Radio Times
type: channel
link: https://www.radiotimes.com
date: 2026-04-10T13:33:56.000Z
update period: hourly
update frequency: 1
update base: 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00
items: 'I walked up to the truck, saw the padlock on the ground, and my heart sank'
items: Paul McCartney’s iconic bass guitar going missing “felt like the worst moment of my life”, reveals former Wings sound engineer
items: In good faith
items: BBC's Pilgrimage star Patsy Kensit: "The treatment I had over the years from the media was pretty awful"
items: Making the headlines
items: 'Helen was formidable as Polly'
items: 'This is not a regular sex scene'
items: 'Tommy's broken and cracked'
items: 'People connect me with bad guys'
items: Back in the saddle
items: 'I'll keep doing it because people want it'
items: Father and son
items: Barry Keoghan reveals why Peaky Blinders film's story of fathers and sons moved him so much – and talks Beatles film role
items: Peaky Blinders veteran Sophie Rundle remembers late Helen McCrory: "It's devastating that she's not here to finish it"
items: British acting legend Tim Roth talks his twisted new Peaky Blinders villain - and compares modern issues to the National Front he witnessed in his youth
items: Martin Clunes talks transforming into Huw Edwards for new drama tackling "awful" crimes – and reveals why Edwards's family do not feature
items: Peaky Blinders icon Cillian Murphy: "I do believe in generational trauma, I also believe it can be stopped"
items: 10 Questions with Lord Sugar
items: Peaky Blinders creator talks contemporary importance of Tommy Shelby fighting fascism: "Look what happened last time"
items: Lord Sugar reveals The Apprentice future and why the UK won't get a hungry entrepreneurial culture: "Too late, mate"
items: 'Nobody's ever done it – I'd love it to be me'
items: Jo Butterfield on Paris Paralympics heartache: "This isn't a recreational thing for me, it's my job"
items: Three's company
items: Six Nations podcasters James Haskell and Mike Tindall talk landing Prince William and Princess Kate as guests on their show
items: 'It's not always about winning'
items: 'I'm happy behind, chasing the pack'
items: Snowboarder Charlotte Bankes reveals why she doesn't need to diet and worry about what she eats
items: Alpine ski racer Dave Ryding talks mental health journey: "I really don't think UK Sport understands"
items: Time for a change
items: Misha Glenny reveals his wife Kirsty Lang’s advice as he replaces Melvyn Bragg for Our Time

'I walked up to the truck, saw the padlock on the ground, and my heart sank'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: A new film charts the long and winding road between the theft and rediscovery of the precious bass guitar that helped Paul McCartney shape the sound of the Beatles
encoded: Add McCartney: the Hunt for the Lost Bass to your watchlist More than 50 years later, it still hurts. “It felt like the worst moment of my life,” says Ian Horne, remembering the morning in October 1972 when, aged 25, he realised he had just lost one of the most famous musical instruments of the 20th century. “I walked up to the truck, saw the padlock on the ground, and my heart sank.” Horne is a former sound engineer with Wings, the band Paul McCartney started with his wife Linda a year after the Beatles split up in 1970. Following a day in the recording studio with the band, Horne had parked a truck full of their musical equipment on a west London street. “It was a three-ton truck with a roller shutter at the back,” he recalls. “When I pushed the shutter up, I saw straightaway that it was gone. The bass wasn’t there.” The instrument in question, a 1961 Höfner 500/1 violin bass, is at the centre of BBC Two’s delightful new Arena film McCartney: the Hunt for the Lost Bass. It’s a documentary about the Beatles, the thrill of being young in Hamburg, the sudden and immense success that followed, and how that success soured. It’s also a detective story that follows the missing instrument over half a century, travelling through London’s criminal demi-monde, the hippy drugs scene, rural Hertfordshire and, at one point, a visit to the seaside. The story ends with the unlikely rediscovery of the bass in 2023 following several investigations and an online campaign that generated headlines around the world. But it begins with 18-year-old Paul McCartney in Hamburg in 1961, on the edge of everlasting fame. The Beatles had been working relentlessly for months, and McCartney needed a new bass. He bought a Höfner 500/1, made in Bavaria, for 287 Deutschmarks (£30) from Steinway Musikhaus in Hamburg. Within two years, the instrument would be as recognisable as the band’s mop-tops and collarless suits. This was the bass heard on the first run of hits, including Love Me Do, She Loves Y…

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Paul McCartney’s iconic bass guitar going missing “felt like the worst moment of my life”, reveals former Wings sound engineer
type: item
date: 2026-04-06T16:00:05.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Documentaries
subject: TV
subject: BBC iPlayer
subject: BBC Two
subject: Magazine
description: "I walked up to the truck, saw the padlock on the ground, and my heart sank."
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. More than 50 years later, it still hurts. "It felt like the worst moment of my life," says Ian Horne, remembering the morning in October 1972 when, aged 25, he realised he had just lost one of the most famous musical instruments of the 20th century. "I walked up to the truck, saw the padlock on the ground, and my heart sank." Horne is a former sound engineer with Wings, the band Paul McCartney started with his wife Linda a year after the Beatles split up in 1970. Following a day in the recording studio with the band, Horne had parked a truck full of their musical equipment on a west London street. “It was a three-ton truck with a roller shutter at the back,” he recalls. “When I pushed the shutter up, I saw straightaway that it was gone. The bass wasn’t there.” The instrument in question, a 1961 Höfner 500/1 violin bass, is at the centre of BBC Two’s delightful new Arena film McCartney: the Hunt for the Lost Bass. It’s a documentary about the Beatles, the thrill of being young in Hamburg, the sudden and immense success that followed, and how that success soured. It’s also a detective story that follows the missing instrument over half a century, travelling through London’s criminal demi-monde, the hippy drugs scene, rural Hertfordshire and, at one point, a visit to the seaside. The story ends with the unlikely rediscovery of the bass in 2023 following several investigations and an online campaign that generated headlines around the world. But it begins with 18-year-old Paul McCartney in Hamburg in 1961, on the edge of everlasting fame. The Beatles had been working relentlessly for months, and McCartney needed a new bass. He bought a Höfner 500/1, made in Bavaria, for 287 Deutschmarks (£30) from Steinway Musikhaus in Hamburg. Within two years, the instrument would be as recognisable as the band's mop-tops and collarless suits. This was the bass heard on the first run of hits, including Love Me Do, She Loves You and …

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height: 2000

In good faith
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Seven celebrities with diverse beliefs set off on a journey of self-discovery from Whitby to Holy Island
encoded: Add Pilgrimage: the Road to Holy Island to your watchlist On a clifftop outside Whitby, six people gather in the hope of finding spiritual connections and even enlightenment. For now, they have little in common other than a public profile. Ashley Banjo is founder of the dance group Diversity, Hermione Norris is an actor known for Cold Feet and Spooks, Tasha Ghouri is a former Strictly contestant and public advocate for deaf people. Hasan Al-Habib and Ashley Blaker are stand-up comedians and Jayne Middlemiss is a radio presenter. Together they’ll walk a winding route around England’s top right-hand corner, travelling through North Yorkshire, County Durham and Northumberland before arriving at Holy Island, long known as Lindisfarne, where the seventh-century St Cuthbert was bishop. Eventually a figure in a beanie hat with wind-blown blonde hair comes into view. This, unmistakably, despite her clumpy boots and backpack, is the actor Patsy Kensit, the seventh pilgrim. She approaches tentatively but as Kensit greets the others, she seems to summon up resolve. “I’m a control freak,” she says later, when we gather after a screening of the opening episode. “I like to know exactly what I’m doing and at exactly what time I do it. But you have to surrender to these experiences and that’s what I did. I found that first day hard, but I kept saying to myself, ‘Keep walking.’ And the landscape is just so beautiful.” For some, like Al-Habib, a British Iraqi from Birmingham, the open moorland, deep wooded valleys and cliffs were a revelation. “I was struck by this incredible place. You have an amazing vista in front of you and the thought that the creator that you pray to has created it.” This is the eighth series of Pilgrimage., an achievement which will be marked when Pilgrimage is given a special Trustees’ Award at the Sandford Saint Martin Awards at Lambeth Palace in June (for the RT Readers’ Award shortlist, see overleaf). As the freshly installed Archbishop of Canterbury’s rec…

