The Rest Is Entertainment - Boycotting Festivals & Forgiving Will Smith

Episode Date: June 10, 2024

The boycotting by authors and attendees at literary festivals across the UK has taken hold due to sponsorship by investment fund Baillie Gifford. Will the boycotts do more harm than good to the overall literary world? Bad Boys 4 has been a surprise box office success. Is this the final piece of Will Smith's redemption puzzle? Lastly, what are the secrets of political TV debates and how can our leaders make themselves look their best? You can now sign-up to The Rest Is Entertainment newsletter for more insights and recommendations - www.therestisentertainment.com Twitter: @restisents Instagram: @restisentertainment YouTube: @therestisentertainment Email: [e-mail] Producers: Neil Fearn + Joey McCarthy Executive Producers: Tony Pastor + Jack Davenport 🌏 Get our exclusive NordVPN deal here ➼ https://nordvpn.com/trie It’s risk-free with Nord’s 30-day money-back guarantee! ✅ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hello and welcome to another edition of The Rest Is Entertainment with me Marina Hyde and me Richard Osborne. Hi Marina. Hello Richard, how are you? Yes, I'm not too bad. Since we last spoke, you've been to New York for a week and you're only just back and I've recorded 30 episodes of House of Games. So if either of us falls asleep or any of the listeners, I am jet lagged, you are games lagged. I think it's a wishful turn. Oh my god, I am House of Games lagged. I don't know what time it is. Is it a Tuesday? Is it a Wednesday? Are you Sonia? Well, I think. Oh my god, I am at the House of Games lagged, are we? I don't know what time it is. Is it a Tuesday? Is it a Wednesday? Are you Sonya?

Well, I think I know now I'm one of the guests. Okay, so this week, what are we going to talk about? We're talking about redemption. We're talking about Will Smith's movie, Bad Boys 4. Bad Boys Ride or Die, to give it his official title. I'm so sorry, Will. We're talking about whether he has re-entered the acceptable pantheon. We're talking about Bailey Gifford, there's an awful lot of book festivals which have

had to cut their ties with an investment company called Bailey Gifford because of a campaign, so there's huge problems in the book festival industry, we'll talk about that. We're also going to talk about political TV debates, maybe you've seen a couple of them now and there's more to come. So we'll talk about the format, how people behave within those and what you might expect in the coming ones if you can bear to tune in. Yeah and as a TV producer I'm going to talk about who I would consider to be a good booking from the people we've seen. Let us begin with Bad Boys.

Bad Boys Ride or Die, the fourth instalment in the Bad Boys franchise, which honestly I'm shocked the first one was in 1995. It was a really long time ago. Yeah, Bad Boys. Yeah, it has been a box office smash. It is finally after a really bad disappointing May for tent pole movies, tent poles by the way, which you probably all already know, are the big big movies designed to sort of hold up the rest of the schedule. Now, Bad Boys, for reasons, was not regarded as a tent pole. In fact, people were very unsure how it would do because, as we all know, Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars. It was slap heard around the world. And it was unclear really, whether someone who, despite going on to win an Oscar later that evening,

we're going to talk about how the whole thing has unfolded. Talk about redemption. that was quick. That was quick. This was by no means guaranteed. It's a real surprise to some people that this movie's done so well and it's done so much better than a lot of things that were expected to do far bigger business. So we're not really talking about business this week, we're talking really about the route that his publicist has crafted back from that moment. Can I just mention as a sidebar though, having talked about the movie opening, do you know, I was in New York last

week as we've discussed, in the Bronx there is now only one movie theatre. No way. In total. Nearly one and a half million people live in the Bronx. I was going to watch it before we went to the Yankees game and I was thinking maybe I'll catch it up there and there was only one movie theatre in the Bronx. That's crazy. This publicist, is that a publicist who stuck with Will all the way through? Yes. Now we saw her on the night, she's her name, well we didn't see her but she was there on

the night. Meredith O'Sullivan Wasson. Whoa. Remember where he was sitting? Names much? Yeah. He was sitting within slapping distance clearly of the stage. Yeah. So everyone in that theatre after the incident happened, first of all, you know, why was it such a horrible moment?

Obviously it's an unbelievably weird and ridiculous thing to do after all these he was finally going to break his best Oscar drought and he was going to win it. But I think part of it is it's so complete the destruction of everything because I know I talk about persona a lot But what we like to think of our move are leading actors not our character actors But as versions of the characters they play we want them sort of to come bring that same persona out every time and Will Smith's Persona was that he was breezy. He was charming, you know, he never he refused to swear in any of his rap songs Yeah to me. He's like a kind of a fresh prince

Yeah refused to swear in any of his rap songs. Yeah. To me, he's like a kind of a fresh prince. Yeah. And he, yeah. And I suppose the other thing you'd think is he in the most serious end of the roles he played, obviously there's a continuum, that kind of persona is that he was very disciplined. So every, he gets on stage and says, get my wife's name out of your fucking mouth. You're swearing now. Okay. And it's, I mean, it's like the sort of live abortion of all of it.

