Woman's Hour - 02/07/2026

Episode Date: July 2, 2026

Women's voices and women's lives - topical conversations to inform, challenge and inspire.

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Hello, I'm Nula McGovern and welcome to Woman's Hour from BBC Radio 4. Just to say that for rights reasons, the music in the original radio broadcast has been removed for this podcast. Hello and welcome to the programme. Well, did you see the 11 foot tall figure of Superman that was suspended a thousand feet above the pavement when it's actually within the exposed spire off the shard, which is the capital's tallest skyscraper.

Now the photos and the video of it are quite a sight. But Rachel Brosnahen, who plays the latest Lois Lane in the new Superman film was there in the flesh yesterday. She is in our studio today. So Superman and Marvelous Mrs. Maisel fans do stay with us. We also have the journalist Jenny Evans to discuss her memoir, Don't Let It Break You, Honey.

It is her story of fighting back against a system that had harmed her following sexual assault, including abuses of power in the press and the police. We have the author, DJ and footballer Annie McManus this hour on how the lionesses win at the Euros inspired her to get back on the pitch. The Euros or UEFA's European Women's Championship gets underway tonight. And I'm wondering, are you planning on following the tournament? Which team? Where will you watch? And with who?

You can text the program. The number is 84844 on social media where at BBC Women's Hour, or you can email us through our website. For a WhatsApp message or a voice note, the number is 0,300-100-400-44. Plus, we'll have the story of Bella Cully, the British teenager, held in prison in Georgia for possession and trafficking of drugs. Bella says she was tortured into smuggling. We're going to be in TBC for the latest on that. But let me begin with Superman. Many of us have seen a Superman film at some point in our lives. Clark Kent has got a lot of the attention, but let us focus in on his love interest,

the Whipsmart journalist Lois Lane. Taking on that role is the actor Rachel Brosnahan. Now, you might know her for her Emmy-winning portrayal of Midge Maisel in the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, her Emmy-nominated performances in the House of Cards or her work on Broadway. But she's now in the DC-Universe film Superman. She's alongside David Cornswet,

as Clark Kent slash Superman and Nicholas Holt as Lex Luthor. It'll be released next week. Maybe you're seeing the posters around for it as well. Well, she's here in studio. And I'm wondering, what was it like, Rachel, to be high above London yesterday at The Shard?

It was incredible. It was much higher than we all thought it might be. And Superman was massive from up there. I just, I can't believe we had the opportunity. And I've been told not to say something very rude about being taken up there. on the BBC. Of course not.

Was it any cooler up there yesterday, I'm wondering? I have to admit, it was a bit. Yeah, there was a nice breeze. It was beautiful. What a way to see London. Yeah, I mean, the pictures of it are everywhere. And it's definitely an eye-catcher. Look up, I think, is the slogan that they're giving.

But I want to know, I want to look back. How did you find out that you had got this iconic role of Lois Lane? I've now told this story number. of times and I wish it was a better one, but I was, I was in a toilet in Soho, in New York. And my phone rang and it said maybe James Gunn on the caller ID. And I've been waiting for that call for about maybe a week or 10 days at that point. And so I was like, I've got to pick this up. I can't miss the call, you know, and sort of ran out and tried to pick it up and hoped that a toilet didn't flush behind that. And I'll just say James Gunn, CEO of DC Studios. Yes. And the, right.

writer and director of the film. Yes. And he called and said, how would you like to be Lois Lane? And then a toilet flushed behind me. And I said, I'll take it. He must have been at the other end thinking, I don't even want to know what he was thinking. But that is quite a lot to take in. Did you, like, I mean, were you just waiting for that call thinking, I've probably got it? Or did it take a minute? No, no matter how long I've been doing this, I don't think I've ever left a situation being like, yep, nailed it. That one's mine. No, I had no idea. And I knew that I'd probably get a call in one direction or another from someone, but I didn't know that when he was calling it would be a positive call. It was, it was very exciting. A little bit intimidating,

but at that point, you know, I'd started to feel like I was seeing little signs everywhere at the risk of sounding totally woo-woo. I left this audition and went on the plane, and went on the plane and I'd never seen any of the man of steel films and all of them were on the plane available to watch. There was a man next to me on the train the morning that I got that call wearing a Superman t-shirt and I just started to feel like there were tiny signs all over the place, but it was really, really exciting. And how long then from when you got that call until you start filming? It was a couple of months. But not that long? No, do you know, it was about eight months because the actors went on strike.

So set the call in, I want to say, May or June, and we started filming in February, I believe, the following year. And so you go, and I want to hear more about the filming in a moment. But, you know, as I was researching Superman, I remember watching Superman the Christopher Reeve story, which is such a beautiful film. And in one part, it tells the story of Robin Williams, who is Christopher's great friend and roommate.

And Robin tried to dissuade Christopher. from taking that original Superman role that he wouldn't be considered a serious actor if he took it. And I was wondering, is there any of that attitude towards superhero action films anymore? I suppose there is a bit within the industry,

but I think there's been enough people, including Christopher Reeve, who laid the groundwork for so many of us. It was definitely a big risk for him. It hadn't really been done at that point. And I don't think anybody knew that it would become what it did. As he said something about,

you know, when you get out there, It's just you in those tights, and it could have been pretty silly. But thankfully, it ended up bringing the magic of cinema to so many people and sort of launching this genre in a really big way. But, I mean, we're following in the footsteps of some phenomenal actors, not just the ones who have played these roles before us, but in other, you know, DC and Marvel universes, there's so many brilliant actors in them.

