Woman's Hour - Actor Helen George, 'Stevenage Woman', Author Diana Evans

Episode Date: April 5, 2023

She is best known for her role as the Poplar-based midwife Trixie Franklin, in Call the Midwife. Helen George has also been a star of Strictly Come Dancing, sung with Elton John and at Buckingham Palace to mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day. She now brings all her theatrical skills together by stepping into Deborah Kerr's shoes to play the part of Anna in a UK tour of the Rodgers and Hammerstein musical The King and I.Is ‘Stevenage Woman’ the new ‘Mondeo Man’? The Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer is being urged to focus on this female swing voter group in a new report by left-leaning think tank Labour Together. But how useful are these profiles and why are they used? And from ‘Workington Man’ to ‘Essex Man’, why are they typically male? We discuss with Rosie Campbell, Professor of politics and Patrick English, Associate Director at Yougov.A House for Alice is the new novel by Diana Evans, a sequel to the much acclaimed Ordinary People. It is a multigenerational portrait of a black British family, and explores the impact of matriarch Alice’s decision to return to the country of her birth, Nigeria, to live out her later years. Diana joins Nuala in the studio to discuss the inspiration behind the novel. Did you ever flick through Carole Jackson’s hit book ‘Colour Me Beautiful’ to “find your season”? The popular 1980s trend of ‘getting your colours done’ is back. The hashtag #colouranalysis has 766million views on TikTok and you can even find a filter to work out your colours for yourself. So, as we are once again asking ‘what season am I?” We talk to Journalist Kat Brown who is a big believer in the power of colour, and Nisha Hunjan, founder of Style ME UK, who uses colour analysis.Presenter: Nuala McGovern Producer: Emma Pearce

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2. And of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Nuala McGovern and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. I'm wondering, were you a fan of The King and I? What about Call the Midwife? Aston Villa? Well, if the answer is yes to any of those, you will be happy to hear. We have Helen George on the programme today who is intrinsically linked to all of the above. I'm looking forward to speaking to her and finding out, among other

things, how she manoeuvres across stages in voluminous dresses because she's on tour with the King and I so there's lots to talk about. And on to a different woman, the Stevenage woman. Is that you? Apparently a mum in her early 40s, she's got two kids, works hard, plays by the rules and pays the bills.

But this is a demographic that political parties apparently want to attract ahead of the next general election. What do you make of that? Narrowing a voter down to certain attributes. We had Mondeo Man or Workington Man, but we're going to see what's behind the Stevenage Woman. Mondeo Man, that was in the 90s,s right we're also going to go back to the 80s because we're asking did you ever get your colors done figuring out what colors look best on you well it is back thanks to social media

so we're going to have a chat about that and also home what does it mean to you? It is an overriding theme I found of Diana Evans' beautiful new book, A Home for Alice. It's about a family's matriarch thinking about returning to Nigeria after a life in the UK and I'm delighted to say Diana will be here in the Woman's Hour studio. Now if you want to get in touch with the programme

perhaps on that aspect of home, you know is it a building? Is it a state of mind? Is it a certain country? Or maybe you have a hankering to go home while living elsewhere Anyway, I'd love to hear your stories

The text number is 84844 at BBC Women's Hour on social media and our voice note or WhatsApp message, that number is 03700 100 444 and we'd love to hear from you on any of those stories as we go through the next hour. Do get in touch. But first, unless you were, I don't know, actively hiding from the news yesterday, you will have seen that former President Donald Trump was arrested in New York and pleaded not guilty to 34 criminal charges

during a historic court hearing. He then went on to give a defiant address to his supporters after becoming the first former US president to face a criminal trial. But we're wondering, what do we know about the two women that are mentioned in this case, who many assume to be Stormy Daniels and also Karen McDougall. Well, to throw some light on this subject, I'm joined by Scott Lucas, Professor of US and International Politics at University College Dublin. Good to have you with us, Scott. Well, thanks so much for having me here, Nuala. Now, let us begin. For those that were not following it step by step,

how would you describe the latest status of the case against Trump? Extremely serious. And I think it's really important to cut through the headline that a lot of people are going with, which is this Trump's defiance. Some might use other adjectives for what he said in Florida last night, because what happened in New York during the arraignment was the handing down of 34 felony charges, not misdemeanors, but felonies. Each of those charges carries a one to four year prison sentence if Trump is convicted potentially. And it's really important to explain what the charges are because there's a lot of mud being thrown on the wall to try to undermine the legal system. They start with, as you mentioned,

the affairs that Donald Trump had with these women, allegedly, Stormy Daniels and Carol McDougal. And I will just jump in there. Forgive me, Scott, but he denies those affairs. Please continue. Yeah. So you're going to hear, you know, whenever you need to put an allegedly in, do so, right? But it also has to do with allegedly a Trump plan, a wider plan that was concocted with his fixer and lawyer, Michael Cohen, and a publisher named David Pecker in August 2015, to suppress any news of Trump's sexual encounters that could adversely affect his campaign for the presidency. So there's actually a third payoff which is claimed. It's not just these two women, but to a former Trump Tower doorman

who alleged that Trump had a child out of wedlock, something which proved to be false, by the way. Where does this go? You have the case now where you have the immediate charge of falsifying business records to cover up the payoffs to Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal. But it's linked to a wider felony allegation, which is this was part of, quote, an organized scheme to interfere in the 2016 election. So you start with these affairs, and what you wind up with is that Trump, it is claimed, falsified the business records so he would not be caught in his breaking of state and federal election laws. And that's why it's a felony. We will not hear again in the case until December. We're going to have a big lag where evidence is presented to the defense,

