The Rest Is History - 206. Historical Love Island

Episode Date: July 11, 2022

The Love Island phenomenon is sweeping the nation, so Tom Holland and Dominic Sandbrook are joined by Tom's daughter, Katy Holland, to play their part in creating a ‘villa’ made up of historical figures. Who will loveable nice-boy Jimmy Carter ‘couple up’ with? Will Judas Iscariot and Stanley Baldwin get along? Head to Twitter after listening on Monday morning to vote on The Rest Is History's Love Island poll for your FAVOURITE historical couple. A special bonus episode will be released on Wednesday 13th July to announce and assess the winners and losers. Join The Rest Is History Club for ad-free listening to the full archive, weekly bonus episodes, live streamed shows and access to an exclusive chatroom community. *The Rest Is History Live Tour 2023*: Tom and Dominic are back on tour this autumn! See them live in London, New Zealand, and Australia! Buy your tickets here: restishistorypod.com Twitter:  @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Thank you for listening to The Rest Is History. For weekly bonus episodes, ad-free listening, early access to series and membership of our much-loved chat community, go to therestishistory.com and join the club. That is therestishistory.com. Before we get started today, this was supposed to be our big announcement of our first live show in a year. It's on the 13th of November in London. But we released the tickets early to our club members and they've pretty much sold out. Now, it is still possible to join the waiting list. The link is in the episode notes where you can search The Rest Is History Live. So as I said, this was going to be our only live show in 2022.

So we're very sorry if you've missed out. And if you don't want to miss out in the future, you can always join the club at restishistorypod.com, restishistorypod.com. But we're going to try and work out if there's something else we can do. We're going to see if we can work out some other arrangements or maybe one extra show or we'll see when we come. Yeah, exactly.

But I'll keep you posted on that. And in the meantime, even if you don't want to join the Rest Is History Club, other arrangements or maybe one extra show or we'll see when we come yeah exactly but i'll keep you posted on that and in the meantime if even if you don't want to join the rest is history club just keep listening hello and welcome to the rest is History's Love Island. The couples are on their way to the island bronzed, buffed, stripped and ready. Yes, it is that time of the year again and if you're wondering what I'm talking about, don't ask me because this is not my idea. I'm here with my co-presenter Tom Holland who reveals himself to be an unexpected reality TV show enthusiast. So Tom, what is Love Island and why are we doing it? I don't really know because I've never watched it. Oh no. But we are a podcast, are we not, that responds to great public events. So we've responded to

political events, to sporting events, to all kinds of occasions yeah and there is no question that here in britain love island um is a big event we are obviously both kind of 273 so it completely passes us by however i have two daughters and you may remember that last year my younger daughter eliza persuaded us to do a version of love island on our episode on henry vi's Six Wives. One by Anne Boleyn. Yeah, one by Anne Boleyn, who absolutely iconic contestant. And so this time around, I thought it would be good. We'll do a whole episode themed around Love Island, but because I've never watched it and I don't really know how it works.

Tom, your research has let you down completely. No, but I have an elder daughter who is on hand and is at the end of this microphone. So a great, great thrill to welcome to the podcast, But I have an elder daughter who is on hand and is at the end of this microphone. So a great, great thrill to welcome to the podcast my elder daughter, Katie. Welcome to The Restless History. Thank you so much for having me. It's been a childhood dream. So Katie, just for the benefit of the many British listeners and the many overseas listeners who may have no idea what Love Island is can you just give us a very very brief sketch about what it what it involves of course um so it's been going on now I believe for six seasons um and essentially um Love Island is where you get a group of very good looking people onto an island in Mallorca

and they're completely cut off from the outside world. So they have a phone, but they can only talk to the other islanders on the phone. They have no idea what people are saying on Twitter, which is kind of part of the fun, is looking at all the memes that come out of the show. And essentially the aim of the show is to win. So you get 50 grand at the end of it

and you can decide whether you are going to split that money with your partner or you're going to keep it. So the aim of the game is to show, are you really in it for love or are you doing it? Are you selfish, egocentric grasper? Yeah, to become an influencer and and sell yeah and like sell expensive uh toothpaste but how does the so the contest so what are they doing are they kissing what are they because my son says some of his some of the girls at school

some of the 10 year old girls have seen it but they call it the love kiss show so so presumably there must be some love kiss as well as islanding going on so yeah good question um so every single week there's a thing called the recoupling um so it'll either be the boys that choose the girl that they want to couple up with or the girls choose um and the moral of the show is if you're single you get dumped from the island right okay so there's so there's real jeopardy so basically people have to pair up so that's that's you have to you have to try and kiss anyone who okay okay just one quick question can i just intervene the coupling up as you call it yeah i mean they're I mean, to ask a very boring, well, not a boring, a very exciting logistical question.

They're not kind of physically coupling on TV in front of the cameras. Are they or are they? They did in, okay. So they did in recent series when it was less famous. But I think now the stakes are higher. So that also adds another layer of complexity. It's like, are people really in it for love anymore okay okay so we are going to send five hunks and five babes um not to Mallorca but to Dominic Sandbrook's Fantasy Island Pleasure Island Tom sorry Dominic Sandbrook's Pleasure Island for those people who don't know

that was the name that the BBC wanted to give a TV documentary that I made. Just to be clear as well about one other thing. I'm so excited about this episode that I've lost my voice. That adds another level of complexity to the discussion. So we are going to send five historical hunks and five historical babes to Dominic Zanbrook's Fantasy Island. Pleasure Island. Pleasure Island. and they will then have to to couple up but katie we asked you to to nominate uh 10 archetypes and you sourced all your friends didn't you and so this is a kind of a group your group conclusion as to as to the um the 10 archetypes of of the contestants on love island so could you

just give them to us? Yeah, of course. And I'm really sorry in advance if I've missed any, but I did ask my friends just in case. Okay. So I've put them into two groups. So men and women, but they could apply to either gender, but I think Dom and Tom,

you've just put them according to the standards i gave you so okay so men so for the first one i said player very good looking keeps changing his mind about who he wants to be with the second one is the kind of sweet shit one who doesn't get anywhere and usually has quite a wholesome job so the classic archetype this is dr alex in season four he was a doctor of course dr alex yeah um number three is the traitor he's very similar to the player but pretends he's not um and pretends he's more into his partner than he is and then at castle and more which usually happens in the fourth week they get sent to another house where they have the opportunity to meet loads of more people. And they potentially, they pretty much always come back with a new girl after they come back to the main villa.

