids you know I wouldn't have done that if I wouldn't have I wouldn't have said

I would do that I wouldn't I wouldn't have had the lifestyle I had if it was a nanny bringing up the kids. I mean, we have had help, but Jeremy's brought up the kids. So I did it with the thought, well, actually, no, overall as a package, we're doing the right thing. And there's a safety in that as well. There's a safety, yeah. Because he's the other half of what you're all about as a family. Yeah. And your morals and all the things that matter to you,

so that you're on the same page. Yeah, we're a unit i think sometimes with um working hard when the kids are little and being away a lot like that you must have to play quite a long game with it in your head to get to the point where they're old enough like hopefully your your daughter's probably at that age now where you can say yes i'm not always there but look what hopefully your work ethic is something that they come to think of as a real superpower that you have that's very kind and I really do hope that's true and I hope I'm an inspiration to them because I do want I do want them to see that that I love them very much

and have so much respect for them and when I do have time for them at the weekend they will get my attention yeah and we do try and do things that you know at the weekend and you know there's I'm taking my 12 year old off to New York for four days next month first time to America for her and I'm really excited about that because we don't spend any time together particularly weekends because she does football um with Jeremy so I see my 10 year old at the weekend but I don't see my 12 year old so I said right we have to spend some time together but I do hope that those big gaps where they don't see me during the week or you know or some weekends that they recognize a that I'm doing what I do partly for me obviously but also for the family unit and for them but also

yeah I hope they I hope they are inspired and I keep saying to them if you if you find something that you enjoy you won't feel like you're working if you if you really find that um the thing that gets you into that frame of mind where you forget the time and you just get into the flow and some days I don't feel like I've worked even though I've done a a fantastic sort of 14 hour day I don't feel like I've worked because I've got into that groove and that flow and I said to the kids don't be going to a job if you can where you're checking the hours as they as they count down I said that might happen but aim aim big aim high and work hard and I do try and get that through to them I don't know whether I have though I mean I don't want to say too much but I I do sometimes think that it's work I don't know I don't know how you I don't know how you present a work ethic to your children I think they've either got it or not

I don't know I think you're right actually and it's um there's also feel, sometimes a bit of a pressure on kids when they see that you found your thing that makes you happy and makes you feel like you're not working when you're working quite young. And, you know, what if you get to 16, 17 and you're not feeling like you've got that thing growing? It doesn't happen for everybody. I used to think that being someone that was creative was a great thing because you can say hey look kids you can do it your own way look at what your dad and I did but actually they're thinking well what if I don't find that thing so that I mean that is hard that is in your in your situation I mean your your your situation isn't so different to to ours and that you know we're not doing conventional jobs and you and Richard aren't doing conventional jobs so there's none of this sort of obvious career path it's no it's and I

don't know what your kids are into because Sonny's now 18 yeah um so he's at that age but yeah it's it is interesting and you've got to let them follow that path of theirs yes and um I think as well because Richard and I haven't worked, we didn't have the same thing with the home being one of us being there. Yeah. So there's been a lot more of them saying, you've already been out three nights this week and that gets harder as well, I think. Well, it's quite tricky sometimes.

I mean, do you think because it was always the way it was that your girls and your family dynamic was kind of a lot more allowing of that? That like i'm out thursday friday saturday sunday and that's just how it is they're quite good they've always been quite good with that do you think no they so for example tonight both jeremy and i are out for um my oldest friend's birthday today i haven't said happy birthday to her shit i'll remind you remind me afterwards yeah it's fran's birthday shout out to fran and it's funny because she's so close to your birthday and probably every year

it creeps up yeah yeah yeah and we're going we're going out for dinner tonight to a place called Flight Club where it's dinner and darts which is oh wow

yeah I've never been to this place before so tonight hope you all get on yeah yeah exactly otherwise the darts will go in the wrong direction yeah

but Jeremy and I are both going out tonight and we don't go out that much but then it was his birthday on Tuesday this week so we both went out for dinner on Tuesday night um and the kids do sort of use the the the sort of guilt lines of you've already been out this week um I feel less guilty about that because I think sort of during the week, I don't feel it's my responsibility to stay in, if I'm honest with you. So I think it's harder for Jeremy. But for instance, last night, Jeremy was at a book club