where the defense might file to have the case dismissed. The judge will consider that. But if the judge proceeds in December, then you and I are back on the roller coaster again with a trial in early 2024. And of course, 2024 is a presidential year in the United States, and we can talk about that as well. But I should say to our listeners, Stormy Daniels, of course, has been in news. She is a porn star. She's been very vocal, you know, has a huge presence on social media. The other person that we're talking about was referred to as Woman 1. And people are suggesting that the evidence leads to Karen McDougal. Karen McDougal is a former Playboy model who Donald Trump met in 2006. And in 2016, during the presidential campaign, Karen McDougal approached

the National Enquirer, which is an American tabloid. And she said, look, I've got a story here. I've got a story of a 10-month affair, sexual affair, I had with Donald Trump, which started only 18 months after his marriage to Mia, and only four months after their child, Barron, was born. What happened is that the publisher of the National Enquirer, who was already part of this scheme by Trump, allegedly, to suppress damaging information, he went to Trump and to Trump's fixer, Michael Cohen, and says, let's catch and kill the story. Let's pay this woman for the rights. We'll tell her that we're going to publish her story. She can have articles under her byline, but in fact, we'll never publish anything. It is claimed in the indictment, directly ordered the payment of $150,000 to Karen McDougal for that contract. What we know is, is that the stories about Karen McDougal never were published in the

National Enquirer. It was actually suppressed as the story during the election. And it was only in 2018, after the Stormy Daniels affair was known about, that Karen McDougal came forward and said, yeah, I also was involved with Donald Trump and this is what happened to me. And I mean, can that catch and kill is a phrase we sometimes hear coming from American stories of this genre, shall we say. But is it legal for the National Enquirer to do something like that? Yeah, I mean, it's legal to buy the rights to anybody's story.

But not publish it. Not publish it. Where we get a case here is, all right, who's providing the money? And the money allegedly was not provided by Donald Trump out of his personal funds. Had he done so, he's still probably free and clear. But when you pay the money out of the Trump organization funds, then you expose yourself to the claims of business malpractice, especially if you cover that up by falsely recording it as something else. And that is really the core of the immediate case, is that in the Stormy Daniels case,

the payment of $130,000 was made by Michael Cohen, his lawyer, and then it was recorded in the Trump Organization records as legal expenses, where Cohen was paid a total of $420,000 in 2017. The reason why he's paid even more, so he could declare the reimbursement at a higher rate because he would have to pay income tax on it. So with Karen McDougal and Stormy Daniels, where are they now in the sense of for the American public? Are they out there, particularly Karen McDougal, who I think might

be a newcomer to many people in the UK really getting to know her? I mean, is she speaking out? I think, you know, she's not. And Carrie McDougal, therefore, I think came as a surprise to a lot of people because we've only had headlines about Stormy Daniels with relation to this case for weeks. Stormy Daniels, by the way, as a porn star and as someone who is now a director, she has her own basically business around the adult film industry. She's out there. She's a celebrity. And you can go to her website, buy her t-shirts, et cetera. Karen McDougal, after she revealed what had happened, she tried to go back into a private life and has largely had one, thank goodness, during the recent

years of the Trump saga, as it were. Whether she's going to be doorstepped now and brought back in public, I hope not, for the sake of the fact that, look, you know, when she finally was able to tell her story, she said, look, I made a mistake. I got into an affair with a married man. I wish I hadn't done it. I just want to get on and live my life. I find that hard to believe that she will be left alone, to be quite honest,

just knowing the way American politics is, and particularly with this story. I was reading, she actually became an advocate for greater awareness about breast implant illness. She had breast implants and she's kind of been talking about that since 2017. But of course, something completely different. You know, we're going to be talking about Stevenage woman.

This is a thing in UK politics a little later, really just kind of how they narrow down demographics. But I was wondering about women, as this is Women's Hour as well, in that support base for Donald Trump. I mean, many people would put down his success in 2016 to white women

coming out to vote for him. How do you see that now, particularly in light of this recent case and of course so much publicity around these particular charges? Well, I think, first of all, I think in your preface to talking about Steve Ingeborg quite rightly, you said, look, should we apply a label, which is such a broad label in this country? And that applies in the US as well. It is true that a lot of white women,

in fact, probably an unexpected number of them, did vote for Donald Trump rather than Hillary Clinton since 2016. But there has been an erosion of support amongst all women, a gender gap, as it were, including white women, for Trump since then. And it was actually quite significant in the 2020 election won by Joe Biden, because I think you need to put this in a wider context here. There are the cases of individual women where Trump is accused of malpractice, let's put it that way. And remember, there were actually 15 or 16 women that came forward and accused him of sexual harassment before the 2016 election. But it's also the fact that there are women's rights issues that are very prominent here. Think about the Women's March in 2017, 2018, to highlight education, to highlight health care, to highlight, of course, abortion rights. In other words, you know, the idea of calling someone Stevenage woman or if you want to call it suburban woman in the States or soccer mom, you've got to get back to the issues that would motivate women and hopefully men. And in this case, I think the idea that Trump in this battle against the system has always put himself first rather than the everyday needs of women, whether they are white, black, Hispanic

or another ethnicity. I think that's the longer term challenge he has if he tries to persist with this campaign in 2024. Really interesting. We could talk longer, of course, Scott, but thank you so much, Scott Lucas, Professor of US and International Politics

at University College Dublin. Good to have you on Woman's Hour. Get in touch, 84844. We're talking about colours. We're going to talk about getting back to the 80s, getting your colours done. Let me see. Reverend Charmaine Host got in touch and said, yes, I had my colours done

more than once. Sweet pea colours were mine and for the first time, I realised I could wear purple. I've loved purple ever since, though I never made it to Bishop. Keep them coming. Right, I want to turn to my next guest, best known perhaps for her role as the Poplar-based midwife, Trixie Franklin in Call the Midwife.

Yes, we're all fans of it. Helen George has also been a star of Strictly Come Dancing, has sung with Elton John and at Buckingham Palace to mark the 75th anniversary of VE Day. She has now stepped into Deborah Kerr's shoes and voluminous dresses to play the leading role of Anna in a new UK tour of the Rogers and Hammerstein musical. Helen, it's so good to have you in the Women's Hour studio.

