The Rest Is Entertainment - The British Celebrity Boyfriend Crisis

Episode Date: August 5, 2026

Are the cult of British Celebrity Boyfriends in trouble? Why are BTS boycotting the Grammys? Should Richard be worried about Count Binface’s manifesto? Richard Osman and Marina Hyde answer your questions on awards show boycotts, libel in books and celebrity breakup rumours. The Rest is Entertainment is brought to you by Octopus Energy, Britain's most awarded energy supplier. Sponsored by Lloyds. Looking for extra value from your spending? You can bank on Lloyds to help your money go further. Search Lloyds Rewards in your app. Summer sale is here: get an annual membership for a third off with code SUMMER26. That's ad-free listening, every bonus episode, and full access to our exclusive members' series. Sale ends August 31st, so grab it before summer's over. For more Goalhanger Podcasts, head to www.goalhanger.com Video Editor: Max Archer Assistant Producer: Imee Marriott Senior Producer: Joey McCarthy Social Producer: Emma Jackson Exec Producer: Ami Bennett Filmed at www.westdigitalstudios.com Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The rest is entertainment is presented by Octopus Energy. Now, show business is full of people who start out as one thing, but then take on some completely new role that completely eclipses it. And before we get on to how Octopus Energy has done that, a few examples. There are people who start out, you know, bands as singers, as actors. A good example would be Victoria Beckham. She started off in a band, Richard.

She was in a band called The Spice Girls. You're going to tell me next that David Beckham used to play football before he became an advertising guy. They have earned far more from their second careers, these businesses they've built up, than they ever did in their first ones. So the idea she's a singer that gets her through the door, gets her known, the culture knows who she is, she then thinks, I'm going to see if I can do something else,

and she has the audience who if she does it well goes along with her. But do you know what? It reminds me of a lot. Tell me. It reminds me of Octopus Energy, because Octopus Energy has also outgrown its own introduction. It's the UK's largest energy supplier, but is now also one of the country's biggest installers of heat pumps, solar panels and batteries. The list even reaches the driveway with a major electric car leasing business as well.

Hello and welcome to this episode of the Rusters Entertainment, Questions and Answers Edition. I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman. Hello Marina. Hello Richard. How are you? I'm okay. How are listeners? How are you? Let's get straight on with the questions, shall we? Just hit me with a question right now. Yeah, we're going to go straight in my BTS. Oh my God, I've got a lot to say about this. I know what the question will be about. Let's start straight away, but I will say to people that we have Marina's update on the state of British celebrity boyfriends in the second half of this as well, which I'm very, very much looking forward to.

Thank you for that. We've got a question here, which I think is perfect. But we'll start with Connor Little. Can you explain why BTS are boycotting the 2027 Grammys? Is this a problem for the Grammys? Yeah, I do not blame BTS for this. Okay, we did it on the podcast. They're back, they back off their national service, boys.

and they have an album called Arirang, but the Grammys have bought in an Asian pop category to sort of ghettoise them into, I think. We know that there are the Latin Grammys, that's something totally separate. We're talking about the kind of Primo main Grammys that is the OG Grammys, and they've put a Latin category in, an Asian category in.

And as a result, has BTS have said, we have decided not to enter the Grammys this year. I hope the music can be heard and loved for what it is rather than being divided by region or language. Now, the Grammys say they did it because this is their quote, our music community sharing with us that they felt they needed to have more opportunities to celebrate different and new genres of music.

They've also done Best Latin Song. Can I just say, how are Asian and Latin countries new? This is all a bit like discovered by Christopher Columbus, isn't it? You know they were there beforehand? But the Grammys have had that for years. I mean, they have so many categories. They go like crazily deep. I really don't think you can do this in this day and age,

Because they would have been eligible. BTS, that album was so massive. And you're in the general category. Your question is, is it a problem for the Grammys? Well, I think it is. First of all, just the idea that any of these things play into the idea of America as this kind of cultural war country or this kind of is not helpful. Second of all, all of these kind of legacy award shows have a big problem in general anyway.

You know, the Oscars, they used to tell you when you were going out, they used to be a screen at the back saying a billion people are watching. Okay, well, last year, 17.9 million. American people were watching and not that many people are watching around the world. The Grammys is the same. They've got about, I think they have about 14, 15 million viewers. But they will have lots of viewers around the world. BTS would have performed for sure because you want those people, you want those

big Asian markets to be watching as well. And they played the World Cup final for a reason. Yeah, yeah, exactly. They did the half-time show. They weren't actually nominated. They took a long time to nominate BTS. They weren't nominated until 2021. They're very US-kewed the year's awards.