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BBC's Pilgrimage star Patsy Kensit: "The treatment I had over the years from the media was pretty awful"
type: item
date: 2026-03-30T23:02:12.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Entertainment
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
description: Seven celebrities with diverse beliefs set off on a journey of self-discovery from Whitby to Holy Island.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. On a clifftop outside Whitby, six people gather in the hope of finding spiritual connections and even enlightenment. For now, they have little in common other than a public profile. Ashley Banjo is founder of the dance group Diversity, Hermione Norris is an actor known for Cold Feet and Spooks, Tasha Ghouri is a former Strictly contestant and public advocate for deaf people. Hasan Al-Habib and Ashley Blaker are stand-up comedians and Jayne Middlemiss is a radio presenter. Together they’ll walk a winding route around England’s top right-hand corner, travelling through North Yorkshire, County Durham and Northumberland before arriving at Holy Island, long known as Lindisfarne, where the seventh-century St Cuthbert was bishop. Eventually a figure in a beanie hat with wind-blown blonde hair comes into view. This, unmistakably, despite her clumpy boots and backpack, is the actor Patsy Kensit, the seventh pilgrim. She approaches tentatively but as Kensit greets the others, she seems to summon up resolve. “I’m a control freak,” she says later, when we gather after a screening of the opening episode. “I like to know exactly what I’m doing and at exactly what time I do it. But you have to surrender to these experiences and that’s what I did. I found that first day hard, but I kept saying to myself, ‘Keep walking.’ And the landscape is just so beautiful.” For some, like Al-Habib, a British Iraqi from Birmingham, the open moorland, deep wooded valleys and cliffs were a revelation. “I was struck by this incredible place. You have an amazing vista in front of you and the thought that the creator that you pray to has created it.” This is the eighth series of Pilgrimage, an achievement which will be marked when Pilgrimage is given a special Trustees’ Award at the Sandford Saint Martin Awards at Lambeth Palace in June. As the freshly installed Archbishop of Canterbury’s recent journey on foot to her new cathedral illustrated, many…

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Making the headlines
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Martin Clunes pinned back his ears and went on a diet to deliver the central role in a drama that recounts the grim scandal that ended the career of Huw Edwards
encoded: Add Power: the Downfall of Huw Edwards to your watchlist At Westminster Magistrates Court on 31 July 2024, Huw Edwards pleaded guilty to making indecent images of children. So ended, in public disgrace, the career of a BBC newsreader who only two years before had told the nation that Queen Elizabeth II was dead. Falls from grace are seldom so spectacular and now, invariably, there is a television drama to recount it. Power: the Downfall of Huw Edwards stars Martin Clunes as Edwards and he gives a remarkable performance that is revealing in every detail. The short back and sides with exact side-parting, the arm extended over the desk to project authority, the portentous Welsh tone: Clunes nails it all. “Edwards delivering the news of the Queen’s death is so well known, that it needed mimicry from me, in a way,” says Clunes. “Those rhythms and sounds had to be spot on. I was happy to get it sounding right.” Apparently happily married with five adult children, when not reading the news Edwards was paying a series of young men for sexually explicit images. The script is based on text messages between Edwards and a 17-year-old in south Wales, Ryan (not his real name), played with aching vulnerability by Osian Morgan. After sending texts demanding pictures, Edwards would calmly address the nation. “What’s so fascinating about this,” says Clunes, “is that we saw Edwards in our homes every night and because he was in the public eye, it just seemed to amplify everything.” Edwards’s treatment of Ryan was part of a pattern of online and text encounters that, the drama argues, led to his downfall. One 26-year-old man in Wales was sending the child porn that Edwards accessed – a crime, says Clunes, “which is awful, there’s no way back from that.” Did Clunes, an actor still bathed in the warm light of his 18 years as Doc Martin, consider the risks of such a dark role? “I’ve never thought like that,” he says. “Don’t ponder yourself too much, that way madness lies. The idea of, ‘We…

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'Helen was formidable as Polly'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Sophie Rundle hopes to honour late co-star Helen McCrory
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist You’ve been playing Ada for 13 years, do you look back at those early performances? I find it so awkward watching them. Who is that child who clearly doesn’t know what she’s doing? Also, I now have my babies. So, my Peaky bookends for me are young girl straight out of drama school and being a newly postpartum mother. My second son was 12 or 13 weeks old when we did the film. Did that make filming The Immortal Man tough? Maybe being that tired and delirious was quite helpful but it was an enormous undertaking. The Peaky team were amazing but it’s crazy to be filmed at this time where I’m really vulnerable and my body is different and I don’t quite know what I’m doing. I am petitioning for a little ticker tape to run across the bottom of the screen saying, “This woman has just had a baby.” View Green Video on the source website Did you realise that Peaky Blinders would have such an impact? Peaky’s changed our expectations of British television. People who love the show will get in touch and say, “We named our daughter Ada.” So, you feel this sense of duty to do it right. But it’s only now that I appreciate quite what an extraordinary beast this whole thing has been. It was one of my first jobs, and I remember thinking, “All jobs must be like this, so the next TV show I go on will be like this as well.” It’s only when you make other shows that you realise quite how extraordinary this has been. Is there a unique camaraderie among the cast and crew? It’s amazing. Everyone goes off and has these incredible life experiences, people are winning Oscars or having babies. It’s life and death. And then you come back and you put the costumes on and you’re like, “Oh, here we are again.” It was amazing to watch when Cillian got an Oscar. It was so right, so justified, so brilliant. I still feel like the girl that’s just out of drama school who’ll never catch up to her older siblings. I’ve always been deeply in awe of Cillian a…

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'This is not a regular sex scene'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: How Rebecca Ferguson prepared for her big “moment of intimacy”
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist Were you worried about joining the famous Peaky Blinders as Kaulo? I rarely worry what people are going to think, because it’s beyond my control. But I wanted to live up to the expectations of Cillian and those who are already in it and create something that merges into their world. Barry Keoghan, who plays your nephew, was a newcomer as well… Oh, I love Barry, he’s amazing, such an open soul and he feeds off things around him. I loved our relationship. His character, Duke, is self-centred, obsessed, but also self-sabotaging, so unpredictable, a time bomb that could just pop any second. Kaulo is the only person who can say, “Stop” and he listens. It’s like tough love, isn’t it? View Green Video on the source website Kaulo uses mystical powers on Tommy — do you believe in that? Well, I’m not religious in any way. But I do believe in the energies in a room. How do I feel before you walked in, and how do I feel now that you’re in it? And I loved going into the world of magic and séance, which a lot of these gypsies believed and believe in. There is a very long bedroom scene with Cillian, did you use intimacy coordinators? I think it’s wonderful that we can have intimacy coordinators and sometimes they are needed, but for me it’s very off-putting and it makes me feel uncomfortable because I have enormous boundaries and I can verbalise them. So we could sit down and say, “What do you need to feel safe? What do I need to feel safe?” And then she could step out of the scene. And then what? I had called Cillian and asked him how he wanted to work. It sounds so silly, but I said, “I’ve studied your sex scenes…” And he went, “That’s weird and awkward.” And I went, “I know, but bear with me. This is not a regular sex scene. This isn’t us getting our kit off, getting on with it, bish bash bosh. This is a moment of release. This is a moment of intimacy, there’s magic.” Are female actors judged differently to men? One of the …