Welcome. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. Well, I mentioned you're currently on tour, but we do have an exclusive announcement that The King and I will play at London's Dominion Theatre in the new year for a five-week limited season. And it's the first time you'll be playing the lead role in a musical on the West End stage.

And I'm wondering how you feel about that. Yeah, I mean, they're big shoes to fill for sure. I'm really excited. It's been such an honour to play this part. She's such a brilliant, brilliant role. And there's, you know, it was written a long time ago in the 50s and to have a feminist role that's lasted the test of time really and is still relevant and still feels modern in some ways

is brilliant to play every night. So, yeah, I'm excited to bring it to town as well. It's such a treat. You know, I think it's going to be such a hit. When you talk about big shoes to fill, let's talk about the big dresses. Dresses to fill. I mean, I was watching some old clips of the original

and I was wondering how do you even, how are you going to manoeuvre that across the stage? I mean, it almost defies description. If people take a look, if we put our arms out as far as we can, that's what we're talking about, isn't it? Yeah, so people can't get close to you, which I find really interesting. And I'm a fan of personal space. So it's really great that, you know, no one can. And there's a line in the show where she says, you know, it's the circle within which a woman is protected. And I really like that idea that, you know, when we are not generally

protected, are we? That we can use our clothes and fashions to protect ourselves in a way that society doesn't. I've always found that fascinating. It really is. When you look at it, there's only a certain amount, even everything, the presence of it, even if you sit down, for example, on really is. When you look at it, there's only a certain amount, even everything, the presence of it, even if you sit down, for example, on the stage, which you sometimes will be because they always wanted the head lower, right? The king and the king and I wanted

everybody else's head lower than his. You've still got this massive amount of space around you that somebody cannot penetrate. Absolutely, and it's sort of peacocking in a way. It's ruffling your feathers and making yourself bigger in a sort of protecting nature, for sure. Were you a fan of the film, the one of Yul Brynner and Deborah Kerr?

Yeah, I mean, I saw it years ago. And I remember seeing this musical years ago as a child at my local theatre in Birmingham. And actually, we just played that theatre, which was a pretty special moment for me. But I didn't know it to the extent, obviously, I I do now and I hadn't realised how strong the script was and the book was and how much of a play it is although it's a big, you know, it's one of the original musicals

with dancing, singing, acting but the book itself is incredible and you have these lengthy scenes of about 15 pages which you just wouldn't get written in modern musical theatre or in fact plays. But they stand the test of time and, you know, audience members come out and say, well, it doesn't feel as long as it is.

And we're so used to that sort of Netflix generation of fast gratification. And it's not that, it's a slow burn. But at the same time, it doesn't feel as long as it sounds. No, I think slow burn is a really interesting way of putting it, actually. And what about Anna? As I was watching her again, because I haven't watched it for a long time until you were coming in to join us,

she's quite the character, isn't she? Quite extraordinary, Anna. Tell me a little bit about what it's like to play her. She survives in a male world and also at the opening of the show you realise she's a single parent with a young son and she's just trying to get by and she has a line that in fact says that I just want to work and support my son and so actually the tale is a pretty modern one and she ends up in Siam which we now know as Thailand helping the the king, this very progressive king who, although wants to cling on to his cultural legacy and and integrally hold on to that tightly.

But he also is willing to let the Western world in somewhat and to educate his women and children. And if that's not one of the most relevant tales we can talk about, it's pretty it's pretty modern um and she um she helped is instrumental in keeping siam it's uh keeping the independence for the country when the french and the british were invading most of the countries around um thailand um and and what's interesting as well as looking back to the actual woman that she's based on anna and how she reinvented herself and how she actually there's this um tale that she was from Wales, she probably wasn't from Wales, she probably had an Anglo-Indian heritage, which was hidden. And she wrote this book, which is still banned today in Thailand, because it's so, well, it's, you know, it's, it's, it's, it's, I can't think of the words, but it's sort of, it's, it's fought by the Thai royal family at the moment. So it is still banned and it's very provocative. So it's just, there's so much history to this role as well. But it's, we've got these sweeping, beautiful songs like Getting to Know You and Shall We Dance? Oh, let's talk about that. And that's Anna Leonowans who had the memoirs that some of it tallies with.

We don't know how much exactly it's true to life, but of course it gave life to this musical and also to this film. Let's talk about Shall We Dance. We were hearing Getting to Know You and now we're going Shall We Dance. What was that like? I mean, people will know you from Strictly as well. Obviously, you danced with Aljaz. Do you have a favourite dance within the musical?

Well, that's kind of the main dance that I do. And when I danced with Aliash, the thing that I kind of really enjoyed the most was ballroom. And of course, this is a more sort of ballroom dance. You know, there's no salsa in The King and I. And it is beautiful. It's a very beautiful moment. And I think the audience really enjoy that moment when we just forget everything around us. And I'm in the big purple dress and we sing that beautiful song and dance that beautiful dance. It's so romantic. Did it take, though, I don't know, some thinking ahead of how you could flow with that giant dress on?

I rehearsed in the dress from the beginning because we knew it was going to be an issue because it affects the way that Darren, who plays the king, holds me, you know, because he can't get so close. So I've always rehearsed in it. So I don't know what it's like to do that. And corsets? Corsets, yes. Difficult?

Of course, always difficult. And of course it's not difficult. They're difficult to sing in, I think. But at the same time, like I'm naturally quite a slouchy person sometimes. So it makes you sit up in a Victorian way. So they're needed. So that is going to be very exciting

as it comes to the Dominion Theatre. Can I talk about Call the Midwife as well? We did also have Helen Thomas in here. Heidi Thomas. Heidi Thomas, excuse me. It's a few weeks ago now as well. But at that point,

we were just saying there's going to be another season that will come as well. The character is so loved. I'm wondering what it's like when you encounter people and do they conflate you and Trixie? I think they do, definitely. I think there's a few similarities as well between us.