They've had a, they've had a big. Over the last year they got K-pop Demon Hunters Golden, Rose for the hub, drew out with Bruno Mars. But for me, yes, it is very, very, what we're seeing a lot. And actually, this slightly feeds into what's happening in film festivals. We talked about, oh my goodness, lots of people just don't go to Cannes now because do you want your film to sort of fall off the screen and then you spend all this money. The same thing is happening at the Venice Film Festival, which is happening in September.

Already, you can see lots of the Hollywood studios have just pulled back from that and just not putting their stuff out there. Used to be the start of an awards run if you didn't start it can. And now people just think, like, am I going to really risk it? And the moment people just are opting out of these big kind of cultural juggernaughts,

then the cultural juggernaut is in trouble. And I would say that even for the Grammys, for anything like that, this was a really stupid thing to do. I don't blame them for boycotting at all for being ghettoized in that category. Not at all. And I do think it's a problem.

And, you know... Well, it's when an institution tries to promote itself as a worldwide institution. As you say, the Grammys, they're sort of American and they've always been American and that's okay if that's what they want

I mean we've got the Brits yeah you know but we don't pretend this is something suddenly a worldwide thing but it's the same as you know the Oscars the Oscars has best film

in a foreign language we would not put BTS in a best we would not have a best Asian song category at the Brits no we would have best international yeah

which is you know which is you can't you can't see these new countries yeah Asia and the Latin countries goodness you know they're doing music now they've just discovered them yeah let's shine a light on that

but it's like the Oscars having the best film in a foreign language. Yeah. Well, sorry, foreign to who? Because, you give away, you know, where you're from. And you can't really do that in a connected. Well, the Oscars, I think, get away with it far more.

But, yeah, this, I think it shows something up, which is only going to get a bigger and bigger deal. But, you know, really, the whole thing in awards things is they want to, they do want to expand out. And they do want to have more categories. And they want to have more people who are eligible. And they want to have more celebrities come into their thing. And they want to have more viral content. So they have to try and keep thinking of new categories.

It's just I think they might have to be a bit more careful. This was a huge miss. About which categories they choose. Yes. Well, I have a question for you. Oh, yeah. And it's from Matthew, this is relevant to your interests. It's from Matthew Le Maester who says,

Count Binface has released his manifesto for the Clacton by-election. Two pledges stood out to me. Number 11, a windfall tax on cosy crime novels written, or written by celebrities. and number 18, Wayne Rooney to be the new expert summariser for the BBC at Eurovision. Are you worried?

Yeah, I read, well, I said I read this about a million people sent it to me. And listen, we all wish him well in his upcoming battle and we can have a little talk about that. It's funny, it's because this whole... Listen, it's a joke, and that's absolutely fine, but it's a cosy crime, which I had never heard of

when I was writing the book, and, you know, I've said a million times. I don't think I write it, but that's not up to me. But when it says written by, I didn't think anyone would start writing crime novels. It's really, really, really difficult. So it's taken me by surprise as much as anyone else. And there's only one celebrity I can think of he doesn't write their books and doesn't admit that. So I think, you know, of all the people, you know, Steph McGovern.

You know, Steph McGovern writes books. She's a great, you know, she's always been around crime fiction. You know, Ollie Smith, he's just done one. He's always been a writer, Ollie. So, you know, people are allowed to write books. But yes, when I read that and I thought written by, you do you think, oh, I just, it's uh yeah it's it's only in the same way that you know marian keys used to get so annoyed when they used to call the chicklet because it's very reductive yeah a bit of you just think oh come on

i just it's not um this is not what i do but it's been a nice reminder that the clacton by-election is happening because nothing is making me laugh more than farrow's just having to chew through that all summer because no one else has turned out it's one of the funniest things of our time it's like a secret diary is it happening i've no purchase on it whatsoever i mean like what's you doing today thinking about it. He's like, I mean, he knows he's going to win. There's absolutely no possibility he can't win. But the, what a colossal waste of everybody's time. Of a long hot summer. And an amazing PR, one of the all-time great PR gaffs. Yeah. Not even a gaff, just something utterly nonsensical that costs you a lot of money and literally nobody cares about. He's paying to do it.

Yeah, it's been, yeah. But it's been amazing for Count Binface. I mean, it's been incredible. It's huge for BinFace. Yeah, it's huge for BinFace. I mean, if we discover that Nigel Farage is actually Binfaces agent, the whole thing makes sense. You're like, oh, I've absolutely got this. But I assume that's not the case. But there's loads of other people standing that Lawrence Fox is standing. You just think that's funnier in a way.

