Woman's Hour - Weekend Woman's Hour: Melinda French Gates, Rebecca Solnit, 'Carents', Actor Tracey Ullman

Episode Date: October 4, 2025

Melinda French Gates is on a crusade to boost research into women's health. She co-founded the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000 which has, to date, donated over $100 billion to charitable projects. Since her divorce from Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, she has left their joint enterprise and set up her own, Pivotal Ventures, which has one purpose: to put power into the hands of women. She joined Anita Rani in the Woman's Hour studio.Gloria Allred is one of the best known women’s rights lawyers in the US. She tells Nuala McGovern what has happened to victims' voices amongst the continuous revelations in the press from the Epstein Files. We then hear from bestselling author and leading feminist thinker Rebecca Solnit, who says the released documents are reminders of a culture that decades of feminism have started to dismantle.The conservationist and primatologist Dame Jane Goodall died this week aged 91. According to the Jane Goodall Institute, she died of natural causes in California where she was staying as part of a speaking tour in the US. There have been tributes from around the world. Wildlife biologist, National Geographic Explorer and President of the Wildlife Trust, Liz Bonnin, joins Anita Rani to remember this ground-breaking conservationist who revolutionised the study of great apes. Jillian Miller who is the director of the Gorilla Organisation, which works to save gorillas from extinction also pays tribute.Many of us will remember the multi-award winning Tracey Ullman from her TV shows, A Kick up the Eighties, Three of a Kind, as well as The Tracey Ullman Show, which was a hit on both sides of the Atlantic. Tracey joins Nuala McGovern to discuss her latest role in the film, Steve, in which she plays the deputy head in a last chance reform school for troubled teenage boys.A ‘carent ’is an adult child who is caring for one or both of their ageing parents, in-laws or elderly relatives. Many ‘carents’ will be balancing work and family alongside. Dr Jackie Gray, a retired GP and founder of The Carents Room, joins Nuala McGovern to discuss, along with Kendra and Rachel who provide care for their parents.Presenter: Anita Rani Producer: Simon Richardson

Welcome to Weekend Woman's Hour. Coming up, highlights from the week. Tracy Ullman talks about her career on stage and screen and her latest role in the film, Steve, playing a teacher in a residential school for troubled teenage boys. We'll reflect on the ongoing allegations about the associates of Jeffrey Epstein with leading feminist thinker Rebecca Solnit and lawyer Gloria Alred, who's represented 27 of Epstein's victims.

She tells us why she keeps fighting. I always say that the women's movement is unique and that it's the only movement in which the participants become more radical as they get older. So we don't agonise, we organize. That's what we have to continue to do to win rights because we know what's at stake for our daughters. Plus, are you a carerent that's an adult caring

for one or both of their ageing parents whilst balancing work and family? We'll hear arguments about why unpaid care is being relied on too heavily to filling gaps in the system. And we'll remember Dame Jane Goodall, the pioneering primatologist whose work transformed our understanding of chimpanzees and whose death was announced earlier this week. But first, yesterday I spoke to Melinda French Gates, the most well-known and powerful woman in philanthropy. She co-founded the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in 2000, which, has to date donated over $100 billion to charitable projects.

Melinda studied computer science and economics and started at Microsoft as one of the few female managers at the company. After just a few years, she became the general manager of information products. She and Bill Gates married in 1994 and divorced in 2021 after 27 years of marriage. She since left their joint enterprise and set up on her own, Pivotal Ventures, which has one purpose to put power into the hands of women. I started by asking her why. Because I think women have, we all have power inside of ourselves. And yet we just as a world have not invested enough in women.

And it's, you know, there have been for a long time big headwinds against women getting to their equal place in society. And those headwinds have gotten stronger. And so I feel there's something we should do about it. I can do something about it. I'm lucky enough to be a philanthropist, so I am. So your company, Pivotal, along with the non-profit, welcomely committed $100 million, specifically to women's health research, promising to deliver in years, not decades.

So tell me more about this. What women are you looking to help? And why have you focused on health care? Well, because for a woman, a woman has to be well, to do well in life, right? And yet, if you look at all scientific research and funding that has gone to women's health, in my country, that's the National Institutes of Health, billions of dollars, 1% has gone towards women's health. And yet women spend nine years of their life in poorer health compared to men. And those aren't just the end of life. That's in her most productive years.

So we should invest in this so women can be well so they can do anything they want. And in fact, just last week, I had the new head of the Crick Institute, which is a big biomedical global research center that's opened here in London. And Edith Hurd, who is leading it was on. And she said, you know, it's only in the last hundred years that we're really looking at women's health. Before that, it was just everything was focused on the uterus. Right. And think about it. We've expected women to just deal with pain and suffering.

Yeah. Do you know of chronic diseases, there are about 140 chronic diseases? 80% disproportionately affect women, I think we should know something more about those diseases. I think you're absolutely right about that. But you've also acknowledged just how little has been done in this regard. So how do you expect results in years, not decades? How are you going to expediate this? Well, this $100 million between Welcome Leap and myself, first of all, let me be very clear.

This is a drop in the bucket. We need hundreds of millions, if not billions, in women's research. but I'm hoping to stimulate others to come into this area. But this particular model they have and have used now for a number of years in other medical cases, we know they send out proposals, they get responses very quickly, they go through the responses within weeks, not years, and then within months, they're outdoing the research to then get to bench science where we can actually put something on the market. So they have a proven model, and we're using it again.

