The Thick Of It creator breaks down Rishi Sunak’s election campaign

We were joined by writer, director and comedy extraordinaire Armando Iannucci in the studio this week to discuss all things political.

In this interview, we discuss the UK general election, the rise of Nigel Farage and Reform UK, and the alienation of the general public by the main parties.

Dr Strangelove opens on 8 October 2024 at the Noël Coward theatre in London.

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the things that are being talked about now in the elections are things that the gurus and the pr and the and the kids are telling them to say but they’re not necessarily things the things that are uper most in people’s minds fundamentally I don’t think the public is is actually asking for tax cuts they’re just saying I can’t get a GP this waiting list at the hospital this doesn’t work there’s potholes everywhere you know it’s just it’s just the whole the sh in the river talk about capital gains I just just get the out the river the level of poverty the level of child poverty the level of uh the fact that you know almost a third of the country is dependent or has a connection with the food bank these are just massive things but aren’t being talked about so I think people feel frustrated about all this and then watch this these kind of debating games about about 2,000 tax thing oh over four years and and it wasn’t the treasury but but you know if I just keep saying it often enough people will go well he said it he said it five times now so it must be true amandi hello how are you hello you good I’m very good yes welcome to politics Joe yeah um on the off chance that any of our audience aren’t familiar with you all your work how would you introduce yourself how would you describe yourself oh okay that’s I’m already I’m going through some existential how I um to make funny things and I like to make people if people think about things as well as Laughing then that’s good so you know I’ve done I go from the silly to the Ry from thi of it to Alan Partridge to death of Starland to David Copperfield and everything in between um and I’ve been doing that for I think about 30 odd years now wow what a career incredible I mean obviously with the British politics at the moment it’s just like the thick of it isn’t it just like it’s just like somebody in politics said to me um uh that the only thing about the thick of it that isn’t accurate is that it doesn’t have people in it saying this is just like the thick of it because when everything whenever anything goes wrong in in in someone’s campaign or whatever that’s what they say um and and people also say you know why you know are you tempted to do the thing of it now and I say no because I kind of thought the think of it was about a golden era when there were kind of rules and most episodes of the think of it are about you know the minister thinks they might have done something wrong and so H how can we stop the world from fighting out and how can we repair the damage only it gets worse but now no one’s bothered if they’ve done something wrong that’s seen as cudos really indeed I guess also provokes the question doesn’t it about whether politics is Downstream of culture if culture is Downstream of politics right because you sort of first episode as what must be about 20 years ago now thick of the the thick of the new labor years yes the alist Campbell infuence um influence Etc and whether or not to understand it as kind of a reaction to the politics of the moment or to understand politics right now as a reaction to it I guess I don’t know what the answer to that question is but well it’s only in that um uh you know when crazy things happen now like you know we just announcing the election in uh a thunderstorm when he has you know a newly built 5 million pound announcing room in Downing Street y That’s when you get oh it’s like the thick of it or photographs of them with like big Mickey Mouse ears behind them by accident or exit and stuff those are all things from the F but the th of it was based originally on my doing research into what actually goes on so um although quite a lot of what’s in it should be a surprise to the viewers it’s not a surprise or wasn’t a surprise to people in politics at the time because we were trying to just absorb into our story lines things that that do happen um and if and but we would make up the main story but the details would be based on reality and we just exaggerate reality to Breaking Point it would go out and then someone from uh whiteall or whatever would ring the next day going how did you find that kept that really quiet well that that really genuinely happened because most of the meetings and and with each series every each series began with me going I think we have to take it even further this time because it’s still nowhere near as crazy as what’s and the in the very opening episode of f had um them in the back of a car trying to improvise policies that cost no money with 45 minutes to go before the Press conf because all their money had been junked by Malcolm Tucker and and uh I’ve had various people who have served in various cabinets come up afterwards and say I’ve been in the back of that car and that frightens me yeah it should do I should you know and you know that think of it was originally there as a sort of warning manual not an instruction leaflet you know we shouldn’t