The number four is the producer's favourite. So usually pairs up with someone on the first day, stays with them and wins the competition. Always very likeable and unproblematic. And then, yeah yeah my dad loved this one the funny one a top lad loves the lads leader of the lads so that's the the five men then for the women I've done number one the bombshell who turns up and causes havoc um so she steals someone else's man and doesn't care. The stupid but lovable one. The justifiably angry jilted one.

He will call her extra chat and tell him off in front of everyone. Another producer's favourite. He will pair up with the other producer's favourite, stay with them and win the competition. And then the gossip who lives for the drama and will ruminate on whether people actually like each other or are they in it for the fame okay those are those are the archetypes that i gave i hope they're faithful to the show thank you very much okay so uh dominic we've divided them

up haven't we we have indeed so we've each got five that we're putting into the house. So, um, should I go first? Go for it. So, so I, I've chosen, uh, the, the first, uh, male, um,

archetype, the player who's very good looking, keeps changing his mind about who he wants to be with. And the historical hottie that I am sending in is George Gordon, Lord Byron, uh, brilliant poet, uh,

notorious lover. Um, and to say that he, I i mean he was incredibly good looking he had the one the one thing he was very self-conscious about he had a club foot and so he didn't he didn't actually like to kind of strip off that's a problem on the love island that is that that is an issue however uh he was a superb swimmer he loved swimming because obviously then he could he was as mobile as he was tended to be immobile when walking so um presumably there's a there's a swimming pool in this villa so he would he'd be very very proficient in the swimming

pool yeah but what's he gonna wear like a wetsuit i mean he's got to strip off uh well he'd have to wear i mean i think they're all wearing tight speedos, aren't they? Katie, is that right? They all wear tight speedos. Byron swam the Hellespont, so I think he'd have no problem just spending the whole time in the swimming pool. Yeah, there is also a swimming pool to show off. Great, great. So Byron would be good there. He's the kind of guy who cheated on his wife with his half-sister. That's the measure of the man.

That's very David Lloyd George. I mean, he just had a sequence of explosively notorious affairs, perhaps the most notorious one, Lady Caroline Lamb, wife of future Prime Minister Lord Melbourne, who was so obsessed with him that she sent him clippings of her pubic hair

in a letter. When he dumped her, she faked a suicide at the Duke of Wellington's ball. She got all her servants to dress up in white wispy dresses and to dance around a bonfire. And then she chucked all his letters in. And Byron, so Byron would be great. I mean, I guess the kind of the dialogue, what they talk, how they communicate with each other is very important on Love Island. So Byron was great. Byron's response to this. Lady Caroline Lamb crept into Byron's house and found one of his one of his books and wrote in the fly life.

Remember me. And Byron replied, remember thee, remember thee till lethe quench life's burning stream. Remorse and shame shall cling to thee and haunt thee like a feverish dream. Remember thee, I doubt it not. Thy husband too shall think of thee. By neither shalt thou be forgot. Thou false to him, thou fiend to me. So that's the kind of banter that Byron would be bringing. But Tom, in very Byronic form, you're talking too much about byron we've got loads more to go through so excellent choice uh and also a

fantastic description of him from his personal physician lord polidori who just they were going on holiday together uh and polidori said of byron that as soon as he reached his room he fell like a thunderbolt upon the chambermaid they They do write each other messages in tea towels when they ask people to be their girlfriend. So they'll write it on the lawn. On the tea towel. And say, I love you. So maybe he can write his poem in the tea towel.

All right, who's your next one, Tom? Well, I think it's your turn. You should give us one. All right. So I was told to choose the sweet one who doesn't get anywhere, usually does a wholesome job. And I've chosen the former US president, Jimmy Carter. Good choice.

So Jimmy Carter, Katie, one-term president, former peanut farmer from Georgia. I think he's going to suffer, frankly, on a couple of things. One is he's a teetotaler. And I don't know if they're allowed alcohol on Love Island, but I think it doesn't speak of a sort of party animal spirit that he refused to have alcohol served in the White House. But he had peanuts, didn't he?

He was a peanut farmer. Well, he was a peanut farmer. I don't know whether peanuts will avail him much on Love Island. Might be popular. So he's married to Rosalind, Jimmy Carter, and he's very uxorious. There's absolutely no suggestion of hanky-panky. They've got a daughter called Amy.

But the sort of slightly complicating factor for Jimmy is that he's an evangelical Christian. He's born again. He's the first evangelical Christian president in modern American history. But when he was running for the presidency in 1976, he gave an interview to Playboy in which he, in very sort of evangelical style, he sort of lambasted himself about being full of sin.

And he said, I don't think of myself as better than other people i'm actually a seasoned and practiced adulterer uh because i've looked um because although i haven't actually done it in reality i've looked on women with lust i've i often find myself looking on other women with lust and i know that this is terrible behavior um so i think for somebody like jimmy carter who's quite buttoned up never drank spent a lot of time with peanuts going to camp david and trying to do talks and um trying to stop people use too much electricity which is basically his thing or too much petrol i think the shock of love island it would be very very interesting how how would how he'd look quite good in his speedos, wouldn't he?

Because he went for runs. Well, he went for a run and collapsed, Tom. Yes. So he famously went for a run and collapsed. He also went boating and was attacked by a killer rabbit, a swamp rabbit. So he's an accident prone. He's kind of accident prone. I'm just anxious about the committing lust in his heart

because i think that sets a bad precedent and if he's coming out with that first of all if he's coming out with that stuff on the island what are the girls gonna think and secondly um you know is it all gonna be too much for him is he gonna suddenly abandon his faith and his kind of long cherished principles and just go wild? Or will he just sit in the corner and cry? It's very hard to say. Yeah. Well,

I mean, that's, that's all the excitement, isn't it? It is. They have to do, they have to do video confessions. Will he be great at that?

Yeah. It's like Big Brother. I think he'd probably have an existential crisis in one of the, in one of the films. But how would, how would, how would that play with the, with the fans, Katie? what do you mean like with the yeah jimmy i think they'd love him you think they'd love him i think so i think the memes would start pretty much straight away yeah

but they'd be kind of in in good nature see there's part of me that thinks that actually he he could get quite far in the competition well we'll find out we don't know yeah usually they they keep the the kind of the one he's not very good at getting the women in for quite a long time all right well he's got to hope then because he's a fan favorite so so that's lord byron and jimmy carter um let's move on to the women so um i've got the stupid but lovable one um and i this was actually quite difficult because there aren't many stupid but lovable people who kind of make a name for themselves in history. They're either very clever or they're not very lovable.