And this time for women's health. We can't talk about women's health right now without discussing the recent news from the US. So in recent weeks, you are aware, Donald Trump, has said that taking Tylenol, a brand of paracetamol, is linked to a very increased risk of autism in children. What was your reaction to this news? We should not mix politics and science. Follow your doctor's advice. Yeah, he also singled out the MMR vaccine for measles, mumps, and rebella, which is given to babies. He said it should be given in single dose, right?

rather than a combined shot and that he heard a lot of bad things about it over the years. This is echoes of the completely discredited claims of Andrew Wakefield, the British doctor who was struck off for the UK's Medical Register for his unethical research and his debunked claims that linked the MMR jab to autism. What those claims did lead to over is a huge increase in vaccine hesitancy. Through the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation,

you focused on vaccine development, particularly for children. With this in mind, how concerned were you by this claim? Deeply concerned. You know, I worked at the Gates Foundation for over 25 years and sat at many, many tables with medical researchers, with scientists. It took so long to debunk that claim. And it was science that proved that claim is not right. And yet, something like measles, mumps, and rebella, that saves children's lives. I have traveled all over the globe, lucky enough to do that for the Gates Foundation. Women and men stand in line in the heat in places all over the world because they know those vaccines save lives. Children are dying in my own country because of that bad news because measles, children die of it. That just shouldn't be. I must say that the MHRA has confirmed that taking paracetamol during pregnancy remains safe and there is no evidence. It causes autism in children.

And President Trump's claims on vaccines have been roundly rejected. condemned. I want to ask you about being a female leader now, particularly now that you don't have a husband that you're in meetings with. Are you treated differently? Have you seen a change? I think the changes are even more in myself. I'm all the more self-confident in my decisions. Look, again, I sat at that table for over 25 years in the Gates Foundation. But now I have my full voice. I'm not sharing it with somebody else. I'm not waiting for their questions. I'm not responding to their questions, I know how I want to invest my money. And so I feel I've stepped into my full power. And that feels great because I can be a fully integrated person. I can say what

I believe. I can invest where I believe. I can use my voice the way I'm saying to my son and my daughters, use your voice in society. Stand up for what you believe in. Your most recent book, The Next Day, is all about transitions. It covers the death of a dear friend, becoming a mother, your divorce, and you say in it that growth really happened when you turned 60. How? I think partly in writing that book and in reflecting, I realize that during transitions, some of them you want to make, like you move maybe from secondary school to another school, some of them happen to you. But I learn that during those transitions, even the difficult ones, is where the growth happens and the change happens.

And there can be beauty on the other side. And so I feel like at 60, I really could step into those learnings. And faith is important to you. You are a Catholic, but also you're working in women's health. And contraceptive is very important for women's health. So how do those two sit together? I had to really, again, go through some inner searching and some learning about the Catholic faith that I did around 2010.

I actually brought in a number of religious scholars from the Catholic faith to teach me. how did the Catholic religion get to where it was on contraceptives? And I realized, and I had literally seen women in the developing world in life and death situations who said, I need to space the births of my children to keep the ones I have healthy and alive. And so as I learned that those were man-made decisions on contraceptives, I realized I need to question this truth because I know what I'm seeing in low-income countries, and I know I use contraceptives. I know what I believe. So now I'm going to step out and use my voice to go against this literally man-made rule. Have you had any backlash?

Yes, I absolutely had backlash from the Catholic Church at the time. I know some people now decide they're not going to follow me. That's okay. But what I know to be true is that when a woman can time and space the births of her children, she's healthier. the children are healthier and more likely to get educated. Your education, as I mentioned, was important to you, your love of computer science being encouraged by it from a very young age. The number of women going into computer science

is rising here in the UK, but slowly. Would you like to see those figures rise? And is it more important now than ever with the rise of AI and the number of men who are responsible for programming it leading to what some might see as biased results that we get women in the industry. I think it is vital that we get more women into technology.

And in fact, in the United States, I make quite a bit of investments in this because what I know to be true is that when women have a seat at the table in the creation of new technology, I was there, luckily, at Microsoft in the early days, we do change things. The discussion changes.

And we can point out some of the bias and get that taken out. So I believe women should be in all places, in society at an equal level. And technology, particularly AI, is literally changing our lives as we speak. So you've got to have women and people of color at the table so we don't bake in bias. And so even the narratives about AI that are being given out in society are not all male focused. They're more, you know, hey, this is how it can help us. This is where it can help us in technology, sorry, in health. This is where it can help us get further in the

law. And so I absolutely believe women need to be there at the table, at the creation, and during the design and creative process. So how did you navigate your own career, those early days, when you were one of the few women in that tech environment? It was hard. That is the truth. I found other women. There were a few others in the company. And I found, let's be clear, we need male allies. I found great men in the company who were for women and who would speak up and say, no, no, no, she has a point to make. Oh, wait a second, you overspoke her, right? So I found allies and then I used to step into the conversation,

lean forward into the conversation, don't lean back, even when people are trying to talk over me or shouting or doing the boys' debate club. And I learned to then step into my voice and my power, but it took time. You've met so many women in your life, those in need of support and greater understanding of their needs. Is there one woman or a group of women who you've met who inspire you to keep going?