But of course, I'm honoured that it has been taken into so many people's homes and the character is enjoyed by so many people. That means a lot. And we're still going after 12 years, which is pretty incredible. I finish the tour of The King and I in a few weeks, and then I go back to filming Call the Midwife. That's what I was wondering. That schedule is pretty rigorous. Yeah, but you know, I'm a working parent, and I've got to pay the bills. So that's what I'm doing. So I don't mind at all. And I'm so lucky to have that job. I love it dearly. And then my family, you know, I've known them for over a decade.

So yeah, it's like coming home to that one. And we're talking about what home is actually throughout the programme. So that's a really interesting one to hear from you. I do know in your spare time though you do like to watch a bit of football. I mentioned Aston Villa. Yeah. That's your team?

Yes, yeah, yeah. And is that kind of a way that you relax or get a bit of downtime? I mean, definitely when I was younger. Not so much these days. But, look, I have a dog, and I think having a dog means that you get out. And, you know, even on those rainy days, it makes you get outside and getting air and getting light to yourself. I think that really lets me relax.

Now I'm sitting opposite you so I can see that you are now a brunette we're going to talk about colours a little later on this programme as well as I tell you everything together but I think a lot of people will associate you with being blonde and of course the papers are like oh the change she's a brunette now but people might be wondering was it just to change your heart or for the role? It wasn't for the role because I'm wigged, actually, and she has a more red tone. I wanted to do something for myself. And for years, I've been bleaching my hair quite a lot for the role of Trixie. I'm naturally blonde, but it was bleached quite white and it was damaging it.

And very kindly, Call the Midwife have agreed to wig me for the next few series, which is great. And I just fancied a change. And I think, you know, there's a lot of connotations that come with being a younger woman and being blonde and I think for years I definitely sort of was tarnished by that brush and not that I don't enjoy being blonde because I do but I think there was definitely a sort of I don't know a negative connotation to that blonde term as well so it's interesting coming away from that and looking back and reflecting back over my years of being seen as a blonde and what comes with that.

Now, you're a famous person, obviously, but my sister, I remember, did the same and she felt that people reacted to her differently. Do you find that? I think so. I think people aren't as willing to judge you so quickly. And I remember even when I was at drama school and years through education, I sort of,

I wasn't particularly academic, but my nickname was Old Blondie. And everything that comes with that, you know, oh, she's just a bit dizzy. She's just a bit ditzy. She's just a bit blonde. And I always fought against that. And, you know, in that kind of Dolly Parton strong way,

you know, I kind of was proud of that as well, that I could kind of, you know, take someone down if I needed to, and, you know, could fight as hard as anybody else. But I do think that people are less likely to judge you if you're not a blonde, which is horrific. What? And makes me want to go back blonde right now. But how interesting. That's a good one for our listeners, 84844 if you were blonde or maybe if you became blonde, how did society react?

Ellen George, wonderful to have you in, best of luck with The King and I and of course with the new season of Call the Midwife. Thank you so much. Lots of you getting in touch, let me see, saw The King and I at High Wycombe recently, the whole show was fantastic, Helen is glorious as Anna loved it, says Margot. And on home, yes, home.

The best definition I know of home is that wherever you stand, wherever you sit, you're looking at something that needs doing. So says Liz in Somerset. Keep them coming, 84844. Right, let us turn. Mention this briefly. Stevenage woman. Is she the new Mondeo man from Boris Johnson's

Workington Man to Tony Blair's Worcester Woman? You may have heard these terms used by political parties and pollsters to describe the key groups

they need to win over at a general election. The Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer is being urged to focus on Stevenage Woman in a new report

by the centre-left think tank Labour Together. But just how useful are these profiles to any party? Why are they even used? And why are they often male? Well, to discuss, I'm joined by Rosie Campbell,

Professor of Politics and Director of the Global Institute for Women's Leadership at King's College London, and also Dr Patrick English, Associate Director at YouGov, which carried out polling in England and Wales for the Labour Together report. OK, Patrick, first up, who is Stevenage Woman and why Stevenage? Hello, good morning. Yes. So Stevenage is, of course, it's a bellwether constituency. So if you look at Stevenage in the way it's voted over the last many, many, many election cycles,

you'll tend to find that the constituency as a whole votes the same or picks the same winner as the winner of the election. So it's a really important seat. There are others available, of course, like Dartmouth or Lubbera, Portsmouth North and West, Worcester. But Stevenage is one that has been sort of selected in this report as the archetype of this voter. Now, who is Stevenage Woman? Well, Stevenage Woman is a personification, I guess, a visualisation of a really important swing voter group currently in British politics. And that group are sort of a little bit socially conservative and sort of a little bit in favour of redistribution, generally are not hugely politically engaged, are sort of disillusioned, a little bit disenfranchised, don't do too much politics, think there's a bit too much politics in their life, but wants politicians to make them an offer that will help them get through their day-to-day lives. And for them, a lot of that's about financial insecurity, it's about childcare, it's about

other issues that affect them day-to-day, and they want politicians to speak to them on those levels and engage with them on those terms. And I, you know, we'll get into whether people find that reductive or not. But Rosie, I want to turn to you. Stevenage woman, as Patrick has outlined. What about Paisley woman? I started hearing about her. Well, I mean, Paisley woman, I only heard about her yesterday, so I can't call myself an expert. But I think that the report that Patrick's produced the data for was really focused on Labour Party target seats. So not so relevant if you're the SNP in Scotland.