Because we all know Nigel Farage is going to win. We all know it's a nonsense. We all know that we start again and, you know, he has to be under investigation. But, you know, Lawrence Fox is trying to get publicity from it and being massively beaten by a bin is is almost funny. But I'm just unaware of it even happening and I write about politics. It's like that thing people used to say

just put them in the Big Brother house but don't film them. That's what's actually happening now but in Clacton. It's like politics is happening but no one can really engage with it. The people of Clacton must be thinking this is absolutely mental.

Absolutely, yeah. But quite fun to have BinFaced going around and visiting factories and what have you. But yes, I did see this cosy crime thing. It just made me think about that whole term because it hurts me a little. But it's, you know, it's okay. So hopefully Cozy Crime goes the same way as Chicklet.

But listen, if I can help out with Count Binfaces Manifesto, then I'm very, very happy to do it. As for Wayne Rooney at Eurovision. Oh my God, yes, please. All the way. I mean, why not, right? Why not? I mean, that would be quite something up there with Graham. I think him and Colleen should both do it.

I'd like to see if they can work together. Maybe they should enter. But your Cozy Crime is a fascinating. phenomenon. As I say, I didn't invent it. It's nothing to do with me. I just write hopefully funny crime books. But in the wake of it, suddenly just this wave of books with very, very, very similar covers. And which, you know, I get it. And if they were really selling, I'd get it. But then, you know, just week after week, stuff comes out. You think, oh, that didn't sell that. I can see the stuff that's selling, and it's romanticcy,

and there's some brilliant literary novels at the moment that's selling loads and loads. And, you know, it's a weird phenomenon, but all, you know, films do it, TV does it, publishing does it, but yeah, I hope that Cozy Croyne goes away of chicklet. I mean, fingers crossed that it does, but I'll just keep... As a reductive label? Yeah, I think so, you know, I hope... But, you know, people who read the books know exactly what they are. But, yeah, God, marketing loves a label, doesn't it, even when it's not working?

Hannah E. has a question for you. She says, I read that Jade Thurwell and Jordan Stevens are rumoured to have broken up after six years together. The main clue being that they didn't post about... their sixth anniversary and Jordan wiped his TikTok clean of the videos they'd made together. Who is keeping tabs on all of this? Is it someone's job to continually check the social media of celebs and figure out who they've fallen out

with or broken up with? Well, Hannah, this is a good question. The question who's following this is absolutely unbelievable amounts of ordinary people which is really interesting. You know, we talked before about Tattle life and all those kind of horrible sites, but there is a whole lot of people. You know, I've

talked about OSint, open source intelligence and that if all these people who just followed what celebrities were doing were maybe put to work in the national interest we would just solve a number of a number of sort of international mysteries intelligence perils all of this sort of thing

I wonder if MI6 are keeping an eye on some of these people because there was some there must be going this guy is good we've talked about recruiting people like micro-influences just get these people to work for you they've got apparently eight hours a data chair who's following who but funnily enough

I was trying to remember back when I was thinking about this question. I remember speaking to a journalist back in the day, honestly about 13 years ago, maybe, yeah, and he had commissioned a piece of software which showed him who was not following who anymore on Twitter or who was doing certain things. So AI can do some of this, but it actually can't do as much as you think. There are third-party apps which track this stuff, but it tends to be only your own account. But I will say that for an unbelievable amount of people, I mean, I often say to people, you know, reality TV is like sport for women. And I'm not saying it because I like both. But there are, as do I by the way. Yeah, but there are a lot of people tracking the equivalent

of Charles Faire Rumors all the time. And they are watching influences. If you look at now someone, something like Mail Online, it's got masses of correspondents who just cover influencers and influencer beef because there's plenty of it. They interact a lot more. Real celebrities are kind of like becoming more boring, I've said real celebrities, you know what I mean, legacy idea of celebrities. And there's lots and lots of that. And the answer is so many people

are watching this stuff all the time and they're just constantly flicking and seeing who's, AI can't do it for you. So it really is just ordinary people. They are that interested. And as I say, we have an army. In the same way that Ukraine have co-opted all those PlayStation players to run their drone army,

these people, God forbid, we find ourselves in a third world war, these people 100% should all work at Bletchley Park. Why not? Yeah, absolutely. It's the equivalent of people just looking out from behind the neck curtains, isn't it? What's going on in the street? Yeah.

It's just, it's that. It's that instinct. But they're devoting so many hours of the day to it. I mean, God bless them. Yeah. I didn't know that Jordan Stevens and J Thiel were together. I'm so sorry yet to find out that. I know.