Did you look back at the films to try and decide what sort of Lois Lane you wanted to be? No, at that point I felt I was a bit too late. I had seen and fallen in love with the Christopher Reeve Margo Kidder movie when, the movies when I was about 12. My dad showed them to me. He grew up on them. And even though the visual effects might have been slightly outdated, they just, I was totally, you know, wrapped watching these films.

With the story. Well, let's talk about visual effects because this is a film, of course, off the age 2025, a lot of CGI. And I'm wondering how. How is that as an actor to be working with, I don't know, various screens or you tell me what it's like? Thankfully, in this film, there's less CGI than you might think. Okay. Some things that I was certain, even watching the teaser that they showed us while we were on set,

things I was certain were CGI like the robots that you see at the beginning of the film in the Fortress of Solitude. Those are practical, or at least one of them is. And they almost don't look real. we were shooting, I can now say this because it's appeared in one of the trailers, but in a spaceship that Lois briefly drives. And that was real. We were hung from the ceiling in a sound stage in Atlanta. It was, we were pretty high up in the air. So we see a theme here. Yeah, but yes, exactly. We had we had the great gift of having a lot of that be practical. But there were definitely challenges. I've shot a scene with Crypto, the dog, who was not real. And it was one of the, nothing will make you feel like a word. actor than shooting with an animal that isn't there. How do you do that? Do they give you direction, left a bit, right a bit? Yeah, it was mostly, they'd been doing it for a number of months at that point by the time I shot it.

And I think everybody forgot that it was my first time ever doing it because they were in such a rhythm. And all I could hear was James over the God mic going, Rachel, no, no, no, you put your hands with the dog. No, you put your hand through it again. No, to let, you're putting your hands through the middle of the dog, you know? I went home and I was like, oh, my God. I don't know if I'm cut out for this. Should I quit while I'm ahead? No, it was fine.

It was really fun. And now I'm being relentlessly made fun of for that day by David and Nick. Well, that has to be done. But it does show some of the challenges. And that sounds also like kind of a thrilling moment when you talk about being suspended and out of your comfort zone. But I hear you're actually not that averse to getting physical and out of your comfort zone, that you were a wrestler in high school. A very now past life, but yes, I was a high school wrestler for a couple of years.

I come from a really athletic family, and I'm kind of a black sheep that way. But my dad played pretty competitive tennis. My sister played D1 soccer. My brother was a hockey player. And so I was briefly a wrestler and a snowboarder, a lacrosse player for about four seconds. I tried a lot of it and then had no skills. So I became an actor. And when you were wrestling, was it against boys or girls?

Boys, yeah, I was the only girl on our team. That's quite something. Yeah, there's something I loved about, there's something that felt really equitable about wrestling, I suppose. It's done by weight class. So even though I was wrestling against boys, we all weighed the same. So they might be stronger, I might be faster.

It was really fun. I just, I loved it. It felt like improv. You know, you're just anticipating somebody's next move. And, yeah, it was a blast. So some parallels with acting. A little bit. Becoming part of the DC universe,

these huge franchises, are you ready for more fame? I actually have no idea what to expect. Obviously other people have done this and have experienced high levels of visibility. You just never know. And it's been a real joy to be a part of this cast, to have had different experiences with this kind of thing.

But I think we felt so wonderfully insulated making this film. James is so passionate about this universe and these characters. He's lived with them for so much longer than we have. And it really felt like we were making a movie. Obviously, we knew for the fans and for other people, but it felt like we were making a movie just for us. And for a movie of that scale, it often felt quite small and in a really fantastic way.

And so I think we're all just ready to bend our knees. and see what happens. And we'd be so lucky if this reached people and moved people in the way that it did us. You were almost in a pocket universe. You'll have to see the film

to know what I'm talking about. Yes, you will. But with that, I'm just wondering about this moment for you, when you know you are, we all know, you're on the cusp of another level of fame,

for example, of recognition. Yeah. Do you think about that? I try not to. Okay. I feel very lucky to have, for many, many years, always been the youngest person on every set I'd ever been a part of. And I feel like I got to watch older actors who were better at this than I was, who had been doing this for longer than I was.

I was raised by a generation of actors who just said, none of that matters. Put your head down and do the work. And I got to watch them in action, deal with fame and visibility. And if I could do that with a fraction of the great. race that was modeled for me. I think I would feel very proud and very fortunate. But I feel like because of that experience, I've been thus far undistracted and just love to work. And so I'm excited about what comes next and the possibilities that come along with the potential of this project being successful in a way that lets me do other things I'm excited about.

Speaking about being the youngest, you were about 27 when you took on the marvellous Mrs. Maisel, one of my favourite TV shows, I have to say, I just loved it. Real joy to watch for anybody who hasn't seen it, watch it back, fast, hilarious, quite subversive in a way because this is about Mrs. Maisel, who was a comedian who was doing the New York circuit, comedy circuit. And I think perhaps even now when we kind of compare, to perhaps where comedy is. Yeah, absolutely.

She was a woman ahead of her time in so many ways. You know, she was modeled after, borrowed different pieces from a lot of pioneering comedians. Was it Joan Rivers? This is what I used to hear. No. And I had asked when we first started, but certainly I, of course, looked at some of Jones material. I looked really closely to a woman named Jean Carroll, who's a lesser-known comedian, borrowed a lot of her physical mannerisms. But yeah, this was a story being told by women about a woman at a time when history was often told by men.

And it's surprising to me, especially after having been a part of that show, that people still wonder whether or not women are funny. I can't believe we're still asking that question in 2025. Yeah, well, we're not asking it here. We're just pointing a finger, perhaps others. Now, Mrs. Maisel, she's a Jewish character. You're not Jewish. But there's often a discussion you'll know about who plays who. And I was wondering what your take is on actors playing other cultures.