And I think that the point of the articles are talking about Paisley women is actually, there's a very similar voter who's voted SNP in the past, but might not do so next time, who perhaps, you know, that the women are more likely to be undecided voters, more often swing voters. And so actually in Scotland, maybe we're better off talking about Paisley women, but actually it's a very similar demographic. Is that fair, Patrick? Yeah, I think that's totally fair. And I think the point is very good that this sort of the model, the Stevenage woman, the Paisley woman, I think really speaks to a wider look now at British politics, where women are among the most volatile voters.

Of course, we have the gender gap is sort of 2015, pre-2015, where women tend to be more likely to vote Conservative. That's now reversed and reversed very, very quickly indeed. So there's lots of volatility among women as a whole as a group. I think Stevenage woman and Paisley woman kind of play into that and are part of that broader narrative. But I wonder why is the woman voter more volatile? Go ahead, Rosie. I've got answers on that. Go on.

The thing is, women tend to be less strongly partisan. So if you look at the extremes of political opinion, the further left, the further right, you tend to see more men. Now, the exception to that is in support for the Green Party, if you might think of that as a kind of more radical view, where you tend to get more women. And so women tend to be slightly on average less interested in politics. And those who are very interested in politics are those who I know which party I'm going to vote for every time because I'm very passionate. And women less often do that. And I think it's because historically

there have been fewer women involved in politics. If you look at the global research, when there are more women involved, women tend to get more interested. It's also about the kinds of issues on the agenda. When the key issues are the NHS or education, women are more interested. And of course, we keep coming back to childcare here on Women's Hour, which is expected for both parties really to be one of those issues that perhaps people will be galvanised behind. But I'm wondering, Patrick, I mean, is this an American import? quick and vast information exchange between political systems and middle party strategists that we are increasingly borrowing strategies terms models of the way that we look at voter populations from different uh countries and that includes america but also includes australia france other countries from all around the world we're kind of sharing this knowledge across and i think so perhaps speak to the broader point i think it is a useful tool that we are bringing

into british politics discourse right now because it helps it helps party strategists it helps commentators it helps anybody interested really kind of visualize and personify who are the swing voters but who is it who jeremy hunt is talking to when he stands up in the commons and says this isn't a new child care policy well we might say it's probably stephenage woman that they've got a very close eye on that. So I think it helps us to understand and narrate what's going on and who the swing voters,

who the volatility is among right now. But do you not think that that is just for the people that are inside politics, for example, to try and narrow it down for them? And instead, you probably will have seen that lots of reporters went to Stevenage

and asked the women what they made of the label, some finding it reductive or unrepresentative. And they're kind of profiling often in an age where many don't want to be identified with a certain class or gender, basically putting people in a box. I think that's totally fair, yes. I think it's not the case that what the report or what the data or what we would suggest is that you could go to Stevenage and talk to any woman there and say this is how you will be or what you will look like, or indeed that the vast majority of women there would fit into that box. But it gives flesh, I think, it gives life to this group of voters who are sort of not hugely politically interested, who really sort of want issues dealt with that they care about,

who aren't sort of on the extremes that Rosie's talked about in terms of I know who I'm going to vote for. I know sort of where I'm going to go. They're there to be made an offer to. And I think it personifies when we look demographically at that group based on their values and their volatility, who the sort of the most common or who the most, the modal person is in that group. And for this group, it's a woman who's in her 40s, who lives in these sort of semi-urban, urban areas, who lives in a lot of swing seats, a lot of seats that are important to both Labour and the Conservatives if they're going to hold on to their majority in the next election. But Rosie, I mean, what about that? You know, the criticism, basically, if you do have these groups, then you just have political parties pandering to a certain demographic.

It's an enormous demographic. I mean, I have to say, of course, it's a simplification and no individual kind of ticks all these boxes. But to me, I'm enormously relieved. The last couple of elections where we, for the first time in the whole period that we've had data, a greater proportion of women voted Labour than men, which seemed to be almost ignored by most of the media. And the last couple of elections, the target voter, I think, was very much described as a kind of left behind man. It was as if women had just dropped out of the debate. So as far as I'm concerned, the fact that we're remembering the average voter is actually a woman. Fifty two percent of the electorate are women.

And actually, if you look among swing voters, undecided voters, they're disproportionately women. I think it's an error correction that we needed to see. Do they, Patrick, the crucial question, do they actually help win elections? I think certainly I think going to what Rosie has just so eloquently put the women may are the sort of the most common voter full stop they're also the most volatile and most likely to be a swing voter in British politics right now so I think absolutely this goes in tandem I think the sort of the left behind working to man is crucial to Labour and the Conservatives winning path right now but so is Stephen's women so are all of these women who don't know who they're going to vote for,

who want these concrete policy offers, who otherwise aren't on the extremes of politics. And these two groups, I think, can constitute the real key groups now in British politics, who those two big parties will be wanting to appeal to to win the next election. So certainly I think they help with elections, and certainly I think understanding, visualising, picturing in your mind, whether you're a politician, whether you're a journalist,

whether you're an interested party, who that person is, who that modal voter, who that most likely swing voter is at any given election is very helpful to understand, to kind of plot the course and chart who's going to win, who's making which appeals, which appeals most likely to be successful, and ultimately who's going to win that election. making which appeals, which appeals most likely to be successful, and ultimately, who's going to win that election. It's all ahead of us. Dr. Patrick English, Associate Director at