Oh, I've met so many women. But, you know, I will say this one woman that I met in West Africa, she said to me, don't you see, don't you see? There's a little clinic over there, and it used to have contraceptives in it. Don't you see, I have five children. And if my husband wants to have another one, I need a way to covertly use. contraceptives so I can at least either not have that child or space that child. It's not fair to my current children. And her voice rings in my head because I know that if she's able to

get contraceptives, which the world has provided over time, she's likely to be healthier and so are her children. How do you feel about sort of fellow billionaires and where they choose to spend their money? Well, I look at others who have great privilege and I try to motivate the ones who I think are movable to give some of that money away and honestly to give a substantial proportion away because what I know is they will be better off in that giving and the world is likely to be better off. And so my way is to try to inspire them and particularly for this women's health cause. I think I'm already talking to others of great wealth who are saying, oh, no, no, I care about that. How are you doing it? Oh, okay, I will invest alongside of you. And so those are the ones that I

speak with the most and figure out what are ways forward. And this is a personal question, but, you know, we've had a very personal conversation. How do you instill sort of values in your children, your three children when it comes to, you know, they've grown up in such a rarefied world. How do you make sure their feet are still on the ground? Yes. Well, as they were growing up, they're all in their 20s now. I'm so proud of them. They're all adults. But as they were growing up, I really kept my middle class family in mind growing up. The chores we had, the allowance we had. And honestly, the values my parents had. And so even though they were living in this very privileged situation, I really said to them, look, you're going to have

an allowance and you're going to have limits and you're going to have boundaries. You're not going to get. you know, a fancy car when you turn 16 and get your driver's license. Like, I took these steps along the way with them, and I have to be honest, I took them out to see the world, to see our backyard in Seattle the parts that aren't so great, to see homelessness, to go out in Africa when they were young many times, to have them understand how great their privilege was and that they did have a responsibility to give something back. Next, the gradual release of files from the US Department of Justice's investigation into the convicted sex offender Geoffrey Epstein. Lord Peter Mandelson, the UK ambassador to Washington, was sacked over his links to Epstein and a number of charities have severed ties with the Duchess of York, Sarah Ferguson, for what appears to be a supportive email to Epstein after his first conviction. On Wednesday, Woman's Hour brought you the voices of two key women in the US to reflect on this ongoing. story. First, Gloria Alred. She's been a woman's rights lawyer for nearly half a century and has represented 27 victims of Jeffrey Epstein. Gloria told Nula what impact all the current

attention on Epstein is having on his victims. It's like a water torture test. It's a drip drip. Many of them had hoped and expected that they could put all this behind them. But that's not what's happening because now there's a political battle and there's still a legal battle going on by Ms. Maxwell, the convicted felon. And in fact, it's before the United States Supreme Court right now, her appeal. Now, whether it will prevail, that's another issue. You know, they're just constant revelations. It's whenever they turn on their news. What do they tell you about what this does to them? I can tell you that for them, it's very emotional. It's emotional that they even feel they have to fight the battle to have the records released,

the investigative files that were done in connection with the 2008 case against Jeffrey Epstein in Florida, which resulted in a sweetheart deal for him where he could go to his office every day and just sleep in the jail overnight to 13 months, and then just, you know, plead guilty or no contest to, you know, soliciting a minor for prostitution and register as a sexual predator and then come back to life where, you know, he was accepted by a lot of his rich, powerful, famous friends who appeared to ignore or plead ignorant of any prior conviction and just resume life as though nothing had ever happened. Of course, one of the voices that was really a proponent for the victims was Virginia Joufrey in April of this year, 2025. She died by suicide at her farm in Western Australia.

She was 41. What does it mean that her voice is no longer heard? Well, I will say that her voice is heard through her family members now, some of whom I met in Washington, D.C., not long ago when I was there for the rally. and rallies of many of the victims who wanted Congress to hear their pleas that the file should all be released and why does there even have to be a battle over this?

They put out statements as the brothers, the sister-in-laws of Virginia Goufrey. They knew her better than many others. Her voice should be heard through that. You mentioned the files being released. Are you hopeful that they will be? Well, I always say hope is not a strategy. It's a child's wish.

So what we have to do, because, again, you know, women are never given any rights. We always have had to fight for them. We still do. So the battle goes on in Congress. Is that the most effective way that you feel you will get the files released? In the court of public opinion, it is important to keep educating the public.

and to bring back to the public consciousness, there are still victims there. Their majority are in fear still. So there's been some justice for them. I represented 27, and we were able to win some justice for them, but it's not enough. I think right now that Congress is close to getting the one vote they need, actually a Democrat who said she would support releasing the five. was just elected. So we'll see when she is permitted to take her seat in Congress and then they have the vote.

We're following it closely and we'll do whatever it takes. It's legal and peaceful, maybe not so peaceful, but legal and politically appropriate. Explain that to me. To win justice for the victim as much as possible. Maybe not so peaceful. Explain that to me a little bit more. Well, I'm saying if we have to, you know, organized protests of victims being out. That may not be considered peaceful. But we have to keep

on with this. We have to be persistent to win as much justice as possible and to try to minimize the injustice. I think were it not for the victims, we wouldn't even have the release of the files that we have, but we just have to keep at it. In January, I'll have been practicing law with my law firm for 50 years. And we still have so many battles to fight. And I always say that the women's movement is unique in that it's the only movement in which the participants become more radical as they get older. And I think that's very true. But the reason for it is because we go back to our lived experience as women and the battles we've had to fight. and continue to fight.