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'Tommy's broken and cracked'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Tom Harper on directing the “explosive” film finale
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist You worked on the very first series — what’s it like to come back to Peaky Blinders? We didn’t know what it would become, but we had cinematic aspirations for it and to be able to realise that was too good an opportunity to miss. Did Nick Cave record a new version of the theme song Red Right Hand for a key scene with Cillian? Yes, when we put that scene together in the edit, it immediately felt wrong with the original Red Right Hand, which feels like Tommy’s a young man, full of bravado and swagger. Of course, Tommy still has some of those things, but he’s broken and he’s cracked. So, we went back to Nick and he re-recorded it for us and I think it works perfectly. Tommy and Nick match each other a little bit. Nick’s older, wiser and sadder maybe. There’s tragedy in his voice, it’s more cracked, more broken. It’s beautiful and human. View Green Video on the source website Why did you decide to keep Cillian and Barry apart for a long section at the beginning of the film? It was always inherent in Steve’s script and the question was: “How long can you make people wait? When are you just going to piss off your fans?” I always wanted to push it as long as we could without feeling self-indulgent. Structurally, there are two very different energies — the stillness and the isolation of Tommy and the chaos and the energy of Duke. And you play them off each other until they come together and you get this kind of explosion. You’re a Quaker, did you worry about the violence in the film? Terrible violence exists in life and I think that storytelling helps us to understand things and to try and look at that in the most truthful, human way possible. It’s why I’m interested in this story of the Shelbys and always have been. As a group of people, they have experienced a great trauma. They came back from fighting for their king and country and were cast aside by the government, so they tried to take back something for themselves…

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'People connect me with bad guys'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Peaky newcomer Tim Roth on the art of playing a villain
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist Your character, Beckett, is a fascist traitor but, for Duke Shelby, very persuasive… The first thing that came to mind was playing him as a geography teacher; someone quite gentle. If you play him as the bad guy then it alerts the people that you’re trying to influence. So, he presents himself as a very reasonable guy with a good idea who just needs some help getting it done. I thought it was the appropriate approach as fascism is sly. It’s a monstrous thing that’s cleverly brought about and, quite often, you don’t realise when you’re in the midst of it. Steven Knight said the fascist elements in the film have contemporary echoes, do you agree? Yes, it seems all the more appropriate now. There are also echoes of my childhood in London, when it was the National Front. I went to school in Brixton and was in Students Against the Nazis. I got beaten up a lot. Their doppelgängers now are the same. Last time I was in England, I walked through a Tommy Robinson demonstration. It seemed familiar from the stories my dad told about the Second World War. View Green Video on the source website Your father was a gunner in RAF bombers during the war… I think my father had PTSD — his trauma was on many levels. This guy I’m playing is a nod to him because my character would’ve been someone that my father would’ve fought against. You bring your own emotions to a role when it’s needed. Beckett is the latest in a long line of Roth villains like Archibald Cunningham (Rob Roy) and John Christie (Rillington Place) — do you like bad guys? If you play a bad guy, people connect with it and you get offered a lot of them. But I don’t mind at all. When people ask, “What drives you as an actor?” I say, “Fear of unemployment, mate.” Which is very British. There’s the jobs you do to make sure the roof stays on and all that. And then there are the ones that you do for yourself and sometimes they fly under the radar, but that’s fine with me. You…

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Back in the saddle
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Cillian Murphy takes the reins for the Peaky Blinders feature film. But what’s the appeal of playing an antihero – and is this the end of Tommy Shelby?
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist Tommy Shelby has been in our heads for 13 years, but even longer in Cillian Murphy’s. British TV viewers first encountered the Birmingham gangster in September 2013, when he rode a black stallion through the streets of 1919 Small Heath. For Murphy, presently sitting opposite me in a London hotel suite, the introduction came months before that, when he first opened Steven Knight’s script and realised Shelby was a part in a million. “I could tell that it was special,” says Murphy, a glossy amalgam of expensively barbered hair and radiant skin that belies his 49 years. “I read the opening sequence where he rides into Birmingham. That wordless, western style, it was instantly iconic, if that’s not an oxymoron. So bold and so confident. I knew I wanted to do it.” Murphy compares Peaky Blinders to a motorbike ride where, “Tommy Shelby is driving the motorbike and I’m in the sidecar going, ‘OK man, I trust you,’ and then he’s off. Very quickly I became the passenger and he became the driver.” Is it usual to be taken over like that? “I’ve never had it with any other character,” he admits. “You give yourself up to it. Something happens, some exchange of atoms. I couldn’t just put his flat cap on and step into it; every time we’d do a series it would be, ‘OK, three months of prep and then getting back into it. I don’t know how I’m going to do that again.’ But then you do it, you’re in the groove and every time Tommy became more a part of me. It’s a strange experience.” View Green Video on the source website And now, perhaps, it is coming to an end. “Steve and I explored how you bring this thing to a conclusion,” Murphy says of the discussions the two men had before The Immortal Man, the Knight-scripted Peaky Blinders feature film, which Murphy stars in and co-produces. “We have a weird symbiotic thing. Steve is preternaturally gifted. If you throw an idea at him, he throws it back infinitely better.” Can that be a little …

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'I'll keep doing it because people want it'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Steven Knight on his Peaky spin-off and prophetic powers
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist The film dwells on Tommy’s existential crisis before the big things happen — are you teasing us? It’s Cillian Murphy having an existential crisis, so there’s plenty to look at. Though you can feel it, that voice saying, “Come on, get out there, put the guns back on!” However, he does something good, and I wanted it to be a big something good. The film is based on the events of Operation Bernhard, when the Nazi government printed millions of pounds worth of fake currency. At the end of the Second World War, the Bank of England changed the design of the £5 note because they believed a lot of that fake currency had entered Britain. Tommy’s decision to fight fascism has a contemporary resonance — did you intend that? It’s deliberate. It’s always unfortunate when one’s work becomes topical, because you don’t want it to be. A lot of stuff I’ve written about has then come along — that’s why I’m never going to write about the Third World War, because I think it will happen. But yes, it’s 1939 again today and I think it’s quite a good idea to remind people that this isn’t the first time people have thought that a really simple solution will work, and say to them, “Look what happened last time.” View Green Video on the source website Many people might not be aware how badly Birmingham was blitzed until they see the film? Absolutely, and the bombing at the film’s beginning of the BSA arms factory is real. The people who died working in the BSA on that night had been offered the chance to go to the shelters and they stayed because they thought the work they were doing was important. People are good. The British seem bad at remembering just how good they can be? I couldn’t agree more. That’s the sort of patriotism I think is really important, knowing what we did well, knowing where we stood, knowing where we still stand, maybe on our own, but we’ve got to be prepared for that. And wondering if we would we be as good as our p…

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Father and son
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: How a Father’s Day greeting led a superfan to take charge of the capped clan… Barry Keoghan on Blinders, Bond and the Beatles
encoded: Add Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man to your watchlist Barry Keoghan has waited a long time to be a Peaky Blinder. “I had that haircut for at least seven years, just in my normal life,” the actor explains. “I’m a massive fan, I was always asking Shaheen Baig, who casts the show, ‘Is there anything there I can do?’” It eventually turned out that there was. Duke Shelby is the violent, disturbed son of Tommy; he’s taken over the Peaky Blinders in his father’s absence and, as events unfold, is arguably the most important character in The Immortal Man. The result of a dalliance with a young Romany woman called Zelda before Tommy went to the Western Front, Duke is 25 when we meet him on the eve of the Second World War. Keoghan is older at 33, but with those cheekbones and his pale blue eyes, he looks young enough to play it – as he did in a Bafta-winning turn as manchild Dominic Kearney in The Banshees of Inisherin in 2022 and the murderous undergraduate Oliver Quick in 2023’s Saltburn. If the rumours of him playing the lead in the next, Steven Knight-scripted, James Bond film are true, Keoghan will make the most boyish 007 yet. “It’s an iconic role and a lot of weight and pressure comes with that,” he says. “It’s nice to see your name go up there, but I don’t think I fit the criteria for James Bond. I’d rather come in and do the villain. The man teasing Bond, that’s more me.” View Green Video on the source website Since becoming an international star following Saltburn, Keoghan was welcomed into a protective huddle with other Irish actors, which is how, in the end, he finally got the Peaky Blinders role. “I stay in touch with my Irish peers – Cillian, Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, we’re quite tight and supportive of one another,” he says. “So, I sent a message to Cillian on Father’s Day and said, ‘Happy Father’s Day.’ Cillian replied, ‘Happy Father’s Day back at you, would you like to play my son Duke?’” Keoghan got the part on the back of a Father’s Day greeting? “Hon…

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Barry Keoghan reveals why Peaky Blinders film's story of fathers and sons moved him so much – and talks Beatles film role
type: item
date: 2026-03-17T08:00:59.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Movies
subject: Contains Trailer
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
subject: Netflix
subject: On demand
description: "I remember looking at [Cillian] and saying, 'My God, Tommy Shelby! That's incredible.'"
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. Barry Keoghan has waited a long time to be a Peaky Blinder. “I had that haircut for at least seven years, just in my normal life,” the actor explains. “I’m a massive fan, I was always asking Shaheen Baig, who casts the show, ‘Is there anything there I can do?’” It eventually turned out that there was. Duke Shelby is the violent, disturbed son of Tommy; he’s taken over the Peaky Blinders in his father’s absence and, as events unfold, is arguably the most important character in The Immortal Man. The result of a dalliance with a young Romany woman called Zelda before Tommy went to the Western Front, Duke is 25 when we meet him on the eve of the Second World War. Keoghan is older at 33, but with those cheekbones and his pale blue eyes, he looks young enough to play it – as he did in a Bafta-winning turn as manchild Dominic Kearney in The Banshees of Inisherin in 2022 and the murderous undergraduate Oliver Quick in 2023’s Saltburn. If the rumours of him playing the lead in the next, Steven Knight-scripted, James Bond film are true, Keoghan will make the most boyish 007 yet. “It’s an iconic role and a lot of weight and pressure comes with that,” he says. “It’s nice to see your name go up there, but I don’t think I fit the criteria for James Bond. I’d rather come in and do the villain. The man teasing Bond, that’s more me.” Since becoming an international star following Saltburn, Keoghan was welcomed into a protective huddle with other Irish actors, which is how, in the end, he finally got the Peaky Blinders role. “I stay in touch with my Irish peers – Cillian, Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, we’re quite tight and supportive of one another,” he says. “So, I sent a message to Cillian on Father’s Day and said, ‘Happy Father’s Day.’ Cillian replied, ‘Happy Father’s Day back at you, would you like to play my son Duke?’” Keoghan got the part on the back of a Father’s Day greeting? “Honestly. Though I do send Happy Mother’s Da…

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Peaky Blinders veteran Sophie Rundle remembers late Helen McCrory: "It's devastating that she's not here to finish it"
type: item
date: 2026-03-17T08:00:16.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Movies
subject: Contains Trailer
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
subject: Netflix
subject: On demand
description: Ada Thorne star Rundle is the only star, other than Cillian Murphy, to appear in all episodes of the original series and the new Peaky Blinders film.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. You’ve been playing Ada for 13 years, do you look back at those early performances? I find it so awkward watching them. Who is that child who clearly doesn’t know what she’s doing? Also, I now have my babies. So, my Peaky bookends for me are young girl straight out of drama school and being a newly postpartum mother. My second son was 12 or 13 weeks old when we did the film. Did that make filming The Immortal Man tough? Maybe being that tired and delirious was quite helpful but it was an enormous undertaking. The Peaky team were amazing but it’s crazy to be filmed at this time where I’m really vulnerable and my body is different and I don’t quite know what I’m doing. I am petitioning for a little ticker tape to run across the bottom of the screen saying, “This woman has just had a baby.” Did you realise that Peaky Blinders would have such an impact? Peaky’s changed our expectations of British television. People who love the show will get in touch and say, “We named our daughter Ada.” So, you feel this sense of duty to do it right. But it’s only now that I appreciate quite what an extraordinary beast this whole thing has been. It was one of my first jobs, and I remember thinking, “All jobs must be like this, so the next TV show I go on will be like this as well.” It’s only when you make other shows that you realise quite how extraordinary this has been. Is there a unique camaraderie among the cast and crew? It’s amazing. Everyone goes off and has these incredible life experiences, people are winning Oscars or having babies. It’s life and death. And then you come back and you put the costumes on and you’re like, “Oh, here we are again.” It was amazing to watch when Cillian got an Oscar. It was so right, so justified, so brilliant. I still feel like the girl that’s just out of drama school who’ll never catch up to her older siblings. I’ve always been deeply in awe of Cillian and Helen McCrory. Is it strange to still …

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British acting legend Tim Roth talks his twisted new Peaky Blinders villain - and compares modern issues to the National Front he witnessed in his youth
type: item
date: 2026-03-16T17:01:42.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Movies
subject: Contains Trailer
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
subject: Netflix
description: 'People connect me with bad guys' – Peaky newcomer Tim Roth on the art of playing a villain
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. In time for the release of Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man on Netflix later this week, we spoke with acclaimed British actor Tim Roth about his antagonistic role in the film as John Beckett, a British ally of the Nazi forces during World War Two... Your character, Beckett, is a fascist traitor but, for Duke Shelby, very persuasive… The first thing that came to mind was playing him as a geography teacher; someone quite gentle. If you play him as the bad guy then it alerts the people that you’re trying to influence. So, he presents himself as a very reasonable guy with a good idea who just needs some help getting it done. I thought it was the appropriate approach as fascism is sly. It’s a monstrous thing that’s cleverly brought about and, quite often, you don’t realise when you’re in the midst of it. Steven Knight said the fascist elements in the film have contemporary echoes, do you agree? Yes, it seems all the more appropriate now. There are also echoes of my childhood in London, when it was the National Front. I went to school in Brixton and was in Students Against the Nazis. I got beaten up a lot. Their doppelgängers now are the same. Last time I was in England, I walked through a Tommy Robinson demonstration. It seemed familiar from the stories my dad told about the Second World War. Read More: Peaky Blinders icon Cillian Murphy: "I do believe in generational trauma, I also believe it can be stopped" Your father was a gunner in RAF bombers during the war… I think my father had PTSD — his trauma was on many levels. This guy I’m playing is a nod to him because my character would’ve been someone that my father would’ve fought against. You bring your own emotions to a role when it’s needed. View Green Video on the source website Beckett is the latest in a long line of Roth villains like Archibald Cunningham (Rob Roy) and John Christie (Rillington Place) — do you like bad guys? If you play a bad guy, people connect…

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Martin Clunes talks transforming into Huw Edwards for new drama tackling "awful" crimes – and reveals why Edwards's family do not feature
type: item
date: 2026-03-16T17:00:48.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Drama
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
description: Martin Clunes pinned back his ears and went on a diet to deliver the central role in a drama that recounts the grim scandal that ended the career of Huw Edwards.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. At Westminster Magistrates Court on 31 July 2024, Huw Edwards pleaded guilty to making indecent images of children. So ended, in public disgrace, the career of a BBC newsreader who only two years before had told the nation that Queen Elizabeth II was dead. Falls from grace are seldom so spectacular and now, invariably, there is a television drama to recount it. Power: the Downfall of Huw Edwards stars Martin Clunes as Edwards and he gives a remarkable performance that is revealing in every detail. The short back and sides with exact side-parting, the arm extended over the desk to project authority, the portentous Welsh tone: Clunes nails it all. “Edwards delivering the news of the Queen’s death is so well known, that it needed mimicry from me, in a way,” says Clunes. “Those rhythms and sounds had to be spot on. I was happy to get it sounding right.” The script is based on text messages between Edwards and a 17-year-old in south Wales, Ryan (not his real name), played with aching vulnerability by Osian Morgan. After sending texts demanding pictures, Edwards would calmly address the nation. “What’s so fascinating about this,” says Clunes, “is that we saw Edwards in our homes every night and because he was in the public eye, it just seemed to amplify everything.” Edwards’s treatment of Ryan was part of a pattern of online and text encounters that, the drama argues, led to his downfall. One 26-year-old man in Wales was sending the child porn that Edwards accessed – a crime, says Clunes, “which is awful, there’s no way back from that.” Did Clunes, an actor still bathed in the warm light of his 18 years as Doc Martin, consider the risks of such a dark role? “I’ve never thought like that,” he says. “Don’t ponder yourself too much, that way madness lies. The idea of, ‘Well, I won’t do that. It’ll burn me’. I’m still hanging in there by saying yes to all sorts of things.” As well as this new drama for 5, those different th…

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Peaky Blinders icon Cillian Murphy: "I do believe in generational trauma, I also believe it can be stopped"
type: item
date: 2026-03-14T12:00:29.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Movies
subject: Contains Trailer
subject: Exclusive
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
subject: Netflix
description: Cillian Murphy takes the reins for the Peaky Blinders feature film. But what’s the appeal of playing an antihero – and is this the end of Tommy Shelby?
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. Tommy Shelby has been in our heads for 13 years, but even longer in Cillian Murphy’s. British TV viewers first encountered the Birmingham gangster in September 2013, when he rode a black stallion through the streets of 1919 Small Heath. For Murphy, presently sitting opposite me in a London hotel suite, the introduction came months before that, when he first opened Steven Knight’s script and realised Shelby was a part in a million. “I could tell that it was special,” says Murphy, a glossy amalgam of expensively barbered hair and radiant skin that belies his 49 years. “I read the opening sequence where he rides into Birmingham. That wordless, western style, it was instantly iconic, if that’s not an oxymoron. So bold and so confident. I knew I wanted to do it.” Murphy compares Peaky Blinders to a motorbike ride where, “Tommy Shelby is driving the motorbike and I’m in the sidecar going, ‘OK man, I trust you,’ and then he’s off. Very quickly I became the passenger and he became the driver.” Is it usual to be taken over like that? “I’ve never had it with any other character,” he admits. “You give yourself up to it. Something happens, some exchange of atoms. I couldn’t just put his flat cap on and step into it; every time we’d do a series it would be, ‘OK, three months of prep and then getting back into it. I don’t know how I’m going to do that again.’ But then you do it, you’re in the groove and every time Tommy became more a part of me. It’s a strange experience.” And now, perhaps, it is coming to an end. “Steve and I explored how you bring this thing to a conclusion,” Murphy says of the discussions the two men had before The Immortal Man, the Knight-scripted Peaky Blinders feature film, which Murphy stars in and co-produces. “We have a weird symbiotic thing. Steve is preternaturally gifted. If you throw an idea at him, he throws it back infinitely better.” Can that be a little annoying? “No, it’s wonderful!” Read More…

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10 Questions with Lord Sugar
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: The Apprentice tsar on why the world’s best entrepreneurs and innovators aren’t British
encoded: Add The Apprentice to your watchlist The Apprentice is currently well into its 20th series, fronted, as ever, by the self-made multimillionaire, life peer, author and sometime political adviser, Alan Sugar. But after two decades of firing contestants who fail to meet his exacting standards, is the 78-year-old’s faith in young British entrepreneurs still intact? Or has he given up on a generation drawn by the lure of celebrity rather than his own ethos of hard work? The Apprentice is now in its 20th series — would you like to reach a quarter century? It’s not down to me but we have agreed another three years. I guess there’ll come a time when either I’m a bit knackered or viewers are phoning in and complaining that I’m like Joe Biden and losing the plot. The BBC will spend a few grand on some market research people and ask, “Should we get rid of Lord Sugar or what?” But, at the moment, I love doing it because it’s really about starting a business from scratch with young people. Have business practices changed since The Apprentice began in 2005? Yes, because of technology and because of the internet. When people create businesses now, rather than having a bricks-and- mortar shop or warehouse, they are created on the web. I like to have a physical product. Let’s make something! So why does The Apprentice remain relevant? Because of our audience. Every single year I get a new generation of youngsters, 13- or 15-year-olds, tuning in. The 15-year-old of 20 years ago is now 35. If you said to him, “Do you watch The Apprentice any more?” you’ll get, “No, it’s s**t. He [Sugar] talks a lot of b******s. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” But the new 15-year-olds are so in awe of it. And the show has created an awareness for business that’s done a great service for young people. You opened the latest series with boardroom scenes in Hong Kong — why? It was a surprise for the candidates. They’ve been sent abroad before, but this is the first time that I turned up. Our frie…

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Peaky Blinders creator talks contemporary importance of Tommy Shelby fighting fascism: "Look what happened last time"
type: item
date: 2026-03-13T15:05:21.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Drama
subject: Movies
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
subject: Netflix
description: Steven Knight on his Peaky spin-off – and prophetic powers.
encoded: This article appears in Radio Times magazine. As Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man arrives on Netflix on Friday 20 March 2026, Michael Hodges speaks with the franchise's creator, Steven Knight, about this explosive outing for Tommy Shelby (Cillian Murphy)... The film dwells on Tommy’s existential crisis before the big things happen — are you teasing us? It’s Cillian Murphy having an existential crisis, so there’s plenty to look at. Though you can feel it, that voice saying, “Come on, get out there, put the guns back on!” However, he does something good, and I wanted it to be a big something good. The film is based on the events of Operation Bernhard, when the Nazi government printed millions of pounds worth of fake currency. At the end of the Second World War, the Bank of England changed the design of the £5 note because they believed a lot of that fake currency had entered Britain. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2026/03/PeakyBlindersTheImmortalManFirstLooks2-05ab95a.jpg" width="8640" height="5760" alt="A man (Cillian Murphy) in a long dark overcoat and flat cap walks down a wet, dimly lit street at night, with snow falling around him and a vintage car steaming behind him near a brick wall illuminated by red light." title="Cillian Murphy in Peaky Blinders: The Immortal Man" /> Tommy’s decision to fight fascism has a contemporary resonance — did you intend that? It’s deliberate. It’s always unfortunate when one’s work becomes topical because you don’t want it to be. A lot of stuff I’ve written about has then come along — that’s why I’m never going to write about the Third World War, because I think it will happen. But yes, it’s 1939 again today and I think it’s quite a good idea to remind people that this isn’t the first time people have thought that a really simple solution will work, and say to them, “Look what happened last time.” Add Radio Times as a Preferred Source on Google Keep up to date on what’s worth watching with your…

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Lord Sugar reveals The Apprentice future and why the UK won't get a hungry entrepreneurial culture: "Too late, mate"
type: item
date: 2026-03-09T17:01:55.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Entertainment
subject: Reality TV
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
description: The Apprentice tsar on why the world’s best entrepreneurs and innovators aren't British.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. The Apprentice is currently well into its 20th series, fronted, as ever, by the self-made multimillionaire, life peer, author and sometime political adviser, Alan Sugar. But after two decades of firing contestants who fail to meet his exacting standards, is the 78-year-old’s faith in young British entrepreneurs still intact? Or has he given up on a generation drawn by the lure of celebrity rather than his own ethos of hard work? The Apprentice is now in its 20th series – would you like to reach a quarter century? It’s not down to me but we have agreed another three years. I guess there’ll come a time when either I’m a bit knackered or viewers are phoning in and complaining that I’m like Joe Biden and losing the plot. The BBC will spend a few grand on some market research people and ask, “Should we get rid of Lord Sugar or what?” But, at the moment, I love doing it because it’s really about starting a business from scratch with young people. Have business practices changed since The Apprentice began in 2005? Yes, because of technology and because of the internet. When people create businesses now, rather than having a bricks-and- mortar shop or warehouse, they are created on the web. I like to have a physical product. Let’s make something! So why does The Apprentice remain relevant? Because of our audience. Every single year I get a new generation of youngsters, 13- or 15-year-olds, tuning in. The 15-year-old of 20 years ago is now 35. If you said to him, “Do you watch The Apprentice any more?” you’ll get, “No, it’s s**t. He [Sugar] talks a lot of b******s. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.” But the new 15-year-olds are so in awe of it. And the show has created an awareness for business that’s done a great service for young people. You opened the latest series with boardroom scenes in Hong Kong – why? It was a surprise for the candidates. They’ve been sent abroad before, but this is the first time that I tur…

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'Nobody's ever done it – I'd love it to be me'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Jo Butterfield already has a Paralympic gold medal from Rio 2016. Now, she’s taking to the ice in pursuit of a historic curling win at Milano Cortina
encoded: Add the Winter Paralympics 2026 to your watchlist Some athletes genuinely are astonishing – Jo Butterfield is one of them. When the Paralympics GB mixed curling team takes to the ice in Cortina, she will be attempting to become the first British athlete to win a gold medal at both the Paralympics and the Winter Paralympics. “Nobody’s ever done it and I’d love it to be me,” says Butterfield, talking at the National Curling Academy in Stirling. “It’s a huge opportunity.” Butterfield, who is tetraplegic and uses a wheelchair, won gold in the F51 club throw (the equivalent of the hammer throw for athletes whose legs, trunk and hands are affected) at the Rio Paralympics in 2016. Even if she doesn’t win again in Italy, her life can rightly be regarded a triumph – especially if one considers the physical limitations she works with. “I can use my arms, but I have very little grip in my hands,” she explains. “My thumbs move but that’s about it. I’ve got very little wrist function. If I put my hand above my head, it falls back down.” Then, as she tends to do, Butterfield adds a positive. “But I’ve got good biceps.” The 46-year-old lives in Scotland with her wife Rhiannon but was born in Doncaster. Her mother was a secretary and her father a systems analyst. Brought up with two older brothers, she was “a bit of a tomboy” but not a sports obsessive. After completing a psychology degree at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, she worked at the Ministry of Defence for the next 10 years. “I managed soldiers’ careers, posting people on tours,” she says. “You never did it lightly, you were sending people to risky jobs. Unfortunately, some didn’t come home and some came home seriously injured.” In an irony that doesn’t escape her, Butterfield herself joined the ranks of the seriously injured following an operation to remove a tumour from her spine when she was 31. “I remember waking up paralysed from the operation on 28 January 2011,” she says. “There was a 0.01 per cent chance …

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Jo Butterfield on Paris Paralympics heartache: "This isn't a recreational thing for me, it's my job"
type: item
date: 2026-02-24T09:54:55.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Sport
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
description: Jo Butterfield already has a Paralympic gold medal from Rio 2016. Now, she’s taking to the ice in pursuit of a historic curling win at Milano Cortina.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. Some athletes genuinely are astonishing – Jo Butterfield is one of them. When the Paralympics GB mixed curling team takes to the ice in Cortina, she will be attempting to become the first British athlete to win a gold medal at both the Paralympics and the Winter Paralympics. “Nobody’s ever done it and I’d love it to be me,” says Butterfield, talking at the National Curling Academy in Stirling. “It’s a huge opportunity.” Butterfield, who is tetraplegic and uses a wheelchair, won gold in the F51 club throw (the equivalent of the hammer throw for athletes whose legs, trunk and hands are affected) at the Rio Paralympics in 2016. Even if she doesn’t win again in Italy, her life can rightly be regarded a triumph – especially if one considers the physical limitations she works with. “I can use my arms, but I have very little grip in my hands,” she explains. “My thumbs move but that’s about it. I’ve got very little wrist function. If I put my hand above my head, it falls back down.” Then, as she tends to do, Butterfield adds a positive. “But I’ve got good biceps.” The 46-year-old lives in Scotland with her wife Rhiannon but was born in Doncaster. Her mother was a secretary and her father a systems analyst. Brought up with two older brothers, she was “a bit of a tomboy” but not a sports obsessive. After completing a psychology degree at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, she worked at the Ministry of Defence for the next 10 years. “I managed soldiers’ careers, posting people on tours,” she says. “You never did it lightly, you were sending people to risky jobs. Unfortunately, some didn’t come home and some came home seriously injured.” In an irony that doesn’t escape her, Butterfield herself joined the ranks of the seriously injured following an operation to remove a tumour from her spine when she was 31. “I remember waking up paralysed from the operation on 28 January 2011,” she says. “There was a 0.01 per cent chan…

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width: 8192
height: 5464

Three's company
type: item
date: 2026-02-04T18:23:30.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Alex Payne, James Haskell and Mike Tindall, hosts of The Good, the Bad & the Rugby, on community, mental health and the dark side of being in the limelight
encoded: It’s hardly enough for a line-out, and certainly not a scrum. But two big men joined by one smaller man is just the right amount for a very successful podcast. First broadcast in 2020, The Good, the Bad & the Rugby features former England rugby union internationals Mike Tindall and James Haskell, and journalist Alex Payne. Tindall, 47, a centre, was part of the 2003 World Cup-winning team. Haskell, 40, a flanker, famously played with a back injury in England’s 2016 Six Nations grand slam victory against France. Payne, 45, the smaller one, adeptly holds things together. It’s one of the world’s biggest rugby podcasts – the trio now sell out live tours and received the royal seal of approval when they recorded an episode with Princess Anne and the Prince and Princess of Wales at Windsor Castle; something Tindall, who is married to the Princess Royal’s daughter Zara Phillips, called upon family connections to get. “That was special,” he says, when we talk. “Everything I hoped it would be.” Counterintuitively, the show’s success might be down to its comparative lack of rugby minutiae. “We’re not really interested in ruck laws and scrum laws,” says Tindall, “We’re interested in the people. This is a very masculine sport. You have to be a warrior on the field, but you can’t ever show your pain. What we’re trying to do is show that people do have emotions, to peel back a few layers.” <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2019/11/GettyImages-1023013496-68da3b1.jpg" width="3330" height="1845" alt="NORTHAMPTON, ENGLAND - AUGUST 24: James Haskell of Northampton Saints looks on during the pre season friendly match between Northampton Saints and Glasgow Warriors at Franklin's Gardens on August 24, 2018 in Northampton, England. (Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)" title="Northampton Saints v Glasgow Warriors" /> They do this by mixing emotional openness with dressing-room banter. “Some of us are more bombastic than others,” says Tindall, possibly th…

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Six Nations podcasters James Haskell and Mike Tindall talk landing Prince William and Princess Kate as guests on their show
type: item
date: 2026-02-02T17:00:04.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: audio
subject: Rugby Union
subject: Sport
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
subject: Six Nations
description: Radio Times talks to the stars of The Good, the Bad & the Rugby.
encoded: It’s hardly enough for a line-out, and certainly not a scrum. But two big men joined by one smaller man is just the right amount for a very successful podcast. First broadcast in 2020, The Good, the Bad & the Rugby features former England rugby union internationals Mike Tindall and James Haskell, and journalist Alex Payne. Tindall, 47, a centre, was part of the 2003 World Cup-winning team. Haskell, 40, a flanker, famously played with a back injury in England’s 2016 Six Nations grand slam victory against France. Payne, 45, the smaller one, adeptly holds things together. It’s one of the world’s biggest rugby podcasts – the trio now sell out live tours and received the royal seal of approval when they recorded an episode with Princess Anne and the Prince and Princess of Wales at Windsor Castle; something Tindall, who is married to the Princess Royal’s daughter Zara Phillips, called upon family connections to get. “That was special,” he says, when we talk. “Everything I hoped it would be.” Counterintuitively, the show’s success might be down to its comparative lack of rugby minutiae. “We’re not really interested in ruck laws and scrum laws,” says Tindall, “We’re interested in the people. This is a very masculine sport. "You have to be a warrior on the field, but you can’t ever show your pain. What we’re trying to do is show that people do have emotions, to peel back a few layers.” They do this by mixing emotional openness with dressing-room banter. “Some of us are more bombastic than others,” says Tindall, possibly thinking of Haskell, who arrives late as he has been at a “diversity and inclusion” session. “I learnt workplace banter is absolutely fine,” Haskell says. “As long as it’s not funny, directed at anybody, or says anything of any remote interest.” He’s jesting, I think, and so is Payne when he says, “Working with James for eight years has driven me to a therapist.” As Tindall points out: “James has seen a therapist since he was 17 years old, to try and maximise…

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'It's not always about winning'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: And yet, with an Olympic medal having eluded him in his career, Dave Ryding is determined to go out on a high
encoded: Add the Winter Olympics 2026 to your watchlist. To see our day-by-day guide of what to watch, click here. High in the Italian Alps, a 39-year-old Englishman is preparing to race. Soon he will lock into his skis, take a deep breath of sharp mountain air and then throw himself down the compacted frozen snow of the Winter Olympics slalom course beneath Monte Vallecetta. When he hurtles towards the finish-line, Dave Ryding will zigzag and turn through a series of gates marked by polymer poles, subjecting his knees and ankles to immense forces, while reaching speeds of 80km an hour. With some understatement Ryding, known as The Rocket, describes this as “quite stressful”. Downhill racing is faster, but slalom is the more technical event where competitors are more likely to make a mistake and crash – with hundreds of cowbell-clanging spectators waiting for him to do just that. “It’s an amazing experience in front of a big crowd,” he says. And frightening? “You learn to perform under pressure, to take the energy from the crowd and not have nerves about it.” When we talk, Ryding has just breakfasted on Greek yoghurt, oats “and blueberries from Aldi”. In summer he grows his own blackcurrants in the Lancashire home he shares with his wife, Dutch skier Mandy Dirkzwager, and their three-year-old daughter, Nina. Ryding, it’s clear, is emphatically not someone who spent months in the Alps every winter. He was brought up near Pendle in Lancashire and, rather than Courchevel, the first time Ryding encountered winter sports it was on the local artificial ski slope – taken there by his father Carl, a ski-mad visionary who sensed, rightly, that his six-year-old son might be good. Carl coached his son on the plastic slope and worked on a market stall in the nearby town of Leyland. “He sold women’s underwear,” says Ryding. “Then he became an industrial cleaner.” When it became increasingly apparent that both Ryding and his younger sister Joanna were talented skiers, Carl retrained as a …

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'I'm happy behind, chasing the pack'
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: Great Britain's Charlotte Bankes is already the current World Cup mixed snowboard cross champion, but will this be the year she wins an Olympic medal?
encoded: Add the Winter Olympics 2026 to your watchlist. To see our day-by-day guide of what to watch, click here. Great Britain’s 30-year-old Charlotte Bankes is among the favourites for the snowboard cross event at the Winter Olympics. One of the most exciting alpine sports, Olympic snowboard cross features four riders battling for position on a course between 1,000 and 1,500m long with curved banks (berms), humps and waves that help to launch riders into the air. The current World Cup mixed snowboard cross champion, Bankes’s career is laden with victories but no Olympic title yet. Is this her time? Your family moved from Britain to the French Alps when you were a child, so you initially represented France, until 2018… We didn’t move for snowboarding so much as the possibility of living a more outdoors life, but I feel fortunate they made that decision. Although I’ve grown up in France, I still feel British and feel proud to represent Great Britain. But the local community in France still supports me, so I’ve found the right balance. So, French coffee or British tea bags? I’m fuelled on tea; I probably drink two litres of tea a day. I take a flask with me on the hill so I can have a cup of tea before the start of a race. I’ve also got a kettle for the hotels so I can make a proper cup of tea. I take my own bags of Yorkshire Tea with me. <img src="https://images.immediate.co.uk/production/volatile/sites/3/2026/01/062MCTTYR-DL-4685953-e1769695172357.jpg" width="7555" height="5040" alt="Week 6 Winter Olympics Charlotte Bankes" title="Charlotte Bankes of Britain, left, and Pia Zerkhold of Austria compete during a quarterfinal of women's snowboard cross at the FIS Snowboard Cross World Cup, a test event for the 2022 Winter Olympics, at the Genting Resort Secret Garden in Zhangjiakou in" /> Do you have a special diet, plenty of protein shakes? No, I don’t like any of that stuff! Riders don’t have to be that careful with what we eat, it’s more about getting a balanced diet that f…

