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Great brands, great prices That's why you rack Hello and welcome to this episode of The Rest is Entertainment with me Marina Hi. I'm me Richard Osman. Hello, everyone, Hi, Marina. How are you out? I'm al right? We had a fun week We interviewed Steven Spilbo, didn't It was a huge honour and very exciting. For him too, I think. Yeah Yeah. I mean, he didn't say it, but I think he thought it. I think he thought it. Our members can hear that tomorrow, everyveryonese can hear that. Thursday O of course I find great questions from our listeners as well. I have been signing pin sheets for my book Tip and sheet is if you get a special So I've got a book coming out at the end of September It's I wasn't going to forget to say it. It's called Water a Time too Be Alive It's a collection of my columns and it's a tip and sheet when you you get a signed edition you can actually get boxes of the p If you're the author, you get boxes of pages and then you sign them and then you put them all back in the box. It sent to you insane because I've had to do about seven and a half thousand or something with film I have to say and this is going to sound like it's sponsored content, it's not. The only thing that has kept me sane is listening to masses of episodes of the book Cub I literally love the book cllub. If you're not listening to Book Club with Dominic Sambrook and Tabby Sarret I strongly recommend. And by the way, I don't need to be signing books when you listen to it No. And by the way, I'm sure they would say you don't even need to have read the books. I actually have read the books, but you don't need to have read the books. and I absolutely they are terrific. I mean, Dominic know this I love him, but Abby is absolutely excellent. it's genuinely kept me saying, I went mad the last time I did a book and I did these in silence. These tippings. Signing tippings are, yeah, there's something about them, that's for sure. But listen we now want to keep other people entertained while they're doing something mundane. Perhaps people are signing books, I don't know. But whatever else to doing, what are we talking about this week? Right We're going to be talking We're gonna have fun thisk We're talking about the Stehen Bartlett discourse. There's been an explosion in the world of podcasting after a passing remark upon Stehen Bartlet's ast Lots of people have piled in and we're about to join them. Yes, well I'm going to go deeper dive on who Stephen Bartlet is and what that means. I wish to speak only facetiously about this subject. so someone's going to talk' be taking seriously. Okay. But that's how we always do it I you know me take things very seriously We are also doing a field guide to celebrity weddings following the Italian union of Dua Lia and Calumurna this weekend in Sicily So we' talking about you know, I will be giving you a proper field guide to how you do a celebrity destination wedding. And we're also talking about sixty Mutes, which is America's flagship current affairs show and it's currently in absolute crisis. Is it for political reasons? I mean, we shall find out. Right. Shall we start with Stephen Bartlet? Yeah, business idea A device that stops you acting like a twat. I would love to pitch that device to Stephen Bartlett on Dragon Stone, Richard. I would love to I would say that people over the last week, you may or may not have felt like a great disturbance in the podcast universe as if millions of voices screamed out in pain, but then weren't silent I'm getting ahead of myself. What has actually happened is that Stephen Bartlet on his podcast said Diry of a CEO. Diry of a CEO. I'm going to do the full quote. I had a couple of glasses of wine, didn't get drunk. It ruined three days of my life because of the domino effect that it caused. It meant that I got worse sleep that night, I ate more poorly the next day because my dopamine system or the cortisol system. That's what they mean by the domino effect, of course.agine that you immediate order dominoes Yeah Eactly. I ate more poorly the next day because my dop immune system or the cortisol system or whatever, was all messed up Then I podcasted Wse, I don't think you used that as verby. and I didn't go to the gym the day after and I could track all of this on my workp. Hashtag ad, hashtag sponsor, invvestor, whatever. and say the word again whoop Whatp? I mean, you spell it WH O OP. What is it? I mean, it's one of these health tracker things. I'm not going to look into it any fther than.iterally I literally couldn't be bothered to look at what it was. It's one of those self optimization devices I slightly felt like you've had two glasses of wine back upp, Stehven. it's not going down in mine, is it? These are the good problems to have. But this thing has sparked a flood of interventions across the podcasting sphere, pushback really, but content mainly. We've heard from Greg James, Paloma Faith, Vogue Williams, Fm Cotton Jan McNally and now, as will ideally not have escaped our own podcast listeners, we've heard from us on it. Well, we've heard from you. I comeome on then. I've yet to say thing. Well, no, you talk to me about Suffa Is this just a way for him to mention his tracker? Well, what I think is This We we're only talking about a talk because I thought I think it's I think people find him interesting. as a fig, I think peopleeople are not quite sure where he came from. People are aware that he exists If you want to look up Stephen Bartlet, pretty much every single article you read about Stephen Bartlet is headlined, Is this the end for Stephen Bartlet? Is this the downfall of a CEO You know, the rise f of Stephen Bark that every single article is essentially wishing him ill. is essentially saying This guy, we don't know where he came from. He certainly didn't come through our conventional media roouts. and yet He seems to have for a very long time pretended to be unbelievably rich and via the medium of doing that unbelievably rich, He seems to be unforgivable for almost anyone. We'll talk a little bit more about him because diary of a CEO did start sort of talking to businessy people, then started to be a slightly more philosophical. I think for his own health and wellbe as the way I read it and now has gone into the world of wellness. It is massive, we should say it's one of the biggest podcast in country. It's one of the biggest podcasts in the world in the world. Yeah. mean it's probably notot in terms of the politics, but if we have a Joe Rogan in the UK, it is Stepehen Bartlet, diary of a CEO. He started before lots of other people started. He built it and built it and built it. It's an incredible Meteer. I mean an insanely good marketeer. get's incredible guests. But as I say, he he's now into that wellness industry and he's, you know, there's been all you know, various kind of aines upheld against him, you know, he would you know, he would advertise Hule and he would advertise Zoe, you know, which is that medical app and not mention that he was financially involved in both of those companies that he was. But I think that if you look at where he came from, I think it drives people insane. And by the way, all of this is caveated with the fact that you know me, I always give people the benefit of the doubt unless I know for a fact that I mean, I just can't help myself. that's how