Well, I think the discussion is vitally important and the discussion evolved over the course of us working on that show. And I suppose that's just it is that I don't have a definitive answer. I think it's something that we should be talking about, that we should be obviously talking about with the people who are represented in these various projects and figuring that out. our job is almost always to play people who are not us, but certainly there's a line and it'll continue to evolve as we learn more and as we have more discussions about what representation means to different groups. So I welcome the discussion. It's important. And that brings me to your production company, scrap paper pictures, which I was taking a look at this morning. And I love the line. You says you want to push at the boundaries of the worlds we

recognize on screen. Yeah. Yeah. What does that mean? Well, I am the beneficiary of a lot of people saying yes to me at moments when, frankly, they had no evidence I could necessarily do the things I was being asked to. We talked about the Marvelous Mrs. Maisel. I'd been explicitly told I wasn't funny for about six or seven years before then. And was that by family? No, no. By, you know, I'd auditioned for a lot of things and people kind of said, look, we like her. She's just not very funny. I lost a role that morning that I found out that I had. booked The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel for being charming but unfunny. And so I have appreciated the opportunity to drop into worlds that are unfamiliar to me. And when we think about world building traditionally,

we think about big genre movies like Superman. But there are a lot of other worlds, the world of 1960s comedy. You know, I played a, I produced a film called I'm Your Woman. And I played a 1970s housewife whose mobster husband gets kidnapped and goes on a big journey, you know, building out that world, what it would be like to be a woman on the run in the 1970s. So, yeah, I think we want to push the boundaries of the spaces, places and people that we see on screen. But, you know, I'm just struck by the fact of those rejections that you got for being unfunny, for example, when it's obviously something you were following and are, I mean, amazing and brilliant

as Mrs. Maisel. How did you bounce back from that? How do you bounce back from that rejection? Or not take it on board if you get a string of people telling you the same thing, which is a negative thing. It's fine if it's positive. I suppose at the time, maybe it would have been harder if I'd felt like I was very funny. But I don't know that it was a solidified part of my identity at that point. And so it didn't feel like a rejection. I mean, of course, I needed a job. I needed to pay my rent. I would have liked to have any number of those jobs. But I guess it just felt like something that must have been true. And so it was a sign because enough people had said it that I should probably just head in a different direction and focus on other things that I was perhaps better at.

And so I was wildly intimidated stepping into this role. But I've often found in my own work that when people take those big chances on me, chances that I wouldn't necessarily take on myself, that you have no choice really. but to stand at the edge of the plank and step off it and try something that feels totally out of your comfort zone. And now I'm hooked on that feeling. And I think that's a part of what we want to do as a production company too, is to say yes to people who are ready to take on a brand new opportunity. And push of the boundaries.

But isn't it thought-provoking that these people that thought they knew you, which obviously they didn't, and that we are at times prepared to take on the opinions of others to shape what we should do or not do? Yeah, it also, I guess with Maisel, it feels like the script was so fantastic. The character didn't really truthfully feel clear to me until maybe the night before or even the morning we stepped on set. But the roadmap was so clear. And Amy Sherman Palladino, who created the show, had such a crystal clear vision that I still don't know that, I still don't necessarily think I would say I'm funny.

I just found a way in to a person who is very funny because she's single-minded, because she literally doesn't know how to do anything at less than 125%, whether it's making a brisket or picking out an outfit or pursuing stand-up comedy when everybody told her she shouldn't. And I think naturally that's fodder for comedy. And then I was surrounded by some of the funniest people I've ever known. So I think there's always, you just have to find your way in. I think I now believe more that there.

There are no limits. It's just about finding the right partners, the right collaborators and people who can push you into spaces that you're uncomfortable with and help you discover new things about yourself. Well, we're very glad you were pushed. Rachel Brasden, thank you so much for coming into Women's Hour. Superman is in cinemas on Friday, the 11th of July. My understanding, you haven't seen it yet? I haven't seen it yet. I'm going to see it next week at the premiere in Los Angeles.

Enjoy. Thanks so much for coming in. Thank you. Well, moving on, if you want to get in touch, 848. I want to know you're watching the Euros. You're gearing up for the tournament. England and Wales are in it. Maybe you're following them. Maybe you're following another country.

Let me know. But I want to turn to Georgia next. A British teenager who is currently being held in prison in the country, Georgia, says she was tortured into smuggling drugs. Bella Culley, who is 19 and from Teesside, initially went missing in Thailand before being arrested in Tbilisi International Airport in May. She appeared in court yesterday, pleading not guilty to charges of possession

and trafficking a large amount of illegal drugs. Let me bring in Rayan Dmitri, the BBC's caucus correspondent who's there, joining me from Tbilisi. Good to have you with us, Rehan. Thank you for joining us. Can you tell us a little bit more about Bella and how she ended up in Georgia?

Hi, Nula. Yes, so Bella Cully, she was an 18-year-old teenager who flew into Georgia back in May. And was arrested upon her arrival at the Tbilisi International Airport after police discovered a suitcase full of cannabis, 14 kilograms of cannabis in her hold luggage. Back then, it was possible to film in Georgian courts, which is not the case now. So we saw the images of this teenager. She looked like she was plucked out of the beach in a crop top and shorts.