So we don't agonize, we organize. That's what we have to continue to do to win rights because we know what's at stake for our daughters. Women's rights lawyer Gloria Alred, reflecting at the end there on the lived experience that drives the women's movement. Now let's hear from American writer and activist Rebecca Solnit. She says it's important that when thinking about the Epstein scandals,

we don't lose sight of how much things have changed over time and that we have feminism to thank for that. For Rebecca, the attitudes and some of the behaviours revealed in the release of the Epstein files are not surprising and in her own girlhood were thoroughly normalised. I entered my teens in the 1970s when what gets called the sexual revolution was raging. There was definitely with the birth control pill

and second wave feminism, some liberation for women. But a lot of what the sexual revolution consisted of for a kid like me, surrounded by a lot of counterculture people, sex is good, everyone should have it. There's no reason to say no. You were pressured from the age 12 on to have sex by adult men. And you had no recourse. Adults weren't intervening. A lot of this was happening quite publicly. And it was also very present in the movies, in rock star culture. I just talked to somebody who had watched pretty baby when he was very young, Louis Moll's movie in which books Shields at, I think, age 12, plays a girl growing up in a brothel in New Orleans. And she's sexualized and exposed in ways

that would be considered completely unacceptable now. It was just so pervasive in the culture and so normalized. I mean, do you see it when you look back now as that we have progressed in leaps and bounds? I'd be curious of your take. Absolutely. I think there's two big revolutions that feminism brought us. In the 1980s, feminism really brought to bear an analysis that said all relationships are power, relationships. Abuse is very common. You know, a 12-year-old girl and a powerful adult man do not have the same kind of power. And they talked a lot about rape and child abuse in ways that they hadn't been talked about before. And a lot happened. But a second wave was really needed, and it began around 2012 or 2013.

I think that campus rape activists, the Steubenville rape case in the U.S., the sexual assault, rape murder of Jody Singh in New Delhi, brought a second wave of feminism that took place partly on social media, allowing a kind of Greek chorus to what individuals said and what news stories brought us, which ultimately dismantled a lot of the protection for rapists. The protection essentially was all the ways in which people decided women and girls were untrustworthy, unreliable, incompetent to bear witness, vindictive, et cetera. People just automatically dismissed victims as lying. For the last 20 years, women who were victims of sexual assault have told. told me their stories and sometimes told their stories publicly for the first time

because for the first time they felt that they were in a world that would actually listen to them the fact that people like Harvey Weinstein and Bill Cosby, the gymnastics doctor in the U.S., Jimmy Saville over there in your country, and of course Epstein first saw consequences for what they did. Well, of course, Jimmy Saville was already dead. And I think one of the real effects of what gets called me, too, but I think is a much broader wave of feminism is the one we're not going to see. I think seeing Harvey Weinstein in prison, all these other things is telling a whole lot of would-be rapists, assailants, etc. I no longer have the confidence that I'll get away with this that I would have 15 years ago. So the real measure

of something like this is all the things that aren't happening. The system deals with it somewhat better. So what does feminism need to do next, Rebecca? Where do you see the biggest challenges? I think feminism has done miraculous things. Patriarchy as a misogynist system that gives men power, including the power of credibility, of voice of consequence when they speak up, is thousands of years old. The fact that in my lifetime we have not completely abolished it is not a failure or a sense that feminism is somehow doing it wrong. I think we need to continue. I think men need to liberate themselves because patriarchy oppresses them as well. It gives them some advantages, but at a terrible cost. And I think we need to recognize all the ways that men benefit from a world in

which women are free and equal. This is not a zero-sum game anymore than white people are oppressed by non-white people having rights. Men are not oppressed by women having rights. Living in a world where everyone is free and equal is a more beautiful world. I mean, in the slavery area, in the United States people talked about the ways in which a master was also caught up in a hideous system as well as an enslaved person. And I think, you know, inequality distorts and deforms us all. Rebecca Solnit there and Gloria Alred before her. Still to come on the program, Tracy Ullman, on her new film,

and we'll be paying tribute to primatologist Jane Goodall. And remember, you can enjoy Woman's Hour any hour of the day. If you can't join us live at 10 a.m. during the week, just subscribe to the daily podcast. It's free via BBC Sounds. Now to Tracy Ollman. She's starring in a brilliant new film, Steve, about a residential school for troubled teenage boys. Tracy plays the deputy head, Amanda, but as you may know, Tracy's career has been long and varied.

Many of us loved her TV shows, a kick-up the 80s, three-of-a-kind, Tracy breaks the news, and a move to the States in 1985 saw her starring in the Tracy Elman show, the first British woman to be offered her own television. sketch show in the US. And more recently, she played city councilwoman Irma Kostroski in Larry David's hit comedy series, Curb Your Enthusiasm. Tracy has won 12 American Comedy Awards, seven Primetime Emmy Awards, a BAFTA and a Golden Globe, to name a few. In this film, you're a character actress. And I've heard you say previously from a couple of years ago that being a character actress was the dream ever since you watched Ken Loach's 1960s television drama.