But the person that I have nominated is Frances Stewart, who lived between 1647 and 1702. She was born to royalist courtiers during the Civil War, the English Civil War. So they moved to Paris. She was born two years before courtiers during the civil war the english civil war so they moved to paris um and she was born two years before the execution of charles i so she grew up outside england um but when charles ii went back to england with the restoration she went and first of all she she was a kind of lady in waiting to charles ii's mother and then to his wife catherine of Braganza. And she was stunningly beautiful.

So she was known as La Belle Stuart. Everyone at Charles II's court was obsessed with her. Samuel Pepys went on and on about how gorgeous she was. Duke of Buckingham fell head over heels in love with her. But the person, the biggest person who fell in love with her was Charles II himself, who was desperate to make her his mistress. And Frances Stewart was so dumb that she turned him down. And she was described by a French courtier that it would be difficult to imagine

less brain combined with more beauty. Wow. So, and she was so beautiful that she became the model for the first um portrait of britannia that appeared on kind of medals and coins issued in in in 1667 which was the same year that she ended up finally pairing up with someone who was actually not a bad catch the duke of richmond so she became the duchess of richmond um and and then lived a very happy life so um she she may have been dumb but but she was beautiful and happy. So I think that she'd be, I think she'd be very popular.

Oh, excellent choice. She's going to go far. Yeah, I think so. All right. So I'll choose a woman. One of your categories, Katie, was the gossip. In it for the drama and ruminates on whether women, people actually like each other in it for the money.

So I've chosen another 1970s character. I've chosen Marcia Williams, Lady Falkinder. So she was Harold Wilson's political secretary, but she was an immensely controversial figure in British life in the 70s. So she's from quite a humble background. She's the daughter, I think, of a Northamptonshire builder. And she's not an immensely good-looking northamptonshire builder and um she's she's not an immensely good looking woman i think it's fair to say so uh but she's very charismatic and very

clever and she's always plotting and scheming in wilson's sort of back office um she was married earlier and then divorced she has two children secretly with the political editor of the daily mail um she might odd thing for a for a labor insider to do and and that but later on there's a lot of controversy about whether or not she was accepting secret donations from shady businessmen to pay for her children's school fees which you might say is again slightly interesting from um uh the a labor special advisor. But basically, there was always this suspicion that hung around her

about whether she was, pouring poison the whole time into Harold Wilson's ear and poisoning him against his ministers. And B, whether the two of them were secretly having an affair.

And the story, one of his aides said that, claimed that in one of their many blazing rows that they would have in Downing Street, rows that would basically put sort of Boris and Carrie's, Carrie on to shame. Sometimes she would raise her handbag and she'd tap her handbag and she'd point to it meaningfully and she'd say, I have things in here that will destroy you. One call to the Daily Mail and you'll be finished. That's what I do with Tom, actually, a lot with your dad. Yeah, it is. It is.

Is that Love Island behaviour, Katie? The other thing is apparently at one point, I'm not sure if it's in Downing Street or just before they get into Downing Street, they have a massive row. So that's Marcia Williams, Harold and Mary, his wife. And Marcia rants at Mary. And she says, I have only one thing to say to you.

I went to bed with your husband five times in 1955. And it was not satisfactory. So, and then, of course, when Harold Wilson resigns, there are claims that basically she wrote his resignation honours list for him on lavender notepaper, the lavender list, as it was called, basically giving peerages to all her cronies in return for help with the school fees. So that's Marcia Williams.

I think she'd be a combustible character on Love Island. I think the issue of the satisfactoriness or otherwise of the couplings would obviously, you know, play a part. And I don't know. I mean, I don't see her as a fan favourite, but I think certainly the newspapers would enjoy her presence. Yeah, I don't know. I kind of think everyone would say whoever found her deserves a pay rise

because she's such a good TV. Yeah. Yeah. Good. I get a pay rise because she's such good tv yeah yeah good i get pay rise brilliant okay so okay so um i've got another woman next um and this is the bombshell who turns up and causes havoc steals someone else's man and doesn't care so so katie this is um this is a person who was born eliza Gilbert. So same name as your sister. But she's much flightier than our Eliza. So she was of Irish stock, but spent her early childhood in India, then came back, went to school in Scotland, in the northeast of England. She used to run naked through the streets, which caused some eyebrows to be raised. And this was at the beginning of the 19th century. So she's born in 1821 so this is the victorian period so you can imagine that running naked

through the streets in victorian scotland was not a common not a common thing 16 age 16 she elopes with a soldier so very kind of pride and prejudice uh it goes back to india um She has a massive bust up with her husband, leaves him in Calcutta, comes back to London and she has become a dancer. And not only has she become a dancer, but she pretends to be a Spanish dancer. And she has taken on the name of Lola Montes. So she performs as a dancer. She's probably not just a dancer and she gets recognised as having been Eliza Gilbert and so she flees to the continent where she she has a spectacular career as a courtesan so in Paris she has an affair with uh Alexandre Dumas who writes the Three Musketeers um very very shrewdly and I think this is very Love Island behavior she has an affair with a French guy who not only owns a

newspaper but is the dance correspondent. So can obviously write amazing reviews of Lola Montes, bigging her up. Is she in it for the money? She's in it for the money because she just burns through men like nobody's business. And having kind of got off with this newspaper critic, she then gets her biggest catch, who is Ludwig I of Bavaria, who basically allows her to run the country until there's a revolution in 1848 and Lele Montes has to kind of go running off. So having been kicked out from Bavaria, she goes back to London, where she marries again. This is a bigamist relationship, so, you know, illegal. So she flees to America, where she has further marriages, further affairs, people that she's had an affair with.

They all end up getting murdered or disappearing. She goes to Australia where she she has a notorious art, the spider dance, which kind of is a kind of can can. She horse whips people who annoy her. And she's just it's just generally it's kind of chaos, drama. She'd be an amazing, amazing contestant. She's she's had a huge impact on literature. So she's probably the model for Irene Adler in the Sherlock Holmes story, A Scandal in Bohemia. And in the Flashman series, Flashman has an affair with her in Royal Flash.