She looked very kind of disoriented and shell-shocked when she first appeared in court and when she was officially charged. And after that, she was placed in pretrial detention at a all kind of female prison in a town close to the capital of Belize. And that's where she has been since, and she turned 19 at the end of May, in Georgian prison. and her first appearance in court was yesterday after this pretrial detention. And what happened? So yesterday her father, aunt and grandfather, they were present at this pre-trial hearing. And so the prosecution and her defense lawyer, they exchanged evidence. They sort of kind of set the scene for the trial, which is going to go ahead.

head later this month. Bella appeared in person and she was wearing a pink t-shirt and black pencil skirt. She had a ponytail and she smiled when she saw her family. But then she started crying as the court proceedings continued. She was sobbing. At one point, her defense lawyer kind of turned back and was asking for tissues and she got the tissue and she replied. in Georgian to say thank you, which is the word Madloba.

The main point of yesterday's hearing was to decide whether or not a judge would let her on bail, but that was refused. And I think it's quite interesting details that came about this case from her defense lawyer, who at one point he asked Bella to stand up and to show her right wrist to the judge and there was a scarring on her right wrist which he said was from a hot iron. He claimed that she was tortured into becoming a drug mule, that she didn't know about the contents of this suitcase. She didn't know where she was traveling, that she was just handed her passport in Thailand, and that she tried to approach a policeman at the airport in Thailand.

However, according to her lawyer, that policeman turned out to be a member of organized crime. So Bella flew into Georgia in May via Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates, and when she arrived, she was arrested immediately because her suitcase was tagged with a red sticker, and she was trying to explain to the police in Georgia that someone was supposed to meet her with this suitcase. And according to her lawyer, unfortunately, Georgian police did not take action and they launched a kind of criminal case against her, whereas he said if they waited a little bit, they could have seen who was there to meet her with this suitcase. It has also been reported. You describe her a little bit in court that she is pregnant. What do we know on that aspect? she is pregnant according to her lawyer she's 18 weeks pregnant and he that was also presented in his speech when he was kind of arguing for her to be released on bail saying that they know who's the father that it's he used the word fruit of love that it's so so it's somehow not related to her trip to Thailand but yes she's pregnant

Then the penalty, you talk about bail being refused, the penalty for this offense in Georgia? So, Bella is charged on three counts. It's purchasing and possession. These are two separate articles in the criminal code. It's three to five years in prison and trafficking, which is a more serious offense. It's 15 to 20 years in jail or life imprisonment. Bella pleaded not guilty through her lawyer. And as we understand, there's a separate now criminal case that was launched into organized crime, but we couldn't get more details from her lawyer or from the prosecution. And these are, what she's accused of smuggling is marijuana, hashish, cannabis? Yes, it's cannabis and hashis.

So it's 12 kilograms of cannabis in this vacuum kind of black, packaging and two kilograms of hashish. So that is considered an extremely large amount of narcotic substances. And Georgia has very stringent laws on drugs? Absolutely. Georgia has very strict laws and just yesterday there was an extraordinary session of the parliament where they further kind of, it was all about discussing kind of drug offenses, specifically cannabis. And And they have increased the punishment now for selling, purchasing, cannabis. And Georgia has always had this kind of quite severe punishment for the use of recreational drugs. But now it's getting even more stricter with this new amendments to the law.

So this comes at a particular time. Just before I let you go, Rehan, when can we expect the full trial? So the trial will begin on July the 10th. And we don't know yet how long it's going to last. But yes, later this month. Rayan Dimitri in Tbilisi, Georgia. Thank you so much for joining us. Now, listener week, I keep talking about it this week, but it's in August.

We're looking for your brilliant suggestions. Over the years, you have come up with so many interesting topics, including this one. This is from a schoolteacher who had been struggling with the uncontrollable urge to shoplift throughout her life. She shared the... He's widely recognized as one of the... greatest footballers in history. He's won the prestigious Ballandor Award five times. He's the all-time leading goal scorer in professional football. And according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, he's the first active footballer in history to achieve billionaire status. Guess who we're talking

about yet? That's right. Good Bad Billionaire is exploring the life and fortune of football icon Cristiano Ronaldo. That's Good Bad Billionaire from the BBC World Service. Listen now, wherever you get your BBC podcasts. impact this criminal activity is hot on her and her attempts to get help for a recent diagnosis of kleptomania the actual taking of something gives you a psychological boost for want of a better word and for that short amount of time you actually feel good

but then that's taken away pretty much immediately by shame and fear of being caught just walking home feeling that everyone's looking at you everyone knows that you're not who you say you are and then actually when you get home if you have got away with it not even being able to eat or prepare some of the stuff that you've brought

because the guilt is so much now thank you very much to that listener who got in touch perhaps you have something you'd like to share that maybe is a difficult experience for example you can text Woman's Hour 84844 and you can check with your network provider for exact costs

text we charge a standard message rate on social media it's at BBC Woman's Hour or you can email us through our website I'm looking forward to seeing what you come up with. I want to turn next however to Jenny Evans. She was a young actress riding high on the success of her first feature film when she was sexually assaulted by someone

who was in the public eye. When she later found the courage to report this crime to the police, details of what she had experienced were printed in a tabloid newspaper. Jenny decided to retrain as a journalist to try and figure out how it could have happened. And she went on to help expose the abuses of power in the press and the police that had become known as the phone hacking scandal.

I'm sure you remember it. Her memoir is called Don't Let It Break You, Honey, and Jenny joins me in the studio. Welcome. Thank you for having me. Very good to have you with us. The title, that came from an encounter with Maya Angelou when you were just 15. What do you remember of that?

It did. She was at the Hay Literature Festival, which we used to go to every year as a family because it's very near where I'm from. And we went to, obviously, we knew of Maya's writing, and she was an icon, and I was, yeah, 15, a little vulnerable grieving. My dad had died a couple of years before, and her presence was so overwhelming. Her stoicism was just so inspiring.