Kathy come home. Yes. So how does it feel? Well, it's like I've made that circle now. I've got, you know, I've had such a terrific time. That's a beautiful song, they don't know. The late great Kirsty McCall. I mean, she gave me that gift.

Let me sing that beautiful song. It means a lot to me over the years. It was number one in Ireland. I know it was. I probably helped you get there. I couldn't get to number one here. I was behind Carma, Carma, Carme, Carmeleon. No, when I was a kid,

kid, I remember watching Kathy come home and seeing those kids being separated from their mother at that train station. And I thought, this is real. This can't be a TV program. And Ken Loach has just actually reviewed Steve and loves it. I just was shown. And I'm so proud that he even knows who I am, you know. It means a lot to me. I used to sit for hours as a kid, you know, pretending to smoke, you know, my mirror at bedtime, just talking like I was in a documentary, you know, and just like, oh, my husband's in prison.

The kids are driving me mad. I'm really tired, you know. And my mum would go, shut up, go to bed. Stop being in a documentary. I just loved it. I mean, I've always loved Michael Apted, 7-Up, going all the way up to, well, it'll be 70 up in a minute. I mean, I've watched those over the years,

and I find it's so affecting. So it's about the human condition. It's about the human, I love people. I love the poignancy of people. I love the vulnerability, the sadness of people. And I love to laugh. but I'm not laughing at people ever and yeah I look at Dandy Nichols

and my dear friend the late great Joan Plowright who died this year and Maggie Smith and Judy Dench and I'm like I want to be that next generation Well you do that in this film So to let people know a little bit about it It takes place mostly over one day Incredibly chaotic day

And you's crew is coming into the school To do a piece on it The local MP is showing up the staff are facing a funding crisis but there is the behaviour of the boys that are in your care your Amanda and Steve who's played by Killian Murphy

and I should also of course say the teacher Shola Little Sims Oh Little Sims And your character is really a maternal figure I would say trying to keep everything together while things are unraveling all around her

How did you approach her Well as I've got to say Killian Murphy is amazing to be in a film with him. I've met him a few years ago and we got on very well and his wife Yvonne is just great and she heard me on a podcast and she said, that's who you need in this film, Killian.

He'd just come off his big Oscar win and Oppenheimer and he wants to do something on an ensemble and something that means something. He wanted me to play his deputy head and so it was very improvisational of this film. We have a Belgian director, Tim Milance, and it was, you know, he just got a hold of us like he had all these boys in the film that were either professional actors or people he'd

found that never acted before and he worked with them for a few weeks and then he just sort of like threw me in one day and said go in there talk to them find a way through improvise with them and i've done loads of things in my career i'm pretty brave it was terrifying they were so feral they'd worked up this boy energy this drum and bass music they were listening to and all being together and hitting each other and being difficult because that's where they, their backgrounds, why they're in this sort of facility. And it was really hard, no, like, for the first couple of days, I said, I don't know how to get through to them. I don't know how to, you know, I said to kill you him, you know, we are in charge here. But I did because Jay, who plays shy, is

astonishing. And he's very, you know, and they're so vulnerable. And I love boys, you know, and I think they are vulnerable. I have two grandsons now. And they're just, They can be feral, you know, but they're just full of hormones and full of rage. And the complexity of the characters and the unpredictability perhaps as well of when somebody might lash out. And of course, when I'm watching it, I realise there are facilities like this and there are people doing jobs like Amanda does and like Steve does in this as well. I'm going to play a little bit of it actually just to give people a flavour. They are hugely complicated, intricate human beings who are.

require enormous amounts of what we'd now call special educational care. It's exhausting, complicated, demanding work and it's just destroying us. We are underpaid, we're understaffed, we're chronically under-resourced. I am part prison guard, I'm part of nurse, I'm part battle axe, I'm part mummy, I'm part, you know, you get me. And you go on to say, however, that you really love them. Yes, yes. And this is Amanda speaking to the film crew about her job.

And it's interesting, it's in the 90s as well. Yes. Another aspect that many listeners, it will resonate so many. But it comes at a time, it was like 96. Just at the end of an 11-year Tory government and things were, you know, this school was started by us in this film

with private money, private equity money, which gets, as we all see in the film, it's very, it gets taken away from us, a lot of it. And it's, it's, it's an interesting period of time. It's no one's on a phone. You know, you don't see the boys on a phone. They're connecting with each other more

and that has changed so much. Has it scratched an itch playing a character, actress or has it just ignited a bug? It's just lovely to prove that I can do it. You know, sometimes, you know, I've loved what I've done. I love what I've done, I've been a kamikaze comedy person.

I've done crazy stuff. And, you know, to be nicknamed, labelled wacky, zany crazy. I mean, I'm a very serious person at times, and I started off really wanting to do this because of people like Ken Loach. No, it's lovely to be recognised for that. I do love having a laugh as well.

I mean, I'm currently on Ted Lassau and having a wonderful laugh and improvising and doing all, you know. But, no, I'm very proud to be in this film and I'm very proud that they chose me to be in it. Thank you, Yvonne Murphy again, and Gillian to trust me to be in it. And I got moments in this one.