be trying to ape people don’t shouldn’t be going into politics to try and be like Malcolm tuck they should be going into politics to prevent that sort of over control of the messaging happening what is it that that you think is the kind of um the driver behind the longevity of it is it is it that closeness to reality in the conception when you were doing your research and and thinking it Bears it or is it just the sort of the arc that British politics has been on has meant that people have gone oh my God this was so precient well I uh it’s as I said you know I do my research you I take a lot of Pride and Care in my research because I do want to get it right and I don’t think and part of the reason I did the think of it I was a huge fan of Yes Minister and yes prime minister still very funny now still great but the sort of power Dynamic that it Illustrated was the ministers desperately trying to get something done and it’s the civil servant the permanent secretary who’s stopping him uh because they are so used to status quo and and I just felt that that doesn’t reflect the dynamic now which the dynamic now is the central control of the leader’s office or the prime minister’s office and those around them and the treasury and the funding element and the ministers just being really spoks people are you know glorified puppets with very little power and the control are arounded then by the you know the spin room and um what we called the um the enforcers under Blair and brown who were these sound like the Dementors who just go out and tell different departments this is the line this is what you say and that’s how much money you’ve got so I wanted to reflect that Dynamic plus the kind of quartery of unelected experts special advisers who advise the ministers on policy who are all in their kind of mid 20s and that was when I was investigating and researching thick of it before the pilot that was a thing that was completely new to me I hadn’t realized the extent to which our country is run by infants uh who have not been elected um and who will relentlessly rise up the ranks with each failure that they are responsible for relentlessly moving forward falling so that that that was interesting and I don’t think that Dynamic has changed you know the parties have changed the policies and the themes have changed but I don’t think that fundamental Dynamic you know we we’re seeing it now I I suppose it’s enhanced in the campaigns because that’s when it’s all about medium and message and policy and less about the day-to-day running of stuff so that’s when these uh tiny little girls and boys are at their most influential in telling Rishi sunak to say this and telling Kama not to say that and so on so that’s when uh we and it’s it’s in situations like this that then things can go wrong if they’ve been badly managed or haven’t thought through the implications of where they’re filming like the you know filming in front of the uh Titanic you know you know in Belfast and and just being asked about sinking ship and so on um so that kind of naivity shs through uh comes through and I think that’s why people feel a lot frustrated by the way elections go on you know because it doesn’t the things that are being talked about now in the elections uh things that you know the the kind of the the gurus and the pr and the and the kids are telling them to say but they’re not necessarily things the things that are uppermost in people’s minds you know I think I think there’s a whole you know there’s been this whole Phantom fight about raising taxes and not raising taxes and all that but fundamentally I don’t think the public is is actually asking for tax cuts they’re just saying I can’t get a GP this Wess at the hospital this doesn’t work there’s potholes everywhere you know it’s just it’s just the whole the [ __ ] in the river you know it’s just going it goes on and on talk about capital gains I just just get the [ __ ] out the river you know first principles it’s just is so basic plus you know people can’t eat people can’t afford you know it’s the level of poverty the level of child poverty the level of uh the fact that you know almost a third of the country is dependent or has a connection with the food bank these are just massive things but aren’t being talked about and and and also I think a lot of people now are saying brexit was [ __ ] and you know uh some of us who said that at the time don’t want to kind of swap indicated perhaps well it’s horrible because actually you are the results which is you know what did you expect if you kind of looked at your largest trading partner and went no I think we’ll trade with New Zealand um you know what look at the map um it’s that basic but no no we want a blow passports and uh you know so but I think a lot of people and and including you know uh uh and this is the important B a lot of people who did vote for brexit and I going okay you know I did it as a protest or I was you know convinced by the AR it’s gone wrong we what we’re doing about it but actually the whole subject has been uh Sat On by all the parties indeed by the media you know there you know there isn’t a report on BBC News or ITV going a lot of people are upset by brexit but it doesn’t seem to be coming up in any of the manifestos why you know it’s so I think people feel frustrated about all this and then watch this these kind of debating games about 2,000 tax thing oh