So she she would be a combustible highly entertaining highly glamorous um contender she could do her spider dance i think would be a great fan favorite um and she would just i mean she i think she'd find it very hard to stay coupled with one person unless she could be absolutely certain that person was going to win in which case she'd probably stick with him. Such a good choice. She really reminds me of my favourite all-time Love Islander, Moira. Who's that? Which will mean nothing to you. But she's the best person I've ever seen on TV.

And she was also Irish. She surely wasn't the first person you'd ever seen on TV. You must have seen people on TV before. But she's the best person I've ever seen on TV. The best person? I thought you said the first person. Oh, not the first. I had a terrible insight then into the Holland household.

You're banned from watching television until Love Island. Until Love Island comes on. Victorian dad gets it wrong. But there's actually a dance competition. Oh, well. I've got a dancer up my sleeve, Katie, but I'll hold her back for the time being

because I think she's a bit similar to Lola Montez, but also I want her to have the maximum possible impact, so I'll bring her in near the end. So just one more before the break. So you wanted a traitor, didn't you? You wanted a male traitor, very similar to the player, but with the difference that he pretends to be more into his partner than he is,

and then randomly pairs up with somebody else. So when I saw the word traitor, I thought I'm just going to go in quite big with this. I'm going to go with the traitor. So I've gone with Judas. That's a massive choice, a massive choice. So Judas enters the island. So what we know of Judas,

I think there is some doubt about whether Judas is there for love or whether he's there for the money, or more specifically for the 30 pieces of silver um so that that's I mean Judas has got form I think it's fair to say that although some of the other love islanders may not have heard of each other they'll all have by and large have heard of Judas so he comes in with baggage yeah and he's already guilty of one absolutely colossal betrayal as he comes into the island. But the interesting thing about Judas and what I think makes him a wild card in this competition,

I mean, he's got a lot of meme potential because he ended up hanging himself from a tree, didn't he, Tom? Yeah, he did. So fame didn't make him happy. Fame and wealth didn't make him happy. And also with the 30 pieces of silver. But also the truth of the matter is, when it comes to sort of affairs of the heart,

Judas is something of an enigma. We don't know anything about his romantic history, do we? I mean, oddly, the Bible is silent on Judas' love life. So we just don't know how he's going to interact with the others. How's he going to get on with Lola Montez? Will he be pals with Lord Byron? Or I mean, Jimmy Carter obviously is going to have massive issues with Judas.

Yeah. From the get go. Yeah. Cause Jimmy, you know, will be horrified to see Judas pitch up. I mean, there is of course the,

the plot twist that you get in Jesus Christ superstar, where actually he's, he's betraying Jesus simply to try and get jesus to you know reveal himself as the messiah so that suggests a kind of a talent for tricksy behavior for kind of psychological play that doesn't always come off so that might be interesting he might think the sort of judas marcia williams i could see them yeah if not coupling up then certainly they could play an interesting part stirring up the others against one another yeah and so on okay so anyway yeah um i'd be very i'm i'm particularly keen katie to see how judas gets on in this competition so do you think his motors might be more pure or maybe well this is the enigma i mean this is this is the fascination of it, isn't it? And that will be for the audience to decide.

I mean, the man who's already sold himself for 30 pieces of silver, 50 grand is a hell of a lot of money to Judas. Yeah, yeah. What will he do for 50 grand? I think on that cliffhanger, we should take a break. And when we come back, we'll look at the other five contenders.

I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman. And together we host The Rest Is Entertainment. It's your weekly fix of entertainment news, reviews, splash of showbiz gossip and on our Q&A we pull back the curtain on entertainment and we tell you how it all works. We have just launched our Members Club. If you want ad-free listening, bonus episodes and early access to live tickets, head to therestisentertainment.com. That's therestis of the entertainment.com that's the rest is entertainment.com welcome back to love island the tension is mounting the excitement is a fever pitch we're joined by top love island uh connoisseur enthusiast meme generator and all-round expert Katie Holland um who is of course the daughter of top uh TV historian

and Spider-Man Tom Holland and um Katie we've done six of the Love Island contestants haven't we we've we've got some pretty big names unexpected names Byron, President Carter, Judas, Francis Stuart, Marcia Williams. And that's it, isn't it? And Leila Montez. Leila Montez. And Tom, you're due to nominate your next. Yeah, so I'm going to go for a man this time. I'm going to go for a lad.

And this one is the lad of lads. So this is the funny one, the top lad who loves the lads, leader of the lads. And I've gone for General George Armstrong Custer, who, great 19th century general, 1839 to 76, great general, chiefly famous for having led the 7th Cavalry into the largest concentration of Native Americans gathered in the 19th century and being wiped out. Yeah, he says a great general, Tom. He's a terrible general but the thing about the thing about the battle of little bighorn is that it gave it gave those it gave the sioux and their allies probably the the single best moment of the 19th century um and i think that's what custer was all about he was about giving people a great time um people adored him he was nothing but trouble but people completely adored him so he was married he was married to libby and um she wrote about Custer that my husband used to tell me that he believed he was the happiest man on earth.

And I cannot help thinking that he was. Everything he did, he loved. He loved being in the cavalry. He loved having fun. who was in command of the Native American forces at the Battle of Little Bighorn said that he'd been told that when Custer died, he killed a man as he died, and then he laughed. So his very last thing was to kill someone and then laugh, which basically sums Custer up. And the whole course of his career was a kind of constant succession of scrapes, jams and and then people adored him so much that they would let him get out so he was at west point he came bottom at west point he was he he got kind of

court-martialed because he was supposed to be on sentry duty and he went off and got on a kind of lad's piss up in the the local town but everyone liked him so much that they let him off then the civil war happened and he was absolutely brilliant in the Civil War. He had these kind of golden ringlets. He loads of cavalry dash. He charged around. And again, everybody adored him. At the end of the Civil War, he was the youngest general ever in the US Army. And from that point on, he went out to the Great Plains and he just gallivanted around. His superiors would say, go and do this. He'd go off. He traveled everywhere with a team of Irish wolfhounds. And so if he kind of saw a deer or a buffalo, he'd go charging off after them and completely leave his troops stranded. And there was one occasion where

a whole load of soldiers went out to find him, got ambushed by Native Americans. They had their eyeballs taken out and put on rocks. They had their testicles cut off and put in their mouths. Custer was told about this. And instead of feeling guilty about it, he went, how exciting for them. That must have been so exciting for them to be stalked and killed. What a thrill. And so that's basically what he is. Everything is a laugh. It's a thrill and so that was basic that's basically what he is everything is a laugh it's a thrill it's excitement and and people cannot help but forgiving him for all the kind of terrible scrapes that he gets into tom i'm not i'm not i'm not going to try and torpedo custer's chances because i know you want him to do well but i'm not right in thinking that by the

time of little bighorn a he's a busted flush b he's starting to lose his hair i think which is surely a love island problem yeah i mean isn't there a counter argument he's actually a terrible general yeah he's a terrible general i i when i said great i mean great in the kind of love island sense that he looks like a general okay so not if he's losing his hair not if the ringlet yeah but but but he's entering it at the stage where in the words of one admirer, he is as beautiful as Absalom with his yellow curls. Okay, well. So he's a lad. Yeah, he does sound a lad.