I've never been given so much time to be real. And to think about the director, I've never been given a direction like this. This guy Tim would say, go in and take as much time as you want. Look at Killian and say whatever you want. You know, it's like, wow. Normally you come in, you hit your mark, that's light, and someone's checking that. It was all about, you know, and then I would do another take and you go, take even longer.

You know, it shows, though. I was totally gripped from the beginning of it. It's so compelling. It's so raw. So very much recommend. people to catch it. Steve. And also the film in the 90s as well. I was thinking that's at that point, you were

in the States really. Yes. And you had, of course, this string of successful shows on both sides of the Atlantic. Because you're such an acute observer of life, I'm wondering, how did you find the American way of life compared to the British way of life

and, you know, why you moved? I just, my husband, who I married in 83, he's a East end guy, you know, but he lived in Lookout Mountain in L.A., and he wanted me to, we got married there, and I had a hit, they don't know, was a big hit in America, introduced me to America. I'd done a movie with Meryl Street, plenty,

and that became big in America. And I just love living everywhere to get the opportunity to go to America at that time and make a show. You know, people like, they weren't women with their own shows in England, really. I mean, we have wonderful Victoria Wood and French and Saunders geniuses. But to be, it was just astonishing. And I got a whole new, because as you know, I'm a bit of a parrot. I got to visit.

I do know that, Tracy. I like to, I would travel around America and I'd go to Toledo, Ohio. I'd go to Nashville. I'd go to Atlanta. I'd go to, you know, and learn all these new accents and have experiences and study all these people that I love. And then put them in a show. And I just got very lucky. And I really love America too.

And I still have a very strong American identity. I really do. Now, come on, baby. So you're in New York. Come on, I'm walking here, no, come on, talk to me. But I'm wondering, because when I first went to the States, let's say early 90s, American comedy was so different to British comedy. They were worlds away.

I feel that distance isn't there so much anymore. What do you think? Yeah, oh no. I mean, it's, there were so many shows that were in America that had translated from England. There were so many changed formats. I don't know. I think American comedy was always kinder.

And then it got less satirical as we are here. But I think we've always appreciated shows like Cheers and Sanford and Son was from Steptoen's son And I think it's similar now And we just watch each other's TV similar But there's a great respect for British shows You know something like Fleabag comes along And the enormous respect for it

Something like adolescence, it's intrinsically British And there's enormous respect for it So we've touched on a few aspects of your career But is it character acting, do you think, that you want to try and do next? Yeah, I want to be in something funny as well and just, but meaningful, you know, and just be with a nice ensemble. It was so wonderful to be with Larry, David, and Kirby, your enthusiasm.

I mean, I watched that with kind of, what would I say, white knuckles holding on. It was so great. And he's the best. He's secretly a very lovely man. And he'll hate me saying that. He put it underwraps, exactly, the big secret. That was, oh, to do something like that every year as well. And to be considered to know that I can handle the heavy stuff too is wonderful.

Tracy Ullman and her film Steve is out now in selected cinemas and on Netflix. We love you, Tracy. Now, are you a carant? A carant is an adult child who's caring for one or both of their ageing parents, in-laws or elderly relatives. And many will be balancing work and family responsibilities alongside. A recent report by the Institute for Public Policy Research said that unpaid care, whether by parents, spouses or adult children and most frequently women, is relied on too heavily to fill in the gaps of the inadequate and expensive adult social care system.

Well, to discuss this, Nula was joined by Dr Jackie Gray, a retired GP and founder of the Carance Room. She set it up to support those caring for their adult parents, alongside Kendra and Rachel, who provide care for their parents. Jackie Gray begins by explaining why this is such a big issue today. I think what we're seeing now is a phenomenon that hasn't been commonly appreciated in previous generations. The combination of longevity and poor health, often living with multiple chronic conditions, creates this state of frailty, which means people are particularly vulnerable to very small environmental, social or physical stresses. And that in turn creates a stepwise, progressive decline in the ability to live independently and the need to rely on

other people. And you say that is so different. Because longevity, we think is great if the life expectancy is going up, right? Most of you must want to stick around as long as we can. But what have you seen in the changes from when you started as a GP to now? The fact that people are living well into their 80s, 90s, over 100 routinely. And for many, that is amazing. And it's great, you see generations, grandchildren, great-grandchildren. It can be fabulous and I do want to emphasise that.

But for a significant proportion, perhaps 25 to 50, 50% of people over 85, the picture is one of poor health. So lifespan has extended, but health span has not kept pace with that. I mean, you're even talking about an initiative to have a commissioner for frailty? Absolutely. I feel that we do need to have some sort of leadership for this, to recognise that it's an issue and recognise that it's an issue that transcends health care, social care, welfare, and also community care.