over four years and and it wasn’t the treasury but but you know if I just keep saying it often enough people will go well he said it he said it five times now so it must be true you know um it’s you know and it does worry me you know it’s not just funny if he wanted to do a funny it worries me because there’s a vacuum and dangerous things happen when there’s a vacuum you know people move in to create to to take that space that’s a very uh true and preent point there’s so much in that answer I want to unpack okay yes I I will happily attempt to unpack it so I no no so I I think well first of on the point about professionalization I think there’s a tendency to understand new labor as kind of the beginning point at which the political process becomes professionalized and you know the GRE and take a and stick to it ET and I was I was reminded recently there’s a quote going around from Dominic Cummings in 2014 of all people and he’s kind of saying that when you come into government you think that there’s going to be some kind of door behind which there’s a team of secret ninjas who are going to fix everything and then you get there and realize that in fact there is no door there are no ninjas it’s just you and you know some supremely confident and capable you know Army Commander is not going to sweep in and sort this out for you it’s not James Bond and that was part of the reason of doing something like the anyway which was to tell people that you know you get cowed by the impressive looking buildings like Bank of England and the treasury and you think the people behind them must know what they’re doing then you realize no they’re not idiots uh they’re just human and they’re just get like most people they’re getting through the day thinking I think I did okay but I don’t know am I am I doing you know and might have ham and mustard for lunch and yes and funny enough somebody told me when I was researching for feet and in the loop which was the sort of take on Blair and Bush Going To War uh somebody said to me that Kissinger when he was first in Nixon’s working for Nixon I think as National Security adviser at start you know for the first couple of months he was going around going am I doing all right is he does he does he think I’m doing that’s Henry Kissinger you know who very soon had the confidence to you know bombb Cambodia and think that was merited a Peace Prize um but the other thing you just said there about the I was told the very same thing by a guy who used to work at the CIA because I was looking at the you know the failures in intelligence about Saddam Hussein and weapons of mass destruction and where all that came from and um he was excia and he said you know I worked at the CIA and like Dominic Cummings you know he worked there thinking that through that door was the big room with the screens and the and at one day someone will come and tap tap him on the shoulder and say do you want to come and work there and he said it didn’t happen and and like he said they were getting better Intelligence on Iraq from the local back Dad newspapers than they were from their own you know it’s a it you realize it everyone is sort of making up as they go along and everyone is just coming up with an answer because there isn’t time you know to to to to spend on this topic it’s a simultaneously incredibly freeing but also terrifying realization it’s terrifying because we just assume these people know what they’re doing and as as I say they’re not incompetent they’re not you know mad or evil the majority of them they’re just human and they’re fallible and you know we don’t let them make mistakes you know we have very much because we have this now 24-hour pressure on them we’re all journalists now because with our phones and you know if we catch anyone grumpy then we film it and go he’s grumpy but he’s in charge of Health surely he should resign now you know and you see the context and it’s like 11:30 at night and he’s on a train trying to get to Sheffield and and he knows he’s going to be late and he’s got an early start tomorrow and [ __ ] it someone’s pointing a phone at now you know it’s all that yeah but it is also the you know the um kind of arrogant self-confidence of these 20s somethings who think I could come up with a health policy yes I’ll tell the minister this yes you know and you can’t you read a lot about health um but that’s not the same as you know hearing from people who work in it and what the things are that need fixing your point about this election and the £22,000 in tax or you know national service or you know take your pick yeah I kind of think you know despite wanting an election to you know at its sort of platonic form ideal form yeah that is what it is it’s you know meet me in the marketplace of ideas and let us discuss differing views on Healthcare policy no that’s not going to happen it’s not the what is it the Agora yeah in ancient Athens people were happily debating debating no absolutely not but on this occasion it almost feels more um bass than that yeah and that it is just almost about sadism and Vengeance and going we have we’ve had it with you you could promise me the moon ryak yeah you I don’t care you’re gone yeah it’s it’s about punishment more than anything else yeah it it it is but it’s also I think punishment at what we’re getting still which is silence as much as possible from K starma because you know I don’t want