How do you think he'd do, Katie? Well, I feel like the fact that he's not a great general doesn't really matter because they mention their jobs in the first week and then it doesn't really come up. He's not there to fight the Sioux, is he? Well, also, I feel like he'd bring it into the games he'd use like you know general um imagery to rally the troops rally his lads um i think he'd do really well um i mean he'd love all the games he'd love you know he'd be playing pranks he'd be stealing people's speedos and all that you know just be non-stop bants i feel like he'd he'd put on the lady's fake tan just to see how it suited his golden locks he would do you know what he'd be he'd be general banter he would he really would i love him already all right okay

well i've got so my other female contestant who deep down i think should win okay see i'm not gonna put the pressure on you. I think she should win. She's born in 500, about 500 AD, maybe from Syria. Maybe she's from Cyprus. She's the daughter of a dancer and an actress, and her name is Theodora. And she rises from humble beginnings to become Empress of Rome. Now, the thing about Theodora,

so she ends up marrying the Emperor Justinian, and Justinian and Theodora are probably the single most famous couple to have ruled the Eastern Roman Empire. So that's the successor state. Well, it's not the successor state. It's the continuation of the Roman Empire in the East, Byzantium, as it's called. They're one of the two or three most famous imperial couples of all time.

Theodora is a formidable character. So when these riots in Constantinople, after the chariot racing, the so-called Nica riots, when people are shouting Nica, Nica, sort of victory, victory, and smashing everything up and rampaging through Constantinople,

and the emperor is considering fleeing. It's Theodora who famously stiffens his resolve by saying, the purple, the imperial purple cloak, makes the best kind of funeral shroud. In other words, I'd rather die an empress than live as a commoner. And they stay and they kill everybody and survive. But the thing about Theodora is Theodora herself had been an actress and a dancer before she became Empress.

So that scandalized the kind of old elite of the court. And she is the subject of one of the raciest and most incendiary biographies ever written, The Secret History, by a man called Procopius, who had been a courtier and had sort of fallen out with the imperial couple. And he fills it with this sort of, frankly, quite pornographic stuff about Theodora's past. So he says, before she was empress, her venal charms were abandoned to a promiscuous crowd of citizens and strangers of every night and of every position the fortunate

lover who had been promised a night of enjoyment was often driven from her bed by a stronger or well or more wealthy favorite which is very love island procopia says often when she was alone with other actors she would undress in their midst and arch her and arch her back provocatively advertising like a peacock, both to those who had had experience of her and to those who had not yet had that privilege, her trained suppleness, which I think is also very Lavardian behaviour. Yeah, that is.

Often she would go picnicking with ten young men or more in the flower of their strength and virility and dallied with them all the whole night through. And when they wearied of the sport, she would approach their servants, perhaps 30 in number, and engage with each of these. And even thus, she found no allayment of her craving. And though, now I apologize to some listeners for this,

although she flung wide three gates to the ambassadors of Cupid, she lamented that nature had not similarly unlocked the straits of her bosomed that nature had not similarly unlocked the streets of her bosom so that she might there have contrived a further welcome to his emissaries so there's a lot of stuff like this and there's also some carry on with geese isn't there tom there is so so there aren't any there aren't any geese in the i suppose it could be couldn't there on it was my pleasure island so i can pleasure island so you could have them okay so so so she did she did stuff with geese i don't think would

make it onto primetime tv yeah but did she was that a rumor well that's the question isn't it that's the nature of this is the nature of that's the question and reality tv in the age of social media isn't it we don't know what's true and what's not and and also fair to point out that she does end up becoming a saint. So it'll be interesting to see which side of her character she brings out. The side that does things with geese

or the side that just spends the whole time in church praying. Because she's very religious, isn't she, Tom? She ends up very religious, yeah. So I think there's a lot going on with her and frankly, Katie, I'll be astounded if she doesn't win. I'll be shocked. I do think she's the most interesting one. She kind of reminds me of Molly May in season five.

Does she? Did Molly? Was she friends with geese? Well, I don't know. There's just quite a lot to say. Because I think the actress background is quite interesting. Yeah, the arching the back, all that stuff. So Molly May was an influencer before she joined Love Island.

And so I think people had a perception of her that she was in it to win. Right. That she was good at playing up to the cameras. So maybe that would be Theodora's criticism on Twitter. I think she would. Yes. Some people might. Well,

obviously the Procopius took a great dislike to her and I was basically just making it up I think I think sort of Guardian readers will take against her because Procopius would have been a Guardian reading, wouldn't he Tom? No, he's the Daily Mail, he's just making stuff up No, Procopius is the Metropolitan Elite

No, no, no, no he's tabloid, he's at pure tabloid tabloid is at pure tabloid press i think this is that's fake news right that's okay all right so um i've also got an ancient member of royalty uh so i'm going for uh it's another woman justifiably angry jilted one almost always a woman will pull her ex for a chat and berate him in front of everyone he won't care so i have gone for olympias uh fourth century queen from a pyrus who uh ended up marrying philip of macedon and is the mother of alexander the great uh and she had a tempestuous relationship with philip who was not a good boy, was constantly cheating on her. And Olympias was

a terrifyingly angry person, very, very formidable person. You wouldn't really want to annoy her, but Philip did. And so there are all kinds of rumours that in the end, she ended up having him assassinated, which would be a kind of extreme way to win love Island. But I think Olympias, you know, if that's what she decided it took, she'd do it. And other,

her other party trick. And again, perhaps this is something that would enable her to go directly in, in up against Theodora is that she's supposed to have gone to bed with giant snakes. Yeah. So I don't know how that would go down with the watching fans. But so she would offer fans snakes

and an ability to eliminate anyone who annoyed her. Which was her reputation that she was a spurned woman and she never got him back really in the end. Yeah. Well, he had multiple wives didn't he was yeah he was endlessly marrying um uh other queens and also he he played the dirty trick so so um Olympias was the the sister of the king of Epirus and so she could always rely on him but Philip kind of stabbed her in the back by sending off their daughter to to marry him so it was all very incestuous and devious and treacherous so he had the last laugh really no because he

ended up dead and and she uh she she survived him so i offer i offer you olympias yeah i think she's she's um controversial isn't she yeah i think she might pull people's backs up the wrong way. The snake stuff is a problem, I think. Yeah, I don't think she's going to do that well. Okay, well. Sorry. Okay, no, fine. Have we just got one left?