YouGov, and Rosie Campbell, Professor of Politics and Director of the Global Institute for Women's Leadership at King's College London. Thanks so much to both of you. We're going to get our colours done in a bit. Lots of you getting in touch about that. I had my colours done in 1985 and I've worn them ever since. It saves a lot of time

shopping. I walk past racks of wrong colours, all orange, olive and khaki green, golden yellows, brown, not black. Now we're going to talk about home in a moment. I just want to read this comment that came in from Rebecca. I'm in Australia. I'm a Welsh woman with an Australian passport and though

life here beats the UK on lifestyle, positivity perhaps and sunshine, it isn't home. I listen to Radio 4. That's great. Crave the spring flowers, the smell of grass and soil and British humour. Home for me is a wet field

full of cows, hedgerows, family and a sense of something ancestral. He right is what we call it in Wales. Forgive my pronunciation on that. Lovely Rebecca did give me one. Let me see. He right. He right is what we call it in Wales forgive my pronunciation on that lovely Rebecca did give me one let me see He right He right

you'll correct me if I'm wrong on that thank you for that lovely email Rebecca and thank you for tuning in to Woman's Hour and why do I read that comment? because I want to turn next to a book that interrogates the concept of home identity and belonging A House for Alice is the new novel by Diana Evans,

the sequel to the much-acclaimed Ordinary People. It's set between 2017 and 2020, and it's a sweeping, really intimate, also multi-generational portrait of a black British family set in the aftermath of the Grenfell fire and also the Windrush scandal. And it centres on the story of the matriarch and grandmother Alice, who, newly widowed, wants to return to the country of her birth, which is Nigeria.

However, her decision sends shockwaves through the lives of her grown-up daughters, Melissa, Adele and Carol, and their children. Diana's with me in the Woman's Hour studio. Welcome. Thank you, Nila. It's good to be here. What did you think when you heard from Rebecca there about trying to quantify what home is? Yeah, I really connected to that, actually. And I think home is a theme that is a, well, it's always been a very loaded theme for me as a site of questioning, being a person of mixed race, Black British and having been born here but also having connections to somewhere else.

So yeah, I did connect to that sense of a particular place being the place that defines you, the place that you yearn for and that's really the feeling at the centre of this book. Alice's yearning to return to her homeland in Nigeria. And I think it will resonate with so many people because a place can be home, as it is for Alice, when it comes to Nigeria, but may not have lived there for many, many years. Yeah, exactly. What is it going to be like for her if she does end up returning to Nigeria after 50 years of not having lived there?

And there's this sense that yearning for a place, it can really be a static place, an unchanging place, where you're disconnected from the contemporary realities of the place. So there's that question hanging over the novel through all of the different lives that it encompasses. Will Alice go home? Is that home a real place anymore? And the other characters in the novel are also searching for home.

So it's an interrogation of different kinds of home. It can be a geographical place, but it can also be a spiritual home or a psychological home, a romantic home. I think home is really the place where you cease to question who you are. And I think that's what they're all searching for, in a way, a place where they can feel at peace. I see Leslie got in touch from New Market Inn. She says, what is home? A place you can talk, be yourself and spend time with people who truly want the best for you. Looking forward to having both my daughters back at home for Easter. Hope you enjoy it, Leslie.

But I think with Alice, she's an older woman. She's the matriarch of this family. And the rest of her family are having that difficulty with her decision because home for them is something completely different. Talk me through how you were thinking about that intergenerational concept of home. Yeah, well, I knew that I wanted to write a novel that had a large cross-generational sweep and that I wanted to revisit the characters from the previous novel, Ordinary People,

and also that I wanted Alice to be at the centre of these searchings and yearnings. I wanted it to be an ode, really, to African women. The kind of African women mothers that I see in London all the time walking around who are relatively invisible in our media. I mean, my larger project with these books is to create visibility and truthful representation for people of colour. And I think the elderly African woman, the mother, is almost invisible in our culture.

So I wanted to give voice to that. The book is also a way of Alice speaking. So sometimes the prose lapses into Alice's actual voice. But her three daughters, they all have different opinions as to whether she should get this wish of hers to go home because I think her desire, it also affects their lives. She is a source of home for her daughters.

You know, a person can be a home and the absence of her in the UK means almost an absence within themselves of that. So that question, that sense of questioning returns, who am I? Alice lets them know who they are. And completely that comes across so strongly. She's like that anchor that's there for them. But she, her decision to leave is informed somewhat by that feeling of being unwelcome in the UK. And her daughters have had a completely different experience. And I think that when you have different generations, particularly if their heritage is from a different country. There's that disconnect about identity, perhaps, and also home within the same family that grew up in the same edifice of a house. Yeah, exactly.

So that issue of migration can create splits and conflicts within families. So Alice has a completely different perception of what home is. She is a character who has never really integrated into British life and she contains her country within her. And I was really interested in that, the way countries can exist within a human being who has been dislocated from their own country. But then there's her children who were born in the UK and feel a sense of belonging to the UK,

but also this questioning around it because of the issue of race and racism and the way it delivers this message of people who are not born in the UK and not of white British heritage, there's this question of their belongings that has always permeated her children's lives as well. What is also the backdrop, I should mention, I mentioned it briefly there, but it's the Grenfell fire. It brought me right back there, actually, I have to say.

Yeah, very much so. I was down there reporting in those first hours and it just all came back to life for me, actually, I have to say. Yeah, very much so. I was down there reporting in those first hours and it just all came back to life for me, actually, as I was reading it. And I'd be curious just, you know, why you decided on that particular event, horrendous event, as I suppose, really, it's almost like another character in your book, if I'm honest. Yeah, well, when Grenfell happened, I knew that I wanted to write about it and document it in the same way that when the Obama election happened, I knew that I wanted to document it so that it could be remembered and revisited and it wouldn't be forgotten. I think it's very important that those 72 lives that were lost

in the Grenfell fire and the communities and the families that is still being affected by it, their struggle for justice is not forgotten. So it's my way of supporting the Grenfell cause. There's an organisation justice for Grenfell that is trying to get corporate justice and accountability for the victims of the fire because it has almost been kind of kicked into the long grass and I think it's important as artists that we stand up and take some responsibility for making these kinds of changes

and supporting calls for justice. And it affected me deeply as well because I used to live very close to Grenfell, just a few blocks away. And I used to live in one of those tower blocks as well. So it could have happened. It happened it it can happen so easily and um it's it's to do with just an inability of the corporation and industry to to see that these lives as important enough to kind of invest in properly so the cheaper cladding was used and it's it's really the cladding that has been established as the main reason for for why the fire was so bad. But there's just an undervaluing of the lives of the immigrant community in that building,

the black community, the working class community. It was seen kind of as not important enough to respond to in an adequate way. And with Grenfell, I think the idea of loss comes up very much. And that is something that's explored then. That's like a macrocosm. And then in the microcosm in that family, there's divorce, there's separation, there's death, obviously, as well with Cornelius, the husband of Alice.