to you know we’re in a good position it just say nothing say you know give a few little you think about this say it’s hard but you know we’ll we’ll get there you know do that and from Rich just invent stuff you invent invent policies that cost a lot of money and invent the fact you’ll be able to pay for them from you know saving yeah on you know on the welfare system and tax evasion and all that which you somehow haven’t managed to find over the last 14 years but now you you know say that say the 2000 thing even though uh you know there was something awaring about the fact it was not because the the treasury and whatever said no that’s not true but also statistically you’re saying 2,000 but that’s over four years so it’s 500 per year but you’re trying to say so there was something a Welling in that he people he he was being told not only have you lied but you’ve lied inaccurately which is so you just think where is where is meaning anymore yes lost it’s lost um so I think and I think there is a swelling anger about that and I think that is reflected you know we talked about I talked about a vacuum and I think that’s where farage and reform where will’ll take it will swoop in there because a lot of people are genuinely angry and and getting increasingly so because this National conversation we’re meant to be having right now isn’t happening I think that’s the danger for starma I I genuinely think exactly without without verbalizing you know a great many ideas or you know a vision he’s sort of it’s a catch 22 because if he then gets into power and does something extremely radical people go you don’t have a mandate to do this you tell us you were going to do this conversely if he does just stick to kind of what he’s doing and he Tinkers with the TR with the train set a little bit he puts a bush here rather than laying some new track and trying to sort out the mess I think that apathy that has kind of evolved into hatred almost of the conservative party could very quickly turn on the labor party well because it it will be an apathy and then turning into hatred towards the political yes you know let’s call them I don’t know the the The Usual Suspects the two big parties and so on establishment and I think what’s you know you can see ‘s rationale which is were very you know we’re far ahead I’m luring over the people that I need to lure I’m luring back the people who voted brexit but were previously LA but I’m I’m getting the kind of you know was more Centrist conservatives who are worried about where you know the conservative part is going and a very much anti-reform and we’re pro EU and so I’m getting them why should I upset anyone by you know but there is you know it does worry me that there is a whole generation out there who are very very politic motivated but they’re just not that into Party politics they’re into issue politics so there will be you know campaigning uh for the environment or poverty or you know will take the you know um and they are the Next Generation and if they’re already saying as some of them are democracy just doesn’t work should we try an Al an alternative as well as people who maybe weren’t engaged in politics who are now going um well I can’t make head or taale of either of them there’s nothing separates them they’re saying the same old stuff I’ll vote for that guy over there who at least you know looks colorful and is a bit bit making more noise that I kind of get you know in that you know that the reform have the luxury of being able to say whatever it is uh come up with policies whatever policies they like because they’re not going to be in act so they know all they have to say is anything that touches the kind of um the those not just the dog whistle stuff but things that could also appear quite reasonable like you know we’ll fund the NHS from top to AUM why how how you going to do that um I don’t know what how they justify how they’re going to do it but but their spending plans are even bigger yeah than any of the other but they’re going to do it by oh yes no they’re going to do it by not paying interest back on the launs for quantitive easing or something like that some system that suddenly can give you 440 billion pounds if you you know um uh but they also have the luxury of not having their policies analyzed no because they’ve never had to before um so we’ll be interesting see in the remaining three and a half weeks now that they are going to be at least the third party if not the second party I think the uh media have an obligation to test those ideas out and to question I mean uh farage gets a bit NY when he’s questioned you know and that’s a that’s a sign of someone who just likes who likes the performance aspect yes of politics but not the detail aspect but actually governing is about the detail I noticed well I I thought I noticed the change in his demeanor over this election cycle where he’s much more combative and aggressive towards the media when they’re questioning him before I think he was the relationship was far more symbiotic and he was no he needed the media because the media gave him the platform yes whereas now it’s almost as if because he’s been spending so much time on the other side of the Atlantic he’s kind of learning that lesson of actually if you kind of demonize these people yeah go to war with them yeah it undermines them when in the future that you know let’s say they do do okay we’ve looked at reforms Health policies and the idea that they’re not going to charge um any tax on private healthcare providers they’ve costed it as X there’s no way it costs that little it’s going to be far more he says well why would you trust them you know look how they speak to me look how and also you know we’ve got our own media now we know we we we’ll take questions from GB news cuz they’re a proper uh objective serious outfit serious outfit and you know but but but he’s not doing that in isolation over the last four five years we’ve had instances of you know people like Nick Robinson or and reporters from the BBC being bowed at SNP press conferences for asking challenging questions about their plans how things are going to be cost or how certain things are going to work uh we’ve had it at certainly conservative um uh events and we we’re also seeing it at some labor events as well when people are when you know when any reporter is to forensic on an MP you’ll see the you know the Twitter reaction as like another right- Winger from the BBC question and it’s it’s it’s not you you know if you if you question somebody about something that’s not saying that’s not identifying yourself as from the opposite Camp it’s just saying that you should be able to your plans should be able to withstand inspection you know they have to be just fit for purpose so our job is to stress test is to ask you the questions of like have you thought this through where you going to get money how does it work where do these people come in what happens if this happens you know you know and it’s irritating and annoying and it’s hard and so what do you know what I mean it has to be hard you that’s how that’s how you def that’s how you um work out whether your arguments can stand up but we’ we’ve kind of got into this thing of um you’re either with us or against us and if you’re asking me a question about it you must be against me in which case a you’re an idiot B I don’t want to talk to you you know and and that way nothing gets done and and the idea of having a rational conversation between two people who disagree um it’s is looking more and more like some antique kind of from a bygone age yeah you know that’s my wor you mentioned um poverty in your last answer and you’re a p you’re a patron you are a patron of the campaign Against Child poverty there’s been a lot of discussion child poverty Action Group specifically um backwards and WS about sort of two child benefit cap and you know labor saying they’re not going to Comm we’re still waiting for the manifesto this week so there is still possibility they might back on that um and actually I guess it connects to the previous point right about whether or not policy has enough of prominence during this election campaign I would probably say that something as important as child poverty hasn’t had enough discussion just yet exactly um what’s your view let’s say particularly in that policy area looking at the the main parties and their their policy offerings I appreciate the conservative Manifesto came out about an hour ago so you probably haven’t had the time to read the whole thing just yet but they’re they’re going to be funding tax cuts by Saving 12 billion from welfare and benefit reform reform and that kind of that that concerns me a great deal because it still feeds off this idea that somehow the benefit system is being used and abused by a great fance of people who are you know lazy and scres and so on and it’s not I mean I and I don’t I don’t think the public agree with that point of view no cuz I think everybody if not themselves knows someone either within their family or within their kind of friendship who are in real difficulty and who are working better on low pay and use a food bank and we’re ashamed to use a food bank but now it’s become the norm and you know and not just food banks but you know Baby Banks and and and all the other um Char charity Outlets that are there to to to kind of provide a more secure base of support because the the welfare system isn’t isn’t working um but and and what’s increasingly worrying is that they want to reform the welfare system so that they can make the better off have tax cuts and I I was on I wasn’t able to converse with him but Jeremy Hunt I was on a Laura kbur problem with Jeremy Hunt and I had to speak afterwards we didn’t have the kind of but he said you know with benefits as a carrot and stick approach you know knowing that there will be tax you know the more you earn there’ll be tax breaks but my my response with that is why are you using a stick on people on benefits you don’t use a stick with people on business you don’t use a stick with people who just inherited their you know why you know I’m you know I’m in the film and television industry and in various recent budgets gone browned it but JY hun did as well there have been tax breaks for investment in film and television in the UK uh um there’ve been lots of carrots and it’s been great and the film industry has never been healthier in terms of the number of Productions in the UK and um it’s a very skilled industry here and all being you I mean it’s worked wers you know uh so that’s that car carrots can work but why with a certain group of why with people who are in business you give the you do the carrots but people who are benefits need the stick and actually I think the you know what we can learn from you know the carrot issue is that uh you know it can be extended and then there’s the whole other thing which you know and and it’s it’s an endless question but is to do with just the problem in the UK or in government at the moment is there is there is never any incentive to think longterm um the two child cap on benefits that exist at the moment um would cost something like I think it’s something like 1.8 billion a year to get rid of it but it would lift 1.1 million children out of poverty 8 thou 800,000 out of deep poverty and another 300,000 out of poverty um and you still think yeah but that’s 1.8 billion where do we get the 1.8 billion you know the Rwanda scheme has already cost 500 million if it carries on if reg the whole planes and whatever it was estimated to go up to about two and a half billion his his national service thing is something like two billion you know the money is there it just needs the will the will to to to change the priorities you know if if someone in charge at the treasury would say actually shall we get rid of child poverty it could happen in the same way that during the pandemic they said we need to get everyone who’s sleeping rough off the streets and it happened um there’s that but what people don’t also factor in is the what it saves to the economy taking people out of poverty and putting them back into uh work and and and actually takes pressure of Services Public Services you know sate the prison system uh social you know everything uh um and that’s a long-term benefit uh but it’s just harder to calculate what that is but it’s and that’s because it’s incalculable I mean it’s immense the other thing I keep hanging on about is that and because the other thing the government looks at is benefit fraud or H yeah benefit fraud and real campaigns against benefit fraud business fraud is 10 times higher than benefit fraud but we haven’t had you know Vans going around with posters saying if you see a businessman who’s really you know screwing the system ring this number you I mean we don’t have that no why not it goes be inundation economically it makes more sense so there’s that but also there is this um you know just inherent in our system is this it’s hard to do the long-term thing that you know that if we lifted kids out of poverty now we will get the benefits in five and 10 years but this government might only be in for four years or five years so I want the Ben you know I want to feel the benefits now uh and it’s the same with hospitals the same with you know it’s the the prevention is that costs money now but the impact is it saves money because it prevention is better than cure but we don’t have the money to put into the prevention so we just have to deal with the Cure even though that’s much more expensive it’s always a political Choice yeah isn’t it how and where we spend the money and and the sort of the analogies that will get deployed around around you know um the the country’s credit card and the household budget sort of they’re often employed for conversations for example about benefits but not in the Contex of something like national service and I think it’s sadly um becoming a recurring theme that as we go through times of economic hardship post 2008 and sort of more broadly in the naughties you heard this sort of rhetoric around benefit scres and a lot of the TV even sort of mass media TV programs like Benefit Street things like that um and it’s starting to come back around now and the point you made there is such an important that actually quite often um we we conceive of the criminal as you know sort of um I don’t know someone in someone wearing a hoodie or a tracksuit but actually there there are sort of um distinguished gentlemen right in our society who don’t donate to Noble causes and and run run um fantastically successful businesses but we’ll sit for example let’s say in America in the boardroom meeting that decides we need to we need to increase profitability so actually yes we are going to increase the price at which we charge for insulin but you look at that sort of person say that actually that person morally what do you call that person are they a criminal but we we have this tendency to think bizarrely that it’s the disadvantage whether they’re you know a person you know a brown person in a small dingy crossing the channel I mean you say we I I mean I not me I I but I’d argue most people don’t think that do you know what I mean it’s become a kind of talk within the political conversation uh the likes of sunak and and hun and so on they this they’re they’re kind of programmed to think that but they must be doing it for a political function well yes but I think I think it’s it’s it’s just part of their DNA in that they you know that they grew up thinking carot and stick approach that you know that’s what that’s what Thatcher said uh she was on my bedroom wall I want to be like Thatcher I’ll do the carrot and stick approach and then the uh the the labor thing of thinking even though you know the last 14 years have shown us how actually incompetent they are at at running things even though they say they’re the party of business and and the natural party of government that actually they’re just not very good you know put the ideology to say they’re just not very good somehow there’s a labor and and left uh weird inferiority thing which is but we need to look a bit like them otherwise people won’t think we’re proper M you know so we need to talk about cutting that and you know costing everything and being absolutely fiscally you know whatever because and so even though we see how bad the conservatives have been over the last 14 years we’re still acknowledging that their argument is the one that we should still be taking part in and what I’m saying is no don’t don’t acknowledge that argument because they’ve been rubbish you know the argument doesn’t work and and I think this is what the electorate is now feeling which is like I said right at the start I know you’re talking about tax cuts but for the moment can we just stop that and just say how you’re going to put money into the Health Service education transport rail you know how how are we going to sort this and and of course the [ __ ] in the rivers how are we going to sort that can we just have a discussion about that now please MH and then we can go back and vote for whoever we want to vote for but but can we just park all this um you know language of business and language of you know I’m not having a go at business I’m just saying we’re we’re so we we think people who are in business are so perfect that we’re still slightly mesmerized by them and you know as with politicians the thck of it people in business are human so there’ll be ones who are really good and there’ll be ones who are terrible and there’ll be ones in between and we shouldn’t just see them as one group of people who for some reason have an expertise I always laugh at um you know that who who was it lady moan baroness moan moan what’s that her name Mo yeah Michelle moan yeah Michelle moan and her husband talking about the PPE thing in the interview with in the interview and and her husband going well I’m an entrepreneur so I don’t quite see the ins and outs of how the legal at the House of Lords works I’m an entrepreneur I think don’t just say saying you’re an entrepreneur does not get you off you know I could like oh clemency then obviously how how Sil yeah yeah I I could like get uh old bottles of like soft drink and take them back to the shops that you know and ask for 10p and the call myself an entrepreneur I can set up a little thing on Tik Tok you know or a Instagram account go I’m I’m an influencer and I’m an entrepreneur no you’re not you’re just someone who’s got like 10 friends and a suit micro influencer a micro yeah that’s where it starts um jine so don’t say and somehow saying you’re an entrepreneur gets you get away with it so you can go you know in the middle of pandemic you could say I’m an entrepreneur I’ll get you um safety you know I’ll get you masks and um and what’ you do previously oh you made sweets oh yeah fine yeah yeah I is to run a pub but um we were we’re always cleaning up at the end of the night you know in the HB so and you want stuff that’s about being clean yeah that’ll work I I and I’ve got friends can you make ventilators um no but I can I can look it up certainly that’s all it’s just that thing it’s like in the appren isn’t it uh your job for tomorrow is I’m going to ask you to open up a welth stall in the High Street do you know about seafood and so no but I can give it a goal anything for you uh L you know uh just you know and and but we still somehow we’re still curiously impressed by anyone who says they’re an entrepreneur you know I wonder where that comes from maybe maybe that I don’t know um there’s an element of that there’s an element of the kind of you know the social media that you know the the zukerberg of this world they were entrepreneurs and they were disruptors yes you know but for every one of them there’s a 100,000 who didn’t make it and yet somehow that’s the model um and as we’ve found to our cost zukerberg can suddenly own like the biggest company in the world with the most influence over thought yeah in the world and as much information about a personal lives as anyone has ever uh had at their disposal and still not know what he’s doing you know and and and we’ve allowed him to get away with it because you know he’s an entrepreneur that’s the extraordinary thing is you know the concentration of wealth power information in those top companies you know big market cap bigger than the GDP of many many countries combined um I mean he was a student at was it was at Harvard wasn’t it I believe he trying to come up with a how hot are various kind female members that that’s what he was and yet somehow within 20 years he owns all the world’s data welcome to capitalism I know and you how did how did we let that happen yes indeed and the history of Facebook has just been the history of Mark zukerberg going I know we’ve um we’ve not got it right here uh we’re on a journey and um you know we we’re learning from this um you know you shouldn’t be learning on the job if you control all the world’s information you should have a pretty sure idea of what you’re doing um finally you’ve adapted Doctor Strange Love um yeah opening this a starring Steve kougan MH why Strange Love why now uh well I was asked that’s the I mean that’s the boring the answer boring answer was um in the the producers of it were very keen to get to put Strange Love on stage and they had previously put Network on stage nation that was a great success and the kubri family and kubri estate had always been very nervous they’ve never allowed a a a kubric project to be adapted for another meting so this is the first time it’s happened and it was just through patiently explaining to them what they were going to do with it they went to see network were impressed by by it so they knew it was in safe hands and and and once they agreed okay let’s give it a go um uh Sean Foley who’s an amazing director was approached and he suggested me and the kubric family and estate thought that was a good fit so I was asked it was as simple as that and it was so funny cuz because they wanted to not and this was about 2 and a half to 3 years ago they wanted to keep it under wraps until the big announcement Sean fo was trying to get a hold of me to ask me and I kept getting messages saying he’s trying to get in touch but I was in the middle of filming something and I didn’t know it was urgent it was just hi got something to chat about yes and this went on for about C you know chasing each other for about six months and eventually I had five minutes oh yeah must ring short joh do you want to do it’s about Dr stream you want to do Dr streams stage went yes good thank you and then but it just seemed obvious and also you know and we had all that um discussion and the first draft really before you know Ukraine and the war in Ukraine happened but now it seemed so depressingly um you know we’ve come back to where we started you know we now still talking about World War II and nuclear weapons and is the West ready for this and you know all of that so it’s it’s depressing but also I think a lot of Doctor Strange Love is about weirdly Awan logic and conspiracy theory and and you know people who are assuming things about other people that they don’t know and then responding to it in advance even though they don’t know you know the LA it’s about lack of communication and lack of agreement and what happens when two sides are polarized and then start getting annoyed with each other do you know I was almost a a sign of how sort of British politics brained I am I was going I was thinking well I’ll ask Amando I’ll say look the leaders debate um you know seven way past but they’re all talking well will you press the big red button no I’ll press the big red button I didn’t even think that in the context of a war in Europe where where sort of the the the leader of Russia has at various points made not so subtle Illusions to nuclear war yeah for shame that’s what I kind of thinking but I think that’s part of like how it’s working at the moment in the conversation we’re seeing on our screens and you know on our radios and podcasts uh um it it seems curiously detached from what’s happening in the real world yes this the real world is complicated and and complicated things are difficult to get across they are certainly in 45 seconds that this association between kind of reality and um what you’re what you’re hearing in the meeting is such a powerful powerful dislocating thing for I mean the climate thing again you know scientists are going it’s actually sort of too late now but you know we can do our best to make it not quite as bad as we think it’ll be whereas you have politicians saying of course Net Zero but Net Zero but within uh but we need to make Net Zero much more comfortable for most people as if somehow you can dictate the weather like Thor when in fact you know all you can do is stand there as a tidal wave comes and and you know yeah you could put the Broly up please tell me there’s more hope than please I need to well only in that you know if we keep banging away and and and you know calling out not just the flaws in the language used by our political leaders but also you know where uh the media has just not done its job and is not focused on certain big topics that I think actually all of us are really worried about um because as I say if they don’t do that then there’s growing frustration just builds and builds and builds and then you get something much more Sinister happening and it’s not and that sin thing is not going to be stopped by you calling anyone who thinks they might vote for them stupid or a racist or whatever you know because the whole idea is to try and win them back and you’re not going to win them back if you go you stupid racist could you vote for me you know that’s not going to work um um and similarly you know you can’t do the the thing of we should all be very inclusive and we should you know think very carefully about how we talk about people or we will destroy you you know it doesn’t you know you’ve got to have there has to be an empathy and there has to be a willingness to hear what other people have to say before you start punching because otherwise you know we’ll just Retreat to our different silos really and and and which is how how the film Dr Strange of ends in that they talk about going underground and and starting again in their own little tunnels underground you know well we don’t want to get there so we have to engage yes um maybe we should all listen a little bit before we start talking well yeah and uh and it’s so easy it’s so easy especially you know when all you have to do is that or is it that no I can’t um that um you would have to do that so be straight brain you just yeah um you know it’s so easy to do that yeah as so people do it Commando um thank you so much pleasure taking the time to speak I really appreciate it I think we sorted everything so we have we SED it yeah good is the last podcast is it the the final podcast yeah good excellent