One left, yeah. So I'm in this to win this, actually. I want to see my contestants win. I can tell. So there's one category left, which is producer's favourite. Always very likeable and unproblematic. And so I thought I'd go for somebody very monogamous, uxorious, who pairs up quickly and then sticks by their partner

for the rest of the competition. Somebody who a lot of Restor's History audience, you know, who they'll already like because they know him as a great man of history. And trust him. And they trust him. Yeah, they trust him. And he's, of course,

former Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin. Yeah. So Stanley Baldwin, Katie, as I'm sure you know, you don't need me to tell you because I know Stanley Baldwin's name will trip off your tongue. Stanley Baldwin was three times Prime Minister in the 1920s and 1930s.

Criminally forgotten now, it pains me to say. A man of the Midlands. He appears very stolid, kind of paternalistic, conservative. He gave a tenth of his fortune to pay off the national debt anonymously at the end of the First World War.

So he's an incredibly kind man, Katie. And I think that will count for a lot with the fans. I think what will also count with the fans is he's not boring, so he's not Jimmy Carter Jimmy Carter has committed lust in his heart as we know Stanley was almost kicked out of Harrow as a boy for writing his own pornography and then I'd forgotten this that when he then went

on to Cambridge where he got third his time at Trinity College, Cambridge, was blighted by the fact that when he went to Cambridge, as soon as he arrived at Trinity, they said, oh, we've got a new master of the college. And to his horror, the new master of the college was the headmaster of Harrow. Oh, that's awful. Who had never forgiven him for writing this porn. And basically was always glaring at him

or giving him, you you know muttering under his breath as he passed Baldwin so that was that was a problem for Baldwin um but one more thing about Baldwin which I think will endear him to the fans is Baldwin and his wife Lucy had I think six children like I remember but one of them Oliver who also became an MP became an MP for the Labour Party and was gay and lived with his friend Johnny, his partner, all his days. And Stanley, defying the conventions of the times, was absolutely fine with this, would write letters to them as a couple, have them over for dinner, all this kind of thing. Very, very progressive, good behaviour.

Now, on top of that, we need to talk about his love life. So this will definitely, I think this actually will tempt Tom away from some of Tom's own contenders. Stanley met his wife, Lucy. Lucy, when you look at pictures of her, is not a natural Love Island contestant. I think it's fair to say she's quite a large woman, but she's photographed in later life.

So let's give her the benefit of the doubt. But he met Lucy, and he he was as a young man. And what literally bowled him over was that when he first laid eyes upon her, she was bowling in a cricket match. Wow. Because she was a very, very keen cricketer. She played for the white Heather club,

which is, I think the first women's one or one of the first women's cricket clubs, she was an excellent batsman or batswoman. Her average, Tom, do you know what her average was? Yeah. I'm asking you to guess. Oh, 36. No, her batting average was 62.

Wow. She was higher at the time than the top professional men's player. So she was an absolutely first-class cricketer. Do you know, she will bowl over the fans dominic stanley baldwin was immensely impressed by her he would take the train to go and watch her play cricket and then when he will take the train home home again on the way home he would get off katie at every stop to send her a telegram saying how much he was missing her okay yeah stanley baldwin i think mean, he's not in this for the money because he's giving his money away.

He's in this for love. But he didn't adequately prepare us for the Second World War. So there is that. That is a minor, no. So that is more fake news. There is that. So that is perhaps a problem. I feel like you're just jealous because Dominic's choices are so good.

No, I'm not in it to win. I'm not in it to win. I'm in it to provide the fans with the best show. That's the thing. So just before you choose who couples up with who, we just need to run through who looks good in skimpy swimwear because that's key, isn't it? Yeah.

Okay, so who have we got we so we got um little byron byron will look good yeah general custer general custer would look good jimmy carter not good jimmy carter probably not not good he's a bit stupid scrawny yeah a bit scrawny uh stanley baldwin terror he wouldn't look good i mean he looks good in a tweed suit and a hat but he's not going to look good in speedos is he i mean even you would admit that dominic i would i would admit that and who was the fifth man i can't remember i have i have no idea but he'd probably look quite good well that's

i mean he's been roaming around galilee for three years so he's probably quite tanned tanned i think he'd look good i think he'd look good so uh and then the girls uh leila montes would obviously be sensational uh theodora would look sensational francis stewart would look sensational olympias would probably look frightening i just think there'd be something about how they would be. She'd probably have lots of menacing tattoos. And I can't remember who the fifth one was. Marcia Williams, Lady Fulmer. What would she look like? What would she look like twerking? I can't even speak. I'm laughing so much, also I've completely lost my voice okay so I think Marcy Williams

probably is in the Stanley Baldwin category when it comes to the swimwear I don't think it's okay so Katie Dunn can you can you pair up those those 10 contenders so this is sort of week one is it hard um that's the fun of it isn't it okay so i think i do okay so i think instinctively byron and olympia pair up i think she'd i think she'd like she'd want him because he wants everyone else yeah and he would be awful for her he'd be awful and i so i think the producers would would make them get together through games. Excellent pairing. Yeah. Okay, I'm glad you thought that was an excellent pairing

because I wasn't really sure. No, you're the arbiter. You choose. Okay. I think Theodora and Stanley Baldwin. Oh, yeah. That's my dream couple i'd like to have them over here dominic i i can't i mean that is so completely your dream pairing

okay so theodora and stanley baldwin yeah okay good um so that's the second you need to say why or can i just just give you the pair yeah no yeah so that's as obvious i mean well yeah but but why do you think well why is it dominic's dream pet dream pairing because stanley baldwin's his hero and theodora is his um heroine oh i did it for you he's always loved them but why do you think that stanley baldwin and theodora would make a natural couple um because i think um they both have quite cheeky sides to them yeah that's one way of putting it okay yeah that's a good reason that's a good reason they're quite good at they're not they're they're pretty good people at monogamy yeah they're pretty good people. At monogamy, yeah.

