Lynn Barber's Celebrity Masterclass

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:00:00. > :00:18.Lynn Barber has been interviewing celebrity for over three decades.

:00:19. > :00:20.She's done everyone, film stars, ballet dances, politicians, pop

:00:21. > :00:24.stars, sports stars, writers, artists, you name it. Her revealing

:00:25. > :00:27.audacious articles have made her one of the most admired and feared

:00:28. > :00:32.journalists in the country. Does that look OK, or does it is look

:00:33. > :00:36.peculiar? She is renowned for asking the questions no-one else dare ask.

:00:37. > :00:39.The Demon Barber of Fleet Street, they call her. You won't be able to

:00:40. > :00:45.smoke that cigarette. Not on the television. Will you have to go

:00:46. > :01:25.outside. You can't stop me smoking in my own house. You can

:01:26. > :01:32.Newspapers sometimes ran interviews with famous people. Againly

:01:33. > :01:37.politicians. Always in the news context. The what are your plans, Mr

:01:38. > :01:43.Prime Minister? Is the idea of asking famous people nosy questions

:01:44. > :01:48.about their personal life hasn't yet been invented. I was fortunate to

:01:49. > :01:54.come along at just the right time. Who was the most difficult

:01:55. > :02:00.interviewee you ever had? Well, it depends how you mean "difficult."

:02:01. > :02:07.For me, a difficult interview is a perfectly nice, sane chap, liable

:02:08. > :02:11.Michael P -- -- like Michael Palin. Where everything he says is sensible

:02:12. > :02:18.and nice. If you mean "difficult" as in badly behaved, Alan Sugar was

:02:19. > :02:31.pretty difficult. Certainly, staggeringly rude. Salvador Dali

:02:32. > :02:36.Roald Dahl was shouty. Another very shouty one was Richard Harris, the

:02:37. > :02:44.actor. I said "you are vain, aren't you?" He sort of ran around this

:02:45. > :02:49.hotel lobby saying "do I look vain?!" . You are not phased by any

:02:50. > :02:56.of this stuff? No. I then go into teen mode where I fight back. Those

:02:57. > :03:01.sort of people can't cope with a soft response. An argue meantive one

:03:02. > :03:06.is quite good. Most journalists of Lynn's generation started their

:03:07. > :03:11.careers in provincial newspapers. Not Lynn. When she graduated from

:03:12. > :03:17.Oxford in 1966, she went to Penthouse, to work for the soft porn

:03:18. > :03:21.entrepreneur, Bob Guccioni. My duties at Penthouse including, among

:03:22. > :03:33.other things, interviewing people with unusual sexual tastes. These

:03:34. > :03:39.people were not celebs, they were foot fetchishists, voyeurs,

:03:40. > :03:42.transvestites. It was actually good training. Learning to ask open ended

:03:43. > :03:48.questions, designed to draw people out. It was very important not to

:03:49. > :03:51.say, "then you did what?" Not to show disgust or embarrassment but

:03:52. > :03:58.just keep on listening, Del me more show disgust or embarrassment but

:03:59. > :04:02.- why did you find am pewees so attractive. Your a family were

:04:03. > :04:08.slightly embarrassed by the fact you were working for Penthouse? Yes, my

:04:09. > :04:14.family were. I didn't really care. Have you always been nosy?

:04:15. > :04:18.Incredibly nosy. I still am, you know I think that is very much to do

:04:19. > :04:21.with being an only child. In a sort of isolated family. My parents

:04:22. > :04:32.didn't have any family or friends who ever came to the house. What I

:04:33. > :04:37.was really nosy about was how other families were. I think - what is it

:04:38. > :04:46.like having a brother, it must be strange? And things like - does your

:04:47. > :04:50.father ever shout at your mother? I gather your father shouted at you? A

:04:51. > :04:56.lot. Is that why you are beyond humiliation? Yes. I wouldn't quite

:04:57. > :05:00.put it like "humiliation", I'm embarrassment proof. If I'm in an

:05:01. > :05:04.interview and somebody loses their temper and starts shouting at me. I

:05:05. > :05:09.feel quite cosy with that. I mean, it doesn't sort of freak me out at

:05:10. > :05:15.all. It was when she was at Penthouse that Lynn landed her first

:05:16. > :05:19.big celebrity profile. In 1969, Guccione sent to Paris to

:05:20. > :05:25.interviewed with surrealist painter, Salvador Dali. I went over to