Then this publicist all the way through in every commercial break after this had happened could be seen by everyone else in the theatre going up and having sort of a huddle with him. And every publicist you will talk to will say, thank God that is not my client. It's essentially exactly what Rishi Suneck's publicist was doing the day after D-Day. Yeah. Is that kind of level of terror? What on earth?

Crucially, neither his agent nor his publicist got rid of him. But it was a moment of shell shock. I also think what was quite funny that night was that the rest of the audience, how they behave when they don't have their publicist with them to tell them what to do. Because don't forget, he gave some ridiculous speech when he won the Oscar, in which he didn't apologise to Chris Rock. And everybody stood up and gave him a standing ovation. It's like, guys, this is, by the way, just to let you know, this is going to look really bad tomorrow.

It's tricky if you are an A-lister, because your instinct, of course, is when someone else wins an Oscar, you've been taught over the years, the thing not to do is be angry. The thing not to do is stay sat down and look like you're cross. And so that's the only thing that's been drummed into them over hundreds of years. So suddenly, Will Smith said, they go, hold on, when someone hits someone, I have to look cross. Oh, when someone wins an Oscar, I have to look happy. And then it just couldn't compute. I'm going to go happy. I'm going to choose happy because I look better happy. Also a two hour redemption and dark story is the other thing. They've only been

in those sort of things. So they know that Act Three is redemption. So they think, I've been sitting here about two hours now and he seems to be saying sorry. So I guess this is the moment where we all just say, yes, amazing. Congratulations. The apology should be very, very quick in these situations. I'm sort of talking now through the publicist tool, but apology should be very quick. His was not really quick enough. His publicist said to him don't go to the Vanity Fair party which is the famous big party after the Oscars. He went to the Vanity Fair party. Oh no he's dancing to getting jiggy with it with his Oscar and it's like again this is going to look very bad tomorrow. For me honestly the one

good thing about if I was Will Smith there would be thinking oh great I don't have to go to the party. Yeah exactly just go home and have it. Anyway, they get through the immediate period of it, he's banned by the academy and also says, I've resigned from the academy and everyone tries to make it better. But the period of silence follows. Then what happens is that later that year, a movie comes out, but they already had it in the can before, which is a slave movie called Emancipation. And he does one interview, I think, with The Daily Show, which was presented, I think, by Trevor Noah at the time. It's quite difficult doing an interview because you know you're going to be asked about the

thing. Yeah, again, it's very richy. Now, the wife, who is obviously Jada, who is obviously involved in all of this, the next big thing to happen in the redemption arc, which I think this is a bit of a misstep for me, she says in 2023, oh by the way we've been separated since 2016, there are a whole load of plot lines as to why this thing happened. A lot of people, and I must say that of course the Smiths deny it, think that there's some sort of coercion angle and that because she gave him a really dirty look that he's really under her thumb. This was for me a bit of a deviation from the old redemption art because it just makes you think, yeah these guys are weird aren't they? I mean we like kooky

people but this is weird you know. Yes be kooky. Be kooky, be unusual. Like if you're our neighbours they are a lot of fun not oh my god our neighbours are an absolute bin fire. They literally set the bins on fire the last recycling day. So at this point Netflix said that they were going to pause a movie they had with Will Smith and they would wait to see what Sony did with Bad Boys. But anyway, Sony do go ahead with Bad Boys. But I should say that King Richard, by the way, the movie where he played Richard Williams, Venus and Serena's father, was a flop. Remember, the money is always sadly when we talk about Hollywood, as long as it keeps making money for them, as has happened this most recent weekend, it will be all right. So we don't hear from

him again for a while, but then there's this thing, which I think we talked about before on the podcast called the Red Sea Film Festival, which is in Saudi Arabia. And Will Smith got paid about a million dollars to go to the Red Sea Film Festival. That's essentially like the movie star version of being paid to go on Celebrity Big Brother. Yeah, but much easier And paid a million and he had to have an interview but with a very sort of tame Saudi journalist I think I would be time. Oh, I'd be super time. I don't want to leave in several body bags So he did this interview in which he was asked all the questions mentioned legends who still love you quote

Quincy Jones has always made himself available. He wants me to win as a human. He has devoted me as a human, not just as an artist. And then you have to sort of create a, I don't want to say, be humble, because I don't think he's humble. You have to create a sort of simulacrum of humility. So he said, I love puzzles, I love problems.

Yeah, I started making my own problems. Life was going too well. And he said, I love puzzles, I love problems. Yeah, I started making my own problems. Life was going too well. And he said- So you said essentially the snack was like a Sudoku. Yeah, or like when Dave Stewart had his appendix taken out, he had that thing, Paradise Syndrome, you know, that only celebrities get it. I think he didn't need his appendix out.