They're heart of gold, heart of gold. Yeah. And I think Theodora would be, you know, Sandy Baldwin's a leader. She's good at helping a leader. I think people at first wouldn't trust her, that they would think she was just with him because everyone likes him and that it's a clear way to get money. You know, she's a shrewd intelligent and so

rather than married to someone who spends all her time playing cricket maybe if he's matched up with someone who could say you know rearm Yeah You're looking at a very different story the origins of the second world war with Theodore I think Theodore and Sani would be quite sweet together actually

Okay good Okay Marcy Williams I just don't know what to do with her Dora and Sani would be quite sweet together, actually. Okay, good. Okay. Marcy Williams, I just don't know what to do with her. Okay, I feel like Lola Montes and General Custer would have a good time. Yeah, I think they'd be. Definitely would. I can't believe I'm taking this sufficiently seriously, that I'm diligently noting down what you're saying.

Okay, so I think I agree. They completely go together. They are gin and tonic. Fourth couple? Okay, my fourth couple are Marcy Williams and Judas. Marcy Williams and Judas. Yes. I mean, that would be a toxic pairing, wouldn't it?

Well, if she's tapping a handbag and threatening to ring the Daily mail about him but i think because i think she'd be but i think she'd be intrigued by his motives and she'd say maybe we would be a good power couple i feel like they'd match in each other yeah let's join up and make some right yes and i think they tried to sabotage everyone it would yeah so they could win. But I'm not sure they'd make it to the fight well. I guess for the fans to say, isn't it? Well, it's for you to say, actually. And then I finally put Jimmy Carter and Francis Stewart.

Yeah, yeah, I could see that working. But they're both sweet people. But Jimmy Carter done very well for himself there, I think. Unaccountably well. Yeah. I think he'd very well for himself there, I think. Unaccountably well. Yeah. I think he'd be completely obsessed with her, but would be panicking. I think that's a very, very sweet pairing.

Right. But somebody has to go, right? They do. But Dominic and Katie, back me up here. Part of the complication is that you then bring new people into the mix, right? Yeah, exactly. So that's also part of it.

They're parachuted in. So, Dominic, what I thought we should do is that we should, before Katie decides who gets thrown off, because we're going to have four couples that go up to the public vote. So one of these five couples needs to go. we do that let's introduce three lads and three babes in their in their their tight speedos and their bikinis to see whether katie thinks that any of these might be successful in in kind of worming their way in i've chosen three lads you've chosen three babes i'm gutted that you've incriminated me in this but go on yeah okay so the three lads that i've chosen and all of these are friends of the show so regular listeners podcast will will probably know who they are okay so the first the first person I'm introducing well actually they're a pair of lads they're good old they're friends the first one is Dietrich von Hülsen

Heisler who Katie is the chief of the German general staff but is chiefly known for the way that he died so he was in a hunting lodge with the kaiser and a whole and all the top general german generals um the kaiser's feeling a bit down dietrich von hülsenhäseler goes out goes out of the room in mid-supper and suddenly bursts back in dressed in a tutu pirouettes does dance to the sugar plum fairy and then kills over dead now do you think that this would be a party trick that would appeal to any of any of the any of the girls in that we've got there i think oh because that reminds me very much of a moment in 2019 oh really well what 2019. Oh, really? What happened? Tell us. So there's a dancing challenge

where you have to try and get your partner's heart rate up. And it reminds me of Curtis a bit. So there's a couple of dancers in the mix. I mean, experienced dancers. Theodora Lola Montez. Maybe Lola Montez.

You think she'd ditch General Custer for Dietrich Graf von Hülsenhäseler? I'm not sure. I don't think she would. I don't think she would. Okay, well, listen, Katie, the two other lads who come in, the next one is Dietrich von Hülsenhäseler's friend, the Kaiser. Oh, gosh.

But disaster, because he's come in in his tight speedos looking good, but he's wearing deck shoes. He's wearing deck shoes. They're the wrong shoes. He's got the wrong end of speedos looking good, but he's wearing deck shoes. He's wearing deck shoes. They're the wrong shoes. He's got the wrong end of the stick. Oh, no. But would the fact he's wearing deck shoes. Exactly.

I mean, the wrong footwear. I don't know how that would play. What would Olympias or Marcio Williams. Okay. And the third friend of the show he's coming in is General Gordon. Yeah. Chinese Gordon. Great imperial hero in China,

in Khartoum, ends up dying there. But he's possibly not the ideal person to go on Love Island because it was said of him that the presence of ladies, especially fashionable ladies, filled him with uneasiness. And on one occasion, he went to the ballet in naples sat there for about five minutes was so appalled by uh by the spectacle of what the ballerinas were wearing that he stormed out crying you call that civilization so i i don't know whether you think any of those would would really i mean there's no obligation they're all really good i think they're really good choices but i don't think i think general g Gordon would have the same luck as Jimmy Carter,

really. I think they'd make him go on loads of dates and he'd find it horrible. He'd hate it. He'd really hate it. Some people walk out, don't they? Yeah, someone walked out last week, actually, because he thought, this isn't for me. I see General Gordon as somebody who would walk out quite quickly. Yeah, I would agree with

that, Dominic. Yeah, I think he would walk out very quickly. So probably none of them, then. That's disappointing. Yeah, I would agree with that, Dominic. Yeah, I think he would walk out very quickly. So probably none of them then. That's disappointing. Well, I don't think deck shoes are enough to get you booted off the island, but I don't think instinctively, I don't think that none of these people are speaking to me as his soulmate.

Okay, okay, fine. Okay, so Dominic, the three girls. So the three ladies. So I think it's fair to say, isn't it, Katie, that Love Island is a story like all reality TV shows of heroes and villains, and the producers like to create villains. So I thought I'd bring on one of history's great undisputed villains, and that is the writer Virginia Woolf.