Her kind of vulnerability was worn with such grace and such strength that I kind of burst into tears when I saw her. And so at the end when she finished, speaking, she called me to her and she gave me a really big hug and that's what, that's what she whispered in my ear. Don't let it break you. Don't let it break you, honey. How incredible. Yeah. She's been embraced by Maya Angelou. I know. I mean, yeah, she's, she's, she's kind of feels like a guardian angel. I mentioned Twin Town. You were cast in that film when you were just 18. I'm sure a very exciting time working towards acting in those years. But sadly, not long after

After that success, you were sexually assaulted by someone who was well-known, someone you met at a party. It was, and just to let our listeners know, it was a brutal, horrific attack. Even the taxi driver who picked you up afterwards, wanted to take you to the police. But you felt you couldn't at that point. At that point, I was in such shock. Yeah, I couldn't. He kept saying, let me take you to the police station. And I just said, I'm tired.

I just, I want to go home. which I couldn't do. I was actually staying at someone else's house. I had to go back to their house first. But yeah, it was, as is very common, when something like this has happened to you and you are so shocked and so full of shame and so wishing it hadn't happened, I just kind of closed down at first. I understand that. And I should say also in your book, it's made clear that names have been changed or obscured,

details changed for legal reasons. But when you did report the assault, and this is a number of years later, You had a new nightmare begin because details from your police statement appeared in a tabloid, not with your name attached, but it must have been incredibly shocking at that time and I'm wondering what you immediately thought.

Yeah, I reported it when I realised that he'd been accused by somebody else and I suddenly, it occurred to me that he might be seriously violent because until that point I had done the classic thing of thinking I had got myself into a dangerous situation. So I kind of felt a moral obligation to report in the end And I found that experience actually not too traumatic in itself But it was the first time I'd spoken about this stuff

And it was so stressful that after I did so My jaw actually seized up And I couldn't open my mouth fully for months I found the experience of disclosing this stuff The first time to the police so so stressful So to see it printed in the tabloid well, it is the second violation. I don't know how else to explain it.

It was just incredibly frightening. Suddenly, I just, everything I thought I knew and the people I thought I could trust, I didn't think I could anymore. I just couldn't work out how it got there. So I imagine you immediately suspect, or you're trying to figure out how could it have got to the papers

through what means, through what person. I will say that your case was dropped before you had met anybody from the Crown Prosecution Service. Was that normal? I understand that it is still normal that you don't meet your Crown Prosecution Service solicitor in these cases. And I think it would be a really quick change to the criminal justice system that I think women have lost trust in currently for us to be able to meet those solicitors.

I mean, they're representing the Crown, not the individual. so it's slightly different, but it's such a frightening system to enter into. You do lose control of this information, this very private, sacred information. And it would be good to be able to meet all of the team who are representing your rights, yeah. So we asked for a statement from the CPS and they said we recognize how traumatic going through the criminal justice process is for victims of rape and sexual assault. And where there is enough evidence to take a case to court, we offer all adult victims of rape and sexual offences a pretrial meeting with a member of the CPS. prosecution team. But as we mentioned,

that your case was dropped before you did meet somebody. You did get criminal injuries compensation. And tell our listeners what you decided to spend it on and why. Yeah, well, I spent the criminal injury compensation, which is awarded for the damage to your body on retraining as a journalist. And just to say the reason I did that, the reason the case was dropped was because, I realized that some evidence that a friend of mine had found,

a letter that I'd written her which detailed this incident with the famous man and other incidences of sexual violence I had experienced, I thought was great evidence and gave it to the police in this kind of joyful look. This is brilliant evidence to show that this happened and I was writing about it years ago. And I realised when they asked to interview me a second time, that actually what they felt was that it discredited me. It's actually known as bad character evidence, which is incredibly offensive.

And so I stopped talking. I suddenly said, I'm not going to pursue this anymore. And so that's why the charges were dropped. And I trained as a journalist to try and find out how my shot at criminal justice had somehow crumbled in the face of this kind of the press intrusion and this liaison between the police and the press. Yeah, and it's an incredible story of resilience from you.

You use these newfound journalism skills to start digging into the emerging phone hacking scandals. Nick Davies, the journalist at the Gorgeon, was exposing many of these practices at the tabloids and he asked you to get some of those staff on the record. How did you do that? And why were you so good at it? I don't know why.

I mean, I think those people were badly mistreated. I think those newsrooms really reflect a kind of a microcosm of the way the tabloids treated all of us, which is kind of a bullying culture, right? They would steal secrets or take secrets and then use them to shame or threaten to shame people. And the people who worked in those newsrooms were very often bullied and shamed.

And so bullied, shamed people want to talk when you give them the opportunity. So I began to discover that there were loads of really angry staff members at those who'd worked in those newsrooms who had spent a lot of time, for example, women, pregnant women, who had called into the news desk to say they were bleeding and they needed to go to hospital

being sent on some, kind of wild goose chase to a different country sometimes. And when they got there, they're phoning into the news desk and the news, they're saying, oh, there's no reason for you to be there and them heading back. You know, there's just, there was so much mistreatment of them. I think they wanted to talk.

I think also, personally, I probably find it really easy to like people. And I liked every single one of those reporters who spoke to me. I could see the pressure they were under. I could see the mistreatment. And I thought they were, many of them, really admirable people, actually. which is really interesting, which people might not expect. You do talk about their shame, the fuel which tabloids engines run on. One of these hacks, as we'll call them, told you something about Clause 11.