and I was in the office and I was going to work later. But in fact, I came home for nine so that I could see the kids before they went to sleep. So we do have to sort, you you know we have to adapt around it when the kids sort of put that pressure and they'll call up and go when you home when you home when you home and I'm looking at my to-do list and thinking I don't know I don't know it's this is hard but it's that's the balance in the evening that's the that's always the tricky thing during the day when they're at school it sort of doesn't become relevant I know yeah it completely like lets the pressure off definitely yeah and

do you think there are a lot of traits in in your sort of mothering and your work thing that are quite similar like hats you have to wear so I it's probably for other people to comment more on this because they would I'm not I'm not sure how self-aware I am on all this I I think I'm a little bit of a sort of Jewish mum to my clients I quite harsh quite judgmental but want to make sure they've eaten you know so that would be probably my management style um I think with my kids I think I probably am a bit I think with my kids, I think I probably am a bit, I think I'm not particularly good at listening. I think I'm sort of running at such fast speed in my brain that I need to slow down and listen to them. I think where I bring my management style into managing my kids, managing my kids, looking after my parenting, my kids, is the way to get through to me is to make me laugh

and so the kids often will say I've got a great joke for you or I said this at school it's really funny um I've actually got a running list on my phone of funny things the kids have said because I look at it you know every now and again I go oh my god they're so funny and they do come out with some brilliant funny things one of them said to me she said she said mum when you're buried on your on your tombstone it's going to say Jimmy I'll call you back which I thought was brilliant it's brilliant it was very funny um so they are they're very aware they're very aware of me and they I think they quite like it in the sense they tell their teachers they say oh my mum manages comedians do you like comedy and then occasionally I'll give my I'll give their teachers

tickets to comedy gigs as a way of sort of you know buttering them up a little bit so I I think the kids quite like that um and they do when we do spend time together I think they appreciate that it's it's not that often and so we sort you know, we treasure it if we do a night away every now and again. But yeah, I find it easier managing comedians than I find looking after children. I find it quite difficult to understand what a child's needs are.

I don't, it just doesn't come naturally to me. I think that's really honest of you. I also think that it's also not a catch-all thing. I think some ages are easier for me than others. That's interesting. Yeah, because there's different bits. And I remember that when they're the sort of toddler bit, I don't find that as engaging as when they get that bit older.

Whereas for some people, when they're like the little pudgy bit, that's their favourite bit. I've known people, when I've heard, obviously a few, and people say, oh, you must love babies. And I'm like, well, I like that stage, but it's not like I have to start, like, keep having another one to renew. You know, I do understand they're going to grow.

And it's also interesting what you say about the jokes and the humour because I think every family's almost got a sort of currency of what... And was humour something that was in your childhood as well? Yeah, it was. And so I'm the youngest of three children and my two older brothers are, well, my oldest brother is sort of in the industry. My middle brother is an artist.

But at the table, it was a very sort of political and intellectual conversation at the dinner table. And the only way for me to get heard was I'd wait for like a little gap in the conversation and then I'd make the most inappropriate pun and that was the only way I communicated I had no interest in anything to do with the news or uh or any of this sort of communist conversation that was going on my parents were both sort of you know members of the communist party it was a very sort of socialist family that was very was very sort of

politically minded we never talked about feelings and it was so serious I felt that I just had to come in with inappropriate and occasionally my dad won't like me saying this but if it was a bad joke he would just say one thing he'd say Hannah hand and he'd give me a pretend slap on my hand for the bad joke and I found this so funny that I just carried on doing it all through my childhood. And he's fully supported me, you know, making comedy my career. He said to me, don't go and do a conventional job.

He was the one that said, make comedy your business. That's amazing. He saw it in you. But why did you not want to do stand-up then if you were making these jokes? I wasn't funny. Like anyone will say,

like the number of times I try and be funny and you could just see my clients going, no, no, stop. Like you're not funny. I didn't think about that. Yeah, you've got to, when you make a joke to a comedian, they just go, hmm.