And he had it taken out, because everything was sort of too perfect. So he could feel something. Yeah, maybe. I mean, I don't want to speculate on, but it's called paradise syndrome. So anyway, he says, I don't need others to applaud me for me to stay focused on my mission.

I want you to feel good. And at the same time, I am deeply human and I am in the process of perfecting my virtue. I love the way celebrities talk. That's fantastic. He's in the process of perfecting his virtue. Yeah. If he was on any American interviewer, by the way,

they'd be like, sorry, can we, I don't know what that means. Um, the audience was someone in the audience, you know, what do you want to do next? And someone's in the audience, shout out a movie with Denzel. And he said, yeah, a movie with Denzel in Saudi. So yeah, I know. So he is, he's talking about having a mission, blah, blah, blah.

All of that is water testing. Yes. So if that goes wrong in Saudi Arabia, if you can't make it there, then maybe he can't make it anywhere. It's his kind of town. His publicist is thinking, he sort of got away with that. Obviously we have the internet, so we all know what he said and it's reported in all the trade papers and all this.

And is his publicist still behind all of this? So his publicist is sort of, this is all the same campaign? They're building the path back. So they're in tandem, the two of them here. Yeah. Then he performed Men in Black at Coachella. So what he's really, I know he really is that bad, that festival. I sound like the most cursed place on earth. Anyway, so what he's saying is, I'm still the same guy. I'm still the same guy. So in a weird way, bad boys ride or die is the crucial bit,

because that persona thing. Yeah, go long ride or die. In this movie he sort of he has to become an outsider again he's him and Martin Lawrence are outsiders again almost outlaws and they have to yeah and they have to work out what really matters and to kind of make their way back so in a funny kind of way he can say I'm still playing that guy and in case you didn't get it he says things like my fans are ride or die and then the Sony fans are ride or die Yeah, they're my ride or dies. That's two people. Yeah Sony chief Tom Rothman is a real-life ride or die. He says he was messing with me when nobody was messing with me So my dude, yeah, he's so corporate. He is so corporate. Yeah. Sony

Chief Tom Rothman is my ride or die. He was messing with me. I don't think what the head of a studio messes with one does one. I just had to do my acknowledgments for the new novel and I had mentioned the absolute heads of Penguin Random House. They're lovely. But now I wish I'd said they're my ride or die. Yeah, you should say these are my ride or die. Well, it's all right. You've got something in the can for next time. And his other upcoming projects are hilarious. He is trekking to the North Pole for Disney. Is he? Yeah, for a documentary. Okay. I mean, yeah. But you know, again, this is a form of

persona thing. I am doing an almost literal penance. I'm making some kind of pilgrimage. What can't be fixed? This is what's worth talking about because what, you know, I've made it sound like, yeah, they've put plot and they have done well here Yeah, you can never say in any trailer Academy Award winner Will Smith because every one time Tasty says well thing. Oh, yeah, that was the thing we slapped Chris Oh, so you got sadly you lose that The weirdness is out now, but yeah, it didn't harm Tom Cruise That much when we found out that Tom Cruise was mega, mega weird.

Although that same management company, that same sort of publicist, they also represent higher ground, the Obamas production company. He's always really wanted to play Obama. I feel like that's still not gonna happen. That may not happen. That may not happen.

Another part of that persona, probably the final part I'm going to mention is that, which was very successful in his biggest movies, is that he was a guy who kind of got knocked down in this game. Even the knock... Yeah, but he was able to deal with setbacks. You know, if you look at things like, I don't know, the pursuit of happiness. And so he can still retain that little bit of it to say, even though the setback was entirely rather than, oh, I'm the last person who survived an apocalypse. Yeah, you created the apocalypse. Okay. So yeah, well done for surviving yourself. If we could sum it up, I would sum it up by saying, as well as Will Smith, this is a story all about how my life got flipped, turned upside down. Am I right? I mean, it was that the clues

were all there from the beginning. You see, well, then there you go. It's sort of still fit, albeit in a kind of wonky and weird way. Now my part in the Chris Rock debacle, I was saying, gone, Will. He's got your wife's name in his mouth. No, when I was, I went on Graham Norton, and on Graham Norton, you never know who else is gonna be on.

So you're sort of sitting there, I wonder who's gonna be on. And then literally the day before, they go, oh, Will Smith is on. And you're like, oh, well, this is so it's a pre slap. Yeah. Okay. So he was one of the biggest stars in the world untouchable.