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Snowboarder Charlotte Bankes reveals why she doesn't need to diet and worry about what she eats
type: item
date: 2026-01-26T17:00:36.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Sport
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
description: "Wherever I am in the race at the Olympics, I won’t give up until I cross that finish line."
encoded: Great Britain’s 30-year-old Charlotte Bankes is among the favourites for the snowboard cross event at the Winter Olympics. One of the most exciting alpine sports, Olympic snowboard cross features four riders battling for position on a course between 1,000 and 1,500m long with curved banks (berms), humps and waves that help to launch riders into the air. The current World Cup mixed snowboard cross champion, Bankes’s career is laden with victories but no Olympic title yet. Is this her time? Your family moved from Britain to the French Alps when you were a child, so you initially represented France, until 2018… We didn’t move for snowboarding so much as the possibility of living a more outdoors life, but I feel fortunate they made that decision. Although I’ve grown up in France, I still feel British and feel proud to represent Great Britain. But the local community in France still supports me, so I’ve found the right balance. So, French coffee or British tea bags? I’m fuelled on tea; I probably drink two litres of tea a day. I take a flask with me on the hill so I can have a cup of tea before the start of a race. I’ve also got a kettle for the hotels so I can make a proper cup of tea. I take my own bags of Yorkshire Tea with me. Do you have a special diet, plenty of protein shakes? No, I don’t like any of that stuff! Riders don’t have to be that careful with what we eat, it’s more about getting a balanced diet that fuels the body properly. I really like a curry. There are certain mornings before races where you’re not that hungry and my go-to is toast and Marmite. Riders can reach speeds of 70km an hour, are you scared of crashes? Fear is there but it makes you concentrate. If you’re riding in a pack with people around, then you really have to focus on your own moves before wondering what the others are doing. You damaged your pelvis in 2011 and then, in 2025, crashed in training — how has that affected you going into these Olympics? My preparation hasn’t been the same…

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Alpine ski racer Dave Ryding talks mental health journey: "I really don't think UK Sport understands"
type: item
date: 2026-01-26T17:00:21.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: Sport
subject: TV
subject: Interview
subject: Magazine
description: With an Olympic medal having eluded him in his career, Dave Ryding is determined to go out on a high.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. High in the Italian Alps, a 39-year-old Englishman is preparing to race. Soon he will lock into his skis, take a deep breath of sharp mountain air and then throw himself down the compacted frozen snow of the Winter Olympics slalom course beneath Monte Vallecetta. When he hurtles towards the finish-line, Dave Ryding will zigzag and turn through a series of gates marked by polymer poles, subjecting his knees and ankles to immense forces, while reaching speeds of 80km an hour. With some understatement Ryding, known as The Rocket, describes this as “quite stressful”. Downhill racing is faster, but slalom is the more technical event where competitors are more likely to make a mistake and crash – with hundreds of cowbell-clanging spectators waiting for him to do just that. “It’s an amazing experience in front of a big crowd,” he says. And frightening? “You learn to perform under pressure, to take the energy from the crowd and not have nerves about it.” Download our free Winter Olympics viewing guide, with a day-by-day TV planner to help you follow every winning moment When we talk, Ryding has just breakfasted on Greek yoghurt, oats “and blueberries from Aldi”. In summer he grows his own blackcurrants in the Lancashire home he shares with his wife, Dutch skier Mandy Dirkzwager, and their three-year-old daughter, Nina. Ryding, it’s clear, is emphatically not someone who spent months in the Alps every winter. He was brought up near Pendle in Lancashire and, rather than Courchevel, the first time Ryding encountered winter sports it was on the local artificial ski slope – taken there by his father Carl, a ski-mad visionary who sensed, rightly, that his six-year-old son might be good. Carl coached his son on the plastic slope and worked on a market stall in the nearby town of Leyland. “He sold women’s underwear,” says Ryding. “Then he became an industrial cleaner.” When it became increasingly apparent that both Ryding and his…

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Time for a change
type: item
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: App
subject: App features
description: After 27 years of Melvyn Bragg there’s a new host of In Our Time. What will the seemingly modest Misha Glenny bring to the table?
encoded: In Our Time is on at 9am on Thursday on Radio 4. Add it to your collection Misha Glenny really didn’t expect to get this job. “I was astonished, flabbergasted, absolutely thrilled,” he says of his appointment as presenter of In Our Time. In bagging the role, Glenny follows Melvyn Bragg, who presented the programme from 1998 to 2025. “This is one of the crown jewels of Radio 4 and Melvyn is such a towering figure,” Glenny says when we meet in Broadcasting House. “It’s an immense privilege and honour to be asked to take it on.” Like many of the two million listeners keen to feed their curiosity, there was one episode that hooked Glenny; the “absolutely brilliant” January 2008 programme on plate tectonics. “I was late and rushing to get out of the house but just had to listen to the end. The conclusion was that without tectonic plates there would be no life. Who knew?” Intrigued, Glenny later told BBC executives he’d want the job if it ever came up, but claims he wasn’t a shoo-in. “No, not anointed at all. The selection process included making a pilot and for three months I assumed I wasn’t going to get the job.” The 67-year-old already presents The Invention of… series on Radio 4 and until recently was Rector of the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. Glenny also wrote the 2008 non-fiction book McMafia, which became a BBC drama series starring James Norton, and won a Sony Gold Award for his radio reporting in central and eastern Europe in the early 1990s. He says he’d like more Russian literature on the show. So, what else might change? “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, but the show might benefit from another guest, or one less,” he teases. He’d also like to tilt towards In Our Time’s many younger listeners: “It’s one of the most popular Radio 4 shows with the under-35s and that’s very important.” Mainly, Glenny says, he wants a smooth transition, so “people can build a similar confidence in me as they had with Melvyn. Frank Skinner said Melvyn acts like an ‘intel…

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Misha Glenny reveals his wife Kirsty Lang’s advice as he replaces Melvyn Bragg for Our Time
type: item
date: 2026-01-14T08:00:07.000Z
creator: Michael Hodges
subject: audio
subject: BBC
description: From flabbergasted fan to the chair once occupied by Melvyn Bragg: Misha Glenny on inheriting Radio 4’s crown jewel – and why depth still matters in a distracted age.
encoded: This article first appeared in Radio Times magazine. Misha Glenny really didn't expect to get this job. "I was astonished, flabbergasted, absolutely thrilled," he says of his appointment as presenter of In Our Time. In bagging the role, Glenny follows Melvyn Bragg, who presented the programme from 1998 to 2025. "This is one of the crown jewels of Radio 4 and Melvyn is such a towering figure," Glenny says when we meet in Broadcasting House. "It's an immense privilege and honour to be asked to take it on." Like many of the two million listeners keen to feed their curiosity, there was one episode that hooked Glenny; the "absolutely brilliant" January 2008 programme on plate tectonics. "I was late and rushing to get out of the house but just had to listen to the end. The conclusion was that without tectonic plates there would be no life. Who knew?" Intrigued, Glenny later told BBC executives he'd want the job if it ever came up, but claims he wasn't a shoo-in. "No, not anointed at all. The selection process included making a pilot and for three months I assumed I wasn't going to get the job." The 67-year-old already presents The Invention of… series on Radio 4 and until recently was Rector of the Institute for Human Sciences in Vienna. Glenny also wrote the 2008 non-fiction book McMafia, which became a BBC drama series starring James Norton, and won a Sony Gold Award for his radio reporting in central and eastern Europe in the early 1990s. He says he'd like more Russian literature on the show. So, what else might change? "If it ain't broke, don't fix it, but the show might benefit from another guest, or one less," he teases. He'd also like to tilt towards In Our Time's many younger listeners: "It's one of the most popular Radio 4 shows with the under-35s and that's very important." Mainly, Glenny says, he wants a smooth transition, so "people can build a similar confidence in me as they had with Melvyn. Frank Skinner said Melvyn acts like an 'intellectual sheepdog'. Tha…

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