So Mrs. Woolf enters the house. I mean, people will know her. Modernist writer, author of Mrs. Dalloway, To the Lighthouse and so on. Also a towering world-class snob who was writing her diary about how she hates her servants and wishes they were all dead and they're horribly fat and common

and all this sort of thing. Well, she wouldn't have to worry about fat people, would she? No, that's not going to be a problem. But the issue of, I mean, Theodora is from the sort of wrong side of the tracks lola montez um virginia wolf i personally i see her trying to form an alliance early on with marcia williams they both have a sort of equine look yes um so they might bond they might bond over that would i mean katie the decision is yours I think Virginia Woolf would get on quite well with Judas oh Dominic but you may disagree I mean she hated Stanley Baldwin by the way there was bad blood

there because Stanley Baldwin oh you know represents everything that Mrs. Woolf despises in the politics of the 1920s so the producers know that of course so that's almost like bringing on an ex or something so when she enters the show. When you've got bad blood before, yeah. I think the cameras are on Stanley Baldwin's face. Yeah. Rolling his eyes. Oh my God, it's Virginia.

Okay, who else, Dominic? So Virginia Woolf, my next one, I have to say Tom was slightly instrumental in some of these choices. The next one is another great fan favourite, though some people might say another villainess, somebody who's going to have a little bit of an issue possibly with Marcia Williams, and that's the late Baroness Thatcher.

So Mrs. Thatcher, now she's an interesting one because, A, she loves dancing. She's well up for the dancing challenges because when she visited the White House in, I think, 1981, Dennis and the ambassador and so on had to basically prize her away from receptions because she wanted to keep dancing to the small hours and actually when they got to new york at the end of the trip she again said at the end of one evening i'd love to now go dancing and they were like no no prime minister you can't go dancing

so that's an issue so but she wouldn't like sitting around by swimming pool would she no because she hated holidays this is problem. She was always trying to work. She would undoubtedly bring work with her. I worry that she would argue with Marcia Williams a lot about inflation or something. I mean, she hated, she didn't get on with Jimmy Carter. So again. Oh, I was about to say maybe that could be a... He was teased a teetotaler.

She likes a drink of an evening. She went to the White House and had a terrible time when he was the host but they're both quite exorius aren't they so well they are they are although she had an eye for kind of raffish slightly sleazy lounge lizard men maybe she loves that she would love byron she'd she hated jimmy carter because he's boring she'd love byron'd love Custer. I actually think deep down she would have a slight soft spot for Judas. Gosh, yeah. No, she's very devout. But the Methodism is an issue there.

No, I don't think so. I think Virginia Woolf I don't think is strong enough to tear apart Marcia Williams and Judas for me. Oh, really? Okay. And what about your third choice, Dominic? Yeah, well, what Katie's thinking about, Mrs. Thatcher, the third choice, a real favourite of Tom's this,

and I have to say he put me up to this. Yeah, I did. It appears to be the late Empress Poppea, wife of the Emperor Nero. But it must become quite quickly apparent, Tom, if there's this whole swimwear stuff and all this business, that actually this is Nero's it's a slave isn't he he's a freedman he's a free boy a freed boy called Sporus who Nero has had castrated

to make him look like Poppea which I think is something perhaps that the Love Island production hasn't yet investigated so we're ahead of the curve so They definitely haven't, no. So they haven't introduced a eunuch. So this is very progressive. I mean there's probably going to be complaints on social media about Love Island going woke. I know exactly what would happen to Sporus actually. That's the one I do know. What's going to happen? I think Sporus and Byron will get together. So what happens to Olympias? Leaving Olympias jilted and booted off the island. Because if you're single, you can't survive. Olympias booted off the island. But hold on, at this point,

at the point that Sporus jumps into bed with Byron. Yeah. I mean, in desperation, isn't she going to try and make a move on Judas or something? Or on Margaret Thatcher? I mean... Well, listen, we need to decide who our couples are katie so you need to decide so you are you booting olympias off and byron is pairing up with spores yeah yeah that's what i

know surely olympias would make a move on jimmy carter rather than francis stewart and and poor francis stewart is so dumb that she'd be powerless she'd wake up and find three enormous snakes in her bed and it would never cross her mind that someone was out to get her because she'd be powerless. She'd wake up and find three enormous snakes in her bed, and it would never cross her mind that someone was out to get her, because she'd be too dumb. Do you think Olympias would have things to talk about with Jimmy Carter? Yeah, Olympias is a woman with a hard-headed understanding of power. So I think that she'd be able to help Jimmy Carter with the energy crisis, and certainly she'd be able to help him with his running.

Oh, I like that. I like that. Okay. Byron and Sporus. Byron and Sporus. Byron and Sporus. And then let's go for Olympias and Jimmy Carter. And then let's get rid of Francis Stewart. And the rest are all as is. Yeah. Stanley Baldwin and Theodora.

Judas is still with Marcia. Yeah. I feel quite strongly about that. Wow. Okay. And then Custer and Lola. Yeah. Okay. So Katie. about that wow okay and then Custer and uh Lola yeah okay so Katie so let's so the five historical

Love Island 2022 contestants are Lord Byron and Sporus, Jimmy Carter and Olympias, Stanley Baldwin and Theodora, Judas and Marcia Falkender, General Custer and Lola Montes. Now only four can go forward to the public vote. Which of those five couples are you going to evict? I think it might have to be Judas and Marcia Williams. Wow. That is a bombshell for Judas. That is a bombshell. He's gone back. He just can't win, can he?

I mean, I just don't think people, I think people don't trust them. He was in it for the money and now nothing. And now nothing. Yeah, I think it was a bit transparent, maybe his motives. So the public didn't like it. So, ladies and gentlemen, that's the result. We will put this up to vote on Twitter. Byron and Sporus, Carter and Olympias, Baldwin and Theodora, Custer and Montez.

Amazing. But there can be only one victor, only one winning couple, and it is up to you, the public, to decide. And so we will announce the result in a special bonus episode that we will put out in, what, a day after tomorrow.

And we will go over the entrails, have a look, analyse the drama and crown our 2022 Historical Love Island champions. Thanks very much for listening. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye.

Thanks for listening to The Rest is History. For bonus episodes, early access, ad-free listening, and access to our chat community, please sign up at restishistorypod.com. That's restishistorypod.com. I'm Marina Hyde. And I'm Richard Osman. And together we host The Rest is Entertainment. It's your weekly fix of entertainment news, reviews, splash of showbiz gossip and on our Q&A we pull back the curtain on entertainment and we tell you how it all works. We have just launched our Members Club. If you want ad-free listening, bonus episodes and early access to live tickets, head to therestisentertainment.com. That's therestisentertainment.com.