:05:26. > :05:30.interview him at the Hotel Maurice, that is where he always stayed in

:05:31. > :05:38.Paris. He liked having this retinue, that just sort of gathered. He would

:05:39. > :05:44.say, you know, "this girl has come from England to interview me, come

:05:45. > :05:49.and watch her". That was a bit disconcerting. I said, "I have to

:05:50. > :05:55.get the plane home" he said, "no, no, we will do some more

:05:56. > :05:58.interviewing. I haven't said the important things yet. I just hung

:05:59. > :06:04.around there for about four or five days. It was such fun. To have that

:06:05. > :06:11.as my first celebrity interview it rob blade gave me a somewhat over

:06:12. > :06:16.rose-coloured idea of what fun it was and how easy it was to interview

:06:17. > :06:20.celebrity. Another time Guccione sent me to Ravello Italy to

:06:21. > :06:24.interview Gore Vidal. Vidal virtually interviewed himself.

:06:25. > :06:33.Telling a well-honed string of anecdotes. But I noticed that when

:06:34. > :06:38.the tape ran out in the middle of of an anecdote he stopped and waited

:06:39. > :06:43.while I turned the tape over. No point in wasting a good anecdote on

:06:44. > :06:50.a silly girl when it was intended for the world! Please welcome, Lynn

:06:51. > :06:54.Barber. After seven giggy years at Penthouse, Lynn took a break from

:06:55. > :07:02.journalism to have children and write books, including this one, ,

:07:03. > :07:11.How to Improve Your Man in Bed. It says here, "never tell him that his

:07:12. > :07:20.penis is too small." It's all good advice! In 1982, Lynn joined the

:07:21. > :07:25.Sunday Express. One of her first assignment was a profile of her old

:07:26. > :07:29.boss, Bob Guccioni. It was at this point that she began to hone her

:07:30. > :07:35.distinctive style of writing in the first person. I thought, I can't

:07:36. > :07:42.write this as though I'm just a reporter meeting Guccione. For the

:07:43. > :07:46.first time. It felt like writing the truth, finally. It also felt much

:07:47. > :07:52.livelier and more interesting than anything I had written so far. Have

:07:53. > :07:56.you never thought, celebs are so predictable, what about interviewing

:07:57. > :08:00.really interesting people? Such as? Such as a brilliant neurologist or

:08:01. > :08:07.whatever, someone whose name no-one has ever heard of No. Well, people -

:08:08. > :08:14.actually people don't usually say that to me. They say, why don't you

:08:15. > :08:22.interview real people? My postman has this extraordinary history. Why

:08:23. > :08:29.don't you I like that sort of gloss of stardom. I like the fact that

:08:30. > :08:34.they are tall poppies. I notice when I'm sort of looking up what's on

:08:35. > :08:39.Desert Island Discs, if it's a neuroscientist, oh, no. If it's a

:08:40. > :08:45.comedian, I'm always there agog. I think that is just my natural,

:08:46. > :08:51.shallow taste, actually. Shallow or not. A string of eye-catching and

:08:52. > :09:00.provocative profiles in the 1980s made Lynn Barber one of the most

:09:01. > :09:04.talked about names on Fleet Street. In 1990, she became the celebrity

:09:05. > :09:11.interview for the independent on Sunday. Since then she has written

:09:12. > :09:19.for Vanity Fair, The Sunday Telegraph and the Observer. With six

:09:20. > :09:26.British press awards behind her, she now writes for the Sunday Times. Why

:09:27. > :09:30.would anyone agree to be interviewed by you particularly because you were

:09:31. > :09:35.referred to, after you went to the Independent on the Sunday as the

:09:36. > :09:39.Demon Barber? Yes. I think it was almost chance that when I started at

:09:40. > :09:44.the Independent on Sunday I just happened to do three or four hatchet

:09:45. > :09:50.jobs, one after the other. I hadn't planned it, you know. For instance,

:09:51. > :09:55.one of them was Melvin Bragg, who I went thinking I'd like. Of course

:09:56. > :09:59.the hatchet jobs were the ones that the readers noticed and got a lot of

:10:00. > :10:02.publicity and attention. The one that really upset people was asking

:10:03. > :10:07.Jimmy Savile if he liked little girls, you know. He had just got a

:10:08. > :10:11.knighthood and readers complained that, here is this wonderful man,

:10:12. > :10:16.who has raised millions for charity and just been knighted, how dare you

:10:17. > :10:24.ask him if he likes little girls, you know. At least I asked! Can I

:10:25. > :10:31.have a cigarette? All right. Yes, let us have a break. Do you ever

:10:32. > :10:36.feel, I have to leave the room and go and have a f a g. I have

:10:37. > :10:49.occasionally done that. The reason I got on with Rhys Ifans quite so

:10:50. > :10:53.well. We were supposedly having lunch and we were going out the door

:10:54. > :10:59.every five minute have a cigarette so is that was a happy bonding

:11:00. > :11:02.experience. I tend to get on with people who smoke and with people who

:11:03. > :11:07.drink fairly well. Some people have said - I expected you to be

:11:08. > :11:12.fiercesome and you weren't at all. I think I should have been a bit more

:11:13. > :11:18.fearsome. But, you know, I don't know. At some point in the early

:11:19. > :11:26.noughties I got hooked on Meat Loaf and could never drive anywhere

:11:27. > :11:30.without playing bat out much hel. I loved his voice, but also the fact

:11:31. > :11:33.that he was middle-aged, dishevelled, hugely overweight. So

:11:34. > :11:38.next time we had an ideas meeting I dishevelled, hugely overweight. So

:11:39. > :11:46.said I'd like to interview Meat Loaf. They all looked at me, "why"!

:11:47. > :11:52.I said, "I'm a fan of his music, I think he must be an interesting

:11:53. > :11:57.man." Boy, was I wrong! He is very keen on golf, which, as far as I'm

:11:58. > :12:03.concerned, means outside the realms of interesting, just like that. The

:12:04. > :12:07.man I met was a grumpy old codger who barely said elhello before

:12:08. > :12:13.launching into a great tie raid about the iniquities of British

:12:14. > :12:16.journalists and how they always get their facts wrong. That was an

:12:17. > :12:21.awkward one for me because I'd sold the idea of Meat Loaf as worth

:12:22. > :12:27.interviewing. So I can't just come back and say - he's so boring,

:12:28. > :12:32.forget it. He had written an autobiography a few years earlier. I

:12:33. > :12:35.got stories and bits from out of his autobiography. He didn't actually

:12:36. > :12:38.saying anything interesting, I don't think, at the time. It's rare for me

:12:39. > :12:45.to do that. But I had to in that case. Half way through filming, Lynn

:12:46. > :12:52.took me off to Golders Green, of all case. Half way through filming, Lynn

:12:53. > :12:53.places. This is where she researchers her interviewees.

:12:54. > :12:56.places. This is where she cuttings library, the likes of which

:12:57. > :12:59.places. This is where she you've never seen before and you'll

:13:00. > :13:04.never see again. You have been coming here for how many years?

:13:05. > :13:08.Probably coming here since the 1980s, I also used her before that

:13:09. > :13:15.when I was at Penthouse Magazine. The archive is vun by the amazing

:13:16. > :13:27.911-year-old, Edda Tasiemka -- 91-year-old. Come in. How are you?

:13:28. > :13:32.Is Do come in. This is Alan Yentob. How long have you been collecting?

:13:33. > :13:37.About half a century. Half a century. Yes. You are a compete

:13:38. > :13:42.orror to Google and Amazon. Never heard of them! Never heard of them?

:13:43. > :13:49.Is I gather there is more and more and more, can you take us through? I

:13:50. > :13:57.have stuff everywhere. After you. Follow me. We are following you.

:13:58. > :14:03.Yes. Up stairs. Up, up, up. Oh, gosh. Footballers are in the loo.

:14:04. > :14:11.You can sit here quietly and read up on a footballer. Theefrjts are

:14:12. > :14:18.sport. Boxing, athletics. Tennis. Somebody wanted Gary Lineker. That

:14:19. > :14:25.is a big file on him. All this here it's art, England. Jacob Epstein,

:14:26. > :14:32.Lucian Freud. What have we in here? This is all showbusiness people. Oh,

:14:33. > :14:37.great. You know what I found here? It's Lynn Barber. I wonder who she

:14:38. > :14:44.is. How did she get here? I don't know. She is worthy of a file. Not

:14:45. > :14:48.as big as some? No, it's not. Quite quite David Beckham style. Muhammad

:14:49. > :14:54.Ali. Not bad. No. That is a nice fat file. Thank you. Yes. Have awe look.

:14:55. > :15:01.Do you mind if we open the Lynn Barber file. No. That is the movie

:15:02. > :15:06.An Education. The Demon Barber. The Barber in the Chair. You got your

:15:07. > :15:10.reputation for hatchet jobs and damaging people? I suppose, yeah.

:15:11. > :15:15.There you are, with the fag in your mouth, as ever. Yeah. Let us put the

:15:16. > :15:20.Lynn Barber file to one side. Here's something interesting. This must be

:15:21. > :15:24.the notorious -- Marianne Faithful. Marianne Faithful certificate

:15:25. > :15:28.interview. That was in 2001. She behaved so badly. I came out of this

:15:29. > :15:31.interview thinking, "I'm walking on air. I can't wait to write

:15:32. > :15:35.everything that happened." You know, she was shouting at me. Her

:15:36. > :15:39.boyfriend was shouting at me. Then we went to a restaurant, were she

:15:40. > :15:44.shouted at the waiters. It was just a sort of jangling, horrible scene

:15:45. > :15:48.which I was keen to write about. You sound a bit like a predator. Yeah.

:15:49. > :15:51.Are you? Not particularly - I wouldn't have said it was a

:15:52. > :15:57.jangling, horrible scene unless it was, but she gave me hell. So I was

:15:58. > :16:03.able to give her hell subsequently in print. Then, here is an

:16:04. > :16:07.interesting one. Liam Gallagher. How do you cope - he is a man who's

:16:08. > :16:13.language is... Yes. Well, I think it was OK with him because I think he

:16:14. > :16:25.said - I wrote it as he pronounced it was sort of fooking. Spelt

:16:26. > :16:28.f-o-o-k-i-n-g. I didn't have a problem with that. It is a problem.

:16:29. > :16:34.If someone says an F-word in the interview. I think you should use

:16:35. > :16:38.it. Sunday Times doesn't like it. In my Lady Gaga piece there is a

:16:39. > :16:47.conversation about the size of her clitoris, you know. She used the f

:16:48. > :16:52.F-word, I wasn't allowed to do it. Mad I think. Good photo. The other

:16:53. > :16:56.thing is, there are lots of tabloid newspapers here. I think you must

:16:57. > :17:00.have a soft spot for the tabloid press? I do. Absolutely. I respect

:17:01. > :17:06.the tabloids. I mean, well, you know, if there is a good celebrity

:17:07. > :17:12.scandal. Here, I notice, is a Fergie story. Yeah. Where she met the fake

:17:13. > :17:17.sheikh and offered to introduce him to Prince Andrew for how much?

:17:18. > :17:21.$40,000. When it comes to issues like press freedom or the people's

:17:22. > :17:26.freedom of the individual to be free from the tabloid press, you're not

:17:27. > :17:31.sympathetic? Is I'm more for freedom of the press. No rules, then?

:17:32. > :17:35.Absolutely. Hacking? I was going to say - no, not hacking. That's

:17:36. > :17:41.illegal anyway. You don't need a special law for that. The area that

:17:42. > :17:44.I care about is that you have got to protect the children's privacy. I

:17:45. > :17:52.don't believe that children should suffer from having famous parents.

:17:53. > :17:55.Something like this, legitimate public interest, I would say. I love

:17:56. > :18:07.reading it. Don't you love reading scandal? If anyone else tells me

:18:08. > :18:11.what a lovely lad, Rafael Nadal is, I shall scream. He is not a lad. He

:18:12. > :18:16.has just turned 25, which is admittedly young, but he is in his

:18:17. > :18:20.ninth year on the professional tennis circuit, has won nine Grand

:18:21. > :18:26.Slam titles and is worth at least ?68 million. I didn't find him

:18:27. > :18:30.lovely at all. I go into his hotel suite. He is supposedly so

:18:31. > :18:36.exhausted. All he has done is play one short tennis match all day. He's

:18:37. > :18:41.lying on a massage table, sort of topless, and with his trousers

:18:42. > :18:48.undone to show his Armani thing. You think, if a woman - he's supposed be

:18:49. > :18:53.to so polite, charming, blah, blah. If a woman my age walked into the

:18:54. > :18:56.room of a 20-something man, who was lying on a table showing his pants,

:18:57. > :19:00.you would think there would be a word of apology or getting up, or

:19:01. > :19:06.something, don't you think? It's complicated he had a PR or manager

:19:07. > :19:10.or something in the room, who was supposedly translating. I mean,

:19:11. > :19:15.actually I think Rafael Nadal speaks perfectly good English, but if he

:19:16. > :19:22.wanted to consult manager, he would go into Spanish, and then come back

:19:23. > :19:26.with some completely pointless PR answer. But at least that gave me

:19:27. > :19:29.something to write about. What about the provocation about his

:19:30. > :19:34.girlfriend, which you kept asking him that question? Well, he had "a

:19:35. > :19:38.girlfriend" technically who very occasionally appeared in pictures,

:19:39. > :19:42.but was supposed to be his childhood sweetheart. Apart from anything

:19:43. > :19:50.else, he's on the road eight-months of the year. She has a job in a bank

:19:51. > :19:56.or something. I kept asking about his girlfriend and said, "if you

:19:57. > :20:02.only see her 30-days a year, it can't be a very fulfilling

:20:03. > :20:08.relationship?" Rafael Nadal for the first time in his interview seemed

:20:09. > :20:12.to turn his full attention on me, a laser stare". For a second I can

:20:13. > :20:19.imagine what it must be like to stand on the baseline waiting to

:20:20. > :20:23.receive his serve. He sort of said, "what do you care about my

:20:24. > :20:28.relationship?" I said, "well, actually I don't give a toss, but

:20:29. > :20:35.I'm trying to write an interview here." I've never done that before,

:20:36. > :20:40.but I was so exasperated, but that broke the ice. He was sort of a bit

:20:41. > :20:43.more yielding after that. That is the other thing, if things happen in

:20:44. > :20:49.an interview, that I don't understand, there's a temptation to

:20:50. > :20:54.neaten them up for the reader and make them understandable. But

:20:55. > :20:58.actually, I quite like to, sort of, shove it to the reader. Here's a

:20:59. > :21:05.problem for you. I don't understand what's going on, maybe you do. You

:21:06. > :21:12.should always try to interview people at home, says Lynn in her

:21:13. > :21:16.book. "A trip to the loo is often ininstructive" it's where people put

:21:17. > :21:21.their awards and cartoons, things they want visitors see, but without

:21:22. > :21:25.too obviously showing off." A down stairs loo like this is not very

:21:26. > :21:28.revealing because they know it's a public place. I mean really naughty

:21:29. > :21:35.journalists try to go to the bathroom and look in their medicine

:21:36. > :21:45.cabinets. Do you? Into the loo. OK. That is a letter from Lucian Freud.

:21:46. > :21:48.I pestered Lucian Freud for years saying, "please, please let me

:21:49. > :21:53.interview" that is one of his rude responses. Dear Mrs Barber, your

:21:54. > :21:55.letter to me is based on the assumption that there is some reason

:21:56. > :22:00.or need for you to interview or write about me. I do, as you rightly

:22:01. > :22:07.suppose, occasionally eat something and, as a result, go the to dentist,

:22:08. > :22:16.but that some way from agreeing to be cat on by a stranger. Sincerely

:22:17. > :22:20.Lucian Freud." I said to him, I know you are working all the time, but

:22:21. > :22:26.there must be some time when you have to break off to go to the

:22:27. > :22:30.dentist or get something to eat, I'll just tag along. The fact that

:22:31. > :22:34.he bothered, it's really good. Where do you write? At the top of the

:22:35. > :22:43.house. I wouldn't film all the way up. It's chaos. I would have tidied

:22:44. > :22:51.up... This is where I write. That's my current tape recorder. This is

:22:52. > :22:56.the tape I'm currently tran scribing, which is Margaret Hodge am

:22:57. > :23:05.There is her voice. You can hardly hear it. Well, I can. I mean, by my

:23:06. > :23:10.standards, that's quite good. This is a very sophisticated piece of

:23:11. > :23:17.equipment. I've got lots of tape recorders, but that's the one I've

:23:18. > :23:23.got in current use. That's another old tape recorder, is it? Yeah. Then

:23:24. > :23:36.I have somewhere got a wizzy, modern one. Which I take along, but I don't

:23:37. > :23:41.trust it really. (Plays tape). That's a typical question from me.

:23:42. > :23:47.It's short. What if they say, "I hope you're not going to use that"

:23:48. > :23:53.Well, it's quite rare that anyone says anything that is so valuable

:23:54. > :24:04.that you've got to fight for it. But I have sometimes done that. I think

:24:05. > :24:08.in my interview with Shane MacGowan said something about his girlfriend

:24:09. > :24:12.saying, she would kill her grandmother to meet someone famous.

:24:13. > :24:15.He then asked me to take it out. I went to the girlfriend and said,

:24:16. > :24:22.could I say this. She said it was OK by her and that it is totally true.

:24:23. > :24:29.She is a good girl. I liked her. Yes, Lynn likes her. She loves

:24:30. > :24:33.popstars too. The trouble is, many of the people she's asked to

:24:34. > :24:38.interview are actors. She doesn't really like them. Oh, God, actors

:24:39. > :24:44.are difficult to interview. The trouble is, they are so fluent. They

:24:45. > :24:47.babble away unstoppably. You think you have quite interesting stuff.

:24:48. > :24:53.When you tran scribe the tape and strip out all the fawny accents and

:24:54. > :24:57.expressive gestures and the whole actory business - You realise you're

:24:58. > :25:01.left with some very stale old anecdotes, which might work fine on

:25:02. > :25:07.a television chat show, but not on the page. Absolutely. Ladies and

:25:08. > :25:12.gentlemen, Meg Ryan. Actors obviously work well on chat shows,

:25:13. > :25:17.they are used to being facially interesting and making gestures, but

:25:18. > :25:22.that is actually fatal on the page because most anecdotes, if you tran

:25:23. > :25:23.scribe them fully, would take about two pages. The punch line wouldn't

:25:24. > :25:37.be worth it, you know. What I find a problem withle actors

:25:38. > :25:41.is that their attitude is often, sort of, what do you want me to be

:25:42. > :25:49.like? Is what I'm trying to say is, well, just be like you are.

:25:50. > :25:55.All journalists dread the hotel circus, when a film company puts a

:25:56. > :26:00.herd of actors in a hotel for a day to plug their new film. They expects

:26:01. > :26:05.them to give interviews from dawn to dusk. Of course, it's an article of

:26:06. > :26:11.faith that they never slag off the director or the other actors,

:26:12. > :26:14.everyone they work with is always "wonderful." Though when I

:26:15. > :26:18.interviewed Robert Redford about the Horse Whisperer he couldn't bring

:26:19. > :26:26.himself to praise any of his fellow actors, not even the horse. Do you

:26:27. > :26:31.write your questions out? I do have a list of questions, but I think

:26:32. > :26:35.it's also quite important to be able to deviate from it. I certainly

:26:36. > :26:39.don't go through them in order, but I don't know if this ever happens to

:26:40. > :26:43.you, there is always at least one moment in an interview where my mind

:26:44. > :26:49.goes completely blank and I often can't even remember who this person

:26:50. > :26:59.is. At that point, it's quite useful to have a sheaf of papers to

:27:00. > :27:06.shuffle. I always type in big letters, "Margaret Hodge or Lorde,

:27:07. > :27:13.or whoever it is" at the top of the page, so it sort of comes back to

:27:14. > :27:18.me. Lynn Barber has been in the interview business for over 30 years

:27:19. > :27:25.now. Her interviewees these days are getting younger and younger. I like

:27:26. > :27:30.the fact that they sometimes send me somebody who is famous to the young,

:27:31. > :27:36.who I've never heard of, so I have to do a crash course in Lady Gaga or

:27:37. > :27:40.Lorde, or whoever. The one thing I really admired about Lady Gaga, but

:27:41. > :27:45.you probably won't let me say this, I said, "can I go on the balcony and

:27:46. > :27:49.smoke?" She said, "oh, we can smoke in here" she expertly did something

:27:50. > :27:54.or other with the smoke alarms. She actually knew what to do to disable

:27:55. > :28:01.smoke alarms. I wished now that I'd asked her how you achieved that. At

:28:02. > :28:05.this point, I'm going to have to apologise for all the smoking in

:28:06. > :28:13.this film. I did try to stop her, but she doesn't listen. People

:28:14. > :28:19.sometimes ask me why I'm still doing interviews, as I approach my 70th

:28:20. > :28:24.birthday. Once in a while, when it's my third actor in a row, I might

:28:25. > :28:30.start grumbling. Basically, the phone call from my editor, "do you

:28:31. > :28:42.want to interview Pete Doherty, Hart Hart, Eddie Izzard, " brings a leap

:28:43. > :28:45.of excitement into my heart. Maybe I should warn the Sunday Times that I

:28:46. > :28:49.would never voluntarily retire. They will have to prize my gnarled

:28:50. > :28:54.fingers from the keyboard and I will kick up an almighty fuss. That's

:28:55. > :29:04.assuming newspapers will still exist by then.