Yeah, spoiler alert. Come on, guys. Right. Should we go to some adverts so you can digest that? I would love that. This episode is brought to you by Lloyd's Rewards. Now, a big mistake that people make is leaving the cinema as soon as the credits rule because there might be a bonus scene right at the end.

There might be one of my favourite things in the middle. Yeah, you never know. In Marvel ones, there used to be a mid-credit scene and then there'd be an end-credit scene. I remember the first one I really remember, well, two, I remember Ferris Bueller's Day Off, where he tells you to go home at the end, but also smoking in the bandit with Bert Reynolds where they would do bloopers. It just feels like a secret little glimpse into a different world. And it doesn't quite have to be over.

Yeah, exactly. and it's just a lovely little added bonus. You've done everything, you've made your show, right? You've given everyone everything. It's just a lovely little extra. Which is also the idea behind Lloyd's rewards, extra value appearing inside something you were already doing anyway, your daily banking.

From shopping to streaming, you can bank on Lloyds to help your money go further. It's rewards like this that make 14 million people bank on Lloyds. Search Lloyd's rewards in your app, eligibility criteria, terms and conditions apply, retailer offers and cashback amounts may vary. UK residents 18 plus. Welcome back, everybody. Now, please can I ask you this question from Elaine Campbell, Richard?

Yes. He says, I am reading a river red with blood by one of my favourite authors, John Connolly. In the book, a character won't go to a Starbucks as he will not drink their coffee. Is it okay for fictional characters to give bad reviews, or can an author ever be held accountable or threatened with a libel lawsuit? Thanks, Elaine. Well, firstly, John Connolly, he's such a brilliant author. any of his stuff.

And because, so, you know, when I write an awful lot of real things, I try and put real things in as much as possible. And, you know, John Connell is the same. And, you know, you don't want someone refusing to go into a, like, an unnamed coffee shop or a coffee shop that you've made, because it didn't mean anything. Whereas knowing that somebody finds Starbucks coffee,

undrinkable, tells you something about their character. So as a character note. No, he cannot be sued for that. You know, if he was writing something, you know, about going in and putting poison in Starbucks coffee cups. Yes, he could be sued for that, for sure. The simplest way of working out the difference. In the first We Solve Murders book, I needed a hotel in the heart of the New Forest

because a character had to be put up in a hotel. And I had been to a hotel and it's called The Pig. And it's in the New Forest. And I really liked it. I thought, well, great, I'll just do that. So it's not an ad or anything like that. but it's a real place. So I knew what it looked like.

I knew where the restaurant was. I know where the stairs would be, all that stuff. So I was able to... We know your Instagram offers exciting clues as to you on future books. Yeah, exactly. So, you know, I could choreograph it very easily. So it was much easier for me to write this thing. I thought, you know, I'll just write about this place because I liked it and I know it.

So I wrote that, put it in the book and, you know, there it is. And if, again, in books, I like it in books where there's places you can actually go. you know you can go oh my god that's the thing for the book in the new book again i needed it is they come back to the new forest again we chase shadows we chase shadows yeah so sorry professionalize that please thank you sorry uh out in september um and again i needed to be in a hotel there's somebody has to be placed in a hotel so i'm writing i thought oh great i'll just use the pig because again it's that the universe becomes you know simpler and then later on there's a scene in that hotel where the manager does something illegal for a bribe, essentially

for our investigators. Now that I am not allowed to write. I am not allowed to write. They're at this hotel called the PIR and the manager takes a bribe and gives them some information because that would be libelious. That's suggesting. You're impuging their stars. Because it's a real place. Exactly. And I'm sort of saying that somebody there would do this thing. And so I had to Then I thought, okay, I will put them in a completely different hotel because I would have to change that because that would be something that they would have recourse. Funny enough, I changed it straight away. I changed it to the original changes to The Huntsman. I thought, okay, the Huntsman, that's a nice name for kind of a forest hotel.

And weirdly, I was down in New Forest, just looking at bits and bobs. And in the same village as the pig, I drove past a hotel called the Huntsman. I must have seen it. I simply must have done. Because the name came to me, I just wrote it down. So I had to change it again. I think it's now called The Hunter's Rest. And there are places called The Hunter's Rest in various places, but not in this place.

But yeah, so I can absolutely write about something real. I could go down and complain about something. I can't then say, oh, a member of staff did X, Y, RZ, because there are real members of staff at this place. And that would be actionable. They don't want to get caught up in one of your plots. Exactly that. But yeah, you can, God, you can slag off things.