Maybe I should say ex-husband. I mean, they were separated. Why did you, with that, the divorce, loss, separation, and also, I don't know, the difficulty of relationships, is that the area of life it seems to interest you quite deeply? Yeah, it is. I mean um these novels are really driven by a desire to study um relationships between people between men and women um sibling relationships um relations between parents and children the impact of your own childhood on

your own parenting really interests me but I think by studying relationships and dynamics between people you can really use them as microcosms to study kind of wider human psychology and social realities so that's what I'm doing really and it's it's a really great way to to do dialogue as well I love writing dialogues and so I'm often finding that I'm hearing characters' voices in my head and writing things down, particularly Nicole, who's one of my favourite characters in this novel. The characters kind of, they speak to each other in my head. And I love studying the way they interact with one another. There's so much as well, the way they interact with one another. But also there is so much music and poetry.

You talk about the dialogue there. I feel that it is part of it. How much does music and poetry dance inform your work? Well, I used to be a dancer and I i love music i think having been a dancer i do find writing a very sedentary silent activity and so i find the need for music is even greater and and i tend to include it in my novels in the way that i include um lots of things really i like lives to be lived within the pages of a book so i like lots of different kinds of scenes, people listening to music, people going shopping, people making love, people sitting down to have dinner.

I like the pages to feel like they're teeming with life and realism, and the music and the dance is all a part of that. I have to say, wonderful book. Really just kind of gave me a window backwards and forwards in London and off a certain life and I know you're all about representation so I think you achieved that so wonderfully in the book. Diana Evans thanks so much for coming in. Thank you very much.

Lots of people getting in touch about home. Let me see, I've lived away since 2006 in my small sailing boat so I travel around the world. I'm back in my floating home now in Malaysia but listen to Radio 4. I'm back in my floating home now in Malaysia, but listen to Radio 4. I love all these people getting in touch in wild and wonderful places. I'm listening to your programme now to give me a sense of home. Well, we're glad you are home with us. I had planned to move into a converted van to travel and find somewhere that actively feels

like home to me. Then the pandemic hit. My family very kindly helped me buy a house in the North East which is an area I've always lived in but not really by my own active choice. It's familiar but not sure it's really home for me and that's Amy

getting in touch. How interesting. Thanks to all of you getting in touch. Right. Next up we want to talk about colours.

It was if you were around in the 80s you'll probably remember it, getting your colours done. Carol Jackson's hit book was Colour Me Beautiful and you would find your season. Maybe you were a spring or a summer

or an autumn or a winter. Well, apparently, we still want to know what our perfect shades are. So being wrapped up in colourful drapes by a colour analyst was until recently seen as old-fashioned. For someone like Bridget Jones' mum, perhaps, rather than an influencer.

But now the power of colour, yes, it's hit social media. The hashtag Colour Analysis has over 850 million views on social media. You can even find a filter, figure it out on your own. But I have journalist Kat Brown, who believes in the power of colour, and Nisha Hunjan, personal stylist and founder of Stammy. You're both very welcome. Hi. I immediately, of course, we have to talk about the colours you're wearing. Why don't

you start, Nisha, just describe to our listeners, because they'll want to know. They'll want to know what I'm wearing. So I'm wearing a winter green, a pine green, and I'm matching it with a bright red lipstick, because I'm a winter. Kat? I'm a bright spring, so I'm wearing some blacks that are suitable for my colour palette, but I'm also basically just wearing black today, but I'm also quite premenstrual and not feeling like super glamorous. The black often comes out, I think, around periods. Not just for obvious reasons.

It depends on your mood. Colour has such an impact on if you're having a good mood, you might think, actually, I'll wear a brighter colour. If you just want to hide a little bit, you'll think I'll just wear black or you think it's slimming. And that's another thing. It's probably not slimming. The cut is what's slimming, but we would wear black, presuming it's going to make us hide a little bit. And maybe we should even go back to basics. Lots of people getting touch here um i was a warm winter in 1989 two ladies from bbc media training did color me beautiful review along with the media training

i suspect as i am now graying i will be a warm autumn use the color scheme all my working life and was complimented on my turnout a lot so it worked for me uh and that's simon um let's go back to basics where did it come from so it So the desire for colour has always been around. We've sort of seen this almost in reverse. It was so interesting that Simon just messaged in because for centuries, men were the peacocks of fashion. And then in the 20th century, they just became the province of grey suits, navy suits, nothing else. And it really sort of exploded again in the 70s and 80s. And the 80s, of course, was a real time of experimentation with colour. I mean, arguably all the colours. It was more like being part of Art Attack than necessarily a well put together

tailored outfit. But what we're really seeing coming up now, particularly with Instagram, the longstanding success of Pinterest is is people wanting to understand how they can sort of dress to make themselves feel like happy and polished and put together but in a way that feels truly authentic to them definitely and where do you think it's back I honestly don't know because people would be saying to me how comes you've booked me and they were like oh I saw it on TikTok it's amazing and I think I don't know what's happened but I think the great thing is with TikTok and Instagram you can actually see it visually you can see someone's wearing the wrong color and instantly the next minute they're wearing

the right color and you think oh my god she looks amazing and she hasn't had Botox or fillers or anything done it's just the color in that exact moment so I think that's where Instagram and TikTok have really helped it but it's good for us because I've been doing it for ages either way do you both of you mentioned the seasons do you go with the seasons yeah autumn winter spring or and in TikTok have really helped it. But it's good for us. I've been doing it for ages either way. Do you both of you mentioned the seasons? Do you go with the seasons? Yeah, autumn, winter, spring or summer. I know people do warm winter, cool spring. I don't know what how that really works. I haven't trained that way. But I just want to know what palette am I give me around 30 colours. And the thing is,

whatever colour palette you are, you're that for life. It doesn't change. The reader was saying that you become a warm autumn. Even if your hair colour changes. Even if your hair colour changes. So it's an investment. You only did it once in your lifetime and the sooner you probably get it done is better, is what I would say. Susie got in touch.