Yeah. And then right at the last minute you find out where you're seated. And I sat next to Will Smith. So I sat next to Will Smith. Not any that is he is not one of those people who just sits there, does his bit and, you know, just kind of leans back. He was so engaged with everyone backstage, on stage, telling stories, laughing at other,

Chris and Rosie Ramsey were on as well. We were all like kids in a sweet shop. Like we'd tell stories and Will Smith would be like really laughing and we'd go, oh my God, Will Smith really thinks we're funny. And he was very giving in that way. And I thought, well, this is amazing. I'm mates with Will Smith now.

And it was, I think two weeks later later then he went and slapped Chris Rock on this persona non grata I thought Will we literally just met you cannot believe what at the very top of the market exactly I but I hadn't realized it was a do-or-upper no right I thought was a turnkey I could just say you know but turnkey friendship to a turnkey friendship and yeah then yeah two weeks later there you were having to distance yourself from him. Yeah. I was going to go, listen, we were friends.

Yeah. For sure. Yeah. We were developing a relationship, but I haven't spoken to him in like 10 days. I, he's not perfecting his virtue. Yeah. Um, so it was, I, I had two weeks of being incredibly excited. I had to rap in front of him.

Hat too. To his, yeah, strong. I chose to. I did, like, when I was at school in our assembly, I did a rap version of the Nativity. I wrote it and performed it. Yeah. Yeah. And so I told the Graham Norton people that, and they were like, oh, well, we got Will

Smith on. So yeah, I had to rap the Christmas nativity in front of Will Smith. Perhaps actually, that's what finally flipped him. Yeah. Perhaps he was fine and then he listened to me talking about my rap version of the nativity and he went, do you know what? I've just got to lash out. I can't lash out here. He kept a lid on it for so long. He was like...

Two weeks later, he's gonna blow. Yeah, honestly as he was stepping up to Chris Chris Rock I bet he was thinking about my line about Pontius Pilate being a publisher which is because he got crucified by the press, Jesus in my story. Yes, oh did he? Very good. How brilliant, I'm afraid we might have to do a splash line on it one day. To sum up I suppose some things have been lost but the crucial thing is he's making them lots of money. So that's the thing if Bad Boys 4 had done 20 million less it would be a very different story so actually and the reason it's done a lot. Even 20 million less by the way I don't think it would be that bad it costs 100 million

obviously the marketing they've spent a lot on. But it's interesting why it did well and it's interesting that when someone is disgraced in the public eye a couple of things happen. He was disgraced not cancelled I think that's crucial. He was in a liminal area. I think that and whatever the noise around it is, somewhere in the back of things is what actual people think and what people who go to movies think. And I think perhaps they didn't think his crime was quite as big as the culture at large thought it was. Maybe Richard, they can separate the art, Bad Boys 4, Ride or Die, from the artist.

The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. Yeah. But the other thing that's interesting when you're talking about his agent and his publicist staying with him, which has obviously been a big deal, is quite often when people are cancelled, certainly in the industry, I'm in television, if the people in the industry think it's a slightly unfair cancellation and actually their road back is slightly quicker. If there's you know a cancellation and people in the industry go even if someone's not prosecuted or anything and people in the industry go that's about time then that road to redemption is impossible. So I suspect

if the professionals drop you. If the professionals just go do you know know what, this is being, you know, they're absolutely right, we don't like working with this person anyway, this is absolute just desserts, we are not going to fight for this person. Whereas perhaps we'll have people around him where they were going, look, what he did was terrible. We've worked with him a long time, we sort of understand where it came from. We love him, we respect him, and he'll have to sit on the benches for a little while but we'll look after him and support him. I think sometimes that's the difference between why some people are redeemed because people think they're worth redeeming and why some people aren't redeemed which is people are going good riddance to bad rubbish. And with that shall we

proceed into a break Richard? Yes we should do. Can I point out that Quincy Jones also still turns up for me? Yeah he likes he was a human as well as a House of Games presenter, author, a multi-hyphenate. Welcome back. Welcome back. We are going to now talk about book festivals, which are in peril in lots of ways after Bailey Gifford, who's one of their major sponsors at eight book festivals, also many art galleries and the biggest nonfiction prize in the UK have either cut ties with the festivals or the festivals have been forced to cut ties. Can you tell us a bit more about why? Yeah, I don't know how much cut through this has had in other industries, but it's huge in the book world. Now around the country we have these book festivals. Cheltenham

is a big one, the Hay Festival is a big one, Edinburgh Festival. They don't make a huge amount of money for anybody. Almost all of them are run as charities. Just quickly what happens at a book festival? There will be events, authors will be interviewed on stage, there'll be lots of panel discussions, there will be lots of sort of children's outreach programs And obviously the big names if you go to a book festival You're gonna sell out your whole centre and everyone's gonna be dying to get a ticket. It's fairly delightful It's a truth festival if you've got one in the local town people really treasure them yet As you say you go along the sort of tented villages as five or six different venues

There's almost always outreach programs where local schools come in in the week before and kind of yeah You know come people come and speak to them, loads of panels where new authors can come along and talk about stuff, this signings, there's all sorts going on, outreach, education, and you know, they're little kind of grenades of empathy which is sort of dropped in the countryside every now and again. And festivals of ideas because inevitably you're talking about lots of things that are involved in sort of non-fiction topics as well as people talking about stuff, you know, just the creative art.