You can't, you know, you can't liable them in the city. you can't say that a coffee company were union busting or they, you know, they, you know, exploited labour. You can't do anything that you couldn't improve it. But if you say, I hate Starbucks. Yeah. That is absolutely fine. Or if you say I went to a named theatre and the seats are too close together. Is there anything like that you can do? Just in the same, if you can do it in a, in a Yelp review, you can do it in a book. Ah, back on a favourite subject of yours. One of the things I get asked most about when people talk to me about this podcast is your item on British celebrity boyfriends.

Oh my God, if a young woman, so many young women stop me in the street about this. Yes. Okay. Anna Warrell has a question about it. She says it looks like Olivia Rodrigo has moved on from Louis Partridge with Julian Kroenbergs, I want to say,

who is not only a private equity associate, but also American. Is this a worrying sign for the cult of British celebrity boyfriends? Wow. Okay. Anna, first of all, I'd say, don't worry. Louis Partridge is currently in Inola Holmes. that is a great shot window for him.

Okay, he's in Netflix. That's a great shot. A lot of American celebrity, female celebrities might see him in that and think, wonderful. I'm looking, that's good,

you know what? That's what I'm looking for. We've seen plenty of moves. I mean, since we did that item, Stiles has gone to Cravitz. So he cravets, Harry Stiles. Is that right?

Yeah, yeah. I've only just heard about Jade Thirlwell and Jordan Stevens. Well, I think the market is in excellent health. There have been some very eye-catching transfers, actually. Casper Jopling, formerly,

with Ellie Goulding has now signed to Olivia Wilde following a successful medical. Has he? Yes, he has. Now, I think there is some feeling, there is some feeling, given that I've created this ridiculous universe. Yeah. I feel there's some feeling that we need a fixed transfer window. Yes. Okay, maybe one in January after they've had to have Christmas with the woman's American family. Yes.

That's a moment for... Yeah, or the American woman's had to have Christmas with the... Yes. and one in September in case you saw anything you liked amongst the celebrity crowds on the Amalfi Coast. I think that's when I would put the transfer windows for British celebrity boyfriends. There are many options.

The Americans, I'm told the Americans have now discovered Ibitha, which will certainly allow the island to ascend to its terrifying final form. And so I think we'll see more movements in the market this summer. At the end of this summer, and by the way, the celebrity summer ends. in about September. Okay. Let's have another look

at where we are with British celebrity but I don't see anything to worry about Anna in the market at all. I think we're seeing movement. People are signing, you know, Olivia Watt.

She's a big player in the market. Yes. To take Casper Jop playing. This is, I think it's all very, very healthy and we're going to see plenty more of it.

I feel very positive for Louis Partridge. I think definitely another American he'll be signed to an American soon enough. Yeah, I think that Louis Partridge is the Col Palmer of the situation really,

which is, you know, perhaps he should have gone to the World Cup. He didn't, but he goes again. That's the point. Yeah. But it is, you know, we've talked in previous Q&A episodes about why there are so many Brits in Hollywood.

And we talked about, you know, the, but we keep sending over our most handsome men to Hollywood to a group of women who have only had American men that they've grown up with. And then they come to London and they go to the pub and they do all those days. Yeah. But scarves, you see, you know how important I think the scarf is to it. I think that summer makes it a bit difficult. But the big scarf, because we're going to see it all back. Don't worry about it, Anna. It's all fine. The market is fine.

The Brits come into their own in the winter, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. The Americans are like a log fire rather than a Venice beach. Yes. Okay, that's very good news. And also, I mean, Tom Holland just, I mean, he flies the flag. I mean, I know he's not the archetypal British celebrity boyfriend. He's a British celebrity husband now. Yeah, he's a British celebrity husband. But I mean, my God, what a absolute exemplar of our country that man is. Absolutely. That's a great marriage, isn't it? Oh, it's terrific. I mean, but it's so, but that's so much part. of why that film is they everybody likes them everyone really really likes both of them they got them when they weren't together they're so you know i mean it is you couldn't hope for more if you were

if sony and you were making that film that you've got them for their whole story and now they're married i mean it's like when canton i went to man united very much so you think here we go this was always meant to be yeah it's destiny yeah and on that note on that positive note let's wind up remember there is the world's cup of bald men truly an incredibly incredible bonus episode for our members. I would say showbiz baldmen as well. Sorry, showbiz boardmen. It is a celebration.

I'm just all bald men in the world being made. Yeah, because I don't want people to be disappointed. They didn't qualify. No, the World Cup of Showbiz, boardmen. If you want to join, it's the rest is entertainment.com for ad-free listening and bonus episodes. Otherwise, we'll see you next Tuesday. See you next Tuesday.