And a frailty commissioner can give it the leadership and the attention that this issue deserves. I mean, it's interesting because you say that many expect to grow old, get ill, maybe unable to care for themselves, go into a nursing home and then die. But that's not the trajectory that a lot of people are on. Absolutely not. The proportion of people who are living in an institution, a care home,

is very small. We think there are probably around 4 million people caring for adults in the community. Just some figures from the IPPOR, they say the number of full-time unpaid carers providing more than 35 hours a week has soared by 70%, 70, in the past 20 years to 1.9 million people. Also, figures compiled by carers UK in England and Wales

says unpaid carers provided care worth 183 billion pounds that's in the 2021 to 202. 22 year. That was an increase of almost 65 billion since 2011. I want to bring in a couple of people who are living through this. Let's start with Kendra. Hi Kendra. Good to have you with us. Tell me a little bit about your situation. I tried to make some notes on this before I started because it could be quite, you can talk in lots of different directions and it's quite hard to follow. But then I actually realized that I was making notes about mom's journey

and not actually my journey. So then it's really hard to separate yourself because you're so used to being the advocate for that person and being their voice

so that when you talk about it you automatically go into that mode and you've lost yourself straight away. So I want to know about you. Yeah, I think to talk about it again without feeling that sense of guilt

about it being about you, I've only really been in this journey full time for two years now and that kicks in really quickly that you are conscious you don't make it about yourself so I think that's where we fall off straight away is that to try and support people in this we've already sort of learnt to be resilient to putting ourselves to the back of the queue

when we're talking about it for me my mum used to have a completely independent life till about three years ago she started to struggle with a couple of physical sort of needs she caught shingles in her eye and that was kind of the first one

and then from that TikTok a lot of things clicked in place and she kept getting little infections and things like that I found it quite tiring be it like juggling all the appointments and but dad needed that support because he's 73 also

and so I would my working hours two years ago to 30 hours it doesn't make that much of a difference really because mum's under five specialist sort of areas like for health

so actually really I could probably quite easily not work at all and still struggle to juggle it on. You say not work but of course you're working but you're working inside the home I mean it could take a logistics degree to kind of manage some of the things that I'm sure

you are doing. What impact, Kendra, do you think it has on you emotionally? I mean, I'm already hearing from you the selfless nature of the work that you are doing. Yeah, I think it's a really odd transition to go through because regardless of how sort of together you feel you might have life before this starts, you just go into overdrive or I personally go into overdrive if mammy's unwealth so anything for my needs goes like aside and that's my choice to do that but there is a cost of that in the end so you can only go for so long having somebody at your foresight before you run out of energy or you get unwell because you're running yourself down and it's a really difficult balance to sustain over initially I never foresaw that it would be forever

Oh, really, realistically, we're talking forever now for mum. I want to bring in Rachel as well. Tell me about your situation and welcome. Hey, good morning. In 2017, it was a big year. I gave birth to my first daughter and also my dad was diagnosed with inoperable pancreatic cancer. He then had chemo and became eligible for radical surgery

to remove his spleen, gall, bladder, pancreas, parts of his stomach. We're now seven years on. He's still with us, albeit with type 3C diabetes, is entirely reliant on medication to digest his food and prone to every infection going, as he has no spleen. I'm his full-time carer. I'm entitled to carer's allowance, which then gets deducted from universal credit, and what they call a sandwiched carer, because they also receive disability to live in allowance my eldest daughter until she's 16, at which point she'll be reviewed to see if she's eligible for PIP. Yeah.

So there's a lot of moving parts there we can tell even from that brief description. And you care for your dad in your, you're all in the same home, which I'm sure brings its own joys perhaps, but also challenges, no doubt. How do you feel it's impacted your life and just about you now? Yeah, I suppose you can't be spontaneous about anything. That's huge. Yeah. Every movement.

It's military planning every day, meal, breath, making sure your appointments are all up to date. People are in the right place. So something as simple as a weekend break may take months of planning and that's for us all to go away together. And that's a lot of pressure. Coming back to you, Dr. Gray, what systems would you put in place to support people like Kendra and Rachel? Well, I think as we've heard, there's the emotional support.

And that was one of the biggest challenges I saw in the surgery, the loneliness, the isolation, but also the guilt, the sense of being overwhelmed, abandoned, frustrated, all of those things. And I think some sort of package of support to help people deal with that would be immensely appropriate. There's no legal framework that allows you to begin to delve in service somebody's property and financial affairs or health and welfare without the appropriate documentation. So that's another side.

So it is complex and I would want that complexity is recognised and supported in full. I mean, is it realistic, however, because you will hear every day as I do how stretched resources are for health and social care? I think it is realistic, actually, because I have seen it in practice, for people who are on an end-of-life care package. At that point, the services do go in. They get specialist support, leadership from a medical consultant. They get fast-tracked through the benefit system. So there is a package of support there, and there's a number to call, a person to speak to when things get out of hand. And there are services like night sitting services provided.

by some of the charities, the respite. And so all of these services can exist. They do exist. There's a tried and tested approach. It's just not rolled out wider, and that's what I'm asking for. Dr Jackie Gray there alongside Kendra and Rachel speaking to Nula. Finally, the conservationist and primatologist Dame Jane Goodall died earlier this week, aged 91. To remember this groundbreaking conservationist who revolutionised the study of Great Apes,

I spoke to National Geographic Explorer and President of the Wildlife Trust, Liz Bonin, and Jillian Miller, who is the director of the guerrilla organization who worked to save gorillas from extinction. I started by asking Liz why she was so significant to so many people. Ooh, there are so many answers to that. As a biologist myself, the first thing that struck me as I was becoming obsessed with animal behavior

is how this young woman in the 60s absolutely transformed our understanding of ethology, of animal behavior, of emotions. She discovered that they used tools, that their diets were different to what scientists had presumed up to then. And she got a lot of criticism for documenting meticulously all of these behaviors

and emotions that she was observing. She really immersed herself in the habitat, very much like indigenous people do. Even that was quite different for the time. And she was a young woman in the 60s. So for me, reading that account of her work then, changed my life and really inspired me. But since then, my gosh, Anita, she's gone on to support young people through her Roots and Shoot initiative. She really connects the dots.