You're not funny. You're not funny. I think I'm one of those people. I'm a massive exhibitionist. So with my friends, I will be the one after a few Proseccos. You you know I'll be the one that's saying the outrageous thing I'll say the inappropriate thing but I have no desire to put myself out there as a performer or as a or as a comedian in any way because I I don't enjoy that pressure I enjoy I enjoy it when it's

you know I'm the person down the pub wanting to make someone laugh and I enjoy working with creatives and I think I knew quite early on that I wanted to be the business side but but also it's an it's in an industry where I can make a joke and no one's going to frown because it's like this is just you know it's just fine you can say what you want it's not we're, we're not in the medical profession where that comment's going to, you know, be inappropriate. Comedy, you can get away with a lot. Absolutely.

And I love that. I mean, comedy's brilliant for that. And I think there's a little, I've got a little tile at home and it says something on it like, beware of artists for they can slip through all different levels of society. And I think comedy's got that, hasn't it? Where if someone can come in and make a room laugh, then they actually can kind of be canny

and actually go anywhere, actually. It's kind of a bit of a key that fits a lot of locks. And a couple of my comedians are using comedy right now in other ways. Absolutely. So one of them is called Pippa Evans. She's using improv to help you in a sort of, in a self-help way to improve your life.

And I've got another client of mine called Stuart Goldsmith who's using comedy. He used it all through lockdown with companies in something called Resilience Presentation where he would talk to CEOs of companies about how you can use comedy to talk and improve your skills with your team. And I think using comedy to enrich people's lives outside of the industry,

I think is really important. And in fact, one of the things we do at home, this is reminding me, we've got a lot of Alexas in the house. We use them all the time. And I'm obsessed by the roasting format, you know, when you roast each other. Oh, yeah? Yeah. What, on Alexa?

You can say to Alexa, no, sorry, I'm obsessed by the roasting format on TV, in stand-up. I was going to say, is there a function on Alexa? Yes, there is. Oh. So on Alexa, you can say to Alexa, roast me, and she will roast you.

She'll say, you know, it's not particularly rude, but it's rude enough for children. Well, she'd be criticising the things I've bought on Amazon. Yeah, yeah, yeah. She goes, Sophie, why did you, yeah, yeah, yeah. Why did you spend that on that? But she, so my kids will say, Alexa, roast me. And they just love being insulted by her.

But what was so clear to me was this favourite format of mine on TV was giving these kids of mine this resilience and they said if a bully says this and this to me i'm gonna say this and they had these these very very funny lines that were age appropriate obviously as they get older they become a little bit ruder and i was so delighted because i think for your kids to be sort of going out into into the sort of slightly harsh school playgrounds and you think, no, they're going to be okay. They could have someone be rude about what they're wearing or what they look like, but they'll have a comment to come back with. I thought that was something that I could give them in my world. I could give them that bit of armour.

It's a huge bit of armour, actually. That, I think, the ability to deflect, but also it's clever. If you can make people laugh or if you can disarm that weight, it's smart. I know that when your kids are little and they make a joke or something,

for me that's a sign of independent thought and wit. So I'm always kind of rooting for them with all that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. I was thinking back as well. I think you were hard on yourself when you said you're not a good listener because I think anyone that says something like that about themselves, generally that's actually something you're not a good listener because I think anyone that says something like that about themselves,

generally that's actually something they're not as bad about as they think. It's the people who think they're great at stuff that tend to be making the mistake. That's really sweet. I think what happens in truth is that I have such a mental load every day that if someone is telling me something that takes, I don't know, 10 minutes and I know what the point is, I completely switch off and think about my list of things I have to do so I don't think I'm a particularly good listener for the mundane things in life I think if someone needs to talk to me about something that's actually deep and emotional and means something to them

then yes I will do yeah but I can I'm a terrible person for going I think I know what you're going to say and no is the answer but I really identify with that actually going, I think I know what you're going to say, and no, is the answer. But I really identify with that, actually. Do you? I do it with kids, I do it with my staff, I do it with my clients. I'm like, I haven't got time for this sentence. I really haven't. I know where we're going with it. It's the equivalent of someone who's got a stutter

and you're finishing their sentence. It's so rude, so inappropriate, and shouldn't be done. And I hate myself for doing it. I mean, I call my mum, you know, every other day and I know exactly the conversation. I could give it, I could write it down in transcript. And I'm sitting there and I go, deep breath, breathe through it, breathe through it. It's fine.

Luckily, she doesn't know how to listen to podcasts, so we're okay. I've sent her so many, she doesn't know how to listen to podcasts so we're okay I've sent her so many she doesn't know how to use her phone it's true that thing well kids are right reading ground for conversations where you're like yes yes and on the way to school like get synopsis of film and then halfway through I'll say something try and chip in and I realize I haven't been paying any attention to what's going on or who it was in the playground that said what and it's so important to them and I'm just like oh and you're telling yourself listen listen listen but all you're thinking is I've got to be so and so and I haven't done x and I have to do it halfway through oh sorry I've just got an email I forgot to send oh it's so bad it's a terrible thing that but hopefully they kind

of understand that there's well if you're like that all the time then it's kind terrible thing that but hopefully they kind of understand that there's well if you're like that all the time then it's kind of how you are yeah I mean I I'm not always like it but I I I apologize because my kids will listen to this at some point I'm so sorry I love you I love listening about I love listening to you I just it's my problem not yours yeah don't worry I think everybody experiences that a little bit as well because there's a lot of things where you you are supposed to be kind of multitasking up here so it is it's a lot to do and you've got a lot of people who look to you for what to do how to respond to things and what to do next so you've taken on that responsibility so that comes with

it you know yeah 100 that kind of thing well i'm aware of your time so before i let you go back to your job and thank you for giving me so much time firstly i've still got here half a square of this incredibly i want to just tiny minute talk about this chocolate you gave me 100 chocolate i've never experienced anything quite like it i haven't made it through a whole square i know i mean i i will probably have 100 grams of that a day. Wow. I'm going to have a tiny bit again now. Yeah. Just for lols.

But that is intense. Hannah, that has taken what I regard as the fun out of chocolate. Yeah. I mean, you're probably right. But I feel so good on it. And I have my ritual every morning is cold swimming and dark chocolate. What time do you get up to do the cold swimming? We get up at 6.15.

Who's we? Jeremy and I. He meditates. Jeremy goes as well? Yeah, he swims. We swim in the Hampstead Ponds or the Lido. And the combination of a cold swim with coffee, dark chocolate, and breakfast as well is the best start to the day.

You're so hardy. I'm very impressed. And if you can do a cold swim and you can eat eat that chocolate then anything that comes to you during the day is fine and easy you hit the ground running that's an interesting thing to put a really high bar at the beginning of every day well done i've got it through another another obstacle another obstacle it must be quite hard to get did you do it this morning then yes Yes. Yeah. And how's the water this morning? Six degrees, which is one more than yesterday. Yesterday was five. Last week was three. And I did 12 minutes.

That's long. It's good. I washed my hair. Yeah, it was afterwards. Do your girls do the cold swimming? Do they eat the chocolate? They don't do either. No.

They've tried both. Oh, they have? They've tried both and it's not for them. They like cadbury's and they like uh warm pools which i'm hugely disappointed in they can come and hang out with me that's fine we can sit somewhere in a cozy room eating the chocolate fantastic just picturing you guys swimming um what do you hope your girls have in their little like metaphorical backpack of things you'd like them to get from you you mentioned resilience that's a very good one exactly what i was going to say i think that's probably the the key thing

and i want them and and a sense of humor because i think if you can approach life with a sense of humor you've you can tackle a lot of things and people types of people kindness i think is so important and i think it's under under understated really as something as a as a trait um and I think is so important and I think it's under under understated really as something as a trait um and I think they're both really kind um and they not typical children they ask other people about their day which I think is just lovely for kids that age yeah I bet well they must get that from you because I'm there's a thread running with your stories of like I mean I'm sure you haven't always felt like it on the inside but just being confident and being able to put yourself out there because that's not something everybody can do you might even have the you know the nows of the business but to actually be confident and