I ran the Image Factor in the 80s, mostly corporate image and confidence training. And they had a client at the BBC and it was the men who really enjoyed the training women tended to find every reason to argue about any change it's a lot about the men women thing here and Nicola in the male dominated nuclear industry the company decided to help by putting on a women in industry course the highlight of this was a colour me beautiful session it was the 80s after all but most of the most of us were shocked we were also advised not to wear strong perfume as it might remind your male boss of his wife you couldn't make it up so some memories

from the 80s there but if you look at somebody Nisha will you immediately know what they are? No that's the whole thing right you they all say to me what am I what do you think I am and I'll be like it's a 50-50 guess because I don't know what your undertone is you might be cool or you might be warm and that's why we can charge for it ultimately because anyone can just say to you oh I'm a trained color analyst and oh I think you're an autumn I think you're a spring but the only way to really work it out is with specific specifically designed drapes you need daylight you're going to get a 50-50 cent thing and a lot of people are being trained now that aren't actually that qualified for it so you might be getting told you're a season and you're not that.

So get it done by the right people. I'll come back to the cost in a minute. But Kat, you did get your colours done, right? 2017, is that correct? I did. You were ahead of the trend in there or behind the trend, depending on the 80s or now. But what was the experience like? It was really lovely because I'm like a lot of, I'm 40 and like a lot of women my age,

I grew up with my mother's own Colour Me Beautiful book in the bedroom and the only redhead in it, in that entire book, was automatically categorised as an autumn. And so I spent a long time being forced into horrible shades that didn't suit me at all because I was a redhead. Oh, well, the 90s classic sort of brown skirts and sort of anything sort of sludgy and depressing because it goes with your hair. But it doesn't at all. So having these drapes put around you, which sounds a little bit like that bit in Sound of Music with the curtains. But it's much more about sort of seeing which colours like make your skin look sort of alive and make you look a bit more joyful. And it was really lovely because it showed me that it showed me colours that I

should go shopping for it's given me lots to look at on Instagram unfortunately the reality is that there aren't always those sorts of colours and the shapes that suit you and throw in the fact that whilst I'm a straight-sized woman I'm also six foot one so shopping is always a bit of a challenge anyway but it does mean that I always know what colours to look out for and if I see them you'd better best I'm gonna whip them off so you're a light spring so what does that mean what are your colours a bright spring I know a bright spring okay really like the horoscopes so actually the woman's hour microphone fluffy thing here is a perfect shade of bright spring red it's almost it's very saturated it's warm I'm always attracted to that colour my colouring is quite similar to yours.

There we go. Have you had your colours done? No, I haven't. Well, we'll have to do your colours then. Sounds good. But I'm always often attracted to that red. But my mum said, I think I was a good five or six at the time,

and somebody said to her, she hadn't noticed I was a redhead at this stage, and somebody said to her, oh, you should never put a redhead in red. And she was like, oh, she's a redhead. But that was kind of the old saying that it used to be, right that's not correct we have to throw out some of the old perhaps stereotypes we have in our heads about certain colours yeah definitely there's certain colours that are gonna you know bring out the best in you certain colours that won't that won't work for you and once you

know what they are that's that's the key and what is it is it the reflection against your skin or it's the combination of your skin, eyes and hair colour. So it's, I don't know how it works. Honestly, when you put certain drapes on, it's like a bit of a magic thing, isn't it? You put one colour on and it will drain you. Put another colour on and instantly your eyes will get brighter. Your jawline will look stronger. Okay.

So for me, I would say the main thing really for colour is to get, if you want to stay youthful, get your colours done. But let's talk about it, though. It's not a science. It can cost upwards of £300. And people will be like, you know, that's money for old rope. What would you say? I would say that £300 is too much to spend on it. I think you should be able to get your colours done for around about £100, £150.

But I would say this, you only need to get it done once in your lifetime. It's an investment. And once you know that, think about all the money you will save in the long run from not buying the wrong colours. And I think right now with sustainability, we're at that stage now. We don't just go into Zara and keep buying a top every week. If you buy a top, you want to make sure it's in your wardrobe

because it suits you, it stays in your wardrobe so you can mix and match it from day to night, build yourself a capsule wardrobe. So I would not style anyone unless I've done their colours. Very briefly, do you think it was worth it? Oh, absolutely. Hugely. Not least because now every time I go on Instagram, I can spot somebody who wears colours that I would suit and go, oh, I wonder where they go shopping. I'm going to start that looking at you. Journalist Kat Brown and also Nisha Hunjan, personal stylist and founder of Style Me. Thanks both for coming in.

Now, tomorrow on Woman's Hour, Anita will be speaking to the writer Curtis Sittenfeld, whose new novel, Romantic Comedy, examines the rules of modern dating. So lots to talk about there. Do join Anita tomorrow at 10am and I will be talking to you again on Monday.

That's all for today's Woman's Hour. Join us again next time. Hello, I'm Lucy Worsley and I want to tell you about Lady Killers from BBC Radio 4. It's a programme that mixes true crime with history, but with a twist. With our all-female team of experts, I am re-examining the crimes committed by murderesses in the past through the eyes of 21st century feminists. What can we learn from these women

and would it be any different today? Lady Killers. Listen first on BBC Sounds. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she

been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story,

settle in. Available now.