I didn't know about this until your book. Can you explain? Yeah, I didn't know about it either. And it was one of the moments when I thought I might lose my composure when I was talking to a journalist about the kinds of things they used to do to get stories. So this person was describing to me that they would persuade survivors of sexual violence to talk to them on the record and offer them a lot of money. And then the more senior team would say do a clause 11 on them, which means they would have to go back to the source, the survivor.

And once they'd given the story and say, sorry, we're not going to pay you because clause 11, which is we don't believe you and we only have to pay if we believe you. So people are given their story with hoping to have financial compensation, shall we say, for telling that particular story. But then they would tell their story and then be refused the actual cash. They would. And I think they shouldn't be judged for expecting that money. I think quite often people donate money when they are speaking to tabloids about things like sexual violence. What they want is to be heard because sexual violence comes with shame, a healthy dollop of shame.

shame has resonance and it lasts and it can make you voiceless. It can make you want to hide. And I think when people speak out, they want to rid themselves of that and they should. But what was it like when you realise that your story, you know, that had been revealed and the ones you were hearing about were actually converging? Right. So I persuaded, I discovered when I was studying journalism that Nick Davis, this Guardian journalist, investigative journalist, brilliant journalist,

was also looking into the behaviour of the newspapers. And so I kind of tracked him down, persuaded him to take me on as a researcher. And then he gave me this job, as you say, of talking to tabloid journalist to see if we could find out if anyone would go on the record about the extent of illegality in the news gathering practices at these tabloids. So I began doing that for him,

but secretly because I didn't want to reveal to him my past necessarily. And obviously you don't have to do that. I was also kind of investigating it for myself. So when I was looking for people to write to the Met Police to ask if they were appearing in paperwork they'd taken from private investigators who would be working for the tabloids, I was also writing on my own behalf. Did I appear? It was my name in there. And so I had this kind of secret agenda. And that was very stressful because I was very concerned that I would be discovered.

And these are journalists and they're brilliant journalists. journalists and there was also speaking to parliamentary aids. I thought someone will Google my name. They knew my name, even if they couldn't print it. They will put two and two together and I will be exposed as having an agenda and I will discredit Nick. And that was my big fear really, which I carried for far too long until I told him. And he was obviously very nice about it when I did. Yeah.

And I know you have to read at times what had been written about you in people that were investigating your story, shall we say, in their notebooks, Glimal Care, in particular, a private investigator whose activities turned attention on phone hacking at the news of the world. He was jailed in 2007. But I do, just before I let you go, want to mention

you talk about the enduring power of shame, we've touched on it there, that you write pain and moors you, shame then steals your boat. Do you have your boat back? Oh, that's a nice question. I'm working on it. I'm still having some therapy. I

got a very good trauma focused therapist who's listening. And I'm working on it. I think it's a very powerful feeling and it's hard to shed. But one of the ways to shed it is to keep talking and keep sharing our stories as survivors of violence and sexual violence. Well, thank you so much for coming in and sharing your story with us, Jenny Evans. The book is called Don't Let It Break You, Honey. It's a memoir about saving yourself. wish you look. Thank you.

It was at the Euros three years ago that the lionesses won England's first trophy since 1966. It was a euphoric moment for England fans, of course, and Manny saying it was a turning point for the game in the country. With the 2025 UEFA European Women's

Championship, kicking off later today in Switzerland, we want to take a look at that legacy and see what has been achieved. In a moment, you'll hear from the author in DJ Annie MacManus, who was inspired by the lionesses after the lionesses after that Wembley win and took up football again, this time in her 40s. First, I can speak to BBC sports, Katie Gournell, who joins me live from Basel.

How is it in Switzerland today's, Katie? Oh, it's fantastic, Neela. I've been to, I had goosebumps, by the way, listening to Gabby Logan talk there, but I've been to seven tournaments now watching England over the years. And I've been to some cities where you would have no idea there was a major women's tournament taking place. That's definitely not the case here in Basel. There's flags, banners everywhere, lining the main roads, the main bridges. There's not one but two fan parks in the city.

You get a real sense that Switzerland and Basel are bracing this tournament. Basel's where the opening game is going to take place tonight. It's where the final is going to take place in July. And there's lots of nice little touches around. One of my favorite things that I've seen is that the pedestrian crossings at the at the main stadium, they changed the little green man to a little green woman kicking the ball. So that's what the fans are going to see when they cross the road going into the main stadium. So, yeah, it's great.

I should say, though, it's absolutely sweltering here in Switzerland. It's 34 degrees at the moment. So that's something that all the fans and the players are going to have to deal with. So it hasn't broken just yet. It has in London that particular heat wave. What would you say the legacy as being, we keep talking about 2022 and the lionesses? It was just, it was so. significant, wasn't it, that moment in 2022? And it was significant for so many reasons. It was

obviously a first major trophy for the lioness has lifted in front of a record crowd at Wembley. But I think, you know, for many of us who have followed women's football for a long time, to sort of fully understand the magnitude of what those players achieved, you have to look at the history of the women's game in England. And remember, it was only in 1971 that the FA lifted its ban on women playing organised football, that band that had stood for nearly 50 years. And even when they lifted it, there was no support financially or logistically from the FA. That only started in the early 90s. And it took until just before Euro 2009 for players to be awarded central contracts by the FA,