talk to people that's a massive part of what you do and I don't think I was always that confident as a child I think it took a while for me to get that armor and so if I can give my kids the ability to trust in their instincts and uh to see the best in people as well because I think if you go through life thinking that most people are good and kind then I think you'll have a better outlook they ask me often you know I meet a lot of famous people and they go are they nice it's always that question and my husband and I both always say, no one is neither nice nor not nice. You know, we're all, you know, we're all a complete spectrum. And we try and explain that it's not black and white and that pretty much, you know, even what you would consider the worst people in the world are also nice in their mind. They're nice. And people they're nice and so we're trying to get the kids to understand the way that

people have this range of personalities and yeah and the environment is so important and to to see the best in people basically yeah and that's actually so important to put about that nuance about maybe being all good or bad about that thing of like because sometimes probably hearing something you'd say oh so and so so lovely or so nice probably puts this false idea that that's that's actually an achievable thing and really it's not it isn't it isn't and if someone in our world behaves badly it's often because something's happened to them that morning or the environment isn't very good and they've been forced into it and you're getting a snapshot of them behaving like that you can't judge them yeah it's so true yeah and how you interact with somebody and one day might be different to the next anyway depending on yeah whatever else is

going on with them anyway yeah especially in my world my work world as well to to have anyone judge my clients based on one thing they say is is something that i would always fight against i think well if they said something it's probably because you put, you triggered something because you create an environment that was inappropriate. That must be quite hard for you because in your role,

you have to be the person where the buck stops as well quite often, don't you? Yeah, absolutely. And if something goes wrong, I have to then work out how do we make this better? You know, make them look good.

Is that something you think anyone can learn to do or is that something you have to kind of be? I couldn't explain it and I think it's an instinct that you develop over the years and I I wouldn't know what it is that I couldn't I couldn't even summarize it yeah you just have you always had that in you that kind of feeling of like being able to be a bit unapologetic about yourself I think so and I also think that I I think I have always been unemployable so I think I've always had that instinct that I'm gonna be my own boss. That's interesting you never yeah of course you've been doing it since you were young but you never pictured yourself ever working for anyone. No I never had that I don't think I could. And could

it have ever been anything other than comedy? I always think about this I mean the only other the the the the other thing I do love is I love interiors so I suppose maybe architecture interiors is probably my second love but I don't think I'm particularly good at it like I don't think I would have had a flair for it do you think it's been really important part of like the oil that turns the wheels that there's jokes to be made all along the way I think so I think so I think I think and I know it's really cheesy but I think this was my destiny and I think that sounds really cheesy and I hate myself for saying it,

but I can't imagine anything else. No, I think that's lovely. I think that's really lovely. Or, no, I'd be a chocolate maker. I'd be a chocolate maker. Is it going to taste like this chocolate? And I'd make, as my kids point out, if I was a chocolate maker,

I'd make no money because I'd eat all my profits every day. You might also struggle to make money if it tastes like this one because I think this is a niche chocolate 100%. I'm so sending you the website. You'll see it's not. I'm sure there's loads of people out there.

We love 100%. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You'll be outnumbered. Thank you so much, Hannah. And now we're going to stop recording so I can hear the full story about your tooth. Oh my God. Is it off now?

There we have it. That was the 90th conversation in the Spinning Plates canon. Hannah Chambers, thank you very much. What a lovely, lovely guest to end on for this series. And I've already started recording quite a few for the new series oh i've got some good people for you really exciting very diverse again for some really really lovely people and in the meantime well actually today has been a bit cold this week i know but today is actually a little bit sunny so I think we're going to go out and about and take the kids to this beautiful

bit in Richmond Park called the Isabella Plantation which if you haven't been, when you're in London town and you fancy a nice wander somewhere pretty head there because you really see all the seasons change in that little bit of the park it's very well cultivated and it's got amazing

flowers and fauna and all the trees and all the leaves turn different colours at different times of the year and there's and it's got amazing flowers and fauna and all the trees and all the leaves turn different colors different times of year and there's ducks it's great so that's where we're going to go today and this week I've actually got a couple of podcast interviews to do for you so there you go it's all systems go in the best of ways have a lovely rest of your week thank you so much for joining me this series i hope you've enjoyed the conversations i've had thank you to all my guests and uh i'm gonna go and put the kettle on again because hey it's sunday around here all right lots of love see you soon Thank you.