I've always been. and it's usually served me well. I' like to give people the benefit of theoubt.' Met him, I've been on this podcast, we'll talk about that later. I'd like to hear that. I don't know why I haven't heard that episode but I need to this week because you could listen to it a lot. I listen to you a lot and I like listening to things that you're on, but have I feel like I should be a completist with your work. No, I don't listen to Darry V you So Stephen Bartlett, born in Gaberon, grew up in Plymouth, I think, low income household goes up to Manchester Metropolitan University, leaves after a term. In twenty fourteen sets up a company called The Social Chain with a guy called Dom McGreor, who Dom McGregor was sort of kind of stayed sensible one and Stephen Bot it was the salesperson. And Social Chain was one of those companies. if you think back to twenty fourteen, All the big companies in the world understood how they did their business, but didn't really understand digital and what Stehven Barert and Don McGreg did said, Look here's a way that you can connect to a completely new audience. And you know it wasn't rocket science, it just they were natives and sort of understood the audience in a way that different people didn't, you know, and they worked for Microsoft and Huawei and Universal, you know, they had big contracts, good contracts, built up the sing social chain. Steh Bartlet right from the beginning was the front man of the thing. you know, I think he understood very, very early on that whatever company he's building The most valuable thing he can do is build his own That's the thing that he really, really understood. The company gets sold eventually, gets sold for or at some point, it's worth six hundred million, gets sold, I think for three hundred million. But actually the bitter bit it that they set up sells for seven million in amongst all of this stuff. They are building a big successful company doing interesting work The numbers and there's plenty of articles that will tell you this. There's some doubt over just how rich were you, just how successful were you, and that drives people to insane. but I mean that's for a hundred percent that you have to pretend to be successful for a long time before you actually are successful. that's clearlyrect One of the things he did. He then built up his own brand, really. He wrote a book called Happy Sexy Millionaire U But again And sold really, really, really well. It was really It's a great title. It's a great title, esssentially, you know, these the things you would want to be a happy sexy Millionaire and got into podcasting very early with diary of a CEO st you ever ever see was you can by the very title it's essentially saying, I'm a CEO I'm going to talk to some other CEO's sort of Mant to usually mant to man, occasionally Mant womoman. And it started as a business advice thing, but all you know he's very smart and it was always what's the take home here? What can I teach you? What can you can listen to this for an hour and be smarter and be more ambitious or have you know genuine take home stuff. He then started interviewing a few more celebrities and it started being a little bit more about mental health When I went on it, again, it' I will say this. firstly, it was a really interesting chat. I absolutely felt like he was in therapy. I felt like a lot of the podcast was him asking questions and trying to work out who he was and that's absolutely fine for me. I think that's f very compelling in its own way And after that podcast, whenever you do anything on any TV or podcast, you will get people come up and talk to you about it And that a very, very different group of people came up and talked to me in a very, very different way and a very interesting way. So I've always always been grateful I did that show and grateful. I said some of the things I said and reached out to an audience who might not have heard that otherwise. So that's always been my thing with Stehen Bartnett, I sort of think Fair enough, and you know, you can't deny that he now is enormously successful. Then he went on Dragon's Den, which I do have an opinion on, which we will get to. He is unbelievably good on Dragon's Den. he's exactly what they need on that they didn't have a digital native on that. and he brings a completely different energy to it So he is somebody who I think has done extremely well It clearly has elements of being a chanllor. But also he has elements of not being a chancellor. know he has followed through and he has made an awful lot of money in a very, very interesting way Now he is in this wellness world I think there are issues. There are issues for our broader culture. I think there are certainly issues for the BBC. Yeah. he's very sort of Bet neverever sleeps, isn't he? Yes. And these I mean, the whole thing of wearables and tracking everything which has been we'll get on to everyone diving in in a minute and all the other podcasts because I think that actually tells us something completely different to what we've been talking about. And it's also funny. Yeah. I just wanted to do that just just to sort of say, hey, this is who this guy is. this is why he is a toll. You know he has set himself up to to be there, but this is where it goes. He's absolutely made for like fit bits and aur whoop trackers, which I must guess please don't say wearable. I mean, the thing about these things is I think If they must exist or they must do them, they cannot and must not pass for conversation. I don't want toar about anybody it's like hearing about someone's dreams. I would literally rather hear about your dreams or how much your four year old child is gifted and talented and a genius. Yes than I would what your sleep score is. And like it should be something slightly shameful that you do in private. Yeah I don't want toar your dreams, your kids or your wearables It's a private activity, right? Like overpaying for Nido the childhood cres or watching lots of like kissing montages from heated rivalry on YouTube. You shouldn't talk about it' talk about it. You shouldn't talk about it if you do it. Okay. So't there's no one in the room who would do either those things Exactly It's disgusting. Yeah. Don't talk about it in public So his tracker, but I did think it destabilised him so much that it reminded me of a little bit of like a modern version of the Twitits that if you didn't like him and you worked for him, you worked at and you could hack Stehen Bartlet's wearable. You could send him into an absolute tailspin Couldn't you? becausecause you could just like slightly alter the You know, the vitals and he could he would go into an absolute tailspin, and that's not someone would get murdered I don't that err by literally being driven insane by their fitbit. Everyone though, in othercast, the rest of the podcasting here has had something to say. In a way, I'm gonna say it no one else will. Okay. This is exactly how World War one started, right? Y Yes finally. This is the podcast equivalent of everyoneces now getting involved in a very, very short space of time. Yes. This is the podcast equivalent of like late June, early July, nineteen fourteen. Yeah. seememingly isolated event. Yes. The assassination of Stephen Bartlett's routine Bu three glasses of wine, Serbian wine, I don't know.ly it's a lovely Hungarian Gustavian prinp. Should have been containable. Yes. But people have got drawn in in a chain reaction these other podcast empires, complex alliances, webs of endorsements. and suddenly the arms race of it all, everyone's involved in this dis. Now here comes Goldhanger.ight So yeah and I include myself in that. Okay Can we take one hundred percent seriously the job description of podcaster Yeah, I think so It's a number, but it's not a hundred Richond. It's not a hundred five hundred fifty maybe. I mean' not I would say it I would say it's lower than author but higher than game show host. K too what degree, Kenny, do you have to take it a hundred percent seriously as your job? I mean, Stehen Bartt' using it as a verb. I podcast it worse And I can't really belie. thought it should be I podcasted worsse Well just don't what about you don't use it as a verb? What about it just doesn't get used as a verb? Well, then what do you say when you're podcasting J Just working. Okay. Oh, you ca it working. That's interesting. You ca it working Wow, you've changed Okay I tell you what I think is actually happening here. It's so interest because all of these people who have like kind of weigh in also are doing these and included ourselves in this. Like an always on podcast. Yes. And you just need the content. Yeah. So I don't want to say they're like a Bloomsbury group or you know feeding into each other's work. but actually it reminds me slightly of, do you remember when we talked about BTS and we talked about that thing the Bangang universe, which is like a sort of dark mirror world?es. where because BTS were literally working the entire time, this is obviously the K Bot group, they were working the entire time they actually didn't time to have any form of life so they had to create this kind of fake life which they could then sort of sing and talk about where they have go through problems and have relationships and things because there was literally no time to do anything other than be in BTS. And I slightly wonder whether just This is just like, o great, Stephen Bartler said something mildly stupid. We can have a week's worth of content. All of us can about this. But I do think as well, you know, as I hinted at, every article about Stephen Bar is is this the beginning of the end and people cannot quite see how he did what he did. But he has been wading into difficult territory recently. You know, he's sort of he started talking to, you know experts on in sales. he's had some sort rather interesting, slightly funky opinions on his podcast and I should say that the Flight stududio is a production company. They said the diary of a CEO is an open minded long form conversation with individuals identified for their distinguished and eminent career, like me, and or consequential life experience They heard a range of voices, not just those Stephen and the DiaryEO team necessarily agree with. But you know, everyone's laid into him, you know, they called him a Griff there, they called, you know, they called his world an empire of bluff So I think that you know, he finds himself, you know, the more money he's had, the wider that podcast goes. he does find himself in an interesting New worldor That's for sure. And you know, he's had issues on draged Stan as well with some sort of ear seeds that were supposed to cure diseases which they didn't do. Sorry, ear seeds. Yeah, slight little seeds that you put in your ear that I forget what it was they cured. It turns out they didn't. No So it doesn't matter what it was that they cured because they didn't you know, I could say anything because they didn't cure anything at all. So he found himself a bit of trouble with that. And people always say, o they never invest on Dragon's Den. He's invested over three million pounds on that show in like fifty four different things. They really do They do. Yeah. And he really does invest. and he really, really gets involved. you know, he is really good at business You know, perhaps he wasn't as good at business as he hinted at the very beginning of his career but he has caught up and now he is, which is half the game. In the world of podcasting It is sort of wild west. There is no offc. You can do what you want. There's things like you know, when he's advertising fuel and so where he was you know caught out and there was an apology, it wasn't done again. But in terms of the content you do, in terms of what you talk about, you are free to do it. Now Dragons Den If we've learned anything from working, you know, from people who work at the BBC for the last ten years. If there's a minor, minor issue, any sort of tiny issue that might come up, then the BBC get in enormous trouble. I would have thought this is and I love him on Dragon Ste by the way, and I love Dragonstem. I love that show. I really, really do feels like an accident waiting to happen I mean, it really feels like an accident I mean, don't you think Mat Britain's first trip to the podium But wow, it's it's gotta come soon. Yeah pretty about two weeks. Yeah. You know, that feels like a difficult thing to ride both of those horses to be on the BBC where everything has to be squeaky clean and any newspaper will pick up anything that happens and to run an enormous podcast that interviews controversial people on the edge Oh. intellectual thought, as we know it at the moment, and on the edge of health thinking, as we know it at the moment. Both of those things you are allowed to do, you're allowed to do Dragonstan and you are allowed to do a podcast that pushes the boundaries of what we think about things It feels like at some point. that might become an issue. I find it, I find that jewel carriage way that he's on Q quite an interesting one. Yeah But listen, he's an incredible self publicist. and I don't say that as a criticism because, you know That's essentially the career for so many people these days When I went to do his podcast, it was on the D dayay of the Queen's funeral and I don't drive so they send a c to pick me up And u Nly if a call comes to as a Prius In this it was Stephen Bart's own people carrier that was entirely tricked out. Instead of a thing between you and the driver, there was like a massive screen, the whole width of the car. A screen that you could watch TV on o. Yeah. All the seats were a cream leather and monogrammed in black SB. So you kind of think, I sort of admire it because you just, you know, I mean overfin L looks I'm just thinking I wouldn't Pay for that If it was my if it was my, I wouldn't do it but but it it's sort of commitment to the bit But then but the other side of it, we put the screen down because I wanted to chat to his driver who was lovely called Smiley. And Smiley said, It said I used to work in retail. It said about five years ago He said you know, all went wrong and I thought I'm going to be an Uber driver. So Smiley gets a job as an Uber driver. He said, My first ever job, my first ever job, I get this thing saying someone three minutes around the corner needs to be taken fifteen minutes away. My first ever job was quite nervous. passenger gets in is Stehen Bartlet He said at the end of the journey fifteen minutes later, he said, Would you like to work for me And he said and I've been his driver ever since So you know, and funnily enough, Smiley and I because he he dropped me back off home as well. And we watched the Queen's funeral procession together because it was just the end of my road. So the two of us we sat in a car and just watched. No, no, we had a little wander down and watched the watched the funeral procession. So I watched the Queen's funeral procession with Stephen Bartlet's driver Well, that's a claim to Yeah, isn't it just ever? Is there a podcast in that So and as I say, when I met him, I sensed he was looking for something, you know, he's in his twenties, of course he's looking for something and I was happy to talk to him But you know, he now occupies a very interesting place in our culture. and this booze thing. I do want count I know we've talking a lot about Stephen Barkler. I really want to talk about this optimization culture Do you optimize No, of course not. But it reminds me of nothing more than what people used to do is they used to optimize their children. So their children would be at French lessons, then they'd be at pian lessons, and then they'd be at hockey practice. So every night they would like their kids' lives were incredibly regimented because they were you know people thought you could somehow kind of mold this child into some kind of genius Your child is not going to be a concert pianist. I will just say that. So teaching the piano by all Mabia so they can play it at a party, but they're not to be a concert pianist But it seems to swapped over from molding our children into supreme beings into this idea that we can mold ourselves into a supreme being by literally gaming every single statistic about ourselves. We're money balling ourselves, right Yeah, it buts it's all just You're just staying on people's platforms. Yeah.' I think you're never you're completely unoptimized. Yeah. you're truly like giving your data to the man the entire time, literally every form of possible piece of data iving it I get that your gut biome is important. I would argue it's not that important. It should never pass a conversation at any point. Yeah. I'm I've even mentioned it on this podcast, but really no. But it is a fascinating thing. it's very easy to make money out of And it's all but I mean, I suppose that all art and literature is all denying we're going to die. I mean, that's I mean, I just don't think the whoop app is anything like the Great Gatsby. so I don't really want to see it compute.reat literature, No, no. It's not it's really the all of these things. I mean, it's, you know, It's just it's just a fancy w. Yeah. but the key thing that will kill you is stress. And you know paying attention to every single number of every For some people, by the way, it works very well because that's some people's personality. Some people absolutely love having a number for everything. That's why people love fantasy football. It's like fantasy football, but for your health. We've had to stop for your health. Yes, because I found it too stressful. Yeah. Exactly. But this stuff is not good for you. You know what works, get a bit of sleep Drink some water. Have friends, laugh and love. And please don't compete over it the last resuge Absolutely nuts and it doesn't make you happy, but it does make another group of people very, very rich indeed. We know the answer already. we all know it. Every one of us knows it and we don't need that to be monetised by Other people, loveo will be the next one They will startop putting the love numbers on like relationships. Oh we talkking about, but actually it's really interesting just the complete wholesale abandonment of creation of intimacy to these platforms is really interesting, actually I mean you do I mean you could do a very long series on that But the key here's the key is you are the only generation that this will happen to This is a bubble that you're in the middle of and historians will look back And they'll go, what on earth were you doing in wearing all of these things, tracking every single bit of your sleep, tracking? There are lots of people who need, by the way, to wear trackers for medical reasons Absolutely byy that. Most people do not need to use them and there will come a point in the future where everyone just goes outside and looks at a sheep Don't you think? Thank you thank you so much for that glimpse into our collective. But yeah, if you get to the stage where a couple of glasses of wine are ruining the next three days. Then yeah, you know you have an issue. Let this be the end of something rather than the start of something. I like to think this is the end of the First World War rather than the beginning of the First World War But again, that's my personality type. Very good. OkayK, well we'll await the Treaty Versailles of all of this I'm sure I love that podcast. We'll put a bed to it. Yeah After the break We're going to be joining to Sicily to discuss Destination, celebrity weddings and Juli Callumns. Whatever you do, don' drink the wine. This episode is brought to you by Lloyds. Now I love it when characters are part of a club. You wouldn't know anything about that, would you, Richard? The Thursday Murder Club in some ways reminds me of the A team. I would now would like to map each of those characters onto the A team and feel I probably could. I mean, Elizabeth is Hannibal and it's not even closeed. That's exactly right, and Ron is howling Mad Murdock. Well, there are definite perks to being in a club. J ask the members of Club Lloyds because with Club Lloyds, you can bank on Lloyds to give you more wherever you are. If you join Club Lloyds there's sorts of benefits you can choose between. There's, for example, six free cinema tickets. They've got an annual coffee club and Gourmet Society membership, which would be mine. And also something that the Thursday Murder Club Weould' enjoy very much indeed To top it all off, you have fee free spending abroad, which means wherever you are, you won't be charged by Lloyds to using your debit card when you're traveveling. Now joining this club costs five pounds per month, but that is refunded in any month that you pay two thousand pound into your account. Now that is a club that's worth being part of. Check out Club Lloyds today. You'll need to be a UK resident and aged eighteen or over to apply It's nearly that time everyone. The rest is football will be on Netflix every day for the world's biggest tournament. Join myself, Alan and Micah for daily debates, unfiltered takes and the most special of guests. all from the heart of New York City Yeah, that's right We're excited to. See you soon This episode is brought to you by Prime. What if you had one more chance with the one that got away? Sam, you came home. Based on the bestselling novel from Carly Fortune. Every year after follows childhood friends, Sam and Percy, as they reunite in the dreamy, nostalgic lakeside town of Berryess Bay Love can be hard to find. So if you're lucky enough to find that person, never let go. A second chance at first love, every year after, streaming june tenth, only on Pime Welcome back, everybody. Now I would like to offer you, Richard a field guide to celebrity destination weddings. Yes ple Because we've just had a very big one. Both of them are celebrities D L and Callamown have just got married. Huge congratulations. I love both of these people. and they've just got married in Sicily in Palermo Now First of all destination weddings A lot of people have a view on this. Yes, I do. Yeah, yeah, I'm sure. And it's you know, in civilian life, you know, you can end up having conversations like sorry They're getting married in Mexico and for some reason the Henrykeand is and Mkonos unacceptable, right? Yeah This is totally unacceptable. I've got nine weddings this summer. Okay, but not these are not these are not our ways. o. we're talking about celebrities here. Right. So let me explain to you what you have to do. This is the exact labook. What before you go to the destination, the week before you get married in either Chelsea Old Town Hall Registry office or Maryibon Town Hall Registry Office. Both of them in London. These are the only two options. Yeah. did they did Marbon There are only three outfit options for the bride Vivian Westwood b a mini dress Yes a white trouser suit or a pretty much exact replica of Bianca Jaggers when she married Mick What does that look like? It's like a cream suit, but skirt suit, midi skirt. Oh yeah, with a big white hat. Probably Eve Salarom, but don't quote me. Yes. Right, hold on hold on. It's going to bring up a newspaper, quote you. Yeah. then Marina said, yes, she said the Bian. said it was Eal Eve Salarom. Yeahah, from Marina Hyde. Yeah, exactly. Bombshell. ye, I know. I won't quote you. Anyhow, those are the only three outfit choices. Okay. Da La chose option three ian I believe that's E s on wrong. Right. Yeah, I'm told. Yeah. For the man there's only one choice. No one cares about those' right. just like a dark suit. No one was it. Yeah D Mig was in a light suit, of course. Was he? Yeah.. Yeah. butook was Call. in the OG I don't know. I literallyn't care less what people the man wears for the registry office. Don Don'traw focus, right? No, don't. Yeahah, exactly. Even if he is going to be James Bond. And I think civilians well, we'll get to that Civilians only for that, because you don't want, you know, you're not going to have Alton hanging around on the Maron rooad chucking some dried rose petals. Oh so for the the Anyway, then you have to decide where your destination will be. Italy is currently very popular. You know you've got Lake Como, Tuscany, Sicily, Venice. There's an awful lot of tax doodgers living there. Yeah yeah. And then so it's going to be very expensive, right? better if you picked your venue off the telly so that people can say And this one people keep saying where Julipe and Calam Turner got married, they keep saying or it's in the credits of the White Lotus season two, okay. It's not, but mis reporting is also a very important feature a celebrity destination wedding. So which is good. It needs a balcony. It needs a balcony where you can emerge for the hyperoid to merge and give something to the the paparazzia wave as if to say, you know, obviously you can't come in, but I know I have a huge fandom and we saw Julie her on our balcony. And you also need to have a balcony where you can emerge the next morning so people can say, after you've been partying till six AM. This is all very important that they can get a long lens of you build up the local media, which will be picked up over here. The local media both loves and hates you. It's not a celebrity destination if the local media doesn't both love and hate you. you had some road clothes, whatever. This is quite a new thing. When George Clooney and Amal got married in Venice and they sort of took over the whole thing, no one really cared Obviously when Lauren Sanchez, friend of the podcast and Jeff Bzos. Hy, Lauren, Hey, Jeff. There people people People cared more. So you get a lot of these kind of boring articles about, you know, oh you're turning it into a theme park and something me to do with the climate and so on like that. I don't know, I don't know. This is all pos partive it. Ithing to do with the climate.hing to do with the climate. Steen Barlley, you asked for a toaster for your wedding because you're setting up house. Now, unless you're judged to have you know temporarily ruined a seventeenth century city state Palermo be at Venice, you haven't really had a proper celebrity destination wedding. So we saw a lot of people saying about Dulipa and Callum, you know Palma is not someone's living room. What? Anyway, You just need to get a few locals to say things like that. Ruining a city is your uncle being sick in a font of modern weddings. Yeah Yes. Yes. It's absolutely essential U now, you need a series of dresses. Nobody has just one and What's I saw that D know we don't know what dress Dulia wore Yeah, but we will find out Yeah better. We will do. But Donatella Vversace was there. That's the other thing The designer comes. the wedding. Oh no. it was funny enough, actually Kirin was. Is there any sewing he's doing you know, it's like an explit. like them, it' sort of it's for Okay, so I don't know, I'm guessing that it was Vi dress because otherwise she sound is a bit of a gut it if she turns up and it's Georia Asdne. I know it it's almost rude. Okay. now somebody famous has to do a song Obviously, it goes without saying that Elton is the pinnacle. but if not Robbie,'ll do it. Now Elton did do the song Yes, yes. And I think it's almost always your song Yeah. A lot of people have been able to tell everybody that this is their song It's ironic isn't it? Yeah And the guest list is kind of a bit shady here because we don't yet know. and they're very, very good. It's exclusive if your' guests are sort of people who know they're not allowed to put anything anywhere near social media or anything like that. So there's all kind of rumours, maybe a robbery that was there, maybe if you would have to step into the breach if Feltson can't do it for one reason or another. Anyhow I feel like we should discover at some point that Eva Longoria attended. Don't ask me why she' is the Zeig of all celebrity weddings. Really? She was there when Victoria danced on Brooklyn, I. Was she? Yeah, very much there. Serena Williams. I know she just presented a some humanitarian award to Lauren Sanchez fifteen minutes before. Did she? Sere Wiam. Serena Williams is a celebrding I'd like to go to. Yeah that would be fun. That you would have got quite a lot of good people there. I think Katie Perry and Justin Trude, she's becoming a bit of a zerleig. Really? Those two, I think we could they might be the new Longoria of guests. He's loving his life, Justin Tude. You know who reminds me more of day after day Portillo it's like he did the political thing And now he's like, oh, I can just go like, you know, he's like, I can just hang out with Katie Perry and go around the world in the same way that Portilla goes, Oh, I can just do train rides now forever and ever and people like me. Yeah. But I can Justin Trudeu's train rides programm. Okay, The logistics, you've got a lot of private jets. So thats then we have to have a lot of articles about how do they all, you know how do you sameame which we had for the Bezos wedding, How do they? It's a small airport? Is it? We don't even know, but you're made to think that Palermo is like this absolutely tiny Yes. It's not, by the way, it's not It's like a major international hub but and the private jets are arriving. By the way, I read this really interesting article last week about this guy. He built a private jet tracker of basically Silicon Valley private jets because he thought that If there is an apocalypse, it's an apocalypse chapter that they'll know first, and by the way, in my view, they'll have caused it quantum. But that's how they'll know first. Yeah. And you'll know because it's a bit like the great noise of the private jets a bit like in the ancient world when there was thundering, they thought the gods were displeased. We all think, al right, there's so many private jets suddenly. They're all heading to Alaska. or New Zealand where they the bunkers That's what my brother's new book is about. I you told me before I'm dying for this. It's really good. Yeah, it's really good. It's really interesting. That whole world is very, very interesting. That whole world is mental. Yeah. But yeah, but it's absolutely right. second Five of them go to Alaska or New Zealand at the same time. You're let Great. Yeah. ye. It's over and you're not going to be able to get out. Anway The other thing with celebrity destination weddings is could it help with work projects I'm just saying For Callin Turner Is him being bathed in Sicilian light in a white linen jacket At this stage In a certain audition process, the worst thing Is it going to give him the edge over Jacob? I don't know, I don't know whether it is, but for me it's going to be between those two. and as I said before, that I thought they were leading in one direction, but we don't know you don't know who says yes. That's a lucky side effect, though, isn't it? Yeah. They're not going to Palermo because of Bond they're going to Palermo for for the other many, many reasons. you're talking about. Let's think about synergies, Richard, because I can assure you their agents are. You got have synergy. I canure yeah. That sort of covers your celebrity wedding. The next one, which obviously we're going to have to go big on in this podcast is Taylor and Travis These reports that are so nuts that I cannot believe they're true, but there have been a number of reports in recent days saying that Tanus swift and Travis Kelsey are getting married at Madison Square Garden. We know they're getting married in New York, but they're getting married at Madison Square Garden. Wow in the ro. The Moies. I mean Oh inro.so you work there. So me renewing my vows here She works there and sometimes not always, butah sometimes she works there. I just Anyway, if this is true, they'd really have to dress it up Yeah because it's supp supposed to be He's not going to look like an Oxfordshire Church, is it? No, it's not going to or a grand palazzo. No. it's I mean you could You canult take get to it? I don't know this can't be jed. Yeah, I wonder if you'll get fans to go. Oh, of course, they will Yeah, there may be be something of that. I don't know What's your general opinion on a destination wedding, though Do you have to, is my general opinion. Yeah Why do you have your honeymoon? And then it's on you. Yeah. And then and if you do do one, if you're actually telling me that you're going to also have a destination Stag will home weekend. You are now taking the p. Yeah a staggle Hen I think is fine because that's you know, can you can make an excuse and not go to a stagg or hen if you can't afford it or whate whatever it is, you can kind of say, you know what? that's so annoying. I can't come out to Budapest But for you can't say no to a wedding. and you got family and you got old friends and you know, everyone's got different income levels Yeah, I think it's no, it's just a no. but I mean, if you are marrying someone Greek Yes by all means maring Be that's where all of their family are from. So you're trying to find a halway point and you' you know you're marrying someone in Australian and, you know, fine I get it. There's definitely excuses for having it. Yeah. But is general Yeah. if you're from H Hewardweith and you're getting married in Fadarraaki and then everyone's flying back to Hwardeith, I yeah come on. come on Especially if you're the age where everyone's getting married at the same time. It's so expensive. Yeah, yeah. It's so unbelievably It's expensive anyway doing it in the UK. Do celebrities pay for their guests to go out there It's not clear, is it? I would have thought that if you thought for one second that Yeah, they took lots and lots of rooms. and I think you put all your family members and your friends who and just say, we've got a room for you and then you know You know, Adele, you sort yourself out obvious reasons. The best person to be in that situation is like Canleam Turner's aunt But you who's like a sort of, you know, just an absolutely regular person who going who is Beyond delighted that her nephew is getting married,' always wanted to see it. It's a lovely de. And now it's like we will not hear people say a bad word about it Oh that's good. like that. Oh, that's really, really nice. Yeah. But yeah, so she's going there and like Elton John's playing. She goes, I mean I often hear your song at weddings, but I've never seen not this one again. Yeah. But that must be Amazing. Well, many congratulations to them we hope exly. they'll probably release a couple of pictures just so we saw what they actually look like. Yeah. But yeah, so that was very that was a happy one. But Taylor and Travis next I mean, watch this space if they do it at Mam? gos, I can't believe it's true. Yeah, that's nuts. Okay Shall we turn to a more tradal Res's entertainment subject. Yeah, I mean, I suppose it's drama. Yes, it really ises we're going to talk about sixty minutes, which is the biggest current affairs show in America, which is having an unbelievable couple of weeks, we'll talk about why Meltown Meltdown is exactly that. There was an incredible meeting between the new guys coming in to run it and some of the people who currently work for it, which hass been reported everywhere. thought it'd be a fun thing to give some context to. It's on CBS's on every Sunday night at nine o'clock. It's investigative reporting. it's like sort of panorama, but it's not yes yeah. It's like if Panorama was massive. It's basically it at sixty minutes. Y. part of the global cultural conversation. And yeah, they tend to have fifteenty minute investigations. They have these correspondents who've worked there forever and ever and ever. and they take incredible pains over every single thing they report. So it's a really blue chip show. It has been for years and years and years, a huge brand in the States There is not a direct equivalent here, but Let's imagine it is something like the newews at ten. This would be where you're Trevor McDonald's and Jon Snows and you know, these the kind of has all the big hitters. We're talking about it because it's become the battleground of a fight over editorial independence, corporate ownership, Trump, ego Exactly. Yeah, so David Edison, who is the child of a billionaire, who has been bought CBS amongst many other things, including CNN and all sorts of things he decided to overhaul sixty minutes. Can I say something first before we say this? It actually started before then all of this because There was a Trump lawsuit, Trump water lawsuit against CBS some what he felt was some kind of selective editing of a Camela Harris interview This was an CBS owned by Paramount, was still owned by the Redstone family. Sherry Redstone was trying to sell it and A lot of people thought this case would eventually get thrown out because it was a perfectly reasonable sort of F Amendment defense to it but in the end because they needed regulatory approval to be able to sell the whole of Paramount to Skuyance to David Ellison's company They settled with Trump for sixteen million dollars. And a lot of people within sixty minutes were very, very angry that this has happened and said, this is editorial independence has been sacrificed for corporate interests, for Trump interests. Scott Pelly, who is a veteran correspondent, was very vocal about that U, but anyway The deal went through, they got their regulatory approval, and they clearly regarded that as a price to pay. but we've then seen O things happened. Steven Colbert, we know that Jehan Colbert show is finishing on CBS. So there's definitely a thing about CBS that you know, is it vulnerable to the editorial independence being interfered with by corporate entities? And the stuff that's happened this week is crazy. So there's a one called Barry Weiss who ran a media organization called the Free Press that David Edison bought for one hundred and fifty million dollars.. Right leaning, I think it's fair to say aning, I think it's fair to say as well. and he bought Bariwis in free thinking Yeah much of the thing we said. much the story was that she was brought into the New York Times between twenty seventeen and twenty twenty, which was a sort of particular kind of the height of to some degree, kind of peak woke and she was brought into sort of she covered culture and politics to be act as a counterweight to walk. you know, seen as leaning too Democrat or whatever it was. She was quite reactionary. she said things like you know cultural The idea of cultural appropriation is stupid, intersectionality is a flawed idea. These were regarded as complete sort of blasphemies at the time. And in the end She resigned because she said that effectively Twitter had become the New York Times' on a you silent editor, because people were so scared of cancellation or backlash that they kind of cleaved to quite a narrow point of view. And I have some sympathy with that. there are lots of places that needed some kind of correction, I think. I will not say that I've agreed with everything she's done since then. And people lots of people totally loathe her. But she was installed having never run a newsroom of any meaningful size before and certainly not a TV newsroom as editor in chief of CBS Ns by David. Well, that's thing. Daviddrison buys a company for a lot of money and then sets her in charge of CBS News and sixty minutes. So the situation you have is, as you say, someone someone who is an iconoclast versus a very traditional, very long standing Fadty liberal. newewsroom and this incredible franchise which is sixty mininutes, which has been going forever and ever and ever. And a lot of the correspondents are in their seventies and eighties and have been there forever. and suddenly she's a new broom sweeping through it. Now CBS newews, which she's in charge of, Ratings are down and down and down And now we have a situation with sixty minutes, which is the absolute jewel in the crown. and it should be said profitable you know, good ratings. profitable, Viss brought in a new kind of chief editor called Nick Bilton, who is not from particularly from a news background, He used to write for Vanity Fair, as a screenwiter, all sorts of things like that. He used to be a tech correspondent at New York Times. Yeah. So you know he's world and They had a meeting last week where they came in for the first time and a lot of the Big correspondents have left already Anson Cooper, who is the sort of probably the biggest dog of all at sixteen minutes, he has left. So many have been made redundant and lots and lots lotots of the producers and stars correspondent, everyveryone has been made redundant. they talk about it as black Do they call it B black Thursday or Black Friday or whatever. So Nick Bilton comes in and has his first meeting with his team to try and say, look, this is who I am. this is where I want sixty minutes to go and Scott Pelly who we were talking about One of the correspondents, very senior correspondent. he had something to say in that meeting. did he not? Yeah, he seems and by the way, theud audio of this meeting was, of course recorded and given to the New York Times. I mean, literally within two minutes of the meeting ending. Scoty seems made a big speech saying Barrywise was murdering sixty minutes. Um Strangely, it seem he seems to and various other things beside. he has a big sort of goes kind of toe to toe with Nit Bilton He seems not to have realized Scott Pelly that this could potentially get him fired. Yeah He said he said to Nick Bilton, you have Slender qualifications for the job You will never be welcome. in this newsroom is essentially what he said. this is his first meeting with his boss being recorded by the way, and then that recording immediately being released. I'm not saying that and who recorded it and who released it, but it was recorded and released very soon afterwards. Anyhow, it turns out you can get fired for stuff like that. So he Scott Beelly did get fired and he's now on this incredibly emotional round of interviews saying about, you know, the teent, the family on sixty minutes, you know, we travel together, we dine together, we go into literal combat together. or you cover literal combat but okay. And then he started crying in some of these interviews. He said, it's like your family being murdered Someone wipes out a large number of your family members. This is talking about the you know comings and goings in the CBS newewsroom. It's like your spouse being murdered I would say that again a reminder that American journalism takes itself so preposterously seriously. British journalism takes itself quite seriously. in British news onses but American is. Can you imagine anyone in the BBC saying, this is literally like your spouse being murdered? Okay, let's just take a overent here So there are There are three major correspondents still on air, by the way, who have said they will go if anything more is done to us. Y. But they have all agreed for now to stay. The thing was they were all going to go at some point. But like one of them Leslie Style, I she's eighty four years old. I this is like the Democratic establishment. Yeah. But it really is. But she's agreed to stay, Bill Whitter has agreed to stay in another one just sort of see if they can continue the DNA of sixty minutes into this new era. and Nick Bilton has come back fighting quite right ye, in some ways. he said he said in the termination letter you know, he said u, um that Scott Pedy had behaved with remarkable incivility and contempt. And you know he did is the truth, whether he had a good reason to do it is another matter. I mean, Nick Bilton sent a memo saying that you absolutely he is not going to take any political leads from the ownership of CBS. I mean He would do that if it's true and he would do that if it wasn't true. So it's sort of doesn't help. But you know, his email. It ends, you think And this is where we came in. it ends It's been ahead of a first week. Let's get to work which is like a Will Ferrell comedy So here's the interesting thing about this story is is this purely and the Trump agenda trying to bring down One of the last great Bastions Oh American news and American news reporting and independent Americ news reporting, is it that? because every single fact about it makes it looks like It is that, the people who have been brououghtght in, the people who have left the ownership, all of those things Is it? and, you know, when you hear Nick Bilton talk. he said, lookook, I genuinely recognize this show gets good ratings and I genuinely recognize it is profitable It will not be either of those things or do either of those things for long He said Broadcast news is an ice cube is how he's described it. And he said, an ice cube is not going to get any bigger. I mean it's literally it's out there. It's going to get smaller and smaller and smaller. And the world of news Now, as we know on this show very, very well, is a world of younger personalities of clippable things, of you know, going viral. It is not one hour on a Sunday night with a huge lead in from the NFL, which is what sixixty Minutes has got. It is not an audience that has grown up this franchise and believes in it and we'll follow it blindly. That's all gone And so there is an argument that this isn't a political intervention. What it actually is a lifeif saving intervention of bringing in a whole new generation of people into this brand, this brand which is trusted buildilding it out and turning it into something Yeah I agree with that. I agree and we can't argue that there has been effectively And editorial interference. Oh yes becausecause the mere settling in order to get there. We can't yeah, there has been Um and I do also think that attempting to have a correction from that era where I mean I sort of hate calling it Pete Woke, but you know for want of a better phrase, where lots of liberal newsrooms had, in fact these incredible blow ups about tiny, tiny things and real enormous cancellations of staff members and things like that over really actually relatively minor infringements of some perceived liberal code And I do think that there has needed to be some kind of correction if you wish to try and keep things mainstream. And you I've talked about it before and talked about it a bit when I did appear before the the select committee, that we in the UK, we have this extraordinary thing that America does not have. We had the BBC sitting right at the center of our sort of mainstream. and I realized that people have got all sorts of different problems with the BBC, but like sixty percent of people Check it frequently.. In America, you've got a situation where nothing gets more than twenty percent for anybody and the polarisation is almost off the charts. L if you like Fox News, then you absolutely hate New York Times and vice versa. And they are everybody is sort of flung out to the outer reaches of these graphs and they don't have anything sitting in the middle. And the attempt to kind and I do think that when a shared mainstream disappears and we see this all over the world, you get big cultural problems and it The lack of a shared mainstream in America and the perception that some things are for some people and some things are for other people. and it's very, very siloid like that is not great for social cohesion at all. and you can see the effects of it. So I think the sort of aim of it, whether or not you think they're doing it right and whether or not you think that actually is their aim or it's kind of a coOvert thing for interference, I think the aim of it is good to try and create something that more than twenty percent of people ever are going to think is trustworthy. And it doesn't sort of matter if you have got bigger ratings than you had before because other things have fallen away You're still, as you say, the ice cube is not a terrible. y. Yeah. And one very interesting thing about it is you know Trump is sort of obsessed with broadcast media and he's obsessed with legacy media Yeah. the truth is that's that's a, you know, The steam trains, those things. and he is obsessed most of his generation, as are most of our generation with these things that are not going to be here in thirty years time. you know, with the stuff that we grew up with, which we still consider to be incredibly important and which culturally is still incredibly important. You know, it's still because it's an echo chamber and you know, legacy media always you know, what legacy media talks about leads what other legacy media talks about. But That's not going to be the battleground. No. And actually going around in high profile as Scott Pilly' doing now going around high profile broadcast slots and literally crying about things is like, oh my God, you are absolutely not helping, even the thing you think you're helping. He actually said at one point, I think the headlines will just be about me crying and people saying I'm a lunatic You call that? listen call that? He's a good journalist. sixty minutes is back on air in September. They are currently scrabbling around to get the sort of. I mean again, they're saying it stuff we do is incredibly difficult. The kind of journalistic kind of skills you're going to have to do to have to do what we do is almost impossible to find. And you kind of think maybe it's not. Maybe there is a next generation of journalists. I mean, who will want to touch sixty minutes is another question. But they are currently recruiting to replace an awful lot of the producers the talent they used to have, but it'll be back on air in September. We'll see what the ratings are like and we'll see what the political Bent is like, but I think it's a more interesting story than it first appears and I think if onene things it iss just about political interference. I think we're missing a picture which is biggest current affairs show in America, if it wants to stay that, has to find a way of reinventing itself. I agree Any recommendations this week Yes, I have. I've got a really good novel which is coming out this week. It's called Experts in a Dying Field And it's by Patrick Fraye. Now Patrick Frane is a very funny writer for the Irish Times. and This is very good for our entertainment podcast. This is a story about the members of a band, the Heathens who were active in Dublin about sort of twenty years before the events of this story. but tragedy struck and they sort of scatter. and then they reconnect U, and it's about b I mean it's about bands. It's about the music scene, and a lot of it is about Dublin and It's really annoying. I know it's really annoying when people say, it made me laugh and it made me cry, but it made me laugh a lot out loud. and it absolutely made me cry. And he's got such humanity per Patrick F and I absolutely loved it. So it's called Experts in a dying Field. Amazing. I will recommend Disclosure Day the new Sielberg movie because it feels like a great Spielberg movie. We chatted to him about it. you can hear that on Thursday on our Q and A, but it's a proper multipleix movie and you know, I love, you know, backack roims and all stuff like that, but it's nice to have both isn't it? So ye, go see disclosure dayam. So two and a half hours, but it doesn't feel like it And our bonus episode for our members, which you can join at the rest is entntertainment. comot I'm talking to James Canghus for minutes about how a celebrity could make a run for office even with within our political system now and generally about celebrity politicians what they bring And how we're going to see much, much more of them in the future. Yeah hashtag the Martin Lewis question U We will see you all on Thursday. 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