which laid the foundations for women to make a career out of playing football, rather than having to fit it in around second jobs. Like, for example, someone like Jill Scott, Linus Legend, would have had to do when she first started playing. I know. We're not talking about history. We're talking about. Exactly. Recent years. Listen, have a ball tonight. We'll talk to you again, no doubt, over the tournaments. Thank you so much for joining us. England. We're talking about whales in it for the first time as well. Of course, we held them on a little earlier. But on the topic of legacy, I was recently joined by the author, the DJ, the presenter of the sidetracked podcast, Annie McManus, who that lioness win for her had a huge impact on her own life. I told her to take me back to that day in 2022. When the England women's team, won the tournament. I am in a house in New Key in County Clare on the west coast of Ireland with all of my family, extended family, nieces, nephews, brother's sisters, mom, dad and we're

all crowded around the television watching England. Now, one should say that for Ireland to watch England and be rooting for England's is not often the case. It's an unusual scenario. Yes, because normally we root for Ireland, but Ireland weren't playing. And so what was unique about this was that it was women's football. And I had never sat around with my family and watched a big sporting event like this where it was women's football. And from the off, it felt special and unique because of that. It made me simultaneously sad and happy upon it finishing. Happy that my sons, I have two sons who are both mad for football, were looking at that as a very normalized thing, seeing a Wembley Stadium that was sold out, seeing this reaction, seeing this kind of glorious performance by women playing

football. And then sad because I, like so many other women, started playing football as a child, played it through primary school, and then around puberty, gave up and never went back. Well, we'll get to that later, but didn't go back for pretty much all of my adult life. And so it made me sad for the... the football that I'd missed out on, I suppose. Do you remember why you gave it up at the time? Well, it was really a practical thing. So I played in my primary school.

There was no girls football. You either did Irish dancing or you got to play football with the boys. So I played football with the boys. And I think there was maybe two other girls. And then it was all lads. And I played on the team and it was great. And then I moved to secondary school and there was no football option for girls. It was hockey.

So I then played hockey and really enjoyed playing hockey. then went to university and kind of stopped playing team sports altogether. And from that moment on, kind of didn't play team sports for the rest of my adult life. And I think there was a real kind of sliding doors moment when I moved to London and walked down the road to my local park and saw that there was a women's football team training and playing and feeling this real pull to want to go and join them and ask them how I could play with them. And then that classic kind of intimidated, they were so good. good. I didn't feel like I was good enough. Just lack of confidence. I didn't do it. And I always wonder if I'd had the nerves to go in and say, can I play? Would I have managed then in, you know, the 20 years I lived in London to have had that community of a football team and a squad and to have that regular exercise? Because it would have done me so much good. Yeah. But you have found your path, but they kind of say, you know, what's for you won't go by you. You missed at that time. However, you have, after a

seeing the lionesses. Was that the catalyst? It was the catalyst. It stirred something in me. It definitely stirred something in me. And I've always loved playing football. I think what's important to say is that around the same time my kids were playing football and I'd noticed upon going to all the football training sessions that all the

volunteer, it was a community football, all the coaches were dads. And there was a very strict kind of rule, it seemed, silent rule where the dads were the coaches and the women stood on the sidelines with the water bottles. And I remember being cross on half of all the young girls who come along and see that there's no place for them as senior. Yeah.

Then a East London Football Club got in touch of me and said they were doing an over 40s football session for women. And I thought, they invited me along and I thought that this is, I should go. I should just go and see how it feels. Did you have any trepitation at that point? I was breaking it. Because I hadn't played football, like since I was 11. So I was really nervous and I didn't know how I would be and I didn't know how I would be. and I didn't know how it would feel.

And it was so inclusive and so inviting. And there was women from the ages of 40 all the way up into their mid-60s. And some of them were a complete beginners. Some of them were really good. And at the end of that training session, they gave out prizes at the end and they gave out a prize for a player of the thing or something.

And I won a prize. Was it a player of the match, Annie? It was one of, yes. Let's own it. I got a little crest, like a sticker. Yeah. And I went home into my house and I showed my son.

And he was so proud. with me because he'd been so encouraging and I'd borrowed his football boots for it and then my husband saw how much I loved it as well and he was like I was like I have to do this I just I know it now it feels like coming home like I have to do this tasted it yeah

so after that then I went looking for a local club and eventually found a local club and I've been playing for them ever since you said you were really nervous going down to the over 40s which was a training session I mean maybe a more relaxed atmosphere than trying out for

the club were hoping to be accepted? Yeah. What do you remember of those days? It's so much more than just your physical ability. It's also the fact that I was 46 at the time and everybody else was so much younger. And I remember doing a jog around the outskirt, out of the pitch at the start. And there was another woman and I remember speaking to her and her saying, oh yeah, I'm like mid-40s too. And I was like, don't you? Like, haven't you been injured?

Yeah. I kind of came in with all these anxieties. and her being like, no, if anything, it's just made me much stronger. And that being such a profound thing for me to hear. Because I had a lot of internalised ageism where I thought there's no way that I am going to be able to physically manage this. I'm going to get injured. And so many of the women that I had spoken to around my area

had also said the same thing. Because I had flirted with the idea of starting my own women's football when I couldn't find a club. And all the other school moms and all were like, oh, couldn't I just get injured? So I kind of had that in my head. It's funny, isn't it? Thinking of the injury before even the playing.

Right, yeah. And then to meet this woman who's like, no, it's made my core stronger. It's made me stronger in every way. It's made me fitter. So that was like, okay, maybe I can't do this. And then, yeah, I needed like a full season of just training and learning how to play football again, learning about positioning and how all the different positions worked on the team. Also, finding my position.