She works multicultural and multisectually. She was just an incredibly wise, fierce behind the scenes, but kind and compassionate woman who inspired, well, thousands, if not millions of people. I would probably say millions. Yeah, an extraordinary woman. Julianne, I'm going to bring you in. You were also inspired by Jane's work. Tell me why. Whereas the Edwardians had gone out like these wild beasts, you know, and we're going to capture them and take them back to display in museums,

they actually got into understanding them. One of the things I like very much about Jane is that she wasn't an extremist. So although she hated the idea of chimps being kept in laboratories and kept in captivity for various reasons, she knew that she couldn't actually change that single-handedly. She'd go in and she'd say, look, make their lives better, they're bored, they're lonely, they're unhappy, at least give them, and not just a little bit of enrichment, but actually make their lives better. And she did that, and I thought that was absolutely marvellous.

And she had that gentle, gentle personality, a twinkle in her eye, you know Liz, and you've heard her many times, do a pan-hoot when she's doing a talk. Yes. She'd do this call that the chimpanzees do when they say good night to each other each night. And the whole audience would be riveted. She was a magical woman, really, in her own way. Liz, tell us about her work with chimpanzees. Her instincts led her at a time where she knew nothing about wildlife or wild animals.

It was a very objective science at the time. Her instinct led her to feel what she needed to do to better understand these animals that she was very careful. quickly became obsessed with, and how she documented everything at a time where people were criticizing her and saying, this is not science. Why are you even speaking about emotions that this chimpanzee looks, seems to be sad after one of its tribe has passed away? So she was very strongly encouraged not to document, but her strength of conviction, which is something Jane had for the rest of her life, and which is why she was an extraordinary leader for so many

people, animal behavior, animal sentience, the capabilities of animals on their own terms in their environment. That was, in no small part, thanks to Jane scribbling down everything she observed. I'll never forget when I first met her. We said, hello, we were chatting away. We took a picture. And then she just stared at me and bore into my soul. It felt slightly unnerving, but also incredibly powerful and warm. And when I asked Ben Garrard, who's the amazing, broadcaster and scientist who knows Jane very well. I said to Ben, he was there. I said, Ben, what the heck was that about?

I felt that was really all. He goes, oh, yeah, don't worry about that. She learned that with the chimpanzees. This is how, you know, you really get a cut of another being. You look into their soul. I was like terribly excited by it, but I never had the guts to ask her. Yeah, what did you see? What did you see in me?

I was just scared to ask her, but I hope I passed. I think you would have passed in flying colours, Liz. Gillian, you say you admire her because she would also work with people. when she didn't approve of what they were doing. Tell me what you mean by that. Well, she hated the idea of animals being kept in captivity, chimpanzees in particular being kept in captivity. She hated the idea, but what could one woman do to change that?

Actually, she did change it because she spent the last part of her life touring, traveling the world. She set up the Roots and Shoots program in the schools, millions and millions of children, you know, grow up learning about conservation. But you know one thing, there's another story that I wanted to mention to you, which is after 10 years, she thought it was time to go home. She thought she'd named them all, she'd studied them all, she knew their relationships, she knew their habits, she really loved them. And she thought, well, it's time to go back to England now. And I think, I don't know if it was our husband, a filmmaker, he persuaded her to stay. After 15 years, she saw the first chimpanzee wars.

Now, people didn't know that chimpanzees are so close to humans that they will go out and they will have wars with each other's groups, with other groups, you know, over territory, over resources and what have you. She would never have seen that if she hadn't stayed. So I think that was part of her grit and determination. Liz Bonin and Jillian Miller paying tribute to Jane Goodall. That's it from me. But before I disappear, I just want to flag that the second episode of The Woman's Hour Guy to Life

comes out tomorrow on BBC Sounds. It's all about ambition without burnout. How to chase your goals while protecting your well-being. So joining Nula is the TV chef and author Lorraine Pascal who shares her experience of burnout, Dr. Claire Ashley, the author of Burnout Doctor, and Helen Tupper from Squiggly Careers. Here's one of the practical tips in the episode from Helen.

There's a little clever language hack that you can do here because if you say I can't, very often a highly assertive persuasive person can convince you that you can. You might say, well, I can't come to the meeting and they'll say, well, you know, I'll make it shorter and you probably can. Whereas the I don't is a lot harder for somebody else to disagree with and it means that you are more likely to identify with that. Like I don't go to meetings after five on a Wednesday because I go and put my kids up. And then it's much, it's hard. But if you feel like your willpower is weakening

or somebody is challenging you and challenging you, I think some careful use of the I don't when you might have been saying I can't could be a good one thing. To hear the Woman's Hour Guide to Life, just go to BBC Sounds, search for Woman's Hour, and in the feed you'll find the Guide to Life episodes.

The second conversation drops at 8am tomorrow and if there are topics or issues you want us to cover, then do get in touch. And don't forget to join Noola on Monday at 10am. Enjoy the rest of your weekend.