Yeah, and there's always some mad thing that you've never would have thought of when you go along and see like something about the geography of the brain and you're like, oh my God, that's the best power for people talking about it. So those have always gone on. They need sponsorship, of course, because, because you know it's they do deficit funds you know they do make sure they've got outreach they do make sure that there's you know some tickets are cheaper and more available and that as you say well if you're in Rankin and people like that you go along and do

these festivals one because they're fun and they're nourishing but two because you know that's a good way of the festival making a lot of money yeah because they can set up a big tent for good money and that money then funds everyone else come into that festival. So these are wonderful things now. Bailey Gifford is an investment company. There's a pressure group called Fossil Free Books and they targeted Bailey Gifford because Bailey Gifford has some investments in fossil fuels. A very small percentage by the way compared to most other investment funds.

I should say that every person who I spoke to who works in book festivals have loved their partnerships with Baili Gifford and think they're so engaged. Yeah, fossil free books are saying, well, they do have some money, 2% of the money that they invest is in fossil fuel companies. So they launched a campaign to boycott Baili Gifford and to say to authors you must either a boycott these festivals and not turn up or be if you do go there to use it as an opportunity to protest and they also wrote to lots of other authors and said just so you know if you do speak at this festival we can't guarantee there won't be a

protest at your event. I should say that the things they're against are, sorry just to get back to the omni-cause for a second, fossil fuels, genocide and colonial violence. I mean, you know, saying to a written author, are you for or against genocide? I'm actually, I'm going to break news to you, I'm against it. And they also criticise Bailey-Gifford for investing in various companies like Nvidia, Amazon, Nvidia make the chips and they say that at some exactly biggest firm in the world and they say that the Israeli military uses some of these services. Well I mean some of these authors,

your books are all on Amazon, you're invested in these things but anyway, Fossil Fields Genocide and Colonial Violence is what they're against. So what happened is of course they targeted Bailey Gifford, they targeted these festivals and they said, no, Bailey Gifford must talk to us. And what Bailey Gifford said was, no, we're going to pull out of every single one of these festivals. And some of the other festivals said, no, we're pulling out of dealing with Bailey Gifford. We have to.

But they all issued these incredibly regretful statements saying, we don't want to do this. We feel, and I have seen a lot of criticism of the festivals for not standing up to these, this sort of collective that no one really knows who they are and by the way I haven't heard of any of the people involved in them. It's quite difficult if you are trying to say well no authors will come and we're going to collapse with that, it's better that we still continue to exist. But that's how far they pushed them to a sort of existential point. And. And festivals, we should say, have already collapsed. Other ones have gone.

There was one in Bristol called Ideas. There was one in Glasgow, I Write. Yeah, they're all operating on a shoestring. So here's the thing. I'm very comfortable with people campaigning against fossil fuels. OK, I don't think everyone is fairly comfortable with that. What the fossil fuels people were saying was a couple of things. They're saying the idea of this is, is we're raising the issue and therefore Bailey Gifford will have to come and talk to us and we can talk to them about

divesting, which means taking their money out of fossil fuels. So that was their strategy. The strategy is not let's collapse these festivals. The strategy is we need to get the attention of Bailey Gifford. We can then negotiate with Bailey Gifford. Bailey Gifford, of course, they said, in fact, Andres Adorico, who's one of the guys, said, the aim has never been to target festivals. It has been about using these festivals, very unique relationship with this investor. Festivals do not have a unique relationship with this investor. Bailey Gifford pulled out, said there's no money left, and fossil free books are saying, oh, I mean, they must be rubbing their hands with

glee. They've just walked away without answering any questions. You go, of course, that's what they were going to do. I mean, there's absolutely no way that wasn't what's going to happen. And another fossil free books thing is saying, this is not about purity, it's about strategy. Okay. Now, by the way, if it was- Wow, what a great strategy. If it was about purity, I'm all behind it. We have that discussion. If it's about purity and this is what you're saying, then I'm all behind it. If it's about strategy, it's a terrible strategy because these festivals need Baili Gifford a huge amount more than Baili Gifford. I'm not behind it if it's about purity. Well, the purity thing is interesting

because if it is about purity, you have to follow that through. And if you're against Baili Gifford, there's a number of other organizations you do have to be against. By the way, you know me, I will never see a fence without wanting to sit on it. Okay. I'm happy to listen to all sides of this. But all of the people I've seen talking about it all have their books on Amazon. I've checked all of it this week. Every single one of them. Amazon, by the way, is one of the companies they want Bailey Gifford to divest from. And I haven't yet seen, I'm sure there will be an argument they have,

I haven't yet seen what their argument is for it being okay that their books are on Amazon. What made with paper? Because of which is, of course, a fossil fuel product. Books are a fossil fuel product. But Andreas Ordorica, who's one of the, he's an Edinburgh-based writer, he's got a new book out, but he's doing a tour, he's doing a reading at Waterstones. Oh, right.

So Waterstones, and Waterstones are owned by Elliott Investment Management, or Large Yarn, which is a big sort of hedge fund, who if you want to look into their accounts, you'll find them very similar to Bailey Gifford. Or they've got a lot more, they've got a lot more than 2% in these things. I'm trying to be even handed.

Yeah. So, you know, if you do want to have some sort of purity of thought about fossil fuels and genocide, you have to take your books off Amazon if that's what you're asking Bailey Gifford to do. You can't go to Waterstones. The world of authors is quite a thoughtful bunch. It's quite a non-confrontational bunch, I would say. And the one reason that I do sit and listen to fossil-free books is I think probably the

world of literature probably doesn't do enough, you know, because we sort of have our cake and eat it a little bit, which we're seen as lovely and artsy and lefty and, you know, everything's great with the world. And actually working in an industry, you know, HarperCollins, where lots of people are, that's owned by the same people that own the Fox Corporation. Lots of people go out to the book festivals in the UAE. Now I know enough authors to know that everyone has their own individual morality and they have reasons why they would do those things, and that's we have to respect people's individuality. I'm going up to do the Edinburgh Book Festival. The most interesting person I spoke to was someone who had signed the

fossil free books declaration. This person said, yeah, I signed up to it because I heard of it. I thought this sounded good. The more I looked into it, the more I understood what their tactics were, and the more I looked at what they were saying, I took my name off that list. And that person said to me, Bailey Gifford, and this, I think, tries to my view, to me, Bailey Gifford sponsoring these festivals is like our very own personal Winterfall tax. That's essentially saying I understand capitalism exists, I understand hedge funds exist, I understand there's a world out there which I have very little control

over the world of money. If there's any way I can get some of that money and use it to spread empathy and I can use it to spread ideas and I can use it to get kids reading, then that's the thing I'm comfortable with. And that's a morality, it's a morality that I share. And I think fossil-free books genuinely admire the passion of it. I genuinely admire this thought that the world is burning, we need to do something about it. I think it's the wrong way to go about it. I think almost every single writer thinks that as well, but it does mean I think that next year almost all of these festivals will probably die. You know? Well, I'm sorry, I don't admire anything about it. I don't admire anything about them. And one of

the things that I particularly don't admire is the suggestion that everything is politics, and that art is the same as politics. that all art, by the way some art is political and much art is born of its time and therefore can be can have that sort of relationship to politics. Art and politics are not the same and if you insist that all art must be politicised and all artists must make statements all the time then what you are essentially wishing for is a contraction of the human experience, contraction of human possibility because you're saying these things essentially semantically map onto each other. This is nonsense, okay? Art can exist just for its own sake. The pleasure of these things just

for their own sake must be allowed to exist. When I think of these people, they're the sort of people who'd been saying to Shakespeare, do you, William Shakespeare, condemn Elizabeth I's brutal suppression of the uprisings in Ireland? Do you? Why haven't you said anything? Why haven't you signed a letter saying anything? If you don't sign it William Shakespeare then this new play of yours, The Taming of the Shrew, we're gonna protest this, you know, is it any good? And I just feel that not everything has to involve someone saying, they say, oh you've got the luxury of that because you don't live in Gaza or whatever. This is, I'm afraid throughout the whole of human history awful things have

been happening but it is, must be allowed to exist in and of itself and it doesn't have to answer any questions and people should be allowed to come and listen to the, by the way anyone you talk to at these book festivals say if you want to hear people talking about these issues, the best place to hear them is at these festivals. The thing that Bailey Gifford's funding at something like the Cheltenham Festival was being primarily directed towards now is the outreach programs for children. They will now go. Okay?

So these people have not thought anything through and it is a contraction of the mind. Things must be allowed to exist in and of themselves and not have to be politicized. Well, listen, well said, but also they're saying, well, one way of replacing this funding would be, we can push for more public funding of the arts. And you think, well, good luck. Good luck with that. I mean, have you not seen that horse bolting down the road a long time ago? And what people don't realise is that the costs of these things since the pandemic have gone up 40%.

I've spoken to people a lot about costs this week, so I think it's quite interesting. And sadly, because so many sort of, I don't know, lighting and tech and marquee companies went out of business during the pandemic, the cost of the ones that remain are 40% higher. Now, these festivals have not passed that on in ticket pricing, because they are acutely aware that there's a cost of living crisis. So they are now cut to the very, very bone, even with this funding. Without it, they are all immediately in crisis. And that has been the effect of this. And it is the most stupid and I hope a galvanizing campaign because a lot of people can see how

completely self-defeating this was. And I tell you something about those fossil-free boats people. They've seen what happened. But because they're so indulged and so spoiled and so weak, they will not apologize for what they've done. They've tried to put it onto Bailey Gifford. No, these are the consequences of your actions and you should face them. If you haven't got the strength to face that, then I don't know what they're talking about, any form of resistance on anything else. It's interesting because I thought it's a useful place here because there's a lot of

people that listen to this You know if there's people I was gonna say who who are high up at big companies You know companies who do spend money on the arts or spend money on charities Then there's a space here that you can spend some money and do an enormous amount of good however I don't know that I would recommend it in the current climate because who would be pure enough because they're gonna say well We'll say it and then some someone will be rooting through our you know they'll find out that whoever I mean a lot of people's pensions are handled by Bailey Gifford

and if you really want to dig down and also just you know they're putting things on Twitter they're putting things on Instagram and you look I get it and I know they will have worked out a way of saying yes yes but yes but but that yes but is not coming across in their public and other people get to say yes, but yeah I think any people who get to say yes, but I'm certainly saying yes But I'll be going to Edinburgh and I'll always go and do these Festivals and if companies do want to come in there's an enormous amount of artists and writers who will support you and will come over The top and support you as well

I should also say that almost all the people from all the different festivals that I spoke to said they, if there would be a way found for Bailey Gifford to come back into partnership and maybe Bailey Gifford have been quite surprised by the reaction to this which has been pretty strong in their favour so maybe there is a way back, maybe there can be some sort of diplomatic solution I don't know but it would be good to think that something could be salvaged. The interesting thing to watch this week, if you're listening to this, is there's an awful lot of pressure on latitude and artists playing latitude because of their ties to Barclays.

And so for exactly the same reason people are being asked to boycott and people I spoke to in the last week, they're all talking amongst themselves saying, I don't really want to boycott in this way, I understand that you know what's happening, but it feels like this isn't the best thing to do. So it'd be fascinating to see what happens with that. But it's one of those stories that definitely watch this space. Watch these Puritans, because that's what they are. They hate culture really. And they really do hate culture. I can't, I don't believe they've got any particular ties to it. And

what they really like is to tear things down. Let me see you build something, because I don't think they build anything. They're wreckers, these people. They're Puritans and wreckers. So what you're saying is take Bailey Gifford's name out of your mouth? Out of my fucking mouth. Out of my, okay, I gotcha. For a bit of light relief, shall we talk about the general election? Yes, yes, yes. The general election, the TV debate. We've now had two, one between Rishi Sunak and Keir Starmer and one of those weird seven person ones where Sunak and Starmer had their proxies. But we are going to see another between Sunak and Starmer. Now, historically the audience really

drops for the second one of these, which I think we've all got a huge amount of sympathy for. It's a bit like me when a new Star Wars series comes out. I'm like, okay, you know, book a Boba Fett on one and done. I see what that is. Yeah, I don't need to see the rest of it. But it's like in boxing, if there's a fight and it's really boring, people don't go, we need a rematch, like never.

It's only if a fight is great. And it was a very, very boring piece of television. By design really, there's nothing there, is there? You've got two people who are not there, neither of their strength is as a onscreen performer. Really, Sunak and Starmer. It is not a fun watch. I quite enjoyed the seven person one, which we'll get onto.

But it's a hiding to nothing for both of them being in that studio. Neither of them wants to be there on stage with each other. I mean, Sunak doesn't wanna be in this election at all. He doesn't want to be anywhere. We know that. He just wants to fly home from wherever he is at any given time. So, you know, I always watch this terrible really, because I listen, I'll put it on the table. I care about the future of our country. But I really, really care about television. And all I'm thinking when I'm watching those debates is,

oh my god, the poor producers. I actually met the producer of the soon next Star Wars one in the lift in the studios in Manchester, because we're filming House of Games just around the corner. And I was thinking, man, I wouldn't want your job today. Nobody is going to give you any credit for anything you're doing. You're working with two bits of talent to, if you were making a tv show you wouldn't you would not work with you know you've got nothing no really uh and it's a it's a huge gig and i thought they did a perfectly good job you know the set looked nice i mean it's two barney walshes it's two barney walshes and that's the trouble uh okay but's not... And the one thing you can do

is try and make it look interesting. I'm always really interested in the visual grammar in terms of the shots they use in this. And they can be incredibly stipulative if they understand the media, the parties. In America, oh my God, they're like, you can't do a split screen with our candidate, you can't do...

They've got a load of different ways and the shots are quite interesting. They didn't do any of that for the ITV debate, so they let them do what they're, what you really want in those is like, people think, oh you want close-ups, close-ups are fine and the wides are fine, but what you really want is the two-shot, because the two-shot, you can see how people relate to each other. If there's a cutaway, in some of the big debates, they have to do it in cutaways, so you see the reactions and that makes it much more like a play. You have to really quite hammer up your reaction. That's why someone like Donald Trump is very good because he was a reality TV

star. He understood that he needed to make big gestures and then the camera would come to him. And Clinton, actually, Bill rather than Hillary, really got this. I mean, he was one of the first people to do this. When he had a debate with George Daddy Bush, George Bush senior, he understood how the cameras were placed. He kept maneuvering himself. So in the background of the shot would be George Bush senior and George Bush senior didn't get this.

So he was often shown in the background looking kind of disengaged or like slightly just looking at his notes or whatever. One of the other funny things is he bought his own stools, his team, he bought his own stools. Yeah sorry. I mean it wasn't the worst of Clinton's crimes in the end was it? I'm so sorry I didn't fully explain that. The sort of Westlife bar stools that they have. His team swapped in the stools that they'd been practicing with, their own ones. So Ross Perot was tiny and couldn't even get on the stool. It was unwieldy. But Clinton was fully relaxed. They'd made it

his environment. That's quite hard to do. And I think most producers would be like, sorry, we didn't... Sorry, those are not our stools. We didn't like for these. Anyhow, so I think those are quite interesting. But basically the nonverbal of it is really interesting. You can see when people really hate each other. Yeah, it's very, very interesting because it's with both of them. Here's the problem. So we were in the same studios and Sunak and Starmor were both in dressing rooms on my

dressing rooms, you know what I mean? On my corridor with their teams and like Labour had three rooms, the Tories had three rooms. And all day there were like people with guns walking up and down the corridor. There were sniffer dogs. Honestly, it's been my favourite day ever in the TV studio. I got to stroke a sniffer dog. Amazing.

Which I didn't think you were supposed to do. So I was like, the dog came out and the guys were the dog. And I was like, oh, that's a cute one. And I was like, he goes, oh, you want to stroke him? I was like, yeah's a cute one and I was like he goes oh you want to stroke him I said yeah I really do I said no I got the sniffer dog that again that's not anything to do with the election you can listen something had gone wrong later yes put him off with my start yeah yeah well let's just say it was a lucky escape yeah it was a lucky escape but there'll be more about the sniffer dogs on the rest is politics I'm

sure but we're gonna deal with the the action. But anyway, there were people all day locked away in rooms talking. And you think, right, what were they planning for? And I know, you know, plenty of people who planned for debates with candidates. And it's interesting when you've got someone like Starmor or Sunak who, and this is no shade whatsoever, who are not natural charismatic television performers. By the way, some of the worst people in the world are natural charismatic television performers. So it's absolutely no shade.

But if you are not one of those, then you sort of have to be trained to be one, which you never can be. And so what it does mean when you talk about those two shots and things like that, you are second guessing the way you're reacting all the time. Because so many people in the last two hours have said, oh no, the thing you must do if you say something,

you must like not just, don't move your hands too much. Make sure if you say something that you're allowed to smile, make sure you're the first to leave the podium at the end to shake hands. Your brain is completely full of that stuff. Whereas you have someone like, you know, watching the seven person thing. I thought there were three people on there as a TV producer.

If I was watching those three people, I think, oh, well you can come back. We'll book you again on the show. Farage, we talked about him when I'm a celebrity where he's far and away the least charismatic person. And on this stage, he's the most charismatic person. Stephen Flynn, I thought was good on camera, was charismatic and Daisy Cooper as well.

The three of them, as a producer, you're thinking, oh, you can come back on the show. Every time I got you, you can come on, because I know I'm gonna get stuff out of you. But that thing that people have to be good on television, and therefore we train them up to be good on television, it so rarely works. That's the big problem.

If you can work on television without someone telling you how to do it, you're at a huge advantage. But most people who can do that are not the people you want running the country. And the people who can't do it are trained with an inch of their life and it makes them worse, I think. Yeah, it makes them buttoned up and hard. You can almost watch the clouds scudding across the face and try and work it out. Yeah. And you're watching Sue Nextama. Those are both bright guys, you know, but they're just, it's not, we watch a lot of TV. We are used to watching really,

really great sparky people on television. You know, we're used to fluency. We are used to wit. We're used to humor. We're used to body language that feels natural. You know our DNA as viewers and we don't get it from those debates and it does everyone a disservice I think. What I find the most odious part of all of it, because we've got such a hard on for American things, is the spin room afterwards. I have been in the spin room since 2010 and it's the worst people in the world telling you that what you've just seen on TV didn't happen and you didn't actually see it and actually something different happened and this is what it all means.

What a lot we've covered today. We have, we've covered a huge amount. Passionately and dispassionately, I hope. Yeah, haven't we just. Thank you so much for listening and we'll see everyone for our question and answer session on Thursday. See you then. Bye.