I had no position. Everyone was like, where do you play? I'm like, I don't know. I'll kick a ball. But I think that will be really helpful for listeners. may resonate with some of them. Yeah. That fear,

because we think of you as commanding crowds, right? We think of you, top of your game, in actual arenas, you know, playing music, but you moved into

a totally different arena, whether we want to call it literal or kind of psychologically. How was playing that first match? I'll never forget it. I remember so many things about it, but I remember going to this big Astor-Turf pitch and it being

a really sunny day and being surrounded by buildings and thinking wow this is kind of beautiful like just being out here on a Sunday afternoon somewhere that I would never normally go in London and I remember being in the changing rooms beforehand being given my shirt and literally trying not to cry

I mean I was such a saddle but what was that behind that? It was so emotional it was the feeling of being in a team like being part of something big like that it just felt for some reason it felt quite profound to be one of the girls not to be the person in the arena, to be part of a team, to be part of a collective, one cog in a big machine.

And I remember there being a turning point where I was marking this woman who was doing my head in. And she was quite entitled and she kept calling out the ref and questioning all his decisions. I remember being a bit cross with her in my head and thinking, oh, this is good. I'm not scared. I don't feel scared. I feel cross. And that's a kind of, it felt empowering in a way to be a bit annoyed by her. and that was a real I mean I remember going home on the tube literally beaming. Your sons and husband have come to watch you play. Yes.

What's that like? When my husband came first, I felt, I don't know, kind of weirdly paranoid because I was like he's never seen this version of me. He's never seen me like in football gear on a pitch like grunting and like it's really like it's really physical. And there's no, well, some footballers are really graceful. I am not, can I just say. And I love that. Yeah, I'm not that person. So there was a sense of like, I don't know, not anxiety, but just like,

oh, this is strange because he hasn't seen this and I don't know what he's going to think. And then I remember turning around at one point and seeing him chatting to another woman's husband and thinking, do you know what, this is actually kind of cool. That's kind of the future. Because the husbands are out there supporting the wives on the people. pitch and it felt really good. I'm going to go back in time because you looked into the history of

women's football as well and back in 1921 the FA banned women from playing saying, and I quote, the game of football is quite unsuitable for females and ought not to be encouraged, unquote. So that meant the ban meant that the women's game was sidelined to being played in public parks

for nearly 50 years. How do you see that now kind of looking back? We know there was a couple of episodes with the war and whatnot when men were gone and women my take to the pitch, but they were immediately relegated once the men came back. I just think when I found out about the band, I found it so unbelievably shocking that it went on for that long until that late. Like it wasn't until the 70s that the FA allowed women's football to exist as a legitimate sport. And that still blows my mind. And it makes me feel really sad.

And, you know, I think about my life and the last time that I had, you think, about all the lost opportunities that women had in the game. It's awful. And I guess you have to credit women's football now for having caught up quite so quickly and so dramatically and really kind of being exemplary in how they have won all these championships. And as Leah Williamson often says, you know, they shouldn't have to win in order to get all this attention. It shouldn't have to be about that. But you can sense a kind of like a change happening. from below, bottom up where there's girls teams now as a norm in football clubs.

You know, I'm a football mum as well as a football player. So you see every weekend when you go to the soccer matches of the kids, you know, there's so many girls teams now. And it's really encouraging to see. And so with the Euro is coming up. And England and Wales are in it. Sadly, Ireland. No Ireland. No Ireland.

Sadly. So who are you going to be supporting now this time? Oh, that's a really good question, Neula. I hadn't actually thought about that. I'll be rooting for both, basically. You know, I was just thinking, because we had some of the, we had Leah Williamson was the top of our power list for the women's hour sports.

Amazing. Women a couple of years ago. And we had three of the Welsh team in there not so long ago that were highest kites because they're so excited about going to the Euros. But one of them, she was like in charge of DJing to like amp up before they start. And I'm wondering, do you get that job? So listen, obviously I've been very conscious of that job, existing and I've been really leaning out.

Okay. You know what? I don't know if I feel confident enough to be able to please everyone in this team. However, I did play a tournament on Saturday with a different team and they were saying that the way they do it is they get everyone from the team to suggest a song and then they make a playlist out of the song. So that's what I'm going to do.

I'm going to be the coordinator of the playlist as opposed to the full curator and then we're all going to have our little thing that we can listen to. I'm going to put you on the spot here though. If you were to pick a tune for your team, what would it be? Oh, I think it's, you'd probably do like the big football terrace chant like freed from desire guy or something.

You want everyone on the bench, on the benches, waving their kitten. Waving, that's what you want. Chearing you on. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Annie MacManus there to get you in the mood for the Euros, which starts later today, and you can follow the tournament across the BBC.

Tomorrow, the sustainable fashion designer Amy Powney will be with us. And I do want to say if you've been affected by any of the issues discussed earlier on the show, there are links and support on the BBC Actionline. Chat soon. That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time.

Hello, it's Lucy Worsley here, and we're back with a brand new series of Ladies Swindlers. Here we are in cell number one. I'm just shutting us in, Ross. Wow. Following in the footsteps of some all-new criminals. Can you take me down to the other end of Baker Street, please? Certainly, jump in.

Thank you. Join me and my all-female team of detectives. as we revisit the audacious crimes of women trying to make it in a world made for men. This is a story of working-class women trying to get by. This is survival. Lady Swindlers Season 2 with Lucy Worsley from BBC Radio 4. Listen now on BBC Sounds. How did a boycott Jimmy become a billionaire from posting videos?

On good, bad billionaire. We're going to find out how the world's most popular YouTuber, Mr. Biscor, Beast made his fortune. He's buried himself in a coffin for days. Counted to 100,000 on camera. And even recreated squid games, all in an attempt to go viral on the internet. But it all started when he gave a homeless man $10,000. So is he a philanthropist reshaping capitalism? Or is he just the king of the attention economy? Find out